Help with wiring

[GTI]

I'm routing an AC2Car layout with BLST switches. I have a good understanding of everything except this last wiring diagram for the track wiring. If someone understands this and can help me out I would appreciate it greatly. The power is AC and I'm using a Lionel 90watt power supply as suggested on the AC2Car site. It's in French........

[4424ever]

Poigne is your controller and voiture is your car

[docdoom]

Well look at that. Being French Canadian paid off.

[slothead]

You may have this figured out already. Coils at the left are the transformer in the power supply that reduces the voltage from large number on the left (220v) to small number on the right (12v). One of the reduced voltage leads goes to the controllers. There's a diode before each controller, and they are in different directions. (AC pulses forward and backwards and diodes only allow power tho pass through in one direction, so one gets the forward pulses while the other gets the reverse pulses.) The wires out of the controllers go to one of the track rails.

The other reduced voltage lead goes directly to the other track rail. With AC2car 2 cars can be raced on the same lane and each needs a diode between the guide and motor, once again each car's diode must be in a different direction so one car is powered by forward pulses and the other by reverse pulses.

The diodes convert AC (alternating current) to DC (direct current) so the power to a each car becomes pulsed DC. The cars will sound differently because the motors will get 60 pulses a second rather than constant power as with regular DC. Most importantly, each controller and each car for a lane MUST have a diode.

[SpeedyNH]

we call those half-wave rectifiers.
with AC2Car, there are no brakes.

[RichD]

I am only French Canadian on my father's side, so I look here: http://ac2car.org/

[GTI]

Thanks for the explanation! Helps a lot.

[SpeedyNH]

Dr. Dave Reineke ran AC2Car for quite a while on his Trans-Am track. maybe he could share this experiences.

[dreinecke]

Let me know if this helps! The Power Supply was a Lionel model 1033, 90w.

[slothead]

When I heard Dave talking about his AC setup during the zoom meeting a few weeks ago I figured out he must have done it this way. This only has one car per lane so no diodes are needed in the cars. Any car will run in any lane and get 60 pulses of power a second (USA electrical system).

The diagram (schematic) at the top of this page shows how to run 2 cars in lane, which in order to be valuable requires a passing lane for each lane and a lane change switches to select it. I was going to build a track using the full AC2car system then decided I didn't want to route that many lanes.

[GTI]

Thank you, I'm running solo so I have a two lane and I'm putting in BLST switches that I have from many years ago. Point is to run one of the cars and go through a couple or few ghost cars. The Ghost would be on the (b) power and the car I control on the (a) power or the other way around. Using magnetic braid for the track so the ghost cars will have a magnet to get them up to speed and not derail, the chaser will be no mag. This is all in theory for now until it gets built. Thanks for the input though I appreciate it, as it helps clear the electrical part up for me.

[dinglebery]

So you only ever plan on having 2 cars run on the track at the same time? One car per lane? If that's correct why go through all the hassle with the AC2Car stuff and just get a regular DC power supply with Slot.it SCP1 or SCP2 controllers and use GHOST mode?

[slothead]

There's a lot of info on the Internet about tracks like you have in mind. I searched BLST and found some very informative sites. It can be done as you imagine - best wishes.

[GTI]

No, When challenging the ghosts cars there would be up to 4 cars running at once changing lanes.