Home and News

Battery Power

Changes Log

Club Information

Events

Guest Book

Items For Sale

Links

Miniature Pwr Site

Modeling Projects

Modeling Tips

Photo Gallery

Search

Site Index

Our garden railway group has mistakenly purchased a number of third generation, Aristo-Craft, lithium-ion battery packs. These are the packs distributed early in 2008 that are not compatible with the 27 MHz Train Engineer (TE). The red (power) LED on the TE will light up and then fade away when you try to use these battery packs to power it. To date we have four of them: two from a dealer and two from our Canadian Distributor.

Today while bench testing a 75 MHz receiver, I decided to try one of the third generation battery packs to power it. The motor block and LED headlight (programming light) ran fine with it. I tried two of the other two third generation battery packs, and they worked as well. So if you are planning to install a 75 MHz on-board receiver, you can use a third generation lithium-ion battery pack. These packs may also work with other on-board receivers.

Our group has also encountered problems with the power switch on new TEs when using them with lithium-ion battery packs. After the switch has been used a while, the red (power) LED will not light and the TE will not function. Or the red (power) LED will light, but the green (signal) LED will flicker and the transmitter and receiver will not link. This is especially true if two lithium-ion packs are used in parallel to power the TE. A large flash (arcing) is evident when the switch is thrown.

We are now encouraging our members to install a toggle switch between the TE and one lithium-ion battery pack, and use it instead the slide switch on the TE. A standard sized, double-pole double-throw switch is now available to OVGRS members only for $2 in the Items For Sale Section.

When two lithium-ion packs are used, a four-pole double-throw switch should be installed. We are currently using a standard sized, four-pole double-throw, center-off toggle switch in our Evans power cars. The switch is available from All Electronics under catalog number STS-71, or to OVGRS members only for $9 in the Items For Sale Section.

The screw terminals on both these swiches make it easy to install the heavy wiring used on the new TEs and lithium-ion battery packs. The TE and battery pack connectors can be easily replaced with number 6 loop terminals which are available locally at Canadian Tire and most electronic shops.

For a more complete description on how this switch is wired, see the article on how to build an Evans Power Car.