Analogue controller for easy access

[davecar]

Hi,

I am new to g scale so please forgive my ignorance.

I am just in the process of laying track. I have two water features in my garden - one at the top and one at the bottom of my garden. My oval will be about 20 metres long and will go round the water features at both ends of the garden.
I bought a Piko starter set initially so my controller is very basic and is plastic.

The two loops at each end of my oval go though various obstacles and this means that the loco is occasionally out of sight. The controller has about a one meter lead so it is difficult to see what is happening.

I dont want to go to DCC (I have this in OO) and I dont want the expense of radio controlled locos - at least not at this early stage in my g scale hobby.

Is there an analogue controller available that is portable (wire connected would be OK)?

Or can I make some simple adaptations that would give me a more portable control.

Kind regards,

Dave

 

[Neil Robinson]

You may wish to consider radio control of the track power, such as Aristo's train engineer system.

http://www.dragon-gscale.co.uk/cre-55470-train-engineer-walkaround-transmitter--receiver-2275-p.asp < Link To http://www.dragon-gscale....r--receiver-2275-p.asp

These come up second hand at reasonable prices from time to time. A word of caution though, if purchasing a used one test it before purchase or ensure that you will get a full refund if faulty as there are a fair number of non working examples out there.

You may well be able to modify your controller, but I'm unfamiliar with the unit so can't advise and modification would invalidate any warranty.

If you wish to do this and you are handy with a soldering iron post some pictures of the internals of the controller and I may be able to come up with an idea. This offer is only valid if the controller is a separate low voltage device, that is to say the mains voltage transformer is a separate unit to the speed controller.

 

[Anorak]

If it's the Piko 35003B controller can't you just make up some longer leads?

Mine has a seperate power brick that converts mains to 20Vac that runs over low voltage cable tinned at each end that just goes into the push fit connectors on the hand controller. I suspect you might need to connect a longer lead to the track power cable because I can't see how they come apart but again they are soldered bare wire, adding additional wire shouldn't present too many problems.

 

[barryw]

helmsman controllers are available from glendale junction model shop with details of the range (no connection only satisfied customer)

 

[chris m01]

In the very early days of my garden railway I started with the controller in the shed but this was completely impracticle - just not on at all. Also using a 1.5 amp controller with USA Trains locos leads to very short runnig sessions! Being a tight old whatsit I then got a power supply off Ebay and made my own controller using a couple of transistors, a variable resisitor and a heat sink on a very long piece of wire. This worked reasonably well, with the added bonus of acting as a hand warmer on colder days. So yes a controller on a long piece of wire is feasible.

After about six months I got myself a Train Engineer and have lived happily ever after