After another couple of weeks of no real progress on the demo board, yesterday I had chance to start work on it again.
I'd already obtained from Maplin some terminal posts and a rotary selector switch as components, so I was ready to go with drill and soldering iron. The interesting thing about the Maplin rotary switch, if anyone is contemplating using one is that although they are sold as (in this case) a three-way by four contact switch, this appears to be defined by the position of a tab-washer inside the switch. This can be moved to give a different number of clicks. This presumably gives a different number of discrete selections. I didn't test this with a multimeter, but is worth exploring if you think that you have the wrong component for the job in hand. Oh, and I found this little gem out when the switch fell apart after I'd taken the locking ring off to install it. So be careful!
Anyway, this is how it looks from above the baseboard:
The nearest posts, by the switch are the ones that take the power feeds. I will produce some proper wires for a controller with banana plugs, rather than the temporary flying leads that I use for testing locomotives at the workbench. The far posts are for the power feed to go in for the point motors.
And this is it underneath:
I'm using a piece of copperclad sleeper strip as a wiring bus, so that I don't have to try and fit all of the return feeds into a single point or onto a single component.
And so if I get chance today, it's on to finishing off my first Turnout Operation Unit, and seeing if it can be installed.
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