LIghting

LIghting effects, lighting for buidlings, for vehicle models

I don't know of any model train layout that has the amount of lighting that my layout has To me, it is what makes this layout special.

Lamp posts had grain-of-wheat incandescent. I changed to LED

Red building had no lights. Each floor lights up/goes out randomly.

No vehicles had lights, so I put some in. In each vehcile I installed 2 white LEDs for headlights, and 2 red LEDs for taillights. In each case, I took the model completely apart and drilled holes for the LEDs or the wires to fish through. Since I was using 12 volts DC throughout the system, I was able to wire the LEDs in series with a dropping resistor, simplifying the wiring significantly. I.E., intead of 8 wires and 4 resistors for each model, I used 2 wires and one resistor. I wired about 20 models, with more to come.

In this case I used light fiber tubes to get the light to the headlights

This LED was used to light up the cab of a dump truck

A bunch of cars wired and LEDs installed

Dump truck had 6 lights, 2 extra for the safety light bar

There are 4 LEDs and one resistor on this car. Note only 2 wires for power

Box of vehicles ready for placement on the layout

Here's a couple vehicles lit up on test bench

Sport truck shown placed on layout, same truck as in #10

Vehicles lit up in parking lot of train station

All the vehicles lit up before placement

And this is how they look with the power off to their LEDs

video pan of the entire layout, lit up

Blinking Esso sign

Alternating room lights

Run Time: 1:45

Run Time: 0:07

Run Time: 0:19

None of the pre-made buildings or kits that I bought had lights in them. At first I was installing tiny "grain-of-wheat" incandescent bulbs but the current draw became too large so I switched to LED lights throughout. There are no incandescent bulbs in the layout.