# LED install in Pro Drive DCC Switch Motor



## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

I have been working with the Pro Drive DCC switch for a little while now and I really like how it works, and how it's made.


I got the light socket working how I wanted, http://www.mylargescale.com/Communi...fault.aspx ,then decided to make use of it. 


I am planing to have the switch light come on when the switch is thrown allowing the train to turn off the main line. 


First thing I used was a 60ma light assembly from Radio shack but it melted the lens when it was set bright enough to see from a distance in the daylight.


so the I decided to go with LED's but I wanted it to be as simple as possible and stand up to outdoor use. One thing to keep in mind with LED's is that they must be hooked up positive to positive and negative to negative. The out pin on the DCC Pro Drive switch PCB is the positive pin, and of course the inner pin is the negative one. On the LED the lead on the flat side of LED in the positive lead (the left side of the one in the picture below is the positive lead, and it plugs to the white wire lead on housing)).


I wanted to keep everything as easy and simple as possible, after a lot of research online I think I found the perfect solution. 


The CNX410 LED assembly from Visual Communications Company (VCC). It has a resistor built into the housing and has a water tight lens which the housing screws onto making mounting it a snap.I have 21.5 volts to the track so I used the assembly with 1.2k ohm resistor (CNX410-120-X02-4-1-24) with a red water tight lens (CMS442RTP) and red water clear LED that puts out a really really bright 4000 lumens (WP7113SRC/F). The whole assemble with LED only costs $4.21. I also bought some 2.5mm two pin connectors to slide onto the light socket (again simple as possible wanted to avoid trying to solder onto the board) I bought the VCC assembly's and LED's from Mouser Electronics in Texas.



















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I mounted the LED on the opposite side of PCB and switch motor with the LED wire going under the housing and switch mechanics to avoid any interference. I spliced the light socket plug to the LED housing wire leads(make sure you leave enough length to allow you to reach from the rear of the switch and plug into the PCB). To mount it in the Pro Drive the first thing I did was trim the tab off of the inside of the top cover to give you a flat mounting surface for the LED housing. Then you'll need to drill a 5/16" hole in the cover for the lens and a 1/4" one on the bottom of the housing for the leads and plug. You'll need to drill the hole directly below the 5/16 mounting hole to allow the LED leads with the plug on it to fit through switch housing (the best way to do it is to screw the cover on then drill straight through the top and bottom with a 1/4", and then enlarge the Lens hole to 5/16") 


Next you place the lens through the hole, put on the lock washer, and then screw on the CNX410 housing, it locks in place nicely (oh yeah don't forget to put in the LED before you screw it on). 






















Then you fish the LED lead through the hole in the rear of the case and back up into the case where the light pin is. The next step is to pull out the extra wire slack (so it doesn't get tangled with the switch motor) seal the screw holes, place the cover on, apply more sealant to the screw holes, and screw on the lid. Lastly I coiled and glued the wire to the bottom of the switch case for a nice clean installation.






















As you can see the LED is extremely bright and easily seen in daylight, and no melting of the housing lol and all for less than $5.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Very clever! That looks like it ought to work well.


You could use a multi-color led that lights red and green, then you'd have an indicator for both directions.

I'm glad they are working well for you


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## Peter Osborne (Jan 5, 2008)

Great stuff. By the time I get around to installing mine, you guys will have sorted out all the kinks. 

Peter.


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## Peter Osborne (Jan 5, 2008)

Oh, I forgot to ask, with the LED installed, I'm guessing that it satifies the need for the load on the decoder while programming?


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## aceinspp (Jan 2, 2008)

Seeing how all mine are out doors doing all the drilling you did makes it very vulnerable to moisture. I'm waiting to see how Train-Li will be doing this. I would like to figure a way to use some sort of switch type indicator not only using red and green but also yellow. Later RJD


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

Posted By Peter Osborne on 16 Jan 2010 08:39 AM 
Oh, I forgot to ask, with the LED installed, I'm guessing that it satifies the need for the load on the decoder while programming? 

Yes you dont have to open it up anymore, Just coonect it to programming track and off you go.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Posted By lownote on 16 Jan 2010 05:00 AM 
Very clever! That looks like it ought to work well.


You could use a multi-color led that lights red and green, then you'd have an indicator for both directions.

I'm glad they are working well for you


Unfortunately, unless BodsRailroad has different data, the power is on or off, not polarity reversing.

So to have 2 indications, you can have ON and DARK (no light) or you will need to do a bit more circuitry.

The easy way would be a small SPDT relay on the pins, with the appropriate snubbing diode.

Now you also need power for the led no matter what the state of the output. The easiest might be to put a small FW bridge rectifier on the track power input leads, and then appropriate dropping resistor and a dual led (3 pin)...

You could also use a bicolor (2 pin led) but then you need a DPDT relay.

Regards, Greg


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

Posted By aceinspp on 16 Jan 2010 03:25 PM 
Seeing how all mine are out doors doing all the drilling you did makes it very vulnerable to moisture. I'm waiting to see how Train-Li will be doing this. I would like to figure a way to use some sort of switch type indicator not only using red and green but also yellow. Later RJD 

Mine will be used outside as well. 
To tell the truth its not much different than when you do the weather proofing mod from Axel. The LED assembly is water tight on top and below the hole is filled with the LEDs rubber coated leads and then I used some of Axel's black goop to seal it completely, so no issues there. The other hole is already there I just made it a little larger for the plug to fit through. If it is a concern thats nothing the old hot glue gun cant fix









With the way everything is now coated/sealed now I'm pretty sure these will work under water,









Ron


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Ron, any comment about the led and 2 colors? 

Can you confirm it's just on and off (the ones I tested did this) 

Regards, Greg


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

Posted By Greg Elmassian on 16 Jan 2010 08:26 PM 
Ron, any comment about the led and 2 colors? 

Can you confirm it's just on and off (the ones I tested did this) 

Regards, Greg 
Hi Greg,
Axel and I did talk about that very same thing, and yes normal ops is either on or off, so bi colored LEDs wouldnt work. Axel was under the impression that it could be done using a small switch and relays, but it got way to complicated for me ( you know how you electrical guys are when you get on a roll, lol). I did have a couple of switches fail (something popped on the pcb) that allowed the light to be powered all the time regardless of switch position so it may be possible.

Then there is the light kit thats available for the switches for like $25 bucks or so from train li. They have more of a European look to them and they stick up pretty high so they wont work for my application.
Ron


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Well RJ, looks like we have a new project! 

Greg


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## Axel Tillmann (Jan 10, 2008)

If you work with either SPDT or DPDT (when using a tri color LED) then you don't need a bridge rectifier. the DCC chips use 24 V so on the board is somewhere 24V. I talked to the manufacturer and it might be possible that the next version of the printed circuit board will have an extra pin for that. In the meantime I believe a servo has 3 lines: Power, Ground, Control. So the power and ground should be sufficient to pull drive the LEDs. I prefer the 2 color LED solution, because I have only three states (straight/thrown). Of course you can make a mount of a dwarf light with three LED's but you only have 2 states anyhow. 

I main reason I can think of why the one LED solution is better: 
The housing that Ron found is 360 degrees visible, the dwarf light will have limited (uni-directional) visibility. Granted the not thrown state is dark, but you have other means to know that your layout is under power. 

Congratulations to Ron on figuring this all out. I like the application.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Thanks Axel. I mentioned using the input pins so as not to recommend someone trying to solder directly to the board. 

Also, soldering to the board would have added another area to waterproof. 

Adding a couple of power pins would be great. 

Regards, Greg


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## aceinspp (Jan 2, 2008)

The thing I would be concerned about also is the Light that Train-Li is thinking about using that if it sticks up it could be come a clearance issue. I found this out while running my AC snow plow. theses switch machines are mounted to close to the track. I shall see how they are attached and what they look like. 
I spent a lot of time working with Train-Li to get these switches to work out doors. More mods are to arrive soon from the factory so that we can now use them in any type weather without failures.

To bad there is not a way to make them so that they could be fixed so they are not so close.

Yep Greg looks like we got are work cut out for us but we shall come up with a great way to make these work as close to proto type as possible. Later RJD


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## Axel Tillmann (Jan 10, 2008)

What rolling stock, other than that snowplow that scrapes the track, should we be concerned about?

I have one customer who constructed himself further extensions and that works well. So coming up with an extension kit can be considered.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Bachmann Shay (with steps installed), Bachmann K27, the steps on a USAT Geep are pretty low... 

Again, this depends on the curves, length of loco. Also, if you always put the motor on the "straight side" of the switch, you minimize problems. 

Regards, Greg


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

I had originally planned to use these 1"x1"x.7" square black pastic boxes I found from a company in Cali. I was going to mount the LED assembly in the box then glue the box lid to the top cover of the switch motor and just have a small hole through to the light pins on the pcb. I built one and used my USA Broadway limited streamliners to test overhang. On the Aristo Wide radious switches the car covered almost 3/4 of the switch, when the car entered the turnout, when it was mounted on the turnout side with less than a 1/4" clearance between the switch motor top and bottom of the car. If I placed the switch motor on the outside or straight part of Aristo wide radius switch the car still covered half the switch, and with the little box mounted to the very outside of the cover there was less than 1/4 clearance between the box and side of car.

I was dissapointed because the box idea would have been so simple to make in volume and that is what led me to the solution I came up with. Now no matter where you mount the switch drive it works with no clearance issues, save maybe the errant snow plow blade  

Ron


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

Thought I'd update this thread since they have some run time on them now.

My Modded Switches have been outdoors now for 9 months, have had 44 inches of snow dropped on them so far this winter and untold inches of rain.

I have to report that they are all still in perfect working order! I have had no issues as of yet.

They new versions of these switches now come pre-weathercoated And are cheaper than the ones I bought, a BIG win win imo.

Nice work Axel,

Ron


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## CliffyJ (Apr 29, 2009)

Excellent article and testimonial, Ron! 

In your discussions with Axel, did the spdt microswitch option come up, and if so, would it have been a quick way to power one LED for each direction? 

===Cliffy


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## BodsRailRoad (Jul 26, 2008)

Posted By CliffyJ on 07 Mar 2011 03:00 PM 
Excellent article and testimonial, Ron! 

In your discussions with Axel, did the spdt micro switch option come up, and if so, would it have been a quick way to power one LED for each direction? 

from other thread;
Great to hear about the ProDrives, Ron, and thanks for those links (I'll be digging into them next). 



Axel's helping me with my specs and options as we speak. E.g., whether one needs the optional micro switch in the Prodrives. I think yes, for my three return-loop switches that will control an auto reverse module. But maybe not for the others... I was thinking to go ahead and get them all so equipped, just in case; but what did you do? 



Great to know that the DCC control is working as planned -- awesome!! That's exactly the kind of thing I wish to achieve, with a macro or two, so the confirmation is much appreciated. 



Oops, I just realized I was on the wrong thread... sorry folks! But thanks anyway, Ron! 



===Cliffy 


I didn't mess with the micro switches because I depowered my frogs so I don't have to worry about them shorting things out if I go through a switch backwards.

The light socket is either on or off so a bidirectional led wont work, Greg and RJ were going to try and come up with a way of doing it but haven't heard anything from them about it.

I haven't looked into reversing loops yet so I don't have any info, that's in phase 2-3, I'm sure Axel would know though.

Ron


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