Random Thoughts
Posted by: "Bill Fraley" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Tue Aug 26, 2008 9:01 am (PDT)
>Last month at our LVSG meeting at John Foley's, John gave a talk on all the
>new Radio Controlled Model railroads that are fast approaching us because of
>the great batteries now available and what is coming in our future. Wouldn't
>it be neat to lay out your non-electrified track, run your battery controlled
>trains anywhere on your layout! Wow! But what will that do to the DCC
>modelers, as well as us DC modelers?
Bill,
For the larger gauge operators, battery powered layouts are certainly more
feasible and an interesting approach. Just the wiring alone is a great
advantage to say nothing of rail maintenance. Having been in the radio
controlled model airplane hobby for over 30 years, I've seen a more recent
transition to battery powered flight. I think it's in the future for model
railroading, but not without a price. The latest and greatest used in battery
power is Lithium Polymer. These batteries are much lighter and smaller in size
compared with NI-CADs and NI-MH batteries. Furthermore, they have a higher
capacity for a given size. However, one needs to take extra safety precautions
while handling and charging these batteries. In addition, you will get sticker
shock when you price them out. A typical aerobatic RC aircraft might need over
$1000 in Li-Poly batteries. After a 10-15 minute flight, they may need upwards
of an hour to recharge, depending on a number of factors. The question remains
for model railroad of O gauge and smaller; can we get sufficient run time with
the space available for batteries and the number/cost of batteries? It will
come one day as battery technology improves, but for now, I'll stick with DCC!
Gary Chudzinski
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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