I will be having some power poles feeding power to Charde so I got some kitchen wooden skewers, ice cream sticks, thin plastic strip, Peco track pins & here are two - one painted & the other nude.




lot more to go such as  "planting" them & adding power cables.

Just shows what you can find lying around Sol - they look the bees knees. :thumbs

I particularly like the "long" poles.  So often, you see huge conglomerations at the top and a pole which would be about a scale 6ft high !!  Yours are desigend to keep the wires well up out of harms way.

More perspex needed I think.

They look great, don't forget that domestic premises only had two wires (2-phase,240v) whereas what you have made is 3-phase, 415v, which would go to farms, industrial units, etc.
So you'll need poles with transformers, maybe poles with isolating equipment, and of couse guy wires for any pole where the overhead changes direction, even slightly.
Stu

[user=465]Stubby47[/user] wrote:

They look great, don't forget that domestic premises only had two wires (2-phase,240v) whereas what you have made is 3-phase, 415v, which would go to farms, industrial units, etc.
………………………………………..

Not necessarily Stu. :hmm

We had 3 phase because our "hamlet" was some distance from the supply.  Using 3 phase, they could "balance" the phases and avoid any potential overloads.

Also, I presume the supply Sol is talking about is for the Chard yard so it would almost certainly be 3 phase.  As you say, he will need a transformer on the final pole ……….:roll:

You are quite right Peter, perhaps I should have put that as a final supply to a single domestic premises it would usually only be 2-phase, but, yes, to a collection of supply points it would be 3-phase.

For a yard, there might be a ground mounted transformer, rather than a pole one (or twin pole one).

All of which makes for interesting and not often modelled detail.

Well, you lot have made me stop & think now about feed in - I will have to have a gander locally but I am providing a switch box on the ground to feed the station. The goods shed will have its own feed in via a cable.
Some of our domestic homes has 3 phase & others in the same street have 2 phase.

Most of our "rural" domestic supply is 3 phase here too Sol but in UK, as Stu said, most homes are on single - only large users would get 3 or "hamlets" where it would then normally be split down to serve each house.

A large ground transformer (perhaps fenced off like a mini sub-station) would make an interesting little feature, or you could mount a smaller one 2/3rds up the pole.

The 2 wire system is actually called single phase i.e. phase (the live conductor) and neutral (240 volts) . In Britain power supplied on poles like this is known as a TT system, usually used in rural areas.

The only installations (very rearly) that had a 2 phase system were premisis that carried out welding using a 2 phase welding machine. 

As a point of interest TT stands for "terre terre" from the French "earth earth", hence there is no earth cable on the poles because the system uses the general mass of earth by means of earth rods at source of supply and at the users end.

Re transformers, I think that if you could get hold of a scrap transistor radio, especially a small one, there are little 'transformers' [Really 'chokes'?] inside that look just like the sort of transformers you see half-way up a twin pole set-up…..

Just finkin, another visit to the tip 'praps?


[Nice poles, will you dip the screw heads in off-white paint?]

I Googled my old area & in Street view, had a look at the power poles & it seems that, yes, homes are 2 wires in - active & neutral. 

From the photo, it appears that there are 4 wires running down the street, one neutral & 3 actives with homes being connected the actives being used in turn presumably to be able to isolate areas/homes.
If this is the case, then I could use the middle insulator for neutral & have two actives - one serving the shed & the other to my switch box on the ground that will serve the station. In theory, the switch box can isolate platform lights, station building & the now defunct signal box.


But I have options - even my switch box could be a transformer, my current area where I live, they are all mounted in cream cabinets on the ground.

[user=324]Ianbo[/user] wrote:

As a point of interest TT stands for "terre terre" from the French "earth earth", hence there is no earth cable on the poles because the system uses the general mass of earth by means of earth rods at source of supply and at the users end.

I know that system is called "SWER" - Single wire, Earth Return. A small pole mounted transformer is close to the rural house.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-wire_earth_return

This is the planned Switch box - just 1" tall



camera shoes up all the mistakes !


I think I wlll  make an new one that is more squatter - like the photo above in a preceeding post.

Redesigned the power box into a transformer box & here are a couple of photos- showing not only the box but the guys wires well.







weeds required to grow plus some weathering on the Transformer box.

My initial reaction Sol,  is that it looks big ………….very nice but big …:hmm  Is it bigger than the first offering ?

I do however, like the guy wires very much. :thumbs

Yes Peter, the new box is a fraction shorter but wider & deeper as it has to contain a transformer - almost the same size as the real cream unit ( it is MY railway after all :cool:).

I tried adding proper wires tween the two poles but not successful so I am getting some fine Boingo wire

http://www.modellers-warehouse.com.au/Wild%20places/Oingo%20Boingo%20line/scalemodelinglin.html

[user=606]Sol[/user] wrote:

…………………………. - almost the same size as the real cream unit ………………………..

Do I take it you'll have lots of fruit vans then ?

Yes.

I just had a look at that wire your getting, can you even SEE IT!

At .08MM or .003" that has to be like (or smaller than) a human hair!

Amazing, you will have to show us a photo of that. If you can.  

Wayne