[Sol]

QUOTE (Lancashire Fusilier @ 6 Aug 2008, 10:58) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>I know Ricahrd at DCC Concepts has a product that does exactly that but I think it has 8 sections of occupancy however it is really simple to set up and requires no track cutting. I am sorely tempted down this path myself and may well buy one for a play.

I have used those detectors from DCCconcepts. Work well under incandescent lighting as they are optical detection but they are not keen on flouro lights.
I had added hi-intensity Red LEDs (8000mCD) over the top of the sensors & all the time, they detected a blocking of the light by rolling stock but sometimes the internal 50Hz flicker of flouro lights would cause the sensors to start chattering.

This Pic gives an idea of what I was using. The Red LEDs are over the top of sensors loctaed in the middle of the track.

To recify the chattering, I had 2 options, completely cover the hidden trackage so external flouros would not give problems or change room lighting back to incandescent but as our Government is banning importation of such globes later this year in an attempt to phase them out, that was not practical now. Both options I did not like so I use a rail detection method.

 

[Sol]

I would like to clarrify what Richard said about my installation

BTW, to clarify Sols comment, my showroom has ONLY flourescents and there is no issue at all with any form of chattering or other problems - Sols problems are a combination of shielding of the LED from direct light by his backscene and the flourescents he is using, which are quite low powered.

We has worked together on a lot of initial testing of these units & found that I did need a lot of additional direct lighting as I only was using 18w flouros partially over the sensors, not the normal 36w types. The sensors were as the photo indicates, partially blocked from the rest of the room lighting & I found that even if I stood up & created a slight shadow, some times chattering would occur.
My 20x12 ft layout room has 2 overhead lighting circuits - for normal operation, 4 x18W with one in each corner & long 6ft fluoro across the middle while for construction, I also switch on 2 sets of 36w units making an additional 144W & under this circumstance I hadno problems. If my storage were completely covered, the one Red LED was adequate as external light frequency could not affect the sensors combined with the LED light.

Let me state that they do work , it was the situation that I was trying to make them work was not a normal situation & perhaps I should have perservered.

I intend to do is to use 2 Hi-intensity Red LEDs per sensor, that I know works, not just the one 8000mCD that I had previously used.