MERG Boosters

1 July 2012

I have completed my first MERG DCC Booster Kit 59.

I am using the booster in place of the DCC Specialities circuit breaker which seemed to be giving me some spurious short circuits. I took it out of circuit some months ago and the shorts went away.

The booster is located indoors but I have connected it to an AWD (Audible Warning Device) on the patio so that when I'm in the garden I know when it has shut down for some reason. I have also installed an on-off switch in the same box so that I can switch off the power to the track when I need to. A separate accessory bus runs directly from the Lenz LZV100 so that points can be changed when the booster shuts down due to a short on the track.

I also bought a 15vDC 6A power supply from MERG but I need to buy a power cable for it before I can replace my Maplin 13.8V unit. I will buy a meter at the same time. The booster has provision for a cheap meter to measure the current used. That will enable me to see what current is drawn and plan for breaking the layout into an appropriate number of power districts with a MERG booster and power supply to each. The layout is wired using 4 track buses: one for indoors, one for the up main, one for the down main and one for the down relief. At the moment they are all powered from the new booster. The indoor bus is switched by a relay from the decoder that switches the point on the patio which forms a reversing loop.

13 September 2015

I am currently using two MERG boosters each powered by a 15vDC 6A power supply which is also available from MERG. One of these boosters powers the indoor track as far as the point on the triangular junction. The other powers the three track busses in the garden - up main, down main and down relief. I have nearly completed two more boosters to power the track busses separately.

I have connected J1/3 and J1/5 on the boosters to C and D on the LZV100 command station. They can be connected either way round but I don't know if that determines the polarity of the output track bus. I believe J and K can be used instead of C and D but I haven't tried it.

The polarity of the three track busses in the garden must match. Similarly the polarity of the indoor bus must match but depends on the setting of the point on the triangular junction. This polarity is switched using a DPDT relay by the point switch.