Laying out the power drops

Today I started to install the 52 power drops on the freshly laid main-line track.  Before I started, I checked each turnout to make sure the frog (place where tracks cross on a "switch") was isolated from the diverging tracks.  If not there will be a short as these are called electrofrogs and route power to the track they are aligned to.  All but one frog checked out.  That frog showed a connection but the track was clearly insulated - impossible.  Then I finally traced the track all the way around the layout and found that with the switch thrown towards the track, there was connection.  The connection actually went all the way around the layout so I was not crazy.  All set.

The little green and red squares locate where each power drop goes.  The green leads at the top of the blip must match the green drops all the way around - the same track - or we will have a short.  Once wired up, if one of the leads is on the opposite track, there will be a short that shuts down the system.  I learned this little trick with the colored pins from a blog on the Modelrailroad Hobbyist web site (http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com) - a free good source of a monthly e-magazine as well as blogs.  That person used green and red push pins, but I went the cheap way and used colored paper and T pins.  Works fine.  Now I can see that I have the green and red leads on the correct tracks as well as where they go on that track.  This makes wiring up underneath the table easier as I will know that the green lead goes to the green power bus and the red to the red.  Sounds like kindergarten but I learned the hard way that by doing this I avoid later problems which are very hard to trace.

The track leads are smaller gauge wire and short. I will solder each lead to the appropriate rail.  The underneath connections are made with a wire nut to connect the lead to another piece of heavier wire if a distance from the bus, and a suitcase connector to connect that wire to the bus.  No soldering under the table thank you.  I have many little scars on my legs  from previous layouts' hot soldering bits dropping on me.