Carrera black box blues, updates maybe?

[sidedraft]

We have a big 4 lane Carrera digital oval, we have been having trouble with our black box getting tripped (shuts down) we are running a MG power supply with 4-6 cars with somewhat bigger motors & mags, my question is, has anyone ever modified or done anything to the black box or wiring to keep this from happening? We are on our 3rd box & don't want this to keep happening & love the speeds with the other brand motors, I read on here a while back where someone wired in 2 CU's & it cured the problem, looking for any help. thanks in advance..

[proxieken]

I am no technical expert, so double check this info before you take my advice and ruin some equipment. This is just what worked for me and my trial and error method.

We are running 6 D124 cars with magnets. I use an aftermarket power supply with variable amps and voltage. I also use the newer control unit.

Take the power supply and turn the voltage all the way up and the amps down to 0. Create a short by running a wire from one terminal to the next. Turn up the amps till it hits 7.8 or 7.9. Now switch it off and remove the wire short. Do not turn the amp knobs, as you want that setting to remain. Now attach it to your control unit. Adjust the volts to about 20, which gives me 18v at the rails.

You can not exceed 7.9 amps due to your power supply being adjusted. This means your control unit should not trip out on you for drawing too much current. I read on here that the control unit can handle 8 amps and it seems to work for me.

One other thing I had issues with. I had power drop outs in places on my track. I was using the Carrera wire taps and getting no improvement. I switched to good speaker wire and have had no problems since. Not sure why.

This is just how it worked for me, so please be careful and listen to smarter folks who might say I am wrong.

I think the black box is limited to less amps also? Not sure about that. You might need to check.

[DaveKennedy]

You cannot exceed about 5 amps in the Black Box it's NOT designed to be used with more magnets and hotter than stock motors period.
You don't "wire in" a CU you buy one and use it. The CU has about 8 amps of protection but it will trip at 8amps so i'd suggest one of the aftermarket wire sets to add a quick burn fuse to your track.

[carlosinseattle]

Proxieken is spot on. You have to limit the amount of amps delivered to the CU. A fuse does not always burn out quick enough to prevent damage. And the hassle of swapping out a fuse every time you exceed 5 or 7 amps will quickly ruin your fun, we had that happen at my buddy's house about a year ago. We weren't able to have any fun until I went and got my adjustable power supply and ran it at 19 volts and 7 amps. No one more problem after that. We had 6 driven cars with magnets and ran for about 3 hours like that. I've also ran with 6 cars equipped with hot motors and magnets, but not for nearly as long. Main thing is if you deliver too much current to the track/CU you'll have problems, and it does you no good to have it anyway.

[sidedraft]

Thanks for the replies & hope to get it sorted out, Carlos sent you a PM.