How to choose lighting for your model railway layout FAQ
Adding lighting to your model railway is a great way to add realism to your layout. Whether it's street lamps for your platform, lighting for your buildings or adding special effects it is all easily achievable.
What colour of LED should I choose for my model railway? Typically, warm white LEDs should be used for resisdential buildings and steam/Victorian platform lighting whilst white LEDs are best for modern plaforms and industrial buildings.
What lights are suitable for my model railway platform? For a platform you are typically looking for single head lamp posts and depending on whether your railway is modern or steam/Victorian era. Railway model lights come in a vast array of styles and picking the right one is down to what suits your style in the gauge you are building.
N Gauge Lights, OO Gauge Lights & O Gauge Lights
How do I light up my railway buildings? This is pretty easy for model railways. The buildings are generally a shell so lights can either be placed in the roof, shining down, or on the floor, shining up. If there is an internal floor then lights will be needed for both floors or you could light up one and leave the other dark to be more realistic.
Lights such as the single LED strips are ideal for N Gauge or OO gauge buildings. 3 LED strips would be needed for O gauge buildings with larger internal spaces.
How do I light a loco engine headlights/tail lights? Our train headlight/tail light module would be perfect for this. It has a tiny board which is current limited so suits AC/DCC or DC from 4v to 24v with two white or red LEDs in a selection of sizes to suit different gauge locos.
How do I add a fire effect to my model railway layout? Our fire/burning building kit would be perfect for this. Contaning two different coloured flickering LEDs and a static LED you can use it to create realistic fire effects such as a bonfire, brazier, burning building or any other fire effect. Single flicking LEDs can be used for candles or in smaller gauge railways.
How would I create an arc welder effect? Our welding effect kit would be ideal. It has a random length of both duration and spacing between flashes to create a very realistic welding effect for you railway layout.
How do I stop LEDs flickering on a DCC layout? LEDs run off DC (direct current) so need a very stable power supply to avoid flickering. On DCC the current alternates so to avoid flickering you will need to use a bridge rectifier which smooths out the current to DC whether the train is going forwards or in reverse.
How do I keep my wiring tidy on my large layout? You could consider using a distribution board. These are PCB strips containing several terminal blocks to a single supply input. They can be daisy chained for larger layouts and some are even individually switched so you can control groups of lights.
The terminal blocks will take multiple LEDs up to the maximum amp rating of the board, but with LEDs this is usually a lot because they are very low current.
I want to light up a shop front sign or billboard, what should I use? Our OO/HO gauge floodlights are perfect for lighting up signs and bill boards on your layout. They look just the part for a small floodlight.