Isolating tracks at Ballarat East Locomotive Depot

T401 and RM58 receive attention from the fitters within the maintenance shed at Ballarat East Locomotive Depot.

The maintenance shed at Ballarat East isn't often used for the stabling of locomotives due to one of the sidings serving the shed running through the fuel point. I decided to add isolated sections to both sidings allowing for stabling multiple locomotives on the same track.

S305 is shut down in the back road while T354 has just been refueled at the fuel point.

X40 awaits for T401 to exit the maintenance shed.

The wiring follows my usual approach of colour wires of the same colour for each track and for the two wires taking power to each of the switches. I use the connectors where the wires need to cross between base boards. I had to cut slots into the control panel to mount the switches. A Dremel tool was used to cut the rail to create isolated sections of track. Feeder wires were then soldered to the rails to provide power to each of the isolated sections of track.

An advantage of how the sidings have been wired is that a loco can be moved out of the maintenance shed while another loco is shut down on the same track or is being refueled at the fuel point.

An attempt to replicate the photo above of T354 awaiting attention at Ballarat East Loco.

T321 and S305 are refueled at the fuel point while in the background T354 is shutdown and T401 can be seen in the maintenance shed.