GP60 smoke unit install

Overview

I've made this a separate page, due to the complexity, and also this overall stragety may be of use in other installations.

This is about using "direct drive" on a smoke unit, no electronics in it, just 4 wires, 2 to a fan, and 2 to the heating element.

I used the Aristo "prime" unit, but works for any unit.

Power

Running the heating element require a regulated supply, in theory you would want control of overall watts, but easiest to have an inexpensive regulated DC supply. These were a few dollars on Amazon. 

This particular one is nice since it is completely enclosed on all sides by Lucite, so nothing can short.

It will fit perfectly in the short hood, the only free space left:

Smoke unit mods

I cut away some of the Aristo funnel, and used the supplied cast brass one from AML, which fits exactly into the recess inside the shell:

also, the supplied bracket needed the holes elongated to match the "bumps" on the bottom of the Aristo smoke unit

After modification this fits exactly

You can see that even the posts line up perfectly with the bracket holes

Wiring

So 4 wires to the regulator to allow it to be removed:

(yellow = output, red is plus input and black is minus input)

Another 4 pin connector to smoke unit (yellow is heater wires, red is fan plus, black is fan minus):

Overall wiring showing connecting the regulator, smoke unit to the 4 wires that will go to the decoder:

Final wiring:

after the wiring harness is done, two circuits are connected (4 wires total):

plus (rectified track power) (decoder J1-6) and port 12 (decoder J1-8) go to the regulator

plus 5 volts (decoder J3-11) and port 9 (decoder J2-10) go to the fan