Solid or stranded ??

[Ian MacMillan]

LOL Ian!  Buss means "a kiss", or a Buss is also a brand name of an electrical fuse.

Bus (one "s") is either a road vehicle or one or more electrical conductors carrying electricity.  I don't knwo why people think that they need to use 2 esses when describing the electrical bus.  Makes me want to roll my eyes.

Typo. On mobile and tied up with way more important things. Sometimes you just need to just let common usage slide like us LEOs not having a hissy fit over the media falsely using the term "clocked"when talking about RADAR.

 Zero f's given

[Denver Road Doug]

Sometimes you just need to just let common usage slide like us LEOs not having a hissy fit over the media falsely using the term "clocked"when talking about RADAR.

Huh?   While I understand the difference in the method, that term has been used interchangeably for decades.   And more by "LEO's" than by media, in my experience.

I can't believe I'm defending the media, and I'm certainly not defending the criticism for using "buss". (I've never heard it used as a term for kiss, much less commonly used as such...I simply look at it as a typo and nothing more.)   But when I hear the term "clocked (you)" I think of a radar gun and I think of the dozens of times I've heard the highway patrol or police use that term.   I guess maybe it's a northeast thing where the term is taboo.  In the southwest and midwest it's as common as "nuking" something in the microwave.

[peteski]

I can't believe I'm defending the media, and I'm certainly not defending the criticism for using "buss". (I've never heard it used as a term for kiss, much less commonly used as such...I simply look at it as a typo and nothing more.) 

Doug, see http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/buss, and http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bus

While a typo seems like a good excuse (from both posters), I often see people use buss while trying to describe a group of electrical conductors. It might be something to do with people with no electronic background thinking that a word describing a vehicle must not be the same as the one describing a group of electrical conductors. Some probably have also seen the electric Buss fuses, associating the double-s word with electricity, thus they incorrectly thinking that the double-s word must be correct for describing the electrical bus.

All I did was to show the correct usage of each word, and I got yelled at.   

[Denver Road Doug]

You can throw all the dictionaries in the world at me and it won't change the fact that I've never heard that word with that spelling used to describe a kiss.   

I wasn't disputing that what you said was correct.  And by all means, if you want to be a grammar cop, (would that make you a  "GEO"?  ) knock yourself out.   But (a) you better get some rest and drink some gatorade...on a train forum you're gonna be BUSY, (b) see "throwing stones vs. glass houses"...hope you're on top of your game, and (c) did you really get the feeling that people were confused by the comments? (aka the proverbial tree falling in the forest)

Anyway, I think it's obvious that the BUSS electrical components has probably created this trend.  Honestly, it wouldn't be the end of the world if that term got adopted.   I know, blasphemy...   

[peteski]

You can throw all the dictionaries in the world at me and it won't change the fact that I've never heard that word with that spelling used to describe a kiss.   

Anyway, I think it's obvious that the BUSS electrical components has probably created this trend.  Honestly, it wouldn't be the end of the world if that term got adopted.   I know, blasphemy...   

I didn't know the meaning of buss until I looked it up after seeing it being used for describing the electrical bus.  I have background in electronics and computers (who used to troubleshoot computer boards with many buses), and I was puzzled by seeing buss used in that context. I thought that I might have been using a wrong word all those years, so I looked it up. Well, bus is the correct word to use, and buss means ... a kiss.  I was probably as surprised as you were.  Now, I'm simply passing that information to others.

Anyways, aren't online forums a prefect venue for off-topic posts?  I'm just fulfilling that requirement.  You can all buss my  !
  Just kidding! 

[Denver Road Doug]

You can all buss my  !

Ha, now that made me laugh.   

[C855B]

Now I learned the "kiss" meaning of buss during the early years of court-order busing for school kids, while I was one of them there kids. There were debates in the press about whether we were "bussing" school children, or "busing" them. Were they riding "buses", or "busses"? It was the phonetic spellers versus the dictionary literalists, I think, because "buses" would normally be pronounced "BEW-zez" under standard phonetic rules, and "busing" would be "BEW-zing", similar to "abusing". Then the whole "buss is an archaic word meaning "kiss", so are we kissing the children?" argument went nuts. It was a grammatician's circus for a while.

Anyway, buss = kiss, and it's been in my vernacular since grade school.

[LV LOU]

 I was gonna post some useful info about stranded wire,but it'll just get lost..And I might make a typeo..

[DKS]

...like us LEOs not having a hissy fit over the media falsely using the term "clocked"when talking about RADAR.

[Peteski mode]
Sorry, but radar is clocking. Traditionally, "clocking" involves marking two points on the road and measuring the time it takes a car to traverse them. With radar, a device with a timer measures the shift in a series of radio pulses that bounce off a car. Hence, radar does indeed "clock" you; the distinction is only in the colloquial usage of the terms. After all, speed is always distance over time.
[/Peteski mode]

I was gonna post some useful info about stranded wire,but it'll just get lost..And I might make a typeo..

FTW

[Writhdar]

"...3M Scotch Lock IDC Suitcase connectors............they're removable..."     ----  don't the displacement blades cut through  the main wire? 

and wouldn't removing the suitcase connector be he same as simply cutting the bus it was connected to?  or am I missing something???

I use suitcase connectors for connecting feeders to the bus.  If, for any reason, I no longer need the feeder wires, I snip them off at the suitcase connector but I leave the connector on the bus

[DKS]

...don't the displacement blades cut through  the main wire?

They only cut partway through the sides of the insulation, and pinch the conductor.

[Writhdar]

Thank you

[robert3985]

"...3M Scotch Lock IDC Suitcase connectors............they're removable..."     ----  don't the displacement blades cut through  the main wire? 

and wouldn't removing the suitcase connector be he same as simply cutting the bus it was connected to?  or am I missing something???

I use suitcase connectors for connecting feeders to the bus.  If, for any reason, I no longer need the feeder wires, I snip them off at the suitcase connector but I leave the connector on the bus

Ask me how I know they're removable...not pleasant, but yes, they can be removed if necessary leaving a slightly pinched wire with two slots cut in the insulation on opposite sides.  You can even use them again if you're careful.  Cutting the feeders and leaving the IDC's on the sub-bus would be the quick and easy way to do it, but I was running out of the red 3M IDC's, had a deadline for an upcoming show and was just removing them temporarily to find a phantom short, having not used good practice and checked each connection at the time of installation as I now do religiously.  After finding the short (a bashed PCB throwbar on top of the layout section), I reconnected all of them, having to re-bend some of the metallic "blades" to ensure they were going to work properly.

If you look at the underside shot of the depot module above, you'll notice a very similar methodology of a sub-bus. The bundle along the top is the main layout bus wiring. Then the terminal block, which aids trouble shooting without clipping wires. Then off the terminal block come the sub-bus wiring which leads to all the individual feeders.

It's funny what concerns whom, you don't want mechanical terminal blocks but are ok with scotch locks. I am anal about soldering and shrink wrapping every connection but then use terminal blocks. My other bad practice is the jumpers between modules. I hate wiring that hangs down during transport, and don't want to have to tie up the ends. So I leave it short and put female plugs on each end of the module. Then I make one foot long jumpers with two male ends. Twice as many electrical connectors as needed, but I love pulling the jumpers off and tossing them in a bag, never to get snagged during transport.

Skibbe...interesting.  I never really viewed Scotch Locks as a "mechanical" connection but they surely are exactly that.    The twin-ended jumpers concept is something I've done in isolated instances, but I've never visualized doing that as general practice at the module ends.  From my way of looking at it, carrying a Box-O-Jumpers would just add another "something" to carry to the shows, and flipping up my long (extra long) power bus ends and folding a Velcro strap over them is just as quick.  Never ever had an end damaged in-transit, but I understand your logic.  Where I save a lot of time and aggravation during break-down and setup is in my integral folding legs, which just get folded down, locked in place and are always attached to my L-girder benchwork and get carried around along with the rest of the section/module.

Doug, see http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/buss, and http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bus

While a typo seems like a good excuse (from both posters), I often see people use buss while trying to describe a group of electrical conductors. It might be something to do with people with no electronic background thinking that a word describing a vehicle must not be the same as the one describing a group of electrical conductors. Some probably have also seen the electric Buss fuses, associating the double-s word with electricity, thus they incorrectly thinking that the double-s word must be correct for describing the electrical bus.

All I did was to show the correct usage of each word, and I got yelled at.   

Peteski, I gotta thank you for your correction way back when on one of my posts I was typing "buss" instead of the correct "bus".  I always wondered if "bus" or "buss" was correct, especially "buses" or "busses" but was too damned lazy to expend the effort to look it up.  "Buss" being a kiss has also been in my vernacular since Jr. High and to my eye, "buses" is not spelled correctly.  That's both the beauty and difficulty of the English language...it's chock-full-O'-exceptions!

Now, if only everybody would say "data" correctly rather than "dah-tuh"...which drives me bonkers!!

[kelleywpns]

Red / Green 22 AWG, Solid .. at least every 2'

[draskouasshat]

Just an FYI, solid wire in a certain gauge has lower resistance than stranded in the same gauge. 22awg solid does NOT = 22awg stranded. i would suggest going with solid due to the lower resistance. I am a signal construction foreman for BNSF and by rule, we figure stranded at roughly double the resistance for our cable runs. I would at least make your bus wires solid and have larger gauge stranded for the feeders.