How to fit LED Lights to a Peco Inspection Pit (the Cheap Way!)

This weekend, I finally got around to fitting lights to my Peco Inspection Pit. Lighting in the Metcalfe Engine Shed on my current 'main' layout has always been a bugbear, and having seen the excellent Mie Depot (as seen on the Mie Depot at Carnforth Railway Station video) in action, I decided to give it a go.

A while back, I'd bought a string of LED Christmas Lights from Wilko, with the idea that they would make great lighting options for the layout. I paid something like 5 GBP (in the post-Christmas sale) for them, and although I've not counted them, similar products on Amazon have something like 100 lights on 10m of cable, so it's pretty good value for money.

Peco Inspection Pit Segment (Unpainted)

The Peco inspection pit kit comes in segments, which look something like the unpainted example in the photo.

Along the top, there are some clips that hold the rails - Peco supplies them in the pack, but I prefer to use my own rails - and in the center of each one is a drainage hole.

Usually there's a grate on it, but I decided to remove them (as you can see) to put the LED light in. Sadly, I forgot to take a photo before I started to experiment.

So you'll need to imagine that there's a grate over the hole in the segment pictured here!

Assembled, Painted Peco Inspection Pit

Assembled, painted, and with a buffer stop added, the inspection pit looks something like the one pictured on the right.

It's painted grey (something which doesn't come out very well on the photo) and has steps at each end. The drainage grates have all been drilled out to make way for the LEDs.

Depending on how long you make the pit, you'll have space for five or six lights. A five segment pit fits well into the Metcalfe engine shed, leaving space at the back for a buffer stop, as pictured.

The next step was to cut off some LED lights (a string of five, in this case) and push them through the holes. The end result is as pictured.

Fitting LED Lights to Peco Inspection Pit

It's not the best picture in the world, but you get the idea.

Luckily, I'd also been careful to drill the holes 'just right', so there's no need for any glue to hold the lights in place.

This is important for me, as I have one golden rule when making layouts - everything is as temporary as possible.

This means that the use of glue to fit lights (which can go pop at any moment!) is out of the question. 

It's also the reason why I don't solder rails together; a contentious point, but one that I believe is vital in keeping costs down!

So, with the lights fitted to the underside of the inspection pit, it was time to put it back in place, plug in the 12V transformer, and test the installation.

First off, I always test these things under low voltage - and as there are 4 lights, at 3V per LED, 12V is the maximum - and had found out two things. One, that operating the lights under anything less than the 3V they were rated at made them look extremely lacklustre, and two, they're pretty bright!

Undeterred, the first test fitting was duly photographed. 

Lights fitted to Peco Inspection Pit

There's a few bits and pieces in this photo, including a scratch built walkway, and some figures and equipment from the Bachmann Scenecraft range.

The gray area is a bit of plasticard cut to exactly fit within the walls of the engine shed, and the baseboard had a hole cut into it to receive the inspection pit.

I know that goes against my reuse philosophy, but in this case, I made en exception because holes are easily filled, covered over, re-used, or just plain hidden!

The four lights shown here operated for a while, and didn't generate extraneous heat, so I decided to try fitting teh shed over the top, and taking another photo or two.

It's only when you fit the whole thing together, and take photos, that any flaws become apparent.

So, firstly, let's look at the effect on an empty shed (i.e. with only the scenery, and no loco.)

Light from Peco Inspection Pit

To my mind, it's unrealistically bright, but you do get a sense of what the shed looks like inside.

In fact, the photo is a little dimmer than real life!

However, given that these LEDs are currently (until my 12V LED strip light turns up!) the only lighting in the shed, I think that the overall effect is reasonable, if not realistic.

However, things take a turn for the worse when a Class 37 is parked in in the shed...

Class 37 in the Shed

The issue is that these LEDs are quite directional and boxed in by the inspection pit, so there's less bleed than I expected from around the loco.

To deal with this, the next steps are several-fold.

First, I want to reduce the power of the lights so that they're not so unnaturally bright. Since I'm working from a 12V power supply, I'm going to wire an adjacent factory in series with the inspection pit lighting, and reduce the number of LEDs to two (per installation).

Then, I'm going to fit overhead lights to the shed (using a strip of 9 LEDs bought off eBay. Hopefully they will provide enough (and not too much!) light to make the whole thing come alive.

Lighting these elements is the last bit of work before adding scenery and ballasting, and still to come are some dwarf signals, and yard lamps, which will all need wiring in before ballasting can commence.

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