Repurposing Old Yard Panels

I began my layout about 1990, in pre-DCC block contol days. On top of that, I was mostly using twin-coil switch machines recycled from earlier layouts. After relocating to our current home in 1993, I at least stopped buying new twin coil switch machines, eventually replacing all of the existing ones with Tortoises. In 2012, I coonverted to DCC, but it was still fed from an NCE PowerCab via the existing block wiring. Several years after that, I bit the bullet, added an SB5 booster, and replaced the block wiring with a 14 AWG power bus.

The result has been old local switch panels still in place, often with the old push buttons and toggles also still in place but no longer connected to anything. I've begun a project to bring these up to date, removing the old analog hardware, adding labels corresponding to the current DCC accessory addresses for the switches to the track schematic, and making some kind of use for the remaining holes where the old block toggles used to be:

This is the West Zenith local panel. Part of its adaptive reuse is as a place to mount JustPlug hubs for structure lighting. While the track schematic is still useful as a way to locate the new switch addresses for DCC accessory control, vthe only remaining control hardware on the board is two push buttons for Kadee 309 electric uncouplers. However, since I removed the 16 volt AC wiring that used to control the Tortoises, I've had to start a new project to restore it to the Kadee 309s.

Things are thus still a mess, and I never got around to painting the fascia. Someday. . .