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It was my intention in the Weissenfels project to put the train detectors with S88 interfaces as close as possible to the tracks. With that way of working one 8 piece train detector (Viessmann 5233) can be mounted on a segment with only a small number of single wiring needed to go to the tracks. The only problem is, how to connect all these decentralized mounted train detectors with S88 cables? The most expensive method is the one from Maerklin. Buy S88 long cables (2 meters) for many Euros per piece, but than still the maximum reach is only 2 meters. That was not enough for my layout. What to do?
The trick is to make my own S88 cables based on UTP cables used in the computerworld for Ethernet. From the 8 wires in a UTP cable (4 * 2 pairs) six are needed (3 * 2 pairs). For the connectors you can use connectors from DIL in Rotterdam of just small PCB connectors with a pin-distance of 2.54 mm.

How do you make them?

(Dutch...)

As indicated in the picture above you start of using a standard UTP cable with 4 * 2 wires. Per pair (blue + blue-white, orange + orange-white, brown + brown-white and green + green-white) these are twisted and all four pairs are also twisted. Hence the name Unshielded Twisted Pair or UTP. Three of the four pairs are needed so one can be eliminated by cutting of the ends. In the picture I have indicated not to use the brown + brown-white in this example. In order to finish the cable with the connectors, please be aware of the following: we need to make a straight cable and not crossed. That means that for example the blue-white cable needs to go from left-under to right under. Please check this by means of looking at a real small S88 cable.

With this way of working I made all my S88 cables. Personally I chose to use the DIL connectors with the following numbers:

• Housing 6 pins: DIL 05.58.106
• Contact (6 per housing needed): DIL 05.58.001
• Tool: DIL 08.90.1305