My question may be rather unique: I plan to set up part of my layout for continuous running with automatic switching. I want to run train A (passenger) toward route #1, and train B (freight) toward route #2. There is no problem detecting a train with any of a dozen types of detectors, but I can't think of a good way to detect a specific train. I considered using 1 magnet on a loco or car for train A and 2 magnets for train B, and a logic circuit to count the pulses, but this seems a bit complicated. Also, I'm not too sure about the reliability of magnets & reed switches.
Anybody have any ideas. Please e-mail replies as well as posting, since I don't get a chance to visit here often.
DC or DCC? Actually, I think the techniques used in progams liek RR&Co could work with either. You just need to know the starting posiiton, after that, the software keeps track of the trains and knows which train is which. It's all very effective and reliable so long as you don;t randomly lift a train off the track and set it down elsewhere ont he layout, and much less complex than schemes which broadcast the address of the loco to each detection section. Cheaper, too. There is also the Uhlenbrock LISSY system which uses IR transmitters and detectors so that each train broadcasts its unique address as is passes over the sensor. I still can;t see putting this all over the layout, rather have one sensor at the exit from staging so the system knows which train is leaving, after that the train tracking ability can follow the train around the layout.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
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gbcutterMy question may be rather unique: I plan to set up part of my layout for continuous running with automatic switching. I want to run train A (passenger) toward route #1, and train B (freight) toward route #2. There is no problem detecting a train with any of a dozen types of detectors, but I can't think of a good way to detect a specific train.
Then I would also think there would be some RFID technology that could be used. You know that kind of stickers that stores use on clothing tags to sense as they enter and leave the dressing rooms. Our club considered having one of those for each car so it wouldn't be so hard to keep the cars coordinated with the computer contolled way bill system.
The only problem with RFID is that even teh short range detectors are kinda too long drange when scale distances are involved - ie, even with HO track spacing, a detector can sense cars with RFID tags in an adjacent track.
I plan to run DC only, with my own relay-logic program. RR&Co has a nice system but an extra computer just to run my simple layout would be overkill. But I didn't think of RFID. I could control the whole system (2 trains, 2 routes) with only a single RFID sensor at each end to tell the system which train is leaving the station and how to set the turnouts. I plan to run any staging or assignments in manual mode. I would not have to worry about cross-detection since both RFID sensors would be at different ends of the layout. Unfortunately the details of the LISSY system are only in German, but I am sure I can find some sort of RFID system that would run a simple relay-logic controller. Thanks for all the ideas and advice.
I've set up magnets and reed switches to light up some lights on my control panel. Specifically, I have two subway trains, and I need to report when one of them reaches the end of a hidden staging track, and which direction it's going when it does that. Because these are fixed consists, I simply arranged the magnets so that the end cars of the subway would trigger the end-of-track light, and the second car would trigger the direction light. If it happens that the train backed in, then this light would not come on.
The magnet switches are pretty reliable. If your application is always going to be passenger vs. freight, putting magnets in a couple of the passenger cars and using those to throw turnouts would probably work. Use additional reed switches after the passenger train passes the turnout to throw it back to the "freight" path.
Get a package of Miniatronics reed switches and magnets. The HO scale ones are a bit stronger, because the car bodies of HO rolling stock are higher and thus further from the reed switches. A package is only about $9, so you can afford to buy them just to play around, and it's no big deal if they don't work.
These are momentary-contact reed switches, by the way, not the more expensive "latching" kind.
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