Hotbox detector

[FThunder11]

In the July issue of MR there was an article about the hotbox detector on the guys layout. Has anybody else tried this? I just thought it was really interesting and I think I'm gonna try it.

[Anonymous]

I'm thinking about trying to have one that actually talks.

[FThunder11]

That would definatley be awsome.

[Anonymous]

Please tell me more? I would love to see this!,no seriously!
BNSFfan.

[ndbprr]

If I do one it will be a version of Community chest in Monopoly rather than another electronic device to keep working. There will be a series of cards in a holder and every time you pass the spot you pull the front card. 99 out of 100 will say all green the hundredth will indicate a hot box and the axle number so the car can be set out.

[easyaces]

Does'nt MRC have a back-ground noise generator that puts out city and country noises? It would be neat if they could incorporate a talking hotbox detector into that or something that would trip and talk when a train goes by. Only other thing I can think of is if you recorded from one over a scanner frequency(161-162Mhz) is where I hear them in my area and they do broadcast to the lead loco on trains after passing a detector.

[Anonymous]

There's an article over on railroad.net about a defect detector that plays a recorded message when it senses a train passing over:
http://www.railroad.net/articles/modelrailroading/detectors/index.php

I don't think it would be that hard to set up a dynamic defect detector. Just use an old PC with a speech synthesizer (since that is what the real ones use anyway), and have it play a message when a train passes over, using a random number generator to determine if there's a hotbox. With some work, it could even count axles, though I'm not sure how, maybe magnets or reflective tape on all axles. How do the real ones count axles, out of curiousity?

Bonus points if you get yours to broadcast over radiowaves (just not on the same frequencies as the real ones!)

[Anonymous]

good ideas. But i don't have the july issue yet[:(]