A club member and I were programming consists on our club layout at the NTS. We apparently hit the program consist button at the same time and received the same consist address (125). We finished at about the same time and we were controlling 2 trains on the layout from 2 different controllers, but not at the same time. Has a similar situation happened to anyone else?
While this isn't a NCE DCC system - we had similar situation using a Digitrax system and we had to do a restart to the Command Station.
Everyone had been running prior to the restart - upon stating the system was back up - everyone began reacquiring their trains.
With everyone pressing the enter button at the same time - many found they were running engines that were not the ones showing on the Throttle display!
Everyone was a bit confused as to why this was happening.
I told everyone to just Dispatch the engines again and then reacquire the engines
BUT this time - wait a bit as I would tell each Operator to do their engine and I would tell the next one and so on - Problem was gone!
I guess if the Enter buttons are pressed at the exact same time (and what are the chances of that happeing?) the Command Station just asigns the first engine to the last Throttle reporting!
It hasn't happend again (that I know of) in over 10 years of OPs Sessions!
BOB H - Clarion, PA
We've had overlapping consist number problems happen enough on a friend's (NCE) layout that he started using consist cards with pre-printed consist numbers to track and control which consist numbers are in use. These follow the loco cards.
Since the process on his railroad is that a consist tying up at a terminal nearly always gets broken down to its individual locos, we build and break down consists more often during an operating session than most people would.
If you only make up consists at one terminal, the chances of overlapping consist numbers are practically zero. My friend's layout has four engine terminals where consists can be made up or broken down, so on his railroad, the chances increase significantly.
He REALLY hates it when there are consisting problems. Or any other DCC issues, for that matter.
-Fritz Milhaupt, Publications Editor, Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc.http://www.pmhistsoc.org
Have you assigned discrete cab numbers to each cab?