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Ethernet For Model Trains?
RiscIt writes: "This technology has been around for some time ... Ethernet-protocol-like networking for model trains. LocoNet was created by DigiTrax. It is meant to work with their DCC systems, which can control trains and most everything else on a layout without hundreds of toggle switches. DigiTrax has posted a basic description of the technology as well as the protocol spec in pdf format. Very cool. I'm not about to go buy a gigabit switch for that train under the Christmas tree, however." Not sure why everything is underlined on that site, but I'm sure the headache will fade. Considering the influence of model trains on early computers (as related in Hackers and other books), this is one of the coolest instances I've heard of turnabout-is-fair-play.
And ignore the issue completely. Convert to PDF, HTML, .rtf, ASCII, etc.
Check the user info before you reply or moderate - everything qpt writes is a troll. "A Sinister Legacy" or "It's Too Much" are good examples.
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No problem. Just head to the nearest rail museum, enroll as a volunteer, and you get to play with REAL TRAINS (at 12 inches to the foot scale) for (gasp!) FREE...
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The posted story gives the impression that LocoNet actually runs the trains. That's not true. The protocol on the track is DCC (Digital Command Control), created by Lenz Electronics of Germany and donated to the NMRA. It's a broadcast-only protocol with currently no feedback mechanism, though work is under way on that. LocoNet is the communications mechanism between the booster that sends the signal onto the track, and the hand throttles that control the trains. That one was developed by DigiTrax.
"Why is this, other than a cool factor like IP over carrier pigeons, so terribly neat? "
.|` Clouds cross the black moonlight,
It's so you can crack terrible puns about there being too much traffic on the 'Net, or using round-robin DNS, or having a token-ring LAN.
~Tim
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~Tim
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Rushing on down to the circle of the turn
For plug-n-play locomotives, DCC decoders are installed by way of a drop-in replacement for the stock light board. For other locos, cutting away a small section of the frame may be required. The smallest decoder available from Digitrax measures 36 x .575 x .16 inches.
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That's not to say that having network access on a commuter train wouldn't be cool, but isn't that what the Ricochet is for?
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Check the mailing list home page for subscription information.
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Just recently a guy came out with a Linux based Loconet monitor that displays the packet data. Basically a packet sniffer for Loconet. He's now expanding it to generate its own Loconet packets. Once done, he can expand it into a control program. I will say that he's released his source so far and it's looking pretty good.
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With DCC, you run a single wiring bus under the layout and tap the track feeders into it. I can use one handheld control to make the trains move and throw turnouts, among other things.
Further, with DCC and a computer, I can create a CTC (centralized train control) board much easier, and with fewer wires, than with block control.
DCC may not be your thing but, personally, I prefer controlling the trains and not managing the track.
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It allows for more systems to be on the net, which runs over the rails, without packet collision. Because dcc often uses a protocol similar to RS-485 one of the problems is that, if too many engines are on the track, the latency climbs. RS-485, and most dcc implementations, use polling to communicate. Therefore, each device on the net slows down the communications for all the devices. This system seems to avoid that problem.
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Is this article talking about a train network architecture based on ethernet or do they actually have train cars with NIC cards and IP addresses that are part of a LAN? I think it's the former, but wouldn't the latter be cool?
Its actually close to the latter. Each locomotive has a controller card in it that picks up the digital signals and controls the locomotive. You program each control card with a unique number. Then you set your throttle controller to that number and control the trains. By changing the number on the throttle you can control multiple locomotives.
Its pretty much the same for other items, such as switches, that can be DCC controlled.
Several of the programs I mentioned in my previous post about the SRCP project are available under the GPL. erddcc, the DigitalDirekt server, runs under Linux. See http://www.der-moba.de/~vogt/DDL/ for more information.
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Cthulhu fhtagn!
Once we get our model train sets hooked up the internet, bill gates will try to take control of them and lay down proprietary gauges. The world is simply not read for .RAIL
You talk about "real"... well, unless you spend thousands on outrageously priced powerpaks and locos, you can't crawl into your station at a scale .5 mph like you can with DCC. You also can't run multiple trains on the same track (same block as well) in the opposite directions either. Simple anolog control is just that - simple. You can hardly do anything "real" on a model layout with anolog/block wiring.
Don't rule out DCC just because it can do everything for you. You don't have to let it. Just let it do the basic things that you couldn't before.
What better way to test redundent saftey designs?
If the train looses computer connection, do you kick in a safty AI? or just shut it all down?
Could you get a machine between your controller box and the train to relize there has been a computer error and deal with it by slowly brining the trains into the next station? Now that I think about it, figuring out how to handle this with while minimilizing the 'passengers' inconvience would be far more challenging then setting up the system.
I choo choo choose you -RW
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I think this is one Britain should leave to everyone else... how about they figure how to stop their trains falling off the tracks every day first.
Wow, someone who knows the difference between career and careen. I'm impressed.
http://www.ntrak.org
For those who want to do model trains but feel they don't have the space or money for a full blown train setup.
Modular train setups where several dozen scale miles of track are routinely set up and dozens of trains run simultaneously with sometimes a hundred or more cars in the consist.
Check it out.
42 - So long and thanks for all the fish.
In a token ring network, isn't the token kind of like the model train? Traveling around and around the network, restricted to the cable/tracks.
Keeping
Gives new meaning to the phrase 'packet collision'. Sorta the Addams Family approach to network management.
And so it goes.
The thingis that you are not controlling the trains, but rather controlling the track! DCC copntrolled trains 'know' what direction they are facing on the track. The direction and speed are not controlled by track voltage and polarity. And yes, DCC does allow trains to make (realistic) engine noises, control signals, switch on lights in carraiges, smoke making devices (so that real smoke comes out smoke stacks). Before you rubbish this go out and look at a DCC setup. Once you have been a train driver being a track driver is not the same. It is really cool when a loco takes a grade and you hear the engine work harder, more smoke comes out the stack some of them can even have a little red light that comes on and varies in intensity to emulate the fireman stoking the boiler!
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...the British version runs Windows 98. Means that the trains keep crashing, you see...
This would make a great deal of sense on the NE Corridor, Washington to Boston, and on commuter trains.
The cheapest way would probably be a wireless lan. Put a wireless router in each car that could contact stations along the right of way, and then route the packets to wireless lan cards in the laptops, either customer provided, or rented by the train crew.
While this has not necessarily something to do with LocoNet, it's interesting nevertheless...
Some guys from the german model rr newsgroup de.rec.modelle.bahn have designed a protocol and several programs to control trains over a TCP/IP network. The project includes the protocol SRCP, clients to control your trains and turnouts (some with graphical interfaces), daemons to control central units for several digital train systems (Märklin, NRMA with LocoNet or XBus) and even a daemon which turns your computer itself into a multi-protocol command center - you only need a simple booster to supply power and data to the tracks. The project is located here. Sorry, german only - use the fish...:-)
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Cthulhu fhtagn!
When I was knee-high to a grasshopper (always wanted to say that), my dad and I built a GIANT trainset in our garage -- much to my mother's great dismay. For this monstrosity, there were at least ten separate track lines that all converged in the 'train yard' that lay on the third level, which my father dubbed, Olympus. To get power and control to all of these tracks, he built a giant control pad full of switches and, to me at least, wholly indecipherable labels.
/. makes leaps and bounds in usability you can complain.. until then, enough with the trolling.
A fairly simple interface via a serial port would probably work well for this. I fail to see how the ethernet protocol benefits a closed circuit system like a train. Why is this, other than a cool factor like IP over carrier pigeons, so terribly neat?
BTW, I liked the underlines for each topic. When
Rami
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Then I went to my family friend's house and saw the 7yr old's setup in their basement.
If you haven't been in the model railroading scene for the last 15-20 years (like myself), you would not believe what they can do today. Not only can the powerpack control several trains at once, but they can all run at different speeds and NOT by the voltage of the track; they regulate their speed by themselves (radio controlled) on a full voltage track! In addition, the modern marvels of 16-bit sound chips has added a new realism to railroading that blows me away. Granted, when I was younger I had a plastic billboard model that actually was a whistle when you pressed a button, but these things you can press a button and have the clickety-clack of the tracks going on.
There were a couple other things that amazed me, but I was impressed enough just by being able to run several trains at once without juggling different power packs.
>sigh<
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Never hit your grandmother with a shovel, for it leaves a bad impression on her mind...
Doesn't ethernet have a few too many collisions? I think token ring might be safer...
I can just see it now...
Telnetting to the caboose to tell it to slow down. .choo TLD.
A web server, complete with webcam, running from the engine.
ICANN introducing the
[from the mind of the geek wife of a model railroader]
Do these ethernet installed trains play streaming audio - that way you could hear mobile phones ringing continuously, cries of 'I'm on the train', announcements describing in tortuous detail the entire contents of the buffet carriage, and the sounds of muffled screams as customers (who were quite happy being referred to merely as passengers) have their lives interrupted once again with an annoucement listing every station the train has ever been through. If you put your head in the right place you can even get all of this with astounding doppler-shift as the train careers past you at a scale 30mph on the verge of shattering another broken rail as it rounds that bend... What excitement.