Model Train Journal

Adrian is, IMO, saving MTH's DCS bacon.

DCS is simple, if you're a NASA rocket scientist, that is.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/topic/wea ... 8285706612

George

"loading it with anything will throw the results into an unknown state."

Really?

This time next year we'll know their condition.

"closed"

I give Adrian a hell of a lotta credit. He waded into that mess and has attacked it by collecting data and behaviors and analyzing it. Given that he designs circuits for NASA at JPL, he's probably one of the few people that can make a functioning system out of it (by re-engineering it I think).

George

Makes me think of the ill fated Lionel electronic set from 1946 that was quickly discontinued. It took intense fiddling around to get it to work properly and you had to be a radio technician to understand what you were doing. If you just want to run trains and have fun with no headaches, you're better off buying the $1000 prewar pile ScaleCraft posted in another thread and expand on that rather then spending $1000 buying into MTH and DCS. It's better to put good money into bad money rather than bad money into bad money is all I'm saying. Waiting for Neil to chime in. He will tell you I am 1000 percent right and why.

The original Lionel Electronic set pretty much required a scope to adjust the tuning/frequency for each car. You COULD do it without a scope if you had the patience of a saint and had high quality/tolerance parts for when a component failed. The real killer for the set was a patent infringement suit brought on by a manufacturer of overhead cranes. They developed the same technology and got a patent for it before Lionel brought out the train set. Patent searches are tedious and I don't think Lionel's people caught on to the similarities until the crane company contacted them.

Re DCS. I don't believe it's "fixable" per se for large complex layouts without considerable rewiring to "smooth our" the communications issues. You are literally tying to build a data communications network on top of the layout power wiring. This isn't like DCC where the protocol is literally baked into the power, its just piggy backed on top of the 60/50 cycle power feed. Any noise on the line and the signal can get scrambled/lost. The "feature" of two way communication tends to make things worse as more bandwidth is wasted on retransmission. Easier to dump it and try something else.

chuck wrote:Re DCS. I don't believe it's "fixable" per se for large complex layouts without considerable rewiring to "smooth our" the communications issues. You are literally tying to build a data communications network on top of the layout power wiring. This isn't like DCC where the protocol is literally baked into the power, its just piggy backed on top of the 60/50 cycle power feed. Any noise on the line and the signal can get scrambled/lost. The "feature" of two way communication tends to make things worse as more bandwidth is wasted on retransmission. Easier to dump it and try something else.

THIS!!! About 1,000,000 X.

And the characteristics describe by Chuck means that each layout is unique and must be tuned individually. And without a scope. Or any idea what you are looking for.

No thanks. Direct. Simple. Reliable. - spelled TMCC.

George

chuck wrote:The original Lionel Electronic set pretty much required a scope to adjust the tuning/frequency for each car. You COULD do it without a scope if you had the patience of a saint and had high quality/tolerance parts for when a component failed.

I read somewhere -- probably CTT -- that the Lionel showroom was in the same building as a tv station and so Lionel's repair guy would take the Electronic set to the tv station and use their scope to keep it in tune.

chuck wrote:This isn't like DCC where the protocol is literally baked into the power, its just piggy backed on top of the 60/50 cycle power feed.

I was on the NMRA command control committee's listserve back in the 90s, when the standards and RPs were first being developed. The expertise on that committee was mind-blowing -- the committee had several EEs, the head of R&D at Volvo, a guy who managed technology development contracts for the military, etc. They were all active model railroaders with layouts they used to test stuff out on.

The expertise on that committee was mind-blowing -- the committee had several EEs, the head of R&D at Volvo, a guy who managed technology development contracts for the military, etc.

Yes. The DCC standard was pretty amazing. I wonder how much of its success was built on the developers interest in making something that would work versus making something that would make money.

A lot of criticism was aimed at Lionel for not adopting DCC. They did look at it, quite seriously. The extensive use of open frame motors, non prototypical operation (aka much high speeds), and operating physically large trains in relatively large spaces meant DCC wasn't suitable. DCC is used extensively in two rail "scale" O where none of those constraints exist, especially on club layouts.

I have TMCC but after several years of using it I went back to conventional control. I had no problem with it but could not get it to work (even with some really expert help) for operating non TMCC locos. Probably my fault. My TMCC equipped locos worked fine but I just felt that for my small layout it was too much trouble.
I read all of the above posts about DCS and if I had gone through all of that I probably would have changed hobbies. DCS seems to be non stop irritations.
I am not an operator or scale modeler. I like to turn on my trains and watch them run.

rogruth wrote:I have TMCC but after several years of using it I went back to conventional control. I had no problem with it but could not get it to work (even with some really expert help) for operating non TMCC locos. Probably my fault. My TMCC equipped locos worked fine but I just felt that for my small layout it was too much trouble.
I read all of the above posts about DCS and if I had gone through all of that I probably would have changed hobbies. DCS seems to be non stop irritations.
I am not an operator or scale modeler. I like to turn on my trains and watch them run.

Roger, I suspect your problems with TMCC originated with some non-functioning TPC300's. I couldn't get those same ones to work, either. And recently (last year), my own TPC400 and another TPC300 that I purchased would not operate properly. I think they all had the same problem. I don't think for an instant the problem was your own fault.

At one point during my year long attempt to make DCS work I was so demoralized that I didn't want to go into the basement and work on the layout. Every time I flipped on the power it was a roll of the dice.

George

Thanks, George. IMo many of us tried Command Control in some form just to be on the modern side of the hobby.
I have no research to show but it appears that there are still more modelers, in any scale, who run their trains conventionally.

If I had gotten into TMCC at a younger age I might have been a dedicated user of it.
But for me there are just too many buttons to push.

in any scale, who run their trains conventionally.

I wonder what would have happened if the LionChief/Bluetooth stuff had gotten out a little bit earlier. I was impressed by what you can do with the phone in terms of just running trains. It's not layout control, its just basic train control, F/N/R, whistle/bell/horn. Easy to set up, easy to control. No wiring at all! EZ/PZ.

chuck wrote:

in any scale, who run their trains conventionally.

I wonder what would have happened if the LionChief/Bluetooth stuff had gotten out a little bit earlier. I was impressed by what you can do with the phone in terms of just running trains. It's not layout control, its just basic train control, F/N/R, whistle/bell/horn. Easy to set up, easy to control. No wiring at all! EZ/PZ.

I don't have any LionChief but I have used it and it would suit me.
Having a different control for each loco would be just fine.
I don't run more than two at a time anyway. I have done three.
My layout is not large and I don't have a lot of locos so I don't
need the capability to run 99 locos. And I have no need to brag.
I am selling off some stuff but might try to get one. Someday.
I would like the one with remote couplers.

Someday.I would like the one with remote couplers.

Lion Chief Plus does that. LionChief Plus 2.0 even allows some control through TMCC/Legacy.

The dedicated remote works well enough. If you just need/want to basically run trains, LC Plus is the way to go. It's not even 1 wire hookup, it's zero wire hookup.

I was very pleasantly surprised with the PRR A5. It's not going to pull stumps but it doesn't need to. Just a really nice little yard switcher with forward and rear remote couplers. I'm going to keep my eyes out for similar products in that line. At $220 it was quite a bargain. Clearance sale, about 50% off original list. It's is not LC Plus 2, just LC Plus..

Roger, I would also endorse LionChief and its variants. We run it in the shop at Christmas time and for demos.

By emulating the R/C car & airplane control systems, Lionel really stole a march on DCS, even in their RailKing line. No layout control, but hand a kid a remote and 10 seconds later they're running trains. No star wiring, no complicated command sequences, no menus, no tin-foil hat. I can see how this might have given Mike another reason to pull the plug.

George