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RC layout not RC loco


sir douglas
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i'm sure that somebody, somewhere might have already tried this.

 

With RC you have the freedom of not being restricted by wires but you can be restricted by battery life and on "normal" system you dont have battery restriction but you do have handheld controller cable length. In a regular RC set up the receiver is in the loco and the wiring of the layout is irrelevent but what if you cant fit the equipment and battery inside your loco especially if its a smaller one or without a tender. This gave me the idea a few days ago of a merge of the 2 systems, what if the receiver on the layout not the loco so you dont have to add the equipment to the locos and this removes the restriction of the controller cable with an RC controller. there is no Battery life on the loco as it is on regular track power, the layout is powered by mains as normal so no battery there but of course the controller does have a battery. the main advantage i would like to try is having a wireless controller without changing the locos in anyway

 

im thinking of trying this out one day on a layout im building in our club as an optional extra but will still be wire for a conventional controller. it will be quite a learning curve having not worked with RC before

 

 

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Probably the easiest way to wireless control of a layout from proprietary gear is by exploiting a DCC system with a wireless handset. But the twist is you don't put the decoders in the locos, but connect one per track section, all of them wired to a decoder bus. (Point decoders can go on the same bus.) You lose much of the capability of DCC, but don't have to do anything to the locos, and then have a wireless handset or handsets to drive with.

 

A facility that would be very useful would be easy setting up and breakdown of 'lash ups', worth finding out which system excels in this department, if this was the chosen method.

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Having RC on the layout gives you the flexibility to walk around "untethered" but does not address the issues of wiring, poor pick-up and general unreliability of a 2-rail system.  I have "touchcab" on my phone which talks to my Lenz DCC - having the locos fitted with DCC means that they are always working on full layout voltage, which does address pick-up issues to a large extent - but if I could have sound and lights as I can with DCC, and the haulage capacity of the loco running from track voltage, I would definitely move towards RC with the receivers in the loco.

 

Before anyone says "but you can buy that", I have, and the performance is disappointing.  See my Duchess thread for videos and more details!

 

There are other solutions coming onto the market, I will experiment further in due course.

 

atb

Simon

 

 

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Ok, so you want to use a basic 2 channel RC combo, but instead of driving servos you want a reversible 12 V  to the track. 

 

This converts the 1-2 mS pulse that normally drives a servo to an output that will drive DC trains. Channel 1 gives speed, channel 2 forward/reverse. 

 

It's an old circuit , but all the bits should be readily available. 

 

1183770564_RCcontroller2copy.jpg.da92c656be5c3c236c1825fc274731a6.jpg

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It’s exactly the same task as is done by an RC system controlling a typical garden railway battery loco, model boat, or model car so, if you don’t want to build something from scratch yourself, you ought to be able to use an off-the-shelf system that is sold for that purpose. The things to watch being the voltage and current ratings of the controller (the gubbins that usually goes in the loco), which will be designed to match typical battery voltages and motor ratings used by 16mm/ft garden railway people, model boat and car enthusiasts etc.

 

If I was to do this, I would avoid some of the very bespoke garden railway systems, and stick with generic kit, because it is cheaper and more freely available, and isn’t reliant on one small manufacturer for its future.

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We have an Aristocraft Basic Train Engineer controller with works in the way described. Available quite cheaply, I think we paid approx £20 for ours. They are no longer made but can still be picked up quite easily

 

Included with some of their train sets (and sometimes available split from sets on ebay) they are designed for use in the garden, it's a DC controller which is controlled by a hand held remote control. We only run one train at a time anyway & it means the trains can be controller from anywhere in the garden

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I thought about suggesting that, but the cheap little ones are often very low voltage and current, and I was worried that giving it 12V or more, then asking it to deliver a couple of hundred mA might cause a flashover or burn out.

 

The cheap RC car gubbins is definitely up to being used in a small battery loco, and slightly more expensive ones (c£20+) can be stripped and used to control LGB locos; a pal of mine has done it.

Edited by Nearholmer
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I am in the process of building an Arduino based wireless control system for a second DC club layout. The hand units look like this

index.php?action=dlattach;topic=530126.0

 

 

and the base unit just controls power to the track in the same way that a wired controller would.

 

The Arduinos use nRF24L01+ wireless transceivers. The hand units are powered by a pair of AA alkaline cells and they seem to last a very long time. And it only takes a few seconds to replace them if needed.

 

...R

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I have been contemplating this same arrangement for my planned layout.

I intend a simple shunting trackplan that could be powered from a single pair of wires (It wont because of reliability risks, but it gives a context of complexity). The locos will be very small OO9 Wren's, simplex's etc that will prove challenging to squeeze a reciever or Dcc chip. But I wanted to be able to operate from front or rear of the layout and with the controller in hand as per my rc trucks. I also intend some moving machinery diaramas on the layout and control of the couple of points.

 

Being experienced with the Deltang transmitters and recievers. Some of the more complex loco recievers would be sufficient I think to drive all my functions and I could built a portable wireless reciever with the cab control track diagram and extra switches included. 

Whilst it would be more expensive than a cheap controller and some buttons, I think it will be cheaper than buying a full Dcc system, with the ability to customise it easily to my requirements (I can solder but I cant programme). 

I think your Idea works for a low complexity layout. But I think it becomes cumbersome and challenging if you exceed 1 transmitter / reciever set. 

 

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This idea is basically using radio control gear to replace the DC controller. There are R/C receivers that have sufficient amps, at least 3 amps so that should not be a problem. what you must ensure is that there is excellent short circuit protection of the receiver as a layout short will fry the chip. 

 

The R/C receiver can take its power from a DC power source with a regulated voltage. The 'controller' ,they are called 'Tx' in RC jargon, still has a battery but these last a lot of hours.

 

You can't merge this with a DC controller, it is either or. You can't have both switched on at the same time.

 

A Deltang simple Tx kit would cost about £24 and a receiver 13V 3A about £40 with a 18V option about £50

 

You would have to install your own short circuit protection

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13 hours ago, otherplanet said:

I think your Idea works for a low complexity layout. But I think it becomes cumbersome and challenging if you exceed 1 transmitter / reciever set. 

 

I'm not sure whose idea you are referring to.

 

The first system I built uses 4 hand controllers in place of 4 wired controllers - people were always getting the long wires tangled as they walked around in the centre of a large oval layout.

 

The second system will have two hand controllers.

 

In both cases the track is wired for traditional cab control.

 

The microchips (h-bridges) used to modulate power to the tracks were chosen because they include short-circuit protection. The chips (Infineon TLE5206) for the second system provide fault notification and this will be fed back to the hand unit.

 

...R

Edited by Robin2
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20 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

The cheap RC car gubbins is definitely up to being used in a small battery loco, and slightly more expensive ones (c£20+) can be stripped and used to control LGB locos; a pal of mine has done it.

 

thats just what im thinking of doing as i dont have any experience with RC and have very little knowledge of electrics such as i dont understand anything at all of the diagram posted above by Dave, sorry

 

with the regular controller compatability that i mentioned, i was thinking along the lines of if i were to croc clip in the power from the reciever to the track feeds from the controller with the controller not plugged in that would be fine, then this the reciever can taken off and the controller plugged in. or for a more permanent set up have a switch to go between them, of course the 2 systems cant be wired in side by side

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On 02/09/2019 at 10:41, sir douglas said:

i'm sure that somebody, somewhere might have already tried this.

 

With RC you have the freedom of not being restricted by wires but you can be restricted by battery life and on "normal" system you dont have battery restriction but you do have handheld controller cable length. In a regular RC set up the receiver is in the loco and the wiring of the layout is irrelevent but what if you cant fit the equipment and battery inside your loco especially if its a smaller one or without a tender. This gave me the idea a few days ago of a merge of the 2 systems, what if the receiver on the layout not the loco so you dont have to add the equipment to the locos and this removes the restriction of the controller cable with an RC controller. there is no Battery life on the loco as it is on regular track power, the layout is powered by mains as normal so no battery there but of course the controller does have a battery. the main advantage i would like to try is having a wireless controller without changing the locos in anyway

 

im thinking of trying this out one day on a layout im building in our club as an optional extra but will still be wire for a conventional controller. it will be quite a learning curve having not worked with RC before

 

 

Back to the beginning, Various manufacturers have made R/C controls in the past.    The advantage of track power R/C control  on an indoor layout is you don't trip over the wander lead, disadvantage is probably that great big aerial sticking up .   Outside it is probably a  waste of time as you still have to clean the track on board battery and R/C makes so much more sense.   However you will lose signal so the set up needs to continue at the same speed rather than stop as per most R/C.   If you are doing it DIY my planned solution never actually worked up was a motor driven throttle.  The R/C drove a motor which operated the controller knob through reduction gear so you simply pressed right to go faster to the right and left to slow down, stop and go back. The controls I intended to use were Morley with centre off knob so if you wanted to go back could but actually stopping was difficult.    It morphed into on-board battery R/C and was absolutely overtaken and made to look Pre historic by Red Arrow etc but its well worth resurecting.  The R/C was from cheap R/C cars around £5 which had 3 or 5 available frequencies.   In many ways it was more realistic than DC/DCC as you had to increase the power slowly, (if you had the gearing right)   As I said I never worked it up but as it is a module which plugs into a Morley with a DIN plug, and the parts were a centre off  pot (£2) and R/C car (£5) and some odd gears and plastic Chinese noodle pot (£6) the cost was far from prohibitive.  And Fun and different in this age when we wait for Bachmann to bring out Black 5  no 45020 in LMS Pink with yellow spots instead of painting one ourselves.

Edited by DavidCBroad
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