New remote control "analogue" system

[The Johnster]

I have no issues with phone touchscreens; the bigger the better of course but something as large as a pad would compromise the hand held aspect of the thing, and I’ll be keeping the old Gaugemaster in use alongside the app-based controller.  I’m happy, no, that’s not the right word, prepared to write off the cost if it is a failed experiment and not to my liking.  The crux of the issue is how well I can control my locos with it, in terms especially of smooth stops/starts and slow speed control. 
 

The Gaugemaster is a tough act to follow in this respect, and I will be happy if the new system equals it in performance.  I’m not expecting it to improve on the GM, but you never know...  Not the main point on my layout but the capacity to replace the various switches and their associated wiring, which my experience suggests are vulnerable to failure and will wear out over time, with integrated circuitry and touchscreen operation of such switching will be much more reliable and is a desirable feature.  My points are hand operated but I have such switches for isolating sections and the Dapol working signals, and will be investigating the possibility of replacing these with touchscreen operation.  
 

I will abandon the experiment if reviews reveal issues.  

[truffy]

4 hours ago, GWR-fan said:

Like Hornby Zero One,  E-link and live steam,  I really cannot see much happening here.  There will be an initial positive response but then waining interest will see the protocol not being updated by the company.

This was my concern when I first heard about it. A proprietary challenge to something that's already widely accepted. It'll all be over in five years' time.

[adb968008]

51 minutes ago, truffy said:

This was my concern when I first heard about it. A proprietary challenge to something that's already widely accepted. It'll all be over in five years' time.

Sadly I think your right.

 

Anything Proprietary has a habit of being disregarded, out-moded or just out and out damaged by competitors... anything from humble Zero 1 all the way upto Apple vs Google.

The only real way we’ll see change is by independent bodies, standards and open sourcing... but it needs one of two things... someone doing something for nothing, or everyone putting a £1 in the pot.. neither have a good track record in this country, and if someone does come up with something, immediately everyone wants £2 back out, before its even finished.

 

There are plenty of solutions possible out there, it just needs harnessing in a way that everyone adopts it. To me the easiest is the obvious.. wifi, supported by cordless battery charging and bluetooth speaker control... the standards are global household and cheap, would run on any existing layout track formation. Given how widely this is used outside our hobby already.. (my washing machine and bedroom lights use wifi)., it costs practically nothing to make now.
 

It just needs some open source software developing, with extensibility and compatibility guidelines to allow anyone to adopt it & customise it rather than being patented and becoming proprietary and niche... but it needs someone to do something for the good of others, and everyone making money in this game to put a £1 in the pot.

 

Edited April 13, 2021 by adb968008

[The Johnster]

And my phone will be obsolete by then as well, so if I want to keep using the system, the way to go will be to retain the old phone with the app installed specifically for this use, which will keep me going until the old phone dies, by which time I'll hopefully be circling the drain myself, and far too feeble to use screen sliders.  Not to worry, the old Gaugemaster will still be working; it's 40 years old already and shows no signs of getting tired.  Lovely piece of kit, and because there has been no real advance in DC tech for many decades, still pretty close to cutting edge...

 

I've now downloaded the app and run the tutorials, and have to say I'm not impressed with the way the Princess responds on the rolling road, but as this is a demonstration video I'll give it the benefit of the doubt for now.  But it's a concern and I'm glad now that I cancelled my pre-order; app control is a good idea but there is no point to it at all if it is as crude as this demonstration.  I'm not impressed with the jerkiness shown with the incremental accelleration and braking, but the controllable inertia effects may well be useful.

 

We'll see when the thing is available and reviewed, but reviews are not going to be that informative in my case; I have very specific requirements from my controllers, controlled slow speed and smooth stop/starts on a layout where a lot of shunting takes place being paramount and not always the primary concern of reviewers.  It may come down to me taking a punt.

 

Sound fx may be of some use if I can attach my own sound files, as I can use whistles, signal box bells, semaphore signal noises, and ambient noise like rain (the layout is set in South Wales), sheep, colliery spoil buckets, babbling brooks and so on.  A general impression of ths sort of bleakness and gloom us Welsh love so much, perhaps with a Male Voice Choir practising 'Jesu Lover of my Soul' or something suitably minor key in the background.

 

This is rooted in a day out with some chums to the North's Colliery system at Maesteg, still 100% steam operated, in 1969.  We came home via Cwmmer Afan on the bubble car, featuring a cab ride from a friendly Tondu driver, and deliberately missed the bus connection over the Bwlch to Treorchy to have a poke around the station and junctions.  It was a hot and humid day and the the inevitable thunderstorm broke at about 6 in the evening; the lads went and hid in the 'Refresh' but I am made of sterner stuff, enjoying the gloom of being in a big grey wet room with the cloudbase about 200 feet above my head, lights on in the buildings, and the noises; streams cascading off the mountains, sheep bleating at each other patheticall in complaint, water gurglesucking in pipes and drains, a 37 playing with some coal empties.  It made a big impression on me and I've always wanted to model the atmosphere of it; I have lighting that can replicate if fairly well.  Mean, Moody, Magnificent...

 

Of course, all this can be done with sound files and played through headphones anyway but it would be nice to have it all in one place, on one app.

Edited April 13, 2021 by The Johnster

[7013]

It is very early days yet and already its being consigned to history. I remember that a similar view was held when DCC first started and it was seen as a flash in the pan and would never catch on. 

If it develops and brings new people into the hobby using a system that is cheaper than DCC then lets embrace it and encourage it, not sit back in our metaphorical arm chairs smoking our pipes grumbling it will never catch on.

[Fen End Pit]

16 hours ago, cbrooks122000 said:

I must admit I wish someone would come up with a CAN system to control accessories, much better protocol and is a bidirectional communication system.

I, like many others have been using MERG CBUS for years. This is a CAN bus system and works really well to simplify wiring on my layout. I only every have a DCC bus to the track and CAN bus to every board. Control panels just have four wires to the layout (12v power and CAN).

David

[jpendle]

3 hours ago, cbrooks122000 said:

Does that mean you can get accessory decoders that work off CAN?

Roco don't have any yet. But other smaller European manufacturers may have stuff.

 

Regards,

 

John P

[jpendle]

Hi,

 

I don't know why this is being compared to DCC, the two are like chalk and cheese.

 

The Hornby system is more like the Lego "Powered Up" system. The main differences being that with Lego the trains have their own bluetooth receivers, so multiple trains can run on the same tracks, and that there is no accessory control in the Lego system.

 

Regards,

 

John P

[adb968008]

The problem with bluetooth is the devices used for control often can only have 1 bluetooth device enabled at a time... be it a speaker, a loco or an accessory... your iphone etc is likely to only support 1 bluetooth accessory at a time.

 

Wifi your limited by imagination ( and range) but I suspect for most layouts range isnt an issue.

 

of course bluetooth means you need a box that does all the communications in order to get that multi-use aspect.. that box.. proprietary of course... now if it had a set of APIs... alas... sigh.

 

Just imagine.. your loco with its own MAC address / NIC, could be registered to you (warranty, theft etc), could be updateable, be registered to your layout, have preset defaults (no cv tinkering, just a friendly web page), easy to update, then use it from your device at will, without need of £100 sound chips, and on any track...

 

now the super lazy.. rig up a camera to your layout, then operate trains, points etc from your armchair downstairs, or on the beach !

Edited April 13, 2021 by adb968008

[Stubby47]

As clever as the app may be, and with the inertia and braking features built in, I still feel the major difference is the ability to 'feel' the controller.  Using a hand-held walkabout (Gaugemaster in my case), I can use my thumb to control the speed whilst watching the loco.  My impression of the app is you'd have to watch the screen to ensure your finger was on the right control, so could not be watching the loco at the same time - there is no physical feedback.

[adb968008]

4 minutes ago, Stubby47 said:

As clever as the app may be, and with the inertia and braking features built in, I still feel the major difference is the ability to 'feel' the controller.  Using a hand-held walkabout (Gaugemaster in my case), I can use my thumb to control the speed whilst watching the loco.  My impression of the app is you'd have to watch the screen to ensure your finger was on the right control, so could not be watching the loco at the same time - there is no physical feedback.

Ipads etc do have inbuilt vibrate motors.

it just needs software to use them..

 

As your loco couples up, the device could “bump” for instance or slow vibrate for braking..

 

Just probably not in this version I reckon.

 

I hope this is the beginning of a good future, I think DCC is as outdated as TDK cassettes.

Edited April 13, 2021 by adb968008

[ruggedpeak]

1 minute ago, Stubby47 said:

As clever as the app may be, and with the inertia and braking features built in, I still feel the major difference is the ability to 'feel' the controller.  Using a hand-held walkabout (Gaugemaster in my case), I can use my thumb to control the speed whilst watching the loco.  My impression of the app is you'd have to watch the screen to ensure your finger was on the right control, so could not be watching the loco at the same time - there is no physical feedback.

Have the same issue with new cars which have touchscreens instead of knobs for the radio, heaters etc - not helpful for road safety. However for those of us who grew up in an analogue world of knobs and buttons and could do many things by touch, we have to bear in mind we now have several generations who have grown up with everything being via a touchscreen, so perhaps less of an issue?

 

The question for me is can the young'uns operate a touchscreen slider without looking at it - definitely a Darwinian selection issue if not.

[Patriot87003]

Can this thread be re-titled or updated to include a reference to the HM6000 and the other two HM6000 threads that seem to exist be locked or merged?

 

Regarding the HM6000, it looks like a good innovation by Hornby ... I see the main benefit being the ability to have a wireless walkabout controller (phone or tablet) ... ideal for walking about a layout/shed, perhaps a garden railway or living room train set ... or even a simple loop whizzing round a Christmas tree operated from the sofa!

 

I’ve had a search online to see if there’s any competition for this type of controller and have stumbled across the BlueRailways product ... http://bluerailways.co.uk/Index.aspx ... similar in some ways, also has the additional option to purchase a controller with proper knobs! Although that bumps up the price ... the app appears more technical, while Hornby’s App appears designed for a broader range of users (the sounds, also the layout builder).

 

My own layout is currently DC/analogue ... when designing approx 13yrs ago, I did allow the option of converting to DCC at some stage (by including DPDT switches that could be linked to a DCC controller). My control panel is fixed in position therefore non-walkabout and is based upon the cab-control method ... has 8 controllers/cabs, 6 of which connect with rotary switches that can power any of the 12 power districts/zones/sections of the layout.

 

 

I’m very tempted to buy and try the Hornby HM6000 ... and could install another couple of DPDT switches between cabs 1 and 2 and the rotary switches ... this could give me the ability to switch to ‘walkabout’ control using my IPad from anywhere within the shed (ideal for say different viewing angles, testing around the layout, filming clips for YouTube etc etc).

 

I also have quite a powerful soundbar and woofer in the shed ... and the thought of waking up the neighbours by using the HM6000 steam whistle via the IPad is quite tempting!!

 

I do echo the thoughts of a couple of the previous comments ... simply can’t beat the feel of a proper control knob! So having just found the BlueRailways site, that’s giving me another option to research and think about - although would be more expensive with the separate handheld controller, and wouldn’t disturb the neighbours!, 

 

 

 

 

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