well filled baps The Sheep Chronicles : These are the adventures of a Sheep, the Works Forecat and Naughty George,

[woodenhead]

54 minutes ago, Captain Kernow said:

Plus the fact that some of us simply don't have the kind of brain that understands the necessary alchemy to achieve DCC success. For me, DCC will forever remain a closed book...

I don't think it's alchemy but I think the decision to go DCC is whether it will add or detract from your enjoyment of what you model.  If you've been DC all your life and you're not feeling constrained by it in what you want to achieve with a model then there is no impetus to change.

 

I did it because I'd had enough of my pitiful attempts at a control panel, a pathetic reason really given I could happily wire up the layout with lots of sections (especially in the fiddlyard to stack trains), I could do the point motors with polarity switching, I even wired the railway so I could use two controllers anywhere on the layout, but I could not make a control panel beyond a black box with lots of holes drilled in it to save my life.  So when I went back to a terminus layout I thought I'd give DCC a go and bought some cheap chips from Rails.  Now I don't need a control panel as I have a piece of paper and an NCE Powercab to control all my locos and points.  I also gave sound a try as I really wanted a class 25 warbling away in my station.

 

But my impetus for DCC was my fear of the control panel

Edited March 18 by woodenhead

[John Besley]

I went for DCC in the end (I should have thought ahead with my wiring when Exhill was DC) simply because as a fire alarm engineer I enjoy the technical challenges and wanted to add background sound - birds, machines etc and sound in my locos to add the final touch

[PaulRhB]

1 hour ago, Captain Kernow said:

Plus the fact that some of us simply don't have the kind of brain that understands the necessary alchemy to achieve DCC success. For me, DCC will forever remain a closed book...

To be honest that’s mostly down to much of the writing and enthusing being for things many people simply don’t need. The pursuit of every bell and whistle masks that it’s actually quite good at some very simple things too. I don’t need to worry about section switches at a show as I just put them all to on. It’s surprising what a difference that makes to reducing tiredness especially on my modular layouts that would need multiple switches for cab control. The second advantage to me is control of sound, which took a lot of research to find the whys and wherefores, and I just want the automatic chuffs, a whistle and flange squeal plus I like having a separate brake which makes it much more like actually driving a real loco. I simply don’t use announcements, spirax valves, seagulls, door slams etc so probably 60% of the sounds on most chips are redundant on mine 😆
I get people selling the merits of automation etc and they simply don’t get I don’t want to automate things I just want to run, (shhh play 😉 ), trains. I think the only thing I’ve really embraced as an extra is route control of multiple points as I find that reduces thinking and tiredness like section switches. 
 

If it provides an advantage you can use the simple end of DCC otherwise if you’re happy with dc’s abilities then keep going! 😀

Edited March 18 by PaulRhB

[Captain Kernow]

3 hours ago, PaulRhB said:

To be honest that’s mostly down to much of the writing and enthusing being for things many people simply don’t need. The pursuit of every bell and whistle masks that it’s actually quite good at some very simple things too.

I've no doubt that you find it simple enough, Paul, but I have trouble understanding basic DC electrics, never mind DCC.

 

It's like other stuff too, such as new software. I really need to get some trackplans drawn up in Templot in the near future, but I know that I will never get my mind round the software and I also begrudge the (inevitable) waste of time, trying to understand it. I'd rather be cutting and gluing bits of plasticard etc....

 

[Tim Dubya]

13 minutes ago, Captain Kernow said:

It's s like other stuff too, such as new software. I really need to get some trackplans drawn up in Templot in the near future, but I know that I will never get my mind round the software and I also begrudge the (inevitable) waste of time, trying to understand it. I'd rather be cutting and gluing bits of plasticard etc....

 

 

 

I'm the same with Templot tbh, I only "draw" crossovers and single points to be printed as track templates.  A whole layout, even the small one I'm planning (in my head), feels daunting to create in Templot.

[PaulRhB]

13 minutes ago, Captain Kernow said:

I've no doubt that you find it simple enough, Paul, but I have trouble understanding basic DC electrics, never mind DCC.

 

It's like other stuff too, such as new software. I really need to get some trackplans drawn up in Templot in the near future, but I know that I will never get my mind round the software and I also begrudge the (inevitable) waste of time, trying to understand it. I'd rather be cutting and gluing bits of plasticard etc....

 

I don’t find it simple 😆 I had a right battle with learning DCC but I wanted certain things from it. A lot of it is unnecessarily complicated in its literature or indeed total lack of it. 
I still find bits of it frustrating and rely heavily on the net to find answers. 
I get the time learning things when it could be spent on getting stuff done. 

[Donw]

I first tried DCC about 20 years ago. I bought a lenz compaq and a couple of decoders and fitted them in to a loco and the steam railmotor. I connected it up to a yard of track an had a go. I could have both on the track and shuffle them up and down quite independently brilliant. 

In my opinion most people have more difficulty with working out where to arrange section breaks for DC.

I have over the years learnt a lot more but I buy a Zimo sound decoder to suit the loco fit it in (kit built locos dont have a built in socket unless you fit one , which is quite easy.  Other than changing the number there is no need to do anything more unless you want to.

Wiring up for DCC is much easier you just connect droppers to the bus wires. Once it is done you can forget having to think about which section switches to throw or whether one is in use by another loco. You can just think like a railwayman.

I fully accept that if you have a dozen locos or more buying sound chips it will be costly but for the CAMEO type layouts with just a few locos the benefits of being able to have a couple of locos freely moving about makes a real difference.

 

Don

[Siberian Snooper]

5 hours ago, Tim Dubya said:

 

 

I'm the same with Templot tbh, I only "draw" crossovers and single points to be printed as track templates.  A whole layout, even the small one I'm planning (in my head), feels daunting to create in Templot.

 

Take it one step at a time, draw your 1st plain line track from end to end and then add the 1st turnout or crossover, just a couple of clicks these days. If it's a crossover, you can extend the track in either or both directions. If you want to add another turnout you split the plain track from the original turnout, you can then put a new turnout in the new bit of plain line, repeat as required.

 

It's been a lot easier to make diamonds, single or double slips and even tandem turnouts, with just a couple of mouse clicks, these days.

 

 

[BlackRat]

I’m thinking of just wiring up one siding, so I too can have a 25 just ticking over…

 

 I’ve sort of inherited some bits of DCC from my dear friend Trev, prob just enough to make it work…

[NHY 581]

Morning all, 

 

Good to see more healthy debate and comments about DCC. As I've said before, my involvement is relatively recent though my large loft layout built in the early 2000s was DCC, powered usung a Bachmann Dynamis. 

These days of course, my projects are much smaller but my "demands" regarding controlability have even more focus than before. Frankly, I've always been a fussy bu@@er when it comes to slow speed running (with the associated starting and stopping) but I accept I'm worse niw tgan before. 

 

DCC caters for that. Smooth loco on DC + GOOD QUALITY decoder + clean track = Happy Sheep. 

 

When you add the dimension of sound then it really is Cameo fun. Just one loco shuffling about plus a bit of bucolic background noise is where I want to be. Ewe will hopefully get there later this year with Rapido's intention to make sound kits available to retro fit to earlier J70s such as mine. 

 

Project W won't initially be sound orientated but may go that way eventually. 

 

But, aside from the smallest of dioramas, I can't now envisage building a layout which isn't DCC powered. 

 

Rob

[NHY 581]

3 minutes ago, BlackRat said:

I’m thinking of just wiring up one siding, so I too can have a 25 just ticking over…

 

 

Morning Ratus Noir, 

 

Slippery slope, Old Boy............

 

R

 

 

 

[Izzy]

I totally agree with the way DCC is often overplayed/oversold when as said it’s the simple basic aspects that for most can have the biggest benefit. And this applies as much, more really, for small/micro layouts as larger ones. Not having to have sections and being able to run one loco right up to another if required is a prime example. DCC is very flexible in that you can pick/mix how to arrange it but the seemingly constant concentration on full automation does hide the many benefits.

 

Bob

[NHY 581]

I've said it before and will continue to advise, DCC is as complicated as you want to make it. I simply want things to move well and where suitably fitted, make a noise/noises. 

 

@Gilbert and his henchmen gave me good advice when I was looking to dip a hoof into it and I've not had any issue in following said advice since. 

 

As it is with our mobile phones, most of us don't use more than 15-20% of their capabilities, because we don't need to and so it is with DCC systems. 

 

 

Rob

 

[Oldddudders]

I am not a techie bloke in any way - although like many I relish what tech can do. The only nod to science in my paltry qualifications is O Level Geography (1964). They still believed the world was flat then! 

 

In the mid-90s, I had a round-the-loft HO scale layout with a number of complexities and two sets of storage sidings. I managed to wire this for dual controllers, and even had a panel that showed, via bi-colour LEDs, which throttle was live to which of many sections. But it was clunky control, and inflexible in what it allowed me to do. 

 

In early 1997, Model Railroader magazine ran an article explaining the basics of DCC. In those days, there were no plug-and-play decoders or sound chips. So, much of the fog of complexity that can apparently obscure DCC for those on the outside these days simply didn't exist - the NMRA Standards had been published (based on some from Lenz, freely-given, I think) and it was a handful of these that the MR article amplified. I was easily able to understand the simple explanations, evaluated the market, such as it was, and bought a cheap entry set - Roco Digital Is Cool. I have never looked back - although within a few months had moved on to a more sophisticated set. 

 

I would imagine each of the UK mags has had a go at emulating what MR did all those years ago - it is such an obvious topic, that might help sell their publication. I bet more than one earnest RMwebber has given it his/her best shot at explanation in these pages, too. I think it a pity that some of those still avoiding the whole DCC issue can't at least be given a chance to see it simply explained, as I was. For some of those people - talented, capable modellers with skillsets far beyond mine - there might be new opportunities for fulfilment.

[david51]

Maybe I’m a Luddite but while I can see the advantages of doc on a large layout with a number of locomotives I’m not convinced that it is necessary for small layouts where only one loco is running. 
a big problem for me is the cost of equipping 30 + locos a number of which don’t have dcc sockets . 
nor am I a fan of sound . When I modelled US railroads I had a number of sound equipped locos which were great in exhibitions but at home  my family found the constant throb of diesel engines obtrusive and I would often turn the sound off. 
These days I operate small layouts with only one engine in steam so no dcc for me . 
However if I was starting out now and was more technically minded then maybe I would take the plunge . 

[Tim Dubya]

Having never wired a layout at all, the "two wires"* principle is rather appealing, however it's the decoder cost that's off putting for me.

 

* according to DCC folklore 😉

[St Enodoc]

16 minutes ago, Tim Dubya said:

Having never wired a layout at all, the "two wires"* principle is rather appealing, however it's the decoder cost that's off putting for me.

 

* according to DCC folklore 😉

Everything is in multiples of two wires (the same as DC...).

[John Besley]

I remember reading the innovative Comand Control project in Model Railroader.... thought it started to surface back in the late 70's when I first picked up a collection of back numbers at Bridgnorth and then followed on by delivery's from Victor's - (166 Pentonville Road?) 

 

Any way the difference in having even just one loco ticking over - I've used the Ruston 48 sound project for mine

[The Bandit]

Coming back into the hobby just eight years ago I opted for dcc as having little knowledge of wiring, section switches etc it seemed simpler. Of course, every single piece of track has two droppers then I added lights so there were more wires. However I use wire in tube for points and no polarity switches so that keeps it simpler. Buying locos one at a time means I buy decoders as I go along. I don’t have sound chips at the moment so that is a big saving. Not being technically minded I use dcc at a very simple level - I was chuffed when I completed my track and wiring to find that locos went backwards and forwards and at different speeds. A bit of a waste of dcc some would say but it is enough for now for me and I get good slow running which I feel is very important. I’m glad I chose to go dcc.

[Tortuga]

I’m tempted by DCC, particularly for Alsop as the ability to move only one loco on a section of track occupied by another would make recreating the shuffling about of the Alsop Moor Quarry working SO MUCH easier…

I’ll stick with DC for the moment though - for me it’s the thought of soldering in those chips, speakers and stay-alives that’s putting me off as well as cost.

One thing I do find quite off-putting about DCC is whenever I read someone’s (DCC layout) topic, there will inevitably come a point where they describe putting either a brand new loco or a loco “that ran fine yesterday” on the track and it not responding as it should / as it did previously. Usually there follows a series of helpful comments to do with various “CV values”, which gets increasingly incomprehensible (at least, to me), until the loco either responds as it should or the issue inexplicably resolves itself (“I took it off the layout for the rest of the running session, then when I tried it again yesterday, it worked just fine!”).

That kind of thing is too close to computers that throw up the blue screen of death for entirely incomprehensible reasons* and would drive me up the wall!
 

(*like my colleague’s at work, which “blue screens” if it’s been unused for more than five minutes or when you’re halfway through writing an email or when you consider using it)

Edited March 19 by Tortuga
Footnote

[woodenhead]

@Tortuga I operate with DCC and I am a numpty, never had a loco work one day and not the next without it being mechanical and nothing at all to do with the DCC element.

 

I did get one interesting chip from Digitrains with a class 35 project that didn't seem right out of the box, should have returned it really as the same chip/sound combo for my second 35 was perfectly normal.  For the first one a play with CV settings made some difference but even now I am not convinced it is the same project as the other class 35.

 

But it's never been a general DCC issue that I've had

[Donw]

15 minutes ago, Tortuga said:

I’m tempted by DCC, particularly for Alsop as the ability to move only one loco on a section of track occupied by another would make recreating the shuffling about of the Alsop Moor Quarry working SO MUCH easier…

I’ll stick with DC for the moment though - for me it’s the thought of soldering in those chips, speakers and stay-alives that’s putting me off as well as cost.

One thing I do find quite off-putting about DCC is whenever I read someone’s (DCC layout) topic, there will inevitably come a point where they describe putting either a brand new loco or a loco “that ran fine yesterday” on the track and it not responding as it should / as it did previously. Usually there follows a series of helpful comments to do with various “CV values”, which gets increasingly incomprehensible (at least, to me), until the loco either responds as it should or the issue inexplicably resolves itself (“I took it off the layout for the rest of the running session, then when I tried it again yesterday, it worked just fine!”).

That kind of thing is too close to computers that throw up the blue screen of death for entirely incomprehensible reasons and would drive me up the wall!

 

I obtained some eight pin sockets from ebay wired the track pickups and the motor to it. I bought some decoders from Youchoose with the speakers. They came with the speakers wired to the decoder and  and 8 pin plug. I mount the decoder and speakers on a piece of card with the edges folded up to avoid contacts. Slide it into place and plug in. I tape round the socket to avoid that contacting anything.  Job done.

 

ps the socket had leads already soldered to it

Edited March 19 by Donw
postscript

[The Bandit]

As I said before, I only use dcc in the most basic way. I’ve read the instructions but they seem to assume you already have some knowledge of dcc. I would like instructions which have very small steps to reach the desired result.

[F-UnitMad]

I use DCC on my main layout, a 17ft x 8ft American O scale affair, & the DCC has distinct advantages over 12vDC for operations. Sound is nice to have, but not essential, and can get irritating if too loud, or overdone - prototypical & prolific use of a warning bell on US Railroads is rather more restrained on my layout!!

The DCC purely powers the trains. Switches (points) are hand thrown.

But for my two British O layouts I've stuck with 12v DC. Partly due to cost, partly for simplicity (just shunty-planks), and partly because I have a couple of steam locos, and as good & immersive as sound can be, to my mind it emphasises the lack of accompanying smoke & steam in those engines.

[Ruston]

On 18/03/2024 at 12:11, Captain Kernow said:

Plus the fact that some of us simply don't have the kind of brain that understands the necessary alchemy to achieve DCC success. For me, DCC will forever remain a closed book...

I don't have the kind of brain that understands it either but then you don't need to understand it. It's like a Software Engineer friend said, when I asked him to explain to me how the internet works - "You don't need to know how it works, just that it works".

I'm hopeless with all that CV stuff and whatnot. As long as one wire goes to one rail and the other wire to the other, that your decoder is plugged or wired in with the 4 wires in the right places then that's it. Never mind there being no need for control panels or having sound or whatever else, the one thing that makes DCC far better than DC is the Stay Alive.

 

By the way, I have to admire the dedication of the chaps who have used IKEA stuff to make baseboards. The last time I visited a branch of IKEA was about 9 years ago. I went in to buy a stool to sit on at my workbench and came out having very nearly lost the will to live. Dreadful place!

 

@NHY 581 Where's your Class 11, Rob? Has it not appeared yet?