hicksan

14 minutes ago, JSModels said:

Reading your plans for automating the layout immediately struck a chord with me - when I first built my shunting puzzle I wondered if it would be possible to automate one. Having exactly zero skills or knowledge in that area however immediately made a theoretical idea only!

 

I did wonder if it had already been done somewhere by someone, but maybe it never has. Until now...

 

(The fact that Phil used my buildings on the layout is an added bonus!!!)

 

Jonathan

JSModels 

I am approaching the code as nested scripts, with the base level made up of a repertoire of simple movements and then calling these to execute the sequence once the logic part has figured out what to do. In theory this could be generalized to any layout. The long term plan is to automate stations or fiddle yards within larger layouts - along  the lines of the famous Automatic Crispin only able to drive trains and shunt them.

The buildings are lovely, btw.

1 hour ago, woodenhead said:

@hicksan As I read through that I have to admit I am beginning to imagine a hump marshalling yard scenario as a scaled up version.

 

RFID sensors detecting wagons passing over an uncoupling magnet which fires at the appropriate cut point and then perhaps some electromagnetic solution to keep the wagons moving along at a set pace - not too fast (which is what happens in any traditionally modelled hump) or to slow as to stop after a few centimetres.

 

This has in fact been done, and in the 1960s to boot.

You can find the video on Facebook under the title "1962: Machines Like Men"

The National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park is currently building a recreation of this. I took a look at the original computer code once and it is brilliantly simple. One could do it with an Arduino Uno these days.

Yes it uses logic, so is proper automation, and absolutely it is inspirational but the loco movements are quite basic. It isn't something that can be generalized onto any layout as I am intending. For me the Inglenook is merely proof of concept, not an end in itself.

8 hours ago, woodenhead said:

My eyes did read that last sentence as "Strategically positioned pensioners etc would also help here".

 

...

 

A question to @hicksan will the wagons to be shunted be required to be positioned over specific sensors at set spots on the layout or is there some other method of identifying all the wagons spotted at the start without relying on something under the track?   I guess I am considering how an intelligently automated inglenook with standard wagon lengths might evolve to a layout less uniform with both short and longer wheelbase wagons in the mix that may not fit positioned sensors.  Or is it simply a case of a lot of sensors capable of deducing the centre of a wagon and therefore it's length?

 

Secondly, might you consider making your couplings servo or magnetically assisted in some way so that they are not reliant on under track magnets to operate, again so your automation rests more in the real world that a wagon may not always be left in the exact same position albeit in the right order.

 

MERG has a good number of "strategically positioned pensioners" who I'm sure will be keen to help me solve this.

The questions of identifying which wagon is where and how to uncouple particular wagons without too many unnecessary extra movements are both at the heart of solving the practical part of this problem. Each has several possible solutions and I am not going to commit to any one of them yet, but it will be a fun process testing each till I find what works best.

However my initial thought is that a single RFID sensor at the mouth of the points ought to be able to identify anything rolling over it. From that it will be able to retrieve data as to the length of each vehicle. If it knows the route set and the direction of movement (which it ought to since it will be driving) then it will be able to figure out exactly what is where and which have moved. The 'setup' process would require the loco to move the wagons into position, or could be entered manually via the control interface (probably a touch screen).

RFID is a subject all by itself, where range and reliability are key. MERG members have been experimenting with the RC522 receivers and have already made a CBUS interface for it. Other groups, such as McKinley have had success with the Eccel Pepper-C1.

With regard to couplings; again there are numerous options for "delayed uncoupling". I hesitate to fit electronic uncouplers in every wagon on grounds of cost. Personally I have used both Spratt & Winkle (mk2) and Kadee couplers and prefer the former (at least of wagons). I will probably then have a single uncoupling magnet near to the RFID sensor, and probably mounted on a servo so as not to cause accidental uncoupling of slow-moving trains. I figure that if the system knows the exact position of each wagon as it passes over the RFID sensor, combined with the length of the wagon, the speed and direction of the train and its stopping distance; then it ought to be able to figure out exactly where to stop the loco so as to position the correct couplings over the magnet before activating the servo.

But all of this is just conjecture at this stage. I look forward to running some experiments on my test track and sharing  progress (or failure) along the way.

These are just the practical problems. I still have to figure out how best to solve an Inglenook with the fewest moves for any given wagon arrangement. My thought is - once I can reliably move wagons, collect, drop off and identify each - to code up several different approaches to run against the initial setup as simulations, before doing any actual movements, and then select whichever solution comes up as most efficient. It's going to be an interesting journey.

Brilliant or bonkers? Not sure which.

Thanks for the kind words, all of you. And thank you Phil for a lovely layout to use as a test bed for a degree of automation never previously attempted successfully and, in my opinion, only made possible by technology that has appeared really within the last year.

I am proposing to do 'proper' automation - as opposed to scheduled train running - and by 'proper' I mean shunting based on inputs that are not previously determined. This cannot be solved by just running a script: it has to figure out what to do first.

To achieve this we need three things:

(1) the right hardware - meaning practical solutions to physical problems - such as reliable uncoupling and how to determine the position of the train such that the correct wagons aligns to the correct uncoupling magnet, plus how to identify which wagon is which and where after every shunting move.

(2) a layout control bus capable of sending rich data messages between the sensors and the processor. Most LCBs are limited to transmitting on/off states. Full automation requires vehicle data. I plan to use CBUS because an event message on CBUS can include up to three bytes of data, but there are other possibilities using wireless data networks.

(3) a processor capable of running dynamic interpreted scripts (as opposed to compiled programs), and where the scripts can be nested so one can run others. This is possible with the Raspberry Pi PICO RP2040, which was only released last year, and where the code is commonly written in MicroPython - as taught in schools. Courtesy of MERG member Duncan Greenwood; we now already have a shield that will connect a PICO to CBUS and a library that allows MicroPython to talk to CBUS, including driving trains. If I succeed in this it will be by standing on the shoulders of giants.

There are no guarantees that my attempt will be successful, but this is something that now can happen and so inevitably will - because this technology means someone eventually will succeed even if I don't. And I would rather not be beaten to the post by code written by a school child or a bot like ChatGPT. It is nearly two hundred years since the Rainhill Trials proved that steam railways were a viable proposition. Full automation has long been a Holy Grail for the model railway community. I believe a solution is now in sight and it is just a race to see who gets there first. Maiman Sidings is merely the first step that will lay the foundations and open the floodgates.

And I plan to use my MERG exhibition lanyard badge as the handheld wifi controller to start it.

On 20/02/2014 at 12:50, Pacific231G said:

I don't think my efforts are ever likely to inspire anyone but my first adult layout- an H0 North American switching layout-  was definitely inspired by the 0 scale Wyandotte Transfer. 

Does anyone have any pics or trackplan of Wyandotte Transfer? Built by Paul Stapleton, Alan Day and Steve Dennison. It featured in the Encyclopedia of Model Railways, published 1979, but with only 3 photos. Apparently it measured 6.5m x 0.5m on five baseboards as an O gauge industrial switching layout. Was it ever written up properly and published in any of the journals? I saw it once at an exhibition, in Ealing Town Hall around 1978, as a boy - and found it quite inspiring.

I am experimenting with some Faller Road System vehicles, converting to fit in UK OO-scale die-cast vehicle bodies. I plan to 3D print new chassis to retro-fit Faller parts, rather than use the Faller adjustable chassis kits (except as sources of parts).

One thing I would like to do is introduce some acceleration and deceleration at the stopping points and slow them down a bit, so as to be driving around slowly in a goods yard - stopping at either the goods shed or coal bins depending on the vehicle.

I am using Dingo Servo Signal Mount with a 50mm long magnet as stopping magnets, rather than the Faller stopping magnet - so that a decelerating vehicle doesn't then overshoot its stop. The question is what to add inside the vehicle? I am rather assuming a capacitor (and maybe resistor in series), in parallel with the motor, would do it - like a mini stay-alive.

I am also assuming a small resistor (PCB trimpot for adjustible control) in series with the motor would slow it down suitably to a 10-20mph parking crawl.

I also found a 3D printed junction mount, for servo, on Thingiverse which I may try out as much cheaper than the Faller version.

Also when two tracks cross ideally it should be at 90 degrees, so a vehicle doesn't slew off its track onto the other. has anyone established what the minimum angle is at which this reliably doesn't happen? eg is 60 degrees acceptable, or even 45 degrees?

Also what is the minimum turning circle radius that works reliably? My experiments suggest a 6cm radius circle is OK but nothing tighter than that. My vehicles will all be quite short wheelbase - vans or smallish lorries. The yard is a constrained space.

Has anyone tried any of this?

The layout is now restored and fully operational. For its age it runs remarkably well. There is a video about it on the Oxrail 2021 website, up for a few more days. After which you'll just have to see it live at exhibitions. We are applying the same ideas but with newer technology to other layouts. An arduino-based timetable unit has been designed for the Abingdon layout, able to operate another arduino as a sound unit to play narration tracks every second or third step in the timetable. Timetables are read from a micro-SD card allowing operators to choose timetables for different years / rolling stock sets. The module also sets all the points and signals for every move and communicates text message status updates with a sister module in the fiddle yard. It uses the MERG CBUS protocol for communication over a 4-wire layout control bus. All inspired by Bossington.

Going back to the question I ACTUALLY asked: operators in front or behind the layout?

1 minute ago, Chris M said:

At 5ft 2in I hate very high layouts as I can’t see them.

I've never seen a layout mounted 5ft high. 4ft perhaps. I tend to prefer 1m personally. It usually depends on the skyline perspective on the back scene - to look 'right' that should be roughly at eye level (as per reality). If people model a low skyline then the layout needs to be viewed at track level. I would say it is the responsibility of the exhibition manager to ensure all tastes/preferences are catered for within the scope of the exhibition. I don't begrudge the space given to Thomas the Tank engine kiddie layouts 2 foot off the ground either: as long as there is something for everyone.

On 22/04/2021 at 15:16, CUCKOO LINE said:

 

make sure the layout is at a level visible to the public, too high is a real pain and turn off

I have no fixed views about height, but I know many people really like layouts mounted higher so they don't have to bend over to get eyes to track level and view it as if it were real. Not that many people have helicopters to fly over real stations. :-)

There's always two answers for every question. Depends, I guess, on the layout and who it is aimed for.

On 22/04/2021 at 12:09, Phil Parker said:

 

Who is providing these? If it's the layout owner, fine, but if (as is normal) it's the club, moving them to the show is going to take a really big van, and demand quite some storage space in the clubroom.

I was thinking a foot rest using exactly the same design as your barriers at L&W, Phil, So all you'd need extra is two uprights off the same base - one long (as at present) and one short stub, set a few inches in front of it, to support the 'lower barrier' on which children could stand. You have already stressed how strong they were and how much weight they support. Ie not big and just a few extra horizontals the same as the rest, and only for the parts of a layout that get most crowded.

I like to put lots of high detail at the front of a layout. It helps in creating a sense of forced perspective because it draws the eye's focus away from the trains - you have to look through things or past things to see them (more like the real thing) - so you see the landscape first and then the railway. Cranes and ships with masts are good examples. This is only possible at exhibitions with decent barriers. It would take only one careless rucksack or over-bulky coat to rip the whole front of the layout off. I've seen that happen too.

That said, one of the advantages of a decent barrier is it allows some of the exhibitors to stand in front of the layout - in the space created - and talk (yes: actually talk to the public) about it - what it represents, how it works, how it was built. One thing I have learnt from exhibiting is people love to ask questions, but they don't like to disturb someone clearly concentrating and engrossed in operating the layout. Hence the question: front or back?

This maybe going slightly off-topic, but as it is an old thread no loss...

The public love to interact with the exhibitors and love it all the more in layouts where the operators - at least some of them - are in front of the layout rather than behind it. People like to see control panels, especially nicely made ones, and fiddle yards, especially the automated type, and they love to see what the operator is doing and talk about how things were made. I have observed fascinated crowds in front of front-operated fiddle yards and peering over the shoulder of back-to-the-public signalmen, especially when the panel has lights and bells.

All of which requires decent barriers to create an operating space in front of the layout. It can't be done with dowels on sprung door stops.

Of course there are limits to this; it won't be right in all cases or even in most. Small or thin layouts are close enough anyway, most times. It works with operators one-person deep but not more. So signalmen or train drivers but not both, clambering past each other. It works with some layouts (big end-to-end types) but not others (where the FY is at the back anyway, and where the best space for the operators is inside the central well) but as a principle I have seen this work, be very effective and clearly appreciated by the viewers. Thoughts?

Second question - thoughts on providing some barriers (eg at the most interesting part of the layout) with a raised platform along the outer side approximately at knee height (a) for smaller children to stand on to bring them up to head height with the layout and (b) to stop people leaning on the handrail quite so much. It might add strength to the barrier and would also stop families encouraging kids to duck under the barrier to stand in front of it - as if its purpose were to give the kids a clearer viewing space. Some exhibitions appear to provide plastic stools for families (and many families now bring their own) but I have found these quite intrusive, especially when people carefully place them in front of the barrier, up against the layout, rather than behind it "so the children have space to stand".

Finally - I considered winding Christmas fairy lights along the handrail of mine, like barbed wire. To stop people leaning on it. Has anyone tried this?

I am curious as to your interest in a 1966 layout. What triggered it? It looks a very nice, finely made layout but what makes it so special apart from its age would be good to know - whether it was particularly innovative in its day - anything to help our researches much appreciated. We still don't know what condition it will be in; if the boards have warped due to damp it might be a challenge. Part of it is in Witney and the rest in Southampton so we can't get it any time soon, as things stand.

Oxford Club have acquired this layout following the death of Leslie Eden. It has been in storage for over 30 years. The plan is to repair and restore it to full working order to include in the 55th Anniversary Oxrail 2021 Virtual exhibition, from October 9th.

Oxford Club were recently (Feb 2021) offered this layout by a relative of the owner (Leslie Eden) who sadly passed away. It was last exhibited in Oxford in 1990. It appears to be folded shut according to the description we have, so may be well preserved for something 50+ years old. If anyone is interested in restoring it please let us know quickly before it is disposed of.

Oxrail 2020, the virtual exhibition of Oxford & District Model Railway Club is live NOW - from Sat 24th Oct till 1st Nov.

www.oxrail2020.com

Also on Facebook.

Featuring:

Garrag Wen, The Ribe Collection, The Pendon Collection, Nippon Tetsudo (Z scale), Coleford, Cliftonbury, Earldean, Old Parrock, Oakworth, Brymbo, Thame, Randolph's Yard, Abingdon Branch, 90p Layout, Hauteluce, Life of a Line, City Basin Goods and, of course, the notorious Ealing Road.

Does anyone know where I might source a set of drawings of the station buildings for the GCR London Extension or the Metropolitan Railway where it worked steam beyond Aylesbury? Looking for plans and elevations of station, platform structures goods and loco facilities, etc.

2 hours ago, noiseboy72 said:

Things can change even after the edit is finalized. In the programme introduction Kathy is shown discussing an infraction of the rules, but whichever episode this was from appears to have been re-edited and that scene removed.

That clip may have been left over from a certain episode in Series 1. KBG are not above taking choice clips completely out of context.

17 hours ago, CharlieJohnson said:

 

Yeah the class 24 was the prototype that we asked to be fitted with DCC so we could run it and then we went and ran it through fire. 

 

Plus you might have noticed Bachmanns Crane too. 

 

Very interesting. If the manufacturers have twigged that the GMRC is a good opportunity to showcase new products, pre-release, then that is a VERY good sign for the impact the show is having on sales, and the hobby in general AND a good indicator on the future of the show. Hornby's new TV ad is another such indicator. Well done to all the teams for making this possible.

11 hours ago, LNER4479 said:

No sour grapes though. It was great fun and a fantastic experience. MASSIVE congratulations to Trainmen of Kent, worthy winners and will be great ambassadors for the hobby with their layouts at Warley. TBH, if we had somehow won, it would have been somewhat embarrassing to spend all weekend at Warley explaining away our Final layout. 

 

I shall be at Warley in any case -wearing my Team Grantham T-shirt with pride - as I was booked to be in the demo area anyway doing my usual layout planning & design thing. It'll be good to catch up with Fred, Carol and any other GMRC-ers there. 

 

These last-minute rule changes are par for the course with GMRC, as we have all discovered who participated this year or last. Sometimes good, but sometimes they result in teams getting stuffed when the best laid plans suddenly turn into dead ends. You just have to take it and cope, I'm afraid. I guessed from the broadcast that you were down on numbers in the final. It was never going to work with just one person doing all the hardware, track and wiring. There's always lots that doesn't get said, because it doesn't help the 'story'. It is about drama, after all. The one thing reality tv isn't about is reality.

I sincerely hope we DO see you, AND your layouts, at exhibitions over the next year. If not at Warley at least at some of the other major shows like Ally Pally. The public really don't care who won the show - but they do appreciate good layouts (and yours were stellar - all three of them) - and exhibition managers know that and will want to draw those kinds of crowds. So I suspect your phone will be red hot very shortly.

Heck, Missenden Modellers got totally hammered in public last year - but Ealing Road has turned out to be the real star and been drawing crowds ever since. We mostly have to put it on auto so we can all stand in front to talk and answer questions, about the show and how we did various stuff, because the interest and demand is so great. People will have huge respect for what you did (I certainly do) and the fact that you lost by only one point speaks volumes. You've had a good few months since filming to polish off all the rough edges. I hope you've done so and not let it go to waste, as some teams did. No-one will be expecting to see the layout in it's rough "as broadcast" state. It had a lot of potential and, in our experience, folk will want to see that realised. It was inspirational modelling. Well done.

Bottom line: there are no real losers in this show. Not even teams that lose their heats. Hat's off to ALL of you. And the real winners are: the hobby as a whole. So thanks very much for taking part.

44 minutes ago, LNER4479 said:

The production company liked it as a design so it was 'job done' and back to the work on the Heat layout.

 

Yes, not a conventional model railway at all, rather a challenge involving the use of model railway equipment. Happily - for us - the judges ultimately went along with that. 

I think one of the problems with the show, not that it has many, is that the production team and the judges have differing priorities. It is the production team that are very much involved in the planning stage - telling the teams what they do and don't like and issuing strong directions as to what they want to see. The teams then find, on set, that the judges may have completely different ideas and may hate an idea that the production team pushed the team towards. Missenden Modellers discovered that conflict the hard way in series 1 but were not by any means the only team to find themselves steered down a dead end. The production team are not, at all, railway modellers - so their interest is in what they think the viewing public will like (regardless of whether the judges will like it) including elements of plot conflict to add dramatic tension to the show - which may be why the show is gradually but obviously departing from any direct association with railways. The last episode might as easily have been titled "The Great Model Gimmick Challenge". Teams ought to go in to this with their eyes open: we have a great time on set but the broadcast result isn't always quite true to the spirit of what actually happened. That's tv for you. It's still good for the hobby and the public love the losers as much as the winners, so you just have to go with it and enjoy the ride.

On 08/10/2019 at 17:24, Grumpold said:

Hi all, I am Martin and I was a member of the Railway Sleepers team.  We knew that we were the outsiders from the start, only 3 of our team being familiar with model railways.  But all 6 of us are also avid wargamers so this is where the model building skills come from.  We are used to building gaming tables full of scenery.  Nevertheless we missed out by just 1 point and fair play to the Muddle team who by winning the scratch build challenge (=2 points) overtook us.  A couple to things.  First taking part is fantastic fun.  It is lovely to build your layout at home or at the club but it is totally different doing that in a competition.  You just cannot compare one with the other.  It is a TV format, it is not a guide to building your own layout at home.  You need to get on with it and you have to live with the choices you made beforehand, often very restricted, without the info needed etc.  We all try to have an ace up our sleeve.  Team Grantham had the radio telecope (absolutely superb modelling), we had the laser cutter machine for the track laying, buildings and the illuminated space race boards.  On the subject of the Queen Elizabeth loco, ou colour scheme was blue and white.  So that is why we choose that loco and James hand painted the coaches in those colours.  I still think that our Queen Elizabeth was the most beautiful loco in all the heats.  When that thing ran over the viaduct, it was superb to see.  And on the subject of shunting, all 3 teams did shunting on their demonstrations.   When looking at the program, it seems to me that they only showed 2% of all the stuff they filmed.  So much happened.  

I would like to know more about how you did the laser cutter stuff. Presumably you did it yourself rather than buying in commercial laser cut products? Did you bring the machine physically with you to Fawley or was everything cut off site? Were the designs yours or were they downloaded from an online library? If yours then might you make them available for others to share by uploading them somewhere, or selling them commercially? In short it was all very impressive. Any other heat, with techniques like that, you would have won hands down.

On 07/10/2019 at 14:26, LocoLadies CF said:

This is a general question to everyone who participated in the Great Model Railway Challenge.  Was anyone else told that children could not attend the presentation because Knickerbockerglory is only licensed for over 18s? As some of you will know, I got into railway modelling because of my grandchildren and none of them were allowed to attend on the last day to watch our heat 3 presentation.   My family have just pointed out that episode 5 there were a number of children there watching.  Just wondering if the rules were changed as the series progressed. 

Yes. I originally asked if my daughter (then 14) could join our team, as she is (was) really into model railways (then). I was told no-one under 18. For reasons of insurance. I later learnt that they made exceptions for the Railway Children team, some of whom were 17. I'm sure the bar will be progressively lowered as the series develops and pressure builds. It would be nice, perhaps, to see a 'junior' episode, as a special and maybe with mentors to help each team and make sure none gets derailed. 

On 06/10/2019 at 17:20, sir douglas said:

one little thing has annoyed me slightly. Tim saying he's been waiting for someone to cut into the board. we would have done it but we werent allowed to in the first season.

We (Missenden Modellers) were in the first season and we cut holes in our baseboard for the canal and the dock scene. If there was a rule about that we weren't aware of it. Oh. Errr. Um.

23 hours ago, whart57 said:

Steve did, but most of it didn't make the final edit.

Unfortunately that's television for you. Once they've decided on the story they want to tell; the show gets edited to tell that story, regardless of what really happened. They think the viewing public want spectacle; under-dogs overcoming insurmountable odds to triumph rather than a team calmly and professionally making something impressive that works first time, so they go with gimmicks and they're probably right. You built a great layout and people will come to exhibitions specifically to see it working, and they will be wowed by it, and you will have done the whole hobby a service by participating. Enjoy the next year. And write it up for the magazines.