ahellary

i think this thread is loosing sight of the op the pricing structure is shall we say.. at best interesting and a worst totaly incomprehensable so id like some one to explain this

so do locos ..... the best idea is not to tip over the pram

yes it is reassuring .. but interesting it was changed today ... and will it change again yes i agree Shirleys treatment has not been very satisfactory and actually we should do more to encorage ladys into our hobby . I also wonder what will happen to others in a simular situation ... i think the stick is a very outdated method of protection and maybe going back to a key system would be a better solution

that does make me feel happier i had not seen that but will the support get better or will it continue down the path of im right you not as the shirley has clearly had

i do agree with you i am reading another softwares manual atm and im almost to the point that i think it will do what i want i just have a couple of things to solve then i will make a decision as im at that point to move now will be a lot easier than moving in 12 months but the issue again is its a one man setup and will it happen again ... ive already had to move once when winlok stopped being developed so im really reticent to move a third time tho i somehow feel that there is little choice in that

that is my thoughts the only issue is it would be several months not weeks to get back to where i am and thats time i really dont want to spend ... life is too short

i must admit im torn i do like tc and have used it for years but im also building a new layout tho a lot of the tc stuff is done now however i am looking at other solutions i think to it will not happen is for tc to revert back to a licence code and no usb stick as it seems to me that the stick is the biggest worry to people its certainly one of my concerns i think i will keep my eys open to see what the other options are doing i do think that tc has really priced itself out of the market in the uk but i dont understand why that stance has been taken as the outcome of the trade deal is not known and at the moment we are still dealing with the eu on the same terms as we ever did Unless there is something major in the next verion i will probably be staying where i am and thats if there is a next version.

we all invest a lot of time and learning to a particular system .. which if you have been developing for many years .. the price is actually far higher than just the program cost ... and theres a pain factor also while i want the best system for my railway there comes a point where the hassel of the best out weighs the pain of moving to a different system and something that seems to have been lost by some developers ... while i feel we should not keep jumping ship unlike car insurance some times you need to take stock

that is the real issue that once you have chosen a route its very difficult to change ant thats i feel is where the developer has you

yes it does and as i use some that i dont think are in itrain but i havent properly looked at version 5x of itrain to see if what i need is avaiable

that is a shame as i do think it hase a lot more features than any of the newer software but im sure they will catch up and possibly supass tc in the future ... so there looks like another learning curve to be had in the fullness of time

I do find this tale of woe concerning as a long time user of TC i have also come up through the v7--8--- 9 route

another reason could be there there are a fair number of users in the uk and to be honest the current users of any product tend to be the best sales people ... thats why big software companys have reference sites to take potential victims ...um i mean customers to see

it looks like the uk can now purchase again im not sure what happened i just went on the rr & co forum and just for curiosity looked in the shop and the uk is back

ok one thing that hasnt been touched on is ..... if your going dcc in the future then are you going the next step and introducing computer control if you are then you should think about needing train detection ... that then opens up a whole can of worms ... as you will need to have blocks of track so that the detector can sense a train in the block which is mostly done by detecting a current dreaw in the section of trach you can do train detection others ways to but the best is current detection... so if you have a terminus you may actually want 2 or even 3 sensors in the platform ... one at the each end then the main platform as well ... the one at the far end is so that you can stop the train accurately the main one is so you the computer knows theres a train there and the entrance one is so the computer can see another loco joining onto the coaches to wiskthem away be it to the carrage sidings or to haul them off to london just my thourghts as some people (yep me) do that sort of thing

well im pleased you made a decision... can you tell us the reasoning for you deciding on the set up you have ... I'm just curious as I have made mine a long time ago and I suspect at the time it was a lot easier Anthony

Hi all I have gone the digitrax tc gold route .... I know the owner of mcinley railway and have visited and had train weekends there many times and we have gone thro the pain of the development of tc right from v 5 .. but I didn't start with tc as to me it had several very big flaws (all have been corrected now) ... I started with winlok ( unfortunately it has not been developed in years) the reason I chose Winlok was the scripting was and still is far better than anything tc has even with v9 ...but I begrudgingly had to go tc when hans tanner gave up on the development of winlok ... As for the loconet route there are a lot of modules from various manufacturers that are compattable I must say that I have stuck with the digitrax current sensing bdl168 to provide the feed back to say weather a block is occupied or not but most of the other loconet hardware is by cml electronics (which has now been sold to gfb designs (dig,n,trak)). I use the dac20 point controller which gives you the control of 8 points but also will give you 8 sensor inputs to feed back on to loconetand also you can use it not connected to the dcc output of the command station as it will listen for the point comants on loconet (this has the advantage that if you get a short that shuts the booster down you can still change points to rectify the situation if needed ), also I use the sigm 10 and 20 signal controller that will set the correct aspect depending on condition you program into it (it reads the loconet messages to do this), also available but i dont use it but i know mckinley does is the dtm 30 which basicly has 30 cells each cell can be programmed to be an input ie from a push button etc or and output if throw a point or light a led based on a turnouts position or track occupancy etc To me the loconet although not actually a very fast network is the better option because.... it works a bit like ethernet in that each device listens on the network and when a device has some thing to report it asked for permission and then says what it needs to say, where as xpressnet is more like token ring which means each devive on the network is polled ie asked if it has anything to say ... but this approach is fine for a small number of devices but as the number grows the network gets slower that doesn't happen with loconet McKinley road must have over 100 moduals of various types all chatting together with no speed issues ... I myself when the new layout is all down in the region of 30/40 modules will be fine as I have that many modules on my old z gauge railway before I dismantled it to go to "n" this summer. I'm sure Itrain has some nice features ive looked at the manual but it isnt as mature as tc im not sure how many years it is but its a very long time so I'd think for I train to get close to what tc offers in the automation department I think it will need a couple more big releases to get close to tc I met herr Friewald at mckinley railway a few years back as David was having issus with tc and Herr Friewald wanted to see how a British model railway was opperated (although Mckinley road isnt typical its does operate very much like a large club layout) but I think the visit helped tc develop a bit more useable for the UK practices. Anthony h-e

hi all i have 2 sissor crossings on my new layout and i was dondering how do you use point motos on it also what ones are people usinfg as the gap between of the 2 pairs of points are too narrow to get 2 seep motors side by side was thinking of either the surface mount peco motors but they are ugly or may be some method with servos any idea would be appriciated

so atm train controller is the way forward i must admit i have over 255 sensors on my railway

yes i dont have issues with the number of locos ... i thought (wrongly ) that i train was limited by the number of locos .... but you havent answered my senario qustion can i train do it? as i cant see how it could having read the manual

alan i already use tc gold so i know it can i was asking the fact will i train do the same i see its limited by the number of locos is that controlled at one time or total on the layout as i have around 35 locos atm anthony

sorry i ment transponding which is the digitrax system also what about the senario?

hi there does it control turntables ? signals ? transponding? will it do this senario? a loco hauled train finishes at the teminus the loco uncouples phyical and logic wise ... a loco is selected from a choice of 10 locos sat in the engine shed and is moved to the coaches that just arrived and is joined then at a certain time the train is dispatched when its cleae of the station the loco tha brought the train in is releast to the shed turned and put ready to be used again? as thats the sort of control also stoping trains if passenger at the center of the platform of a through staion based on length but goods trans stop right up at the signal if they need to stop?

hi there im building a N guage railway that will be computer controlled ..(i have moved from z dcc computer controlled layout) i use digitrax dcc with cml electronics for pouints and signals and digitrax bdl168 for detection..... i use traincontroller gold for the software I have been running computer controlled layouts for the last 15 years +.... i suggest you look closely at the software your going to use as this is the "brains of the railway" i did look at i train a short time ago to see it there is any real alterative to traincontroller as it is very expensive for the gold version ( which i have and its he latest version but the author seems to be anti uk now brexit is in motion) How much automation do you want to achive?? having said that i dont think i trains has the level of control that trancontroller has ... i am aiming for 2 ways of running the layout 1) complete auto control including shunting 2) the computer running the main lines and myself shunting both are achiveable with tc gold .... you need a lot of sensors to do this and reliable uncoupling/coupling so as im running all new stock im using the bachman couplings as they are reliable... if you need any help with how to do stuff both in tc or the general sorting out where sensors and blocks need to bee to achive auto control please give me a shout im in the midlands if it hels to visit ... i hope to hve all my track down by the new year (if work doesnt get in the way i hope this helps anthony