KingEdwardII

Precimodels have a commercial offering here: https://www.precimodels.com/en/ I've not used these yet, but I aim to try them out when time & budget permit. The idea of uncoupling a loco anywhere on the layout by means of pressing a Function key on the handset appeals to me. Yours, Mike.

Something far more wonderful comes from Somerset. Hereford too. Like the produce of Perry's of Dowlish Wake - now there's a name redolent of English countryside and apple orchards. Shame that Dr Beeching saw off the local line at Ilminster - its a long walk from Crewkerne now.

If you want to see the kind of process which applies to a non-DCC loco/unit, take a look here: You don't need to install a board or a socket for the decoder - simply connect the relevant wires. One thing to beware is the space available for the decoder - non-DCC ready stock did not give any thought to making space available where a decoder might be installed. You may need to use a small decoder. You may need to install the decoder a long way from where the current wiring exists. You may also need to remove things like capacitors (as in the case of the Castle in the link above) since these interfere with the operation of the decoder. As Iain mentions - watch out for any parts of the chassis that might be "live" - and make sure that the connections to the motor are via suitable wires. You should ensure that any wire joins you make are insulated - for example using heatshrink sleeving. You need to also insulate the ends of any unused wires coming from the decoder you install. Mike.

My wife and myself ended up sampling the alternatives - I had Pfizer, she had Astra/Zeneca. We both had very mild reactions, fortunately - just sore arms for a day or so. It is strange how different people react in such different ways to these jabs. Yours, Mike.

Unfortunately, I have only used the Layout Editor on MacOS and on Linux - I don't have a Windows PC. I have not had the problem you are describing. Yours, Mike.

"Panel" is here meant in the sense of "Control Panel" - and it is very common for a model railway to have a control panel for things like turnouts, signals and for displaying block occupancy, etc. Examples shown here: https://pls-layouts.co.uk/html/control.htm These control panels in many ways can mimic those on the "real" railway - see, for example, the Swindon Panel preserved at the Great Western Society at Didcot: https://www.swindonpanel.org.uk/ So, the Panel Editor is all about creating a on-screen computer equivalent of such a panel. The Layout Editor can produce a diagram of your layout which can also be used to control the layout from the screen - you may find this kind of diagram easier to follow since it can be laid out much more like the actual physical layout of tracks. Here is the JMRI Layout for my own model railway: In this case the coloured circles represent turnouts and clicking on a circle causes the related turnout to switch. You can use a Panel or a Layout or both - whatever suits your needs. Yours, Mike.

Which computer operating system are you using? Windows or something else?

I think Hattons describe it correctly: "Hornby R8206 Power track for analogue (non DCC) use only" - it ain't designed to be used with DCC... And here is a fuller explanation: https://www.islandrailways.co.uk/Hornby-r8206-r8241-power-straight/ Mike

I have come across the Chesterfield Model Making & Minature Electronics ("CMME") Arduino-based DCC 16 Servo Decoder: https://chesterfield-models.co.uk/product/arduino-dcc-sniffer-relay-servo-decoder-all-in-one-copy/ This seems like a very cost-effective servo controller (£22 at the moment) and claims to implement a semaphore bounce effect. So it seems as if it could be a useful controller for servo-driven semaphore signals. It is significantly cheaper per servo than commonly available alternatives such as Megapoints, Digikeijs, GF Controls, etc. The underlying hardware seems fairly standard (Arduino + 16-way servo controller board are both generally available), but I'm not so sure about the software and configuration process. Does anyone have experience of using this servo decoder? Yours, Mike.

A little later in the century and a factory location like that would be just ripe for a little redevelopment as a bijoux set of apartments - I might fancy moving there myself...

A multimeter is one tool I would not be without when doing electrics of all sorts - it tells you voltages; checks resistance and indicates which components are connected electrically - or are isolated; it can show you current consumption for any given device. All these things matter in various ways when doing electrical work and without a multimeter, you are "flying blind". I generally check over any new wiring with a multimeter before applying the power. It is necessary to be very cautious when dealing with a loco which has a live chassis, especially when installing an expensive DCC decoder. Yours, Mike.

My own preference is for Zimo or Lenz decoders, e.g.: Lenz Standard+ V2 Zimo MX617, MX600R. These are Railcom capable. The exact choice depends on how many functions you need and also on the space you have available to fit the decoder in your loco (MX617 is a small one, for example) - and your budget! Yours, Mike.

It is certainly worth checking which version of Java you have installed, although since some of the JMRI functions operate OK, this would not be my first suspicion for explaining the problem. Oracle JDK is not mandatory. "java --version" on a command line will tell you what's installed. I have openjdk version 11.x on my Raspberry Pi400 Linux system and it works fine. You may want to check out the error messages etc. from JMRI. There is the system console: https://www.jmri.org/help/en/package/apps/SystemConsole.shtml Then there are the more detailed (and complex) logs: https://www.jmri.org/help/en/html/doc/Technical/Logging.shtml This might give you a clue as to what is happening when you try to open the programming window. Yours, Mike.

Steve, So this looks like modern era stuff, looking at the link you included. For something non-functional, the simplest is to buy one of the Ratio kits. Modern era biases me towards one of the round post signals - GWR square post signals are wooden and tend to get replaced with the round post steel ones over time. Ratio 467 is a round post single signal and is the princely sum of £3.78 at the moment: https://www.themodelcentre.com/467-ratio-gwr-round-post-2-single-post-signals-oo-gauge-plastic-kit Ratio 460 is a square post kit but is considerably more expensive. If you prefer a bit less work, PD Marsh have a non-operational round post signal which is pre-painted: https://www.pdmarshmodels.com/products/z351-gwr-br-home-signal?_pos=6&_sid=b50eec732&_ss=r For more accuracy, you can go for the brass kits from Model Signal Engineering, but this is a lot more work: https://www.wizardmodels.ltd/shop/signals/s4_kw2/ Yours, Mike.

And presumably confusing for the poor passengers! How many times did they experience a major change in the organization of their train on a journey from, say, Liverpool to Penzance or St Ives? Folk today struggle with the Waterloo - Weymouth service when all they need to do is make sure they are in the right half of the train when it divides (e.g. at Bournemouth). I have no idea how they would cope with being in the right 2 coaches out of an 8 or 10 coach train, which changed make up multiple times along the way... Yours, Mike.

Sorry to hear about your shoulder - no fun at all having a problem with that. When I work under the baseboard, I use large bean bags, both for comfort and for raising me close to the work - I just need to be careful not to snooze off, which would not impress the wife. The odd dropped screwdriver under there is just a nuisance, but being sprayed from above with hot flux and solder is something else - and I know that my soldering skills pretty well guarantee this would happen. Your sofa story reminded me of the time when I had to clear my dad's house after he died a couple of year's back - I ended up sawing his sofa in half in the driveway since we couldn't get it to fit into the van we were using. It kept the neighbours entertained, at least. On a different topic, I have been using the printed Scalescenes platform edging flagstones, which have the white line painted on them. Once I got used to the right way to glue them on and get the edge in the right place, I've found them quite effective, even on curved platforms. They also have the alternative of cross-hatched blue engineers bricks in the same pack. Yours, Mike.

I hope that goes OK for you - but this is one of the reasons I much prefer the MTB MP1 point motors, since they have mini screw terminal connections for the wiring. I try to avoid under-board soldering like the plague. Yours, Mike.

I think that Anyrail, like XtrackCad, can do Bezier curves. I use Bezier curves most of the time in XtrackCad to get smooth transitions from straight to curved track, with the advantage of being able to use the control points to get the largest minimum radius possible for the curve. In XtrackCad, as you move a control point, the effective minimum radius is continuously updated on-screen. The downside of Bezier curves is that you need to know the location and direction of each end of the curve, which can take some trial and error in more complex cases. But this being software, doing trials and making changes is pretty quick. Yours, Mike.

I think I'll stick with my computer layout plan and printouts...

Great - glad it's sorted for you. Mike

Roy, Do you drive the Megapoints Servo Controller via DCC? Reading the Megapoints pages, it seems as if you need 1 x DCC module and 1x 12-way Servo Controller for DCC control of the servos. Have I got this right? Yours, Mike.

Are you using a home network or are you connecting direct to the DR5000? For the latter, you need to select Bridge mode, as on p27 of the DR5000 manual. Yours, Mike.

I think you have the port number set incorrectly. Port 5550 is used for Loconet. For the Z21 Multimaus protocol, you need Port = 21105 as shown on p26 of the DR5000 manual. Yours, Mike.

The TowerPro SG90 & the HobbyKing HXT 900 look like the right options for 9g servos and it is clear that many modellers have used these successfully for both turnouts and signals. I am intrigued by the HobbyKing HK-5330 "ultra micro" servo, which is only 23 x 20 x 6 mm size. It has much lower torque than the 9g servos, but I think that this is going to be OK when driving semaphore signals. I aim to try out a set of these for driving a junction bracket signal, where there are 3 arms to control and where space for the motors is more of an issue. Mike.

Well, I view it a bit differently. You are going to need some kind of DCC controller, like it or not - I would not lump the cost of that into the equation here, since it is table stakes for having a DCC enabled layout in the first place. So the extra cost for automation is really the Pi - and you don't have to have the monitor for the Pi, since it can be run "headless". OK, in my case I have a Digikeijs DR5000 controller and I use a Pi400 with a large touchscreen monitor (22", not 7" !), but I regard that as a replacement for a "traditional" mimic panel. You don't have to go that far to get software automation running. One of the big questions is what mechanisms you are going to use to detect and report the location of trains. Especially if you care about knowing the identity of a particular loco or train. These mechanisms need to fit in to the overall solution. Yours, Mike