Subject:
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Re: LDCC and Boosters
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.trains
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Date:
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Tue, 24 Jun 2003 18:04:23 GMT
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Viewed:
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934 times
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"Tom Cook" wrote:
> Has anyone had any success using DCC Boosters with LDCC? There are ways • to
> connect Boosters of different brands to command stations (e.g., you can • use a
> Digitrax Booster with an EasyDCC command station). Although to do this, • you
> need to know which wires to connect. Has anyone taken the risk of • connecting
> the LDCC outputs to a third party Booster?
>
> Mark, have you made any progress with Boosters?
I haven't really looked at commercial DCC boosters, but I have been
looking at the various homebrew designs on the net. Haven't gotten
past the "contemplation" phase, though. :-)
> I tried running two LDCC RCX bricks in parallel to gain more current. It • was
> not a success. I'm assuming phasing issues and conflicting commands are • to
> blame.
Yes, the phase of the signals would have to be tightly in sync
to make this work.
> I tried electrically isolating my layout into two sections with one LDCC • RCX
> brick per section. It works o.k., but when the motors cross the gaps
> (electrically connecting both LDCC RCX bricks, it tends to slow down all • trains
> momentarily. At medium and high speeds, the issue seems negligible.
When you isolated the two sections did you use one of the techniques
discussed in this thread?
http://news.lugnet.com/trains/?n=20307
The 5cm gap insures that the two sections are never shorted. So, only
the train crossing the insulating section will experience a slow down, if
at all. My preference is for using the tape to create the 5cm gap since
it's not permanent and there is only one spot (vs. 5) where the loco can
stall if it's going too slow.
> I was thinking that an LDCC RCX
> could send signals (via IR) to a second RCX with could act as the Booster • (i.e.,
> the second RCX would be in phase with the first and not receive input from • the
> remotes).
This is a good idea! So good, that I had to try it out immediately. :-)
But, instead of using IR to communicate between RCXs (which would
be clobbered anytime the remote was used), I hooked a "sensor" from
the main track to the second RCX. Here's some pics of the sensor:
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/markril/Trains/DCC/decoder_circuit.jpg
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/markril/Trains/DCC/decoder_circuit2.jpg
I built the sensor for another project (a stationary DCC decoder for
motorized switches - works BTW! :). Anyways, after writing literally
a dozen or so lines of assembly code, I had the second RCX slaving
the first RCX (which was running LDCC). The RCXs are not tightly
enough coupled to use in parallel on one large layout, but if you
use two or more insulated track sections (preferably with 5cm gap),
this should work great!
Mark
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Message has 3 Replies:
 | | Re: LDCC and Boosters
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| (...) So, they're 10K, not 1K as they appear. Anyways, I'll be doing a write up of this sensor and the slave code soon. Mark (21 years ago, 24-Jun-03, to lugnet.trains)
| | | Re: LDCC and Boosters
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| (...) I'm wondering how you could possibly get the signals synced closely enough for this to work without a physical cable connecting the two RCX internals (clocks??? I dunno). What is the cycle timing on these compared to instruction clock rate? (...) (21 years ago, 24-Jun-03, to lugnet.trains)
| | | Re: LDCC and Boosters
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| (...) So, I was thinking there must be some way to make this out of standard Lego parts. I thought of using 4 temperature sensors but dismissed the idea because a) I don't have 4 temperature sensors, and b) it'd be pretty expensive. I had thought of (...) (21 years ago, 24-Jun-03, to lugnet.trains)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | LDCC and Boosters
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| Has anyone had any success using DCC Boosters with LDCC? There are ways to connect Boosters of different brands to command stations (e.g., you can use a Digitrax Booster with an EasyDCC command station). Although to do this, you need to know which (...) (21 years ago, 24-Jun-03, to lugnet.trains)
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