Great video ... now you have me thinking about ABC braking on my steel mill layout for some realistic-looking automatons around structures like coke ovens, blast furnace, etc with a mill switcher and a car or two. Cheers and Happy Holidays !!!
Was shown ABC many years ago, 5 years ago I had the light come on to use it on a public display. Using ESU decoders as they allow to stop forward but keep the reverse active. Good for a point-to-point layout.
@@LittleWicketRailway Instead of a push button, I am using a relay and controlled in JMRI using the signal mast (Red) light in that block. If the red light is on the relay activates and stops the train until you get either yellow or green light. Will be running 6 trains on one track, this will keep them spaced.
Hi Rob, great explanation. I use ABC quite extensively for stopping trains at stations and in hidden sidings. I recommend the Lenz Silver + decoders, which seem more consistent than the ESU ones for ABC. I used Daves at MegaPoints controllers ABC units for the wiring. Difficulties arise when the train has coaches with lighting that pick up from both wheels of a bogie, this shorts the ABC for long enough to make the train accelerate away again. My solution was to remove the pickup from one axle so that the coach is lit from a single wheel on the rear four coaches. My recommendation would be to make the ABC braking work over at least the whole train length, I chose 2.1m for 7 coaches plus loco on the main line and 1.2m for ABC on the branch line. I also have a signal with ABC to hand over a train between operators. My Midland Pullman is non-ABC, two driven ends and lit coaches from each end, I dont have a solution to this combination other than manual driving... An improvement to the way ABC works would be if the decoder operated by receiving an ABC track signal for a half a second, then came to a complete stop before checking for the track signal being on or off, then the opportunity to short the signal in rolling stock would be ignored. Something for an improved decoder....
Thanks Andrew. Good point about the coach lighting. Sounds like there are some limitations to it. I'm still impressed that this functionality is just built in to some decoders, I was totally unaware.
As mentioned the Lenz BM series are priced higher but they have two advantages. First is that they have two sections...a driving section and a braking section. The driving section is to be as long as your longest train. When the locomotive crosses into the braking section the BM applies the braking signal to both sections. This way there isn't a concern for metal carriage wheels creating a false signal. The second advantage is that there default is to send the stop signal. If for some reason the module isn't receiving a clear signal from the following one (ie broken wire or defective connection) then it emits the brake signal and the train will stop.
Hi Rob. I have used ABC for a few years now exclusively with ZIMO decoders. These work brilliantly, but to get the best out of them, I use Decoder Pro with a SPROG3. This combination gives full access to all the other advanced features of these decoders. Even the £20 non-sound versions are fully specified and are fantastic value for money. In addition, they give superb motor control, and have given new life to old models. Highly recommended for all things DCC.
Hello Rob, Your way you give out the information is very good, only down side my laptop is a note book and because you make it so informative I have to get a windows laptop. Keep up the good work 👍 Cheers, Alan
Thanks Alan and thanks for becoming a member. I use windows because I always have. JMRI may work on a notebook(?), the engine driver app should though and you can connect that directly to DCC-EX with a WiFi shield.
Hi Rob, I've got it working on Windows just fine now. Thanks to you for your help. We are moving soon, so when settled in I will start getting hold of the electronics. Can't wait to see how it goes as at my age it will be a very steep climb. Again, keep up the good work. Alan
I did not say, I found my oldish laptop with windows 10 on and I'm using that. Do I need to go to a higher member setting before I can ask a tech (to me anyway) question?
I use ABC all the time. It is great for all sorts of purposes. Also in the staging yard when trains are coming in. You forgot to mention that ABC is direction aware, so you can have an active module guarding a signal on a single track line, and still have trains going past the signal in the opposite direction. This is a very nifty feature.
Fab video Rob, I've used ABC on my fiddle yard on Halland, means i can drive a train into the fiddle yard and it will stop itself, mainly cause I'll get chatting to someone and not heard the loco still running against the end stop. My home layout is a 2 track up and down line going into a single line and a return loop, I have the ABC setion just before a point is if the point is against it the loco will stop and wait till I set the point/signal. must add because all of my locos are sound and f2 active braking I have to use a 'distance controlled stopping' this is due to cv4 being set to 100 on the active braking sound files. also worth noting that with updated firmware on the decoders for the ESU v5 and Zimo you can make a shuttle section ;) that's another video for you :D take care bud.
note the BM-3 does something else as well, this has "slow approach" which does a bit more than just add some diodes but with a suitable locomotive decoder you can stick in speed restrictions - only played with one of these as they are not cheap (as you note) but found it useful on a layout that had an awkward sharp curve so I could set a train running and they slowed for the curve all by themselves. think you need a microcontroller to manage that as it does weird things to the control, that said for two aspect signals the basic ABC is _excellent_. one bit you didn't cover which makes it even better but means a bit of caution, its _directional_, you can set this to protect a terminal station or siding to stop things, _and they can drive out normally_ which is amazingly useful.. the "gotcha" is if you have an out and back or reverse loop as then you get trains that will plough in at speed, but be unable to drive out assuming they don't de-rail.. but that aside for basic automation without being too concerned with hooking to a PC or mucking with Arduino these little diode modules are excellent as a way to stop trains - e.g. say approaching a point set against you to avoid the short circuit or collision. and then even in a more automated layout they are useful secondary protection systems excellent video as always, taking something that on paper is a bit awkward to get your head round and just showing it working for the easy lightbulb moment
Useful to know about the reverse loop 👍 I looked at the slow approach stuff, but I was struggling to recreate it. I read it involves making every other DCC pulse asymmetric. I think the DCC concepts board does slow approach, but I couldn't work out how. If it does then it's great value.
@@LittleWicketRailway if you have a reverse loop somewhere the solution is to use some of the other block detection and automation techniques - but for more normal loops or for stuff like hidden sidings the ABC stuff is perfectly suitable :) and yes if that board can do slow approach then very good
Interesting stuff Rob. One extra question though, lets say the railcar has been ABC'd at the station. Does the DCC controller "know" that the ABC has happened or is that purely a decoder function? If it doesn't, then presumably any display that is based on DCC controller status would still show the loco as being set to run at the previous speed - and would remain so until a new command for that loco is entered at the command station?
I've been trying to get dual occupancy system as shown in the video, but so far it's been a complete failure. So far I've burnt two relays and I'm getting quite desperate. Could anyone please help me as I don't know what else to try or do.
Yes, but it's not quite as simple. You'll still need block detection and that will need to feed into JMRI. Then you'll need to setup your layout within JMRI with signalling, blocks, sections, etc. This can be virtual signalling, but still all needs to be in place within JMRI so the computer knows how things interact. Then you can use the automation tools such as despatcher to move a train. If all set up correctly the computer will automate a throttle to stop the train before the occupied section. Again lighting and sound should stay active.
Hi Rob, on a similar topic, is there a way to slow a loco down on the same spot every time. For example, I have a loop and on the loop is a set complex set of points that I wish to have a speed restriction. I want to set the loco off at normal speed and leave it to run, but the loco will automatically slow during the speed restriction and speed up afterwards without any input control from the controller. I am thinking that the points have an LDR before and after to detect in and out of the section. Thank you.
@@wrrail4428 The DCC concepts ABC unit can generate "Slow ABC". This means that every other ABC pulse is asymmetric. Some decoders (notably ESU and Zimo) can detect this and treat it as "slow" rather than "stop". To get this to work, you need to enable it on the decoder and program the decoder with what speed to use for "slow", but it will do what you want (for a single speed). There are essentially three different methods for hacking with train speed "on the fly". Secondary signalling applied to the track section. This is usually "ABC", but a full Zimo system can use "HLU" (like ABC but with about 6 different speed steps). In this mechanism, the track section applies a supplementary signal to any decoder that is programmed to listen and the decoder responds depending on its configuration. The controller retains full DCC control of the train (including the ability to override the braking signal). A weaker form of this is "brake on DC". Decoders are programmed such that if the DCC signal is replaced by a standard DC signal then they stop. You also lose any ability to otherwise control the train until DCC is restored. An even more basic form of this is to just cut the track power, but that will abruptly disable trains rather than just stop them and might not work as expected if the trains have stay-alives. Train detection and signalling. This is the opposite extreme. Everything is pushed all the way up to the control software and it sends standard DCC train control commands to the particular train based on what the particular train is doing. This is "automated control" rather than locally modifying the behaviour of particular track sections. Modifying the DCC commands. The third method involves a local system intercepting the decoder signal and sending a different signal on a particular track section. This sort of system usually attaches to a control bus and drives a booster for the controlled section, rather than trying to modify the actual DCC signal after it has been boosted. The simplest mechanism is to block any generic speed commands and replace them with an "all trains stop" command, but other options are possible, including per-train modification. Unlike ABC & HLU, this sort of system doesn't require decoder support since it modifies the signal upstream of the decoders. If you have decoder support, ABC is by far the easiest to implement while still retaining full DCC functionality.
Hi Rob, thanks for the video - but one question - I have just set up a automatic shuttle train between two platforms, using an Ecos CS and Digikeijs feedback module, so could i fit an ABC module to stop the trains in shuttle mode, rather than relying on the CV4 deceleration? If so how would the train start to shuttle back again? At the moment the Ecos reverses the direction and the train moves off after a set length of time, but would this command be ignored? Thanks Reggie
I imagine that will depend on the type of your block detector module and how much load it's "detected" output can drive. I think the MERG BTM which Rob instances has an open collector output so would drive multiple devices. However other modules capability to signal to multiple devices reliably would need investigating on a case by case basis.
@@themeparkcreator4416 nice work on the last video, your next could be about getting some of your non-runners working again. Get that Caledonian Belle running 👍
@@LittleWicketRailway well I'm not exactly sure about on how to do that I know roughly know how it works but not too much. I guess I will have to experiment with it
