I was excited to see the article on a DIY DCC system. I have been using one for a very long time, our club’s modular layout runs on one. However, the article references the DCC++ project and provides a link to the Github page for the code. Please note that project hasn’t been updated in over 10 years. New people have taken it over and have done some pretty amazing things to develop it into a very robust and easy system to use. Full information for it is available at:
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We have a thread already on DCC-EX and its suitability as an alternative to commercial systems for model-railroad clubs.
I find both the free source and the hardware-development ‘sides’ interesting and valuable.
Yeah I got an email from Trains with an article on DIY DCC with Arduino. I thought “finally an official review on DCC-EX”. nope. an article on building basically an out of date one. disappointed MR published it. Just buy a DCC-EX. I wish i’d known about it before spending 3x that cost on my Digitrax. I’m happy with my Digitrax. But I could have had ddc-ex and a scale trains ddc engine with sound for the same money.
Agreed. That was a disappointing article and I’m dumbfounded by why they would publish such a thing with DCC-EX running leaps and bounds the last few years
Skimming through the article (I’m never going to read that thing in detail!), it’s ridiculous to think that anyone would attempt such work with DCC-EX so readily and easily available - either DIY or purchased assembled. I feel sorry for anyone who might think it’s a viable project at this date.
I don’t want to be hyperbolic, but it’s almost a dereliction of publishing duty to put that out without significant disclaimers. At the very least, it’s embarassing.
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as an EE i’m interested in doing things myself. The same is true for any MRer who builds from scratch instead of a kit or buys something ready-to-run.
i’m actually working on a 2nd version of an Arduino compatible NCE controller that costs ~$20. A CAB06 cost ~$100.
but the problem with the article is it doesn’t provide a link to the modified code.
The original open source code by Gregg Berman can be downloaded from GitHub - DccPlusPlus/BaseStation: DCC++ Base Station for Arduino Uno and Mega. My modified modules are available from Trains.com
MR hasn’t learned that whle the Dec 2025 article explains how to construct the unit, it’s useless without the software. And while the article describes some of the hardware, even providing a schematic, it doesn’t provide any explantion of the code. the DCCpp code is 5348 lines
And i exchanged some msgs with one of the DCC-EX developers who said DCCpp was abandoned and replaced by DCC-EX because of flaws in the algorithm generating the DCC signal.
it would help if when a magazine published a technical article, that they get them reviewed by people with technical experience who can at least ask the questions readers are likley to ask
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Good post, Greg.
Yes, when I say DCC-EX is readily available, that also means the DIY choice is readily available and well documented (also ridiculously simple). I built mine a couple of years ago and would not select the "purchase’ option myself for another one. 
Correct. the dcc-ex folks sell the parts if you want to assemble. As an EE-CS I may go that route but I’d rather put my time into automatic detection in my interlocking plant.
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