On my NCE system I have long addresses less than 128. How do I run those locos on a layout that uses Digitrax? Do I have to change them to a short address? or is their something else I can do (the digitrax manual doesn’t seem to have the concept of long addresses less than 128)?
Grinnell
You can’t. Digitrax will not recognize the 4 digit address under 128 like NCE will. I’m guessing you have used a 0 as the lead digit. Such as engine 105 uses address 0105. You’ll have to change it to a 1-127 2-3 digit address for Digitrax. ----------------- Ken
On a Digitrax system any address up to 127 is considered a 2 digit address. So address 105 can be entered and run as 105. Any address higher than 127 must be used with the leading 0. So address would be 0128.
Probably the biggest failure of the NMRA standard - on Digitrax, 1-127 is ALWAYS a short address, 128+ is a long address. On Lenz, 1-99 is always a short address, 100+ is always a long address. On NCE, 10127 can be a long or short address, 127+ is always a long address. So there are ranges od addresses that will work on one system but not another. And you can have a loco address 5 and another 005 on NCE and they are two different addresses - the former a short address, the latter a long address.
–Randy
No, the leading zero is not required. Since addresses above 127 can only be extended addresses, no leading zero is ever required on addresses above 127. The leading zero is only required on NCE on addresses below 128 to distinguish between an extended address and primary address, and never required on Digitrax.
I don’t find it a failure of the standard, but a failure of the manufactureres to clearly define and implement the standard. I feel the whole idea of introducing the “2-digit”, and “4-digit”, and “short” and “long” address phrases only served to confuse matters further(‘123’ is a 2-digit address?, ‘456’ is a 4-digit address, ‘3’ can be either?). None of those terms are ever used in the NMRA standards, they are primary and extended addresses. I belive that If the manufacturers were clear from the beginning that there are two distinct and separate addresses - the primary address, which can have any value from 1-127, and the extended address, which can have any value from 0 to 10239 - and then clearly stated what range of each address they supported, it would have saved a lot of confusion.
It is because you are thinking in Decimal and the command station it thinking in Binary so the code is written in Hexidecimal.
Yes, I understand that 100-127 can be represented in two digits in hexadecimal. I was not asking the questions I posed above, but simply listing them as questions that are often asked in the confusion caused by the whole idea of 2-digit and 4-digit addresses. Here’s another one: 128-255 could also be represented in two digits, so why aren’t they 2-digit addresses?
Digitrax uses 1-127 as 2-digit only because that is the range of primary addresses and they can be represented by 2-digits in hexadecimal. Lenz limits 2-digit addresses to 1-99 because we generally do not deal with hexadecimal when dealing with the decoder. Two different manufactureres usiing “2-digit” and “4-digit” in different ways.
It would help if they had explained “this is the range and this is what we use”, instead of “these are 2-digit addresses and these are 4-digit addresses”, but even using the terms 2-digit and 4-digit adds to the confusion. For example, I’ve seen people think that you have to enter addresses from 100-999 with a leading zero to make them “4-digit” addresses. I’ve also seen people think that you have to enter addresses 1-9 with a leading zero to make them “2-digit” addresses. If you do all of your programming and running on a Digitrax or Lenz system entering a leading zero when not required won’t cause a problem. Same thing with NCE, for the most part - I have heard of people trying to run an engine on the default “2-digit” address of ‘3’ by entering ‘03’, which NCE interprets as the “4-digit address” ‘3’ - but when you start using more than one system it can cause p
I’m still confused. For my engine 45, I enter 045 on my NCE system (a long address). On a Digitrax layout, if i set the throttle to 0045, will it run?
Grinnell
I think the question is where does Digitrax look to determine the loco address.
If it looks for short addresses (127 and lower) in CV1, and extended addresses >127 in CVs 17 and 18, then you will have to change CV1 in your loco to 45. This is because NCE recognizes your 045 as a long address and calculates values in CV 17 and 18 to give that address. If Digitrax ignores values in CV 17 and 18 for addresses <128, it will not see your loco.
Digitrax experts need to answer that question.
Since Digitrax has a four digit display on its display, entering a three digit address will automatically leave the first digit as 0. On the UT series throttles the first number of the address would have to be entered as 0
What the display shows is not relevant to the question. Decoder CV1 is for short addresses, and CVs 17 and 18 are for extended addresses. When you ask the Digitrax command station to look for address 45, does it look at CV 1, or does it look at CVs 17 and 18?
It’s a failure of the standard because it allows manufacturers to do three different and incompatible things and yet still meet the standard. Every one of those systems meets the standards, yet they allow for locos that can run on one or two of the systems but not all three. That’s a failure of the standard to establish secific guidance and not a failure of the manufacturers to be consistent - they ARE consistent - consistently following the allowable standard!
Mainly I think to accomodate Lenz, who used a pair of LED displays for address, which means they couldn;t go over 99 on their original system, even though the address ued 7 bits, which really allows up to 127. Digitrax took advantage of that from the beginning. The extended standard then added CV17 and CV18 for long addresses, I guess Lenz chose the 99/100 cutoff to remain compatible with their older short address only systems, Digitrax already was going up to 127 for short addresses, and NCE I guess did what they did so they could effectly reserve the 1-127 address range for consists, since to this day, consists can only use 1-127 (for CV19 consisting).
–Randy
If I enter an address of 45 on a Digitrax throttle I don’t care what CV it looks at. It runs the loco with the address of 45. If I go to program a loco with a 4 digit address I don’t care how many CV’s it uses. It does it automatically, every time.
I have always just added a ‘0’ to the end of a three numbered engine and then program it as a four digit address.
506 then becomes 5060, 422 becomes 4220. Then no problem running on other systems. So far this has worked fine. If some one brings an engine programed on an other system with three digits that will not run for some reason then a quick reprogramming adding a ‘0’ works. It then ran on their system as a four digit number.
I guess that nobody is looking at the question. The OP has a loco, programmed on an NCE system, with an address of 045. With NCE, that is a long address and CVs 17 and 18 get calculated such that the loco will run with a long address of 045.
So, what the OP wants to know is if he takes that same loco to a Digitrax operated railroad will that system look at CVs 17 and 18, ignore the leading zero, and operate the loco on address 45? Or will he have to reprogram the loco to address 45 with the Digitrax controller?
So while a Digitrax user may not care which CV gets looked at or what gets done automatically, it is important to the OP. If Digitrax does not recognize long addresses (CVs 17 and 18) below 128 and looks at CV 1 to get that answer, then the OP will have to re-program his loco from NCE long address 045 to short address 45.
Niether. When you select address 45 on Digitrax, it will send commands to the primary address 45. The command station does not look for the address anywhere(other than in it’s own slot table to see if the locomotive is already selected and to get it’s current throttle settings), it does not know if there is a locomotive with that address or not, it just sends the commands regardless. The locomotive knows whether to use it’s primary address or it’s extended address according to the setting in CV29. If the locomotive is set to use it’s extended address, then it will ignore commands sent to the primary address 45, whether the extended address is 45 or not. If the locomotive is set to use it’s primary address, and it’s primary address is 45, then the locomotive will respond to commands sent to the primary address 45.
Okay, that’s a little more information.
So another question. When programming a loco address with Digitrax, if the address wanted is 45 does the system put the appropriate value in CV1, CVs 17 and 18, or is there an option to use either using a value in CV 29?
The first response answered the question, but I’ll restate it to try to make it clear. If it was programmed as 045 on the NCE system, then it will not run on the Digitrax system without being reprogrammed to an address that the Digitrax system recognizes. If it is reprogrammed to 45 then it will run on the Digitrax system.
FIrst two posts answered the question with respect to Digitrax, I added Lenz. I think the OP’s question was definitely covered, before we got to the second page.
–Randy