Personally I love DCC. This is my first layout since I was a kid when we were full DC. While I loved the DC then, DCC has massive benefits as far as my situation. I use a wheelchair to get around so it allows me to control a lot more on my funky layout set up in the garage. I think it’s all just personal preference.
I know my dad who is 74 this year…was not all the keen on it. But helping him through that learning curve, now he is completely hooked! He can’t believe all he can do with the wireless controller. And although it’s completely overwhelming for him, he only uses what he wants. So the DCC allows me to run like a crazy person with all the bells and whistles, but still allows dad to run it like a newer DC type set up. I think the best time I saw dads eye’s go wide and a huge smile was when I consisted about 5 of our SP locos together and crawled them by him with bells and whistles. Pretty cool.
I’m sold on DCC and can’t even imagine ever running DC again. But they both have their pro’s and con’s.
I’m in favor of most new high tech stuff but not for running my model railroad layout. I prefer simple operating controls and DC over the digital age stuff. I do like having the terrific DCC Steam sound coming from my Southern Pacific Articulateds so I put up with it.
I have experimented with DCC for about 12 years and other than the great sound I still prefer my old MRC Tech II for running my trains.
I’m not knocking DCC, I just like a simple throttle and reversing switch. I run dual mode on my layout with the old style DC block and turnout control. I can run my E7 Daylight passenger and park it on a hidden siding turn off that block then switch over to DCC and run a Cab Forward up my mountain grade with steam sound just a huffing and chuffing then switch back to DC.
I do have a lot of digital and animated goodies on my layout but not on the rails. To me having a computer run my layo
Even if you have some sort of smartphone throttle to display the actual SMPH, you still need to calibrate each loco somehow. It’s not a magic bullet.
Personally I don;t care - I manage my speed the old fasioned way, watchign how fast my loco passes known points, and I really don;t care what number the throttle is display for speed step. I also avoid the inferior decoders that don;t support CV2-6-5 simple speed tables and tune most of my locos so that full throttle is some reasonable speed based on the type of loco it is - no 100 smph switchers. But exact calibrate them all? Forget it. No point. Same with speed matching for consists. Close works perfectly fine - I dont get the demand to have everythign run in lockstep. Just because you CAN doesn’t mean you SHOULD. No one did that in DC< because you couldn’t, yet plenty of DC operators run multi-unit consists. ANd it works fine. DCC is not different.
Some eat bussel sprouts and other veggies cause the want to try to live long and prosper. My wifey from England fixes me brussel sprouts and well, I eat them along with cooked cabbage and broccoli and carrots. You know - happy wife, happy life. =D I really can’t complain, she is way more supportive of my hobby the the ex. Just sayin. BTW, if you pour a butter and cheese sauce over brussel sprouts, they can taste surprisingly good! [oX)]
Where I live a smoker out back might disappear but I cook my pork shoulder about 10 hours on high in my slow cooker - 1 cup of apple cider vinegar, a packet of McCormack “slow cooker” Pulled Pork seasoning and a half bottle of BBQ sauce. My buddy who had a brother who worked at Dinosaur BBQ in Syracuse passed that on to me. Melts in your mouth! mmm!
My mother was a health food fanatic when I was growing up in the 1970’s, although cod liver oil was something she never did.
Now I do have “fond” memories, ok, not so fond memories of liver. Liver is one of those things my mom used to like to torment us with when I was still a teen at home in California. Sometimes she didn’t get all the veins out and when you swallowed a piece, due to the vein it would still be connected to the other piece till in your mouth - that would cause a gag reflex so I would have to quickly swallow the unchewed piece to not choke on it. Ug! Yes, liver was always on my most hated food list.
So by the time I was like 18, I was working at Taco Bell then. I had an evening shift coming and could smell liver cooking down stairs in the kitchen. This time knowing I could fix myself a burrito at work, I climbed out of my sisters upstairs bedroom window and onto the roof - across to the garage and down the side to the ground. Went in, got on my bicycle and quietly left to ride downtown Davis to work. Yep, Taco Bell beats liver for supper any day!
Ah, the memories of the olden days. I only wish I would have photographed the SP passing through town too. sigh That would have been about 1977 - while SP was still in it’s prime.
You can map each function button on your locomotive to your liking, so that they perform the same function (for the most part, certain decoders excepted) for all locomotives.
Or you can be like me and stick with one brand of decoder so they are all the same to start with [:D]
Although that is not strictly true if I buy some pre-installed, some OEMs change the function settings around from the defaults used on the other sound projects. I only use lights, horn, and bell plus mute/startup anyway.
Well Rich, I’ve been reading this with much amusement, so now I have a few minutes I will offer some thoughts:
I still have a flip phone and a desk top - actually both are rather new. I can’t use a mouse pad on a lap top - never have been able to understand or master that.
I do have two Kindles (for the grand kids) and a new tablet - only use it when needed on the job site or when traveling.
I’m not tech shy, I programed some of the first Programable Logic Controllers in the 1980’s. But like a few others have suggested, I’m only interested in tech that makes my life easier.
Tech I love - the blue tooth phone connections in our new cars, indash navigation (way better than any smart phone with a too small screen), the “smart key” features on our new FORD Flex, my X10 home automation that allows control of out dooor lighting from all over our large home, and much more…
Back to train controls - One of the things that has kept me away from DCC is the poor ergonomics of most all of the wireless throttles on the market.
That problem is amplified for me, since I have no interest in blowing horns or whistles, ringing bells, turning lights on and off, playing sta
two occupancy sensors 40" apart. When one tripped the timer went off. And when the second tripped, the timer stopped. I calculated the scale speed this way.
I then had the loconot reverse the loco and repeat the process for 4 speeds (27, 55, 83, and 127)
But the occupancy sensor isn’t that accurate in timing.
The scale response at the lower speeds is also not that accurate: It’s very non-linear on some of my locos. This is especially true, when I change the throttle mode and change the # of cars it’s hauling. Every decoder/train combination responds differently.
This is where the IR beam break speedometers are much better - most occupancy detectors have a little built in delay to keep the occupancy indication from flickering on and off due to dirty wheels.
A speed curve takes care of non-linear response, and can even set a max speed so that if the loco is capable of faster than prototypical speed, once you get the throttle past the correct 75mph top speed, the loco wouldn’t go any faster.
Only way to be TRULY accurate is with feedback, like the motor speed sensor in MTH and BLI locos. That really takes any non-linearity out of the picture. All the calibration for that would be in the decoder, although you would have to know factors liek the gear ratio and th driver size in order to program it properly.
Basically - another one fo those things that is so far down the importance scale it doesn;t register right now. I don;t even look at the number on my throttle, I rarely look at my throttle when running, it’s usually down at my side. Only takes a little experience to get a sense of how fast you really are going (most people run WAY too fast).
To me, the question isn’t about old vs new, or using a phone because you have one. The thing that astounds me is the poor quality of the user interfaces. Some other reponses in here touched on the poor user-friendliness of conventional DCC throttles. I couldn’t agree more. But a phone isn’t helping. We want to run TRAINS… not start an app, scroll through menus, blah blah blah. Nevermind updates, network settings, and all the other baggage that comes with using a smartphone. I want to pick up a device, select an engine (if it’s DCC) and turn a speed or direction control. Touch-screen poking to change speed, or fiddling with the edge volume up/down buttons, are very clumsy unsatisfying controls. The thing about the old-fashioned physical DC throttle type controls is that they were intuitive for humans to operate. Smart phones infuriatingly force users to adapt to the phone. But the hallmark of a good user interface is that the user doesn’t have to learn the interface’s language. It speaks THEIR language. And believe me, I’m a smart phone user (for more than 10 years) as well as a software developer. I have adapted to multiple generations and changes in the interface. And they are all terrible. People have become accustomed to “terrible” so they accept it.
The real proublem with new tech is setting it up, they all come with so much garbage. They should all come with just the basics activated and let the user activate what they need. Took me a week to take away all the garbage on my new PC and I know there is still some on it.