MyLoco and Dallee play very well with the Revolution. Hyde-Out does not work with PWM. ITT and RamTrack sound “systems” aren’t really systems, so I’d not use them in a locomotive. You have to buy a separate card for each sound, which quickly gets quite expensive, to say nothing of taking up an inordinate amount of space.
BTW, Greg - I timed the “All Stop” feature last night. 45 seconds to kill all 50 cabs. My advice, start your cab assignment at 0 and work up.
Later,
K
Yep, you got the right tip there Kevin… although you have the terminology wrong… “Cabs” are throttles that can control a numbered loco.
you cannot kill a cab… you can only stop a loco
You want your loco numbers to start from 0 and work up, because the system has to blindly issue a stop command for all possible loco number.
By the way, I believe there is a way to tell it what the last loco is, but it’s a necessary side effect of the design. There is no central “brain” or controller in the Revo system, so you save that cost, but you lose the ability for all cabs to know about all other cabs, or what locos are in motion/use.
Following the numbering tip is pretty essential, but unfortunately, it ensures that the assigned loco number has nothing to do with the road number.
Regards, Greg
Quote:Not sure what you mean there. The cab number has nothing to do with the loco number, as the cab number can be assigned to any of the 50 locos or accessories programmed into the controller. The "bind address," also a number ranging from 0 - 49--though unrelated to the cab number also of a range of 0 - 49--may or may not be somehow related to the road number of the locomotive, it depends on how you want to set things up. But the bind address is ultimately transparent. When you program a bind address, you give it a unique name, usually a road name and road number. That's what's used to identify that receiver from that point forward. And that is as closely related to each specific locomotive as you choose to make it. For instance, I use road name and wheel arrangement, then the road number--such as "EBT 2-6-0" and "1". No doubt whatsoever which loco that is. Sure, the bind address is 49, but you never see that without the name as well, and in most cases--particularly normal operations--you only see the loco identified by the road name and road number that you type in.
... Following the numbering tip is pretty essential, but unfortunately, it ensures that the assigned loco number has nothing to do with the road number.
The cab number itself is really irrelevant. Its role is to set a pecking order, nothing more. It can be shuffled to suit a given operating session or however. My cabs are assigned smallest to largest locos. EBT #1 is currently cab 0, and TRR #10 is cab 5. I don’t pay attention to cab number when I’m running. I look at the top line of the display which shows the road name and road number to see which loco I’m controlling. I’ve only got 6 locos running with the Revolution, so it’s not a lot of trouble to scroll through to get to the correct loco. I think having to scroll through multiple cabs is more of an issue for folks with large collections who frequently run multiple locos. I seldom run more than one at a time, so the only time I’m scrolling through the cabs is to select the one loco I pulled off the shelf.
Later,
K
You cannot assign a number to a loco that is related to it’s road number… clear enough?
Not sure it took 2 big paragraphs to ask me what I meant, or explain stuff I was not talking about, or teach me something I knew way before you. Remember I was in on the early development, have system manuals from way before it was released.
The emergency stop works on the “bind address”, “loco id”, “loco number”, whatever the frigg Aristo calls it today. It’s THOSE numbers the emergency stop works on and those numbers should be allocated from the beginning, since that is how emergency stop works, blindly issuing stop commands to loco id 00, then 01, etc.
All I am doing is making a recommendation on how to assign loco id numbers so that the emergency stop at least can be somewhat effective.
Regards, Greg
Quote:The cab number has nothing to do with the locomotive number. It's not designed to. The Cab number refers only to the order in which whatever loco, consist, or accessory you wish to control appears as you scroll through the active cabs. That's [i]all[/i]. The Revolution does not define locos based on cab numbers, it defines them on the specific descriptor you type in for each "bind address." You're correct - you can't assign cab numbers based on road numbers (well, you [i]could,[/i] up to loco #49), but the system is not designed to have that relationship. The cab number is strictly an indicator of a place in line, and you need only activate as many places in line as you have locomotives/consists/accessories to control on any given operating session.
... You cannot assign a number to a loco that is related to it's road number... clear enough?
Quote:The emergency stop ("all stop") feature works via the [i]cab number,[/i] not bind address (Loco ID, etc.) It starts at [i]cab[/i] 0, then cab 1, cab 2, etc. until the end of the active cabs, not caring what is actually controlled by that particular cab. You see that when you hit the "all stop" button, and the screen displays the cabs in numerical order as it sends the stop command to each one. If the locos on cabs 0 - 4 have respective bind addresses of 49, 2, 23, 7, and 36, that's the order in which they'll stop.
... The emergency stop works on the "bind address", "loco id", "loco number", whatever the frigg Aristo calls it today. It's THOSE numbers the emergency stop works on and those numbers should be allocated from the beginning, since that is how emergency stop works, blindly issuing stop commands to loco id 00, then 01, etc.
We’re in absolute agreement, but getting hung up in the terminology. To maximize the efficiency of the “all stop” command, you want to allocate your active locos to the first cabs. How locos are linked to their specific bind addresses (Loco IDs) has nothing to do with it. You could start at 49 and work backwards on the bind addresses, or choose them based on the date when you program the receiver, or however you want to. Its strictly how they’re then assigned to the active cabs–where they are in line–that determines the order in which they’ll stop. Pick the locos you’re going to be running, and assign their IDs to cabs 0 through however many you need.
Later,
K
Kevin, I don’t think your last paragraph is right. When you push all stop, my understanding is that that THAT THROTTLE sends stop commands to all active (defined) locos in THAT THROTTLE.
The stop command is then issued from loco id’s 00 to 49 in sequence. I believe that you can define your upper limit.
One throttle has NO knowledge of any other throttle, specifically the locos defined in that other throttle.
I also was of the understanding that the all stop worked on all locos, not just the locos in the CAB in the THROTTLE you are actively using.
But, I will go back and research some more. My evaluation unit has been returned.
(I think I have the terminology right now, do you agree? just the terminology, not the result)
Regards, Greg
Here’s how I’m defining things…
Throttle = (also “controller”) the little black box in your hand with all the buttons and large LCD screen.
Bind Address = A specific code linked to a specific receiver in a specific locomotive, accessory, or trackside unit. These are what you program with loco name, road number, top speed, speed curves, and all that other mumbo-jumbo specific to how the locomotive or accessory operates. These bind addresses are numbered 0 - 49, and are specific to one receiver, needing to be linked to it by pushing the “link” button on the receiver itself. Each throttle can store up to 50 distinct bind addresses.
Cab = the “channels” on the throttle. Each cab can be set up to control any one bind address (SU) or up to six (MU) bind addresses that have been programmed into the throttle. These cabs are also numbered 0 - 49, but numerically have no relation to the bind address numbers. You can limit the number of “active” cabs the throttle will allow you to control in the menu settings. You must start with cab 0, but you can limit it to only enough cabs that you need for your purposes. (I’ve got 6 of the 50 active on mine.)
When you hit the “all stop” button, the throttle sends commands to all of the active cabs in numeric order. As it does this, it sends the “stop” command to all bind addresses associated with each individual cab as it runs through all the cabs. It does this only for the “active” cabs. If there’s a bind address (or group of addresses) associated with cabs that are not active, they do not receive any commands.
Later,
K
Still seems wrong, the 0-49 should be the bind addresses, but maybe you are right.
Can you do this? Set a bind address to 49, and a bind address to 0. Then just issue the all stop and see how long it takes to stop bind address 49 (of course you want it running for this test). My understanding is that it will issue a stop command for EVERY bind address from 0 to 49.
Maybe it issues stop addresses for cab 0 to 49 as you say. The same test could be tried with cab 0 and cab 49.
I’ll look at the manuals again, but I believe it does not detail the all stop algorithm.
Greg
It’s the cabs. Trust me. I’ve tested this. That’s how it works.
Case in point - My aforementioned EBT mogul - Bind Address of #49, cab assignment - Cab 0. My TRR mikado - Bind address of #10, cab assignment - Cab 5. The mogul stops first. But just for grins, I copied it to Bind address 00 and moved it to cab 49, then set cab 0 to some random bind address that’s not been programmed. The mogul didn’t begin to slow down until cab 49 got the command to stop as shown on the display. Oh, and the “all stop” button doesn’t override the momentum like the “stop” button between the arrows does. So, you’ve got 45 seconds lag between the time you push the button to when cab 49 gets the command to stop, then the momentum on top of that.
Moral of the story - don’t assign anything you don’t want to have to repair to cab 49. 
Later,
K
Thanks Kevin, apparently I was remembering the first firmware version, which is actually before the “cab” concept was even programmed. (The cab concept was introduced to allow consisting w/o reprogramming locos to the same bind address).
Yeah, too bad they don’t have a way to override the momentum setting.
Regards, Greg
Richard Eberwein said:So I wander what Richard is currently thinking? ;)
I was thinking of going DCC for my control system for my layout, BUT I don't want to spend that amount of money to run trains on my small layout. Will only run no more the 2 small consists at a time.I have batteries to use for power.If you are a user of the "REVO" I have some questions pros :) and cons :( of the system.
David Russell said:David (Rooster): I'm going to put one of the (1994)trackside T.E.s back in a trail car with batteries for the center cab,the other T.E. in the tender of one anne with batteries. Also use the newer T.E. for track power for the other anne. and if someone brought something to run they can on track power. I will be buying the REVO latter. Richard
So I wander what Richard is currently thinking? ;)
Richard Eberwein said:Almost exactly my current set-up. 1) Trackside TE with block control for track powered locos; A track-side receiver in a gondola with a drill battery for 1:29 Aristo locos; A track-side receiver in a 1:20 gondola with a drill battery for a Dizzie I put battery plugs on; One self-contained battery loco running RailBoss with a Spektrum TX/RX. I have one more RailBoss set up that will probably end up in a trail car with sound for 1:29 trains.David Russell said:David (Rooster): I'm going to put one of the (1994)trackside T.E.s back in a trail car with batteries for the center cab,the other T.E. in the tender of one anne with batteries. Also use the newer T.E. for track power for the other anne. and if someone brought something to run they can on track power. I will be buying the REVO latter. Richard
So I wander what Richard is currently thinking? ;)
I finished putting the T.E. in the box car. When I get the sound board fixed it will be controlled with the AUX socket on the T.E.
Richard
…grinning…
