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Running conventionally, with my ZW-L set to exactly 11.5 on the throttle ring, the two trains below will circle my big (141 feet around) loop at exactly the same speed.  If I space them "on opposite sides of the loop" - about 60 feet of tgracki between them - more than an hour will go by before one meets the other because of tiny differences in their speed.  A simple calculation shows that is a speed difference of only about 1/2 mile per hour.  For the video, I set them only about five feet apart - as close I can set them, for while they orbit the entire loop at the same speed they slow down and speed up on slopes differently, and drift relative to one another about four feet each way.  On most days when I am in my trainroom, even though I have only three track loops, I set four trains going, "unsupervised" in the sense I'm paying attention to working on my layout, and let them chug away fro hours - they make good companions while I concentrate.  I nearly always use a combination of locos that will run at the same speed (I have many) on my big loop, like this. After the video I talk some more about the details of this way of running trains that interest me and have another video that is even, ah, more interesting, I think.

The two locomotives in the video are a Lionel 0-4-0 shifter and a hybrid - an unmodified WBB Baldwin ten-wheeler chassis fitted with the  body from a recent Lionel Mogul.  since the Mogul body is 1/2 longer behind the drivers, I took the front pilot truck from the Mogul and made it a trailing truck under the cab.  Tender is the stock WBB tender.  It runs just like a WBB 10-wheeler (i.e., very smoothly) but looks better.  It is one of my favorite locos. 

-->Anyway, the diagram below shows the throttle setting versus scale speed curves for these two locos.  In actually they are not perfectly straight lines as depicted here but I drew them that way here, for expediency in explaining.  The important point is that they have different slops and they cross at a realistic scale speed - in this case at 11.5 throttle setting and a scale speed of around 50 mph - a bit high for a freight, but okay.  Below a thorttle of 11.5, the WBB chassis is faster.  Above 11.5, the Shifter is faster.  I can set them up and vary throttle slightly around that point to speed up one relative to the other and position them on the loop just where I want them.  

Speed vs Voltage Curves

Thethe load (number of cars) affects the exact setting I need, but if they behave like this without load, they behave like this with similar loads, just at a point tha tmight have moved: with both loaded more the crossing point would be about 12, but still at around the same speed.  Other factors matter, too (some locos change their throttle versus speed curve more than others are they warm up - my Lionel 3759 much more than any other).  The power supply matters alot, too.  I have plotted curves for ever loco I have with my Z4000.  I'm having to do so again with my ZW-L.  Serendipitously, its voltage chopping seems to make this "trick" work much better: yesterday I got 83 minutes of operation of the two locos shown before the shift finally worked half way around the loop and caught the WBB: that is a difference in scale speed of less than .4 mph.

Anyway, the videos below show another combination that is quite interesting: Railking PS2 Y6B and Legacy Southern Crescent (it's been repainted).  The Southern Crescent has cruise and it is locked in and being Odyssey II, is not varying speed one iota, the Y6B will drift back and forthrelatively to this about two feet while orbiting like this. They are going about a scale 18-19 mph.  The blue tape you see on the layout is distance markers setup for me to time speed, etc.

I realize someone inevitably is going to tell me that Legacy or DCS can do this with two or even three locos, etc., but that is not the point.  I have the only universal control system made - it runs everything and it runs them the same way I did when I was eight years old, which is when I first figured out this "trick."   And besides, it's a lot of fun!!!

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Images (1)
  • Speed vs Voltage Curves
Videos (3)
Modded Mogul & Shifter
Y6B and SC
Backwards almost kissing
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I was just starting to do a similar thing with my Legacy LOCOS.  Using the Legacy  Crescent and Blue Comet.  They maintain their relative distances within a foot over an hour. Same start time, momentum settings, Load, and railroad speed.  When I get my F3 and F7 back from Lionel service I will be seeing how the Diesels Legacy Locos match up with the steam. The goal would be to run three maybe four without constant attention and fear of a wreck. Two steam and two Diesel on the same level. 

I tried running a couple conventional postwar Lionel locos on the same oval and made an interesting discovery: at slower speeds one loco went faster, at higher speeds the other loco went faster. So I could keep them spaced out with an occasional speed increase or decrease because the two locos had different response curves! Simple and low-tech.

 

I've read of HO modellers using switchable diode strings mounted in their (conventional) locos, to help match speeds for MU operation. The switchable diodes were wired in series with the motors to drop voltage.

On my previous layout, I had automated the switches to allow two conventional trains to run continuously on a "grand tour" and pass each other in a siding.  The trains did not have be very close in speed, as the passing siding would stop one train and wait for the other to run past.  The faster train waited in the siding a bit longer than the slower train waited.

Originally Posted by mikemike:

I was just starting to do a similar thing with my Legacy LOCOS.  Using the Legacy  Crescent and Blue Comet.  They maintain their relative distances within a foot over an hour. Same start time, momentum settings, Load, and railroad speed.  When I get my F3 and F7 back from Lionel service I will be seeing how the Diesels Legacy Locos match up with the steam. The goal would be to run three maybe four without constant attention and fear of a wreck. Two steam and two Diesel on the same level. 


i'm not sure if you discovered this running conventionally like Lee did or if you did this running with the Legacy Remote.  The only reason I say, if you do this running with the legacy remote I think (not 100% sure) that you will find the Legacy Steam and Diesel will not match speed the same as 2 legacy steam or 2 legacy diesel.  When running legacy engines with a legacy remote they get different speed profiles based on the type of engine they are.  That is why when you run engines in a "lash-up" or MU they take the speed settings from the lead engine.  It's pretty cool.  To experiment with what I am referring too.  Tell one of you legacy engines that it is a subway.  The speed profile is completely different.  Or tell it is a switcher.  The speed profile will change again.  You can find out how to do this in the legacy manual.

if you are running conventionally like Lee is.  Then please ignore my comments.

also, Lee thanks for posting this information.  I find it very useful and fun.

Lee,

  This could be a really neat, and I'm sure unintended, feature of the ZW-L for those of us who are conventional operators. As I am sure you will do, more testing with different engines and loads could prove if this is universally true. I am curious if this would work with Conventional Classics on a small layout like mine.

It is not exclusive to the ZW-L - I used to do it every weekend with  my Z4000, and I'm sure a CW-80 or any other unit could be set to do it, too (although it might be difficult to set a CW-80 as precisely as you can the others.

 

The point is to find two locos that have these characteristics: they have different voltage versus speed characteristics to the point that one is faster than the other below a certain voltage, another faster above that voltage.  You can then run them in lockstep at the voltage and set them up and control how far they are apart by varying plus or minus from that point.  You have to try different locos, and osmetimes there are strange ocmbinations.  An old (before tethers were installed) and new BEEP (after) work (at least one set I have does).  A Railking 2926 Northern and a Dockside switcher, for example.  You just have to try to find combinations that work by experimenting.

Why Lee, you need to throw away all those quaint but obsolete old conventional engines. Then it is a simple matter to cruise your Legacy/DCS-compatible phase 4a radar-detection locomotives at preset distances according to the detailed instructions in the DCS Basics Guide, pages 213-285-397 and also appendix D, but note revisions and updates to edition 1. Also note precautions regarding possible Pacemaker interference, lead vest shielding may be advised.

Can you run two or more locomotives on the same loop of track without blocks or command control?  Certainly you can!

 

Can you operate/independently control two or more locomotives on the same loop of track without blocks or command control?  Nope!

 

If I'm operating two or more trains on the same track, I kind of prefer to be able to control each train separately in terms of its speed and direction--the way one can do so easily and effortlessly with DCS, TMCC, and Legacy.  I do that frequently on my relative small layout.  For this operational scenario, nothing can be more simple than that.

Allan - Can I operate locos?  I guess it depends on what "operate" means.  I never operate locos in the sense that I think you mean - vary the throttle, start and stop, back up and make them do this or that, switch cars in and out of a consist, etc.  Never.   I realize people have a lot of fun doing that, and I like to watch them, but it's not what I do.

 

On long Saturday afternoons when I am building something in my workshop or working on the layout I like to select some locos and cars and put toether four trains, on my three loops, set them in motion, and let them just chug away for hours.  In a way they are like pets - good companions while I work. What is important to me is that I can set them up and let them run, and maybe - maybe - I have to look at them and tend to the throttle to adjust once every hour or so.  And I can control them "independently" - at least to the extent I need.  I can make then run nose to tail or space them out around the loop as i need by adjusting the throttle this way and that - its not what you do, but I like it.

 

Anyway, I concede that Legacy might be "effortless" as you say, but again, I have the only control system that is truely universal - my system runs everything - Legacy locos, DCS locos, TMCC locos, and conventional - pre-war locos, postwar locos, 1970s locos, and modern non-Legacy locos - even my Darstead since I put a rectifier in it, all from one "controller" without any other equipment or any changes or programming other than "put the dang thing on the track." To me that trumps everything else, along with the fact it's identical to how I ran trains in 1956.

Originally Posted by Perry1060:

When I was a kid we tried to run 2 trains on the same track with repelling magnets glued to the engine of one and the caboose of the other. Can't remember what happened but we learned all about lodestone...

Now that had to be a lot of fun!  Cool idea!

 

Originally Posted by TMack:

After the Alcohol thread, I have determined that this group (OGR) is what the gang on "The Big Bang Theory" are going to be like when they get older.

Hey, I resemble that remark, except I've never waited until I was older! 

This hasn't been done many times in the past by many others???? Seems a bit passe. I used to run 2 conv on a small loop, but it gets tiring watching the "dog chase the cat."

 

I am with Allan. After getting DCS ( sorry, never even seen the Lionel set up, much less had hands on it) it became so much more fun to "run" trains. I have said many times, it is a close to running- read, "controlling" - a real train as most of us will get.

 

Just the other  day (I almost posted a thread, but it seemed to not be too important) I was running my 1947 GG1 and later my 226E on the track with my PS2 Chessie steam Special. The DCS remote will easily allow that using the TR and the ENG buttons. That was fun, just considering the years apart that the engines were made.

 

What was more fun, was actually "running" (ie: controlling the train) the Chessie by being able to speed it up or down, perhaps pull into a siding and wait to pass, enter the inner loop and uncouple cars, reverse then return to the tail of the GG1 train...then do the same in reverse. Now that was FUN...note the caps!

 

Get back to us when you can do that with your two conventional engines, easily. I have plenty of conventional, so do not take this as a slam against them....they just see very little solid run time any more, even since I could use the DCS.  

 

I certainly hope that there are many command users on here, that own PW (or even any conventional) who will try this once in awhile.

 

Have fun watching the "wheels on the train go round and round, round and round, round and round." I like to do that also, just not all the time. As Lee or someone likes to post, If it has never been done that way before, it might be fun to try. I feel some should feel free to try command. Sell it later if you do not like it. 

 

And...."After the Alcohol thread, I have determined that this group (OGR) is what the gang on "The Big Bang Theory" are going to be like when they get older." Oh, probably so, so true!! And a good thing too.

 

Greg

(It is hard to tell a person's tone via posts....please do not write back about this being a "slam"...that is not what this is meant to be, if it indeed, sounds that way.)

 

I run Postwar conventional locos on the same main as my MTH DCS locos. Very easy to control the speeds of both locos with the MTH DCS contoller.

 

With the DCS ALL command I run numerous consists with PS-2 or PS-3 locos on the same main line at the same time.

 

I don't have Legacy but I would think you can run numerous Legacy locos at the same time on the same main line with a single command from the Legacy contoller similar to the DCS ALL command.

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