[tankist]

thread describing the CDU that drives the turnouts was moved here

printed out layout diagram, glued it to piece of plywood and screwed sheet of plexiglas. drilled through holes for tactile micro buttons. i got the ones with longer shank so about millimeter is protruding. the holes for indication diodes are through plywood only.

and thats what i got

besides the fact it came out somewhat sloppy for my taste i realised that i decided to use pair of push buttons per turnout. yet again i hit my head with the same impatience stick redesign was inevitable. i removed the top plexi cover and used it as back. cut another piece to size to serve as the new front cover. cut the middle plywood away leaving the borders for strength and as something to screw the panel to

printed out new sheet with improved buttons and indicators layout. glued it to the plexi back and drilled 3mm holes for LEDs and pilot holes for the buttons.

lined up the two sheets, screwed them together and enlarged the pilot hole to hold the buttons.
looks cleaner now

underside. marked the turnouts for less confusion during wiring. buttons are held in place with dabs of adhesive caulk. when dry it proved to hold them very nicely - took some effort to get them out of plywood. i will solder wire leads to LEDs before installing.

since there is some room inside the enclosure i will try to install the capacitor discharge units into it as well (blank proto PCBs shown)

and finally , thats how it will look when done
this time i'm quite happy with what i see

 

[Reckers]

Looks like it should get us to Mars just fine. My plan was to just touch two wires together when I want a turnout to activate.

 

[T-Man]

Good job, :thumbsup: does it come with a coffee cup holder?

 

[Big Ed]

When you hit the button to activate the switches does it light up on the panel?

 

[jsshieldsjr]

No it lights up in the kitchen. Bring me another beer!

:lol_hitting:

 

[tankist]

not at the moment obviously, but the plan is to constantly have indication of route selected displayed. i will be using bi-polar LEDs and all of them will be lit. green/green (quasi "Clear" aspect ) for straight through routes and red/green "medium clear" when diverging route selected. the left most turnout has direct indication for each rout, green for active one, red for the other

 

[tworail]

Great job. Need a video of it in action when completed

I wanted to do something like that for my layout but I don't have the patience.. or skill for that matter. I might do it for the smaller one I built though which is more analog based, with only digital train control.

I just started doing the proof of concept stuff for my large layout control and it's very frustrating... contact tracks and feedback and routes and bla bla bla.. barely have anything to show for two night's work.

 

[tankist]

soldered leads with header connectors to buttons.
soldered wires to the LEDs as well. lucky me i decided to test them prior to gluing them in. i distinctly remember ordering bi color LED' in green/red. and what i got is Blue/ red WTF!!! what do i do with blue/red!?
EDIT: bunch of police cars perhaps, but chase scene from blues brothers is not something i'm going to model

off shopping again and then desoldering the already wired LEDs ...

i guess i can use them as reds only...
if anyone wants blue/red let me know, i have a bunch of them

 

[Reckers]

Red could be useful for modeling Amsterdam....

 

[tworail]

I'm going to make one of these for my small Marklin layout. Just need to lay my hands on all the supplies to do it.

How difficult is it to have the route selected displayed?

 

[tankist]

not difficult really

 

[jsshieldsjr]

OK how do I get pictures to show up in a post like this? I started a Fotiki account but still get the links instead of the pics!

 

[tankist]

OK how do I get pictures to show up in a post like this? I started a Fotiki account but still get the links instead of the pics!

look here:
http://www.modeltrainforum.com/showthread.php?t=2595

BTW, Mods, i thing that picture posting guide should also be made a sticky

 

[jsshieldsjr]

http://images51.fotki.com/v747/photos/1/1623361/8409720/10013120_22_34_Cibolo_Texas_US-vi.jpg

 

[tankist]

http://images51.fotki.com/v747/photos/1/1623361/8409720/10013120_22_34_Cibolo_Texas_US-vi.jpg

use {IMG} tags instead of {URL}

 

[tankist]

soldered new LEDs to lead wires flattened the dome and glued them into the panel. everything looks the same apart that there are twice as much wires sticking from the underside now. a jungle...

started on the boards these LEDs plug in to. powered from the non current blocking side of the CDU ( the left wire terminals basically direct connected to the power plug) . as a second option boards can be powered from the DC or DCC rail voltage (program/run toggle) with polarity kept constant or rectified with schottky diode bridge and voltage regulated with 7805.




i went through that bag of chinese diodes and tested every single one. about 80% were blue/red. the rest were actually green/red and there were coupe of 3 legged ones. lucky my to get an odd bag.

 

[Reckers]

It was the Committee messing with you, Anton. We're still watching you.

 

[Guest]

Great control panel

I like the idea of the schematic of the layout to aid the operation of the trains and points (turnouts?). Do the switches light up ?

 

[tankist]

I like the idea of the schematic of the layout to aid the operation of the trains and points (turnouts?). Do the switches light up ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sj_GGW0_nXw

 

[tjcruiser]

Anton,

Good to see you back here, buddy. Hope all is well on your end.

TJ