BR89 (90% BB, 10% TLG) and TurnTable (99% TLG)

[zephyr1934]

 

43 minutes ago, Toastie said:

While I might use the occasional needle nose pliers when building or even a small mallet, you take your lego builds to extremes!

[Toastie]

So finally I made a video - and as I said: I suck at making videos:

Bad lighting, bad focus, bad whatnot. At least I updated my license for the VSDC editor

Whatever, here it is, make sure you focus on the turntable and other LEGO stuff visible and simply ignore the 89

(@JopieK let me know if I need to move this to the Community forum)

Best regards,
Thorsten

[JopieK]

Looks very nice Thorsen. Great way to build a compact "Drehscheibe". Also the loc operations look very cool.

[idlemarvel]

Brilliant. A superb piece of engineering. And the video quality was just fine. Thanks.

[dtomsen]

Insanity 

Edited June 3, 2022 by dtomsen

[Selander]

Great work ! And fun to watch!!

[Toastie]

1 hour ago, dtomsen said:

Insanity

Says the one, who can make an 8-wide Intercity train running on a DBG R40 9V circle in pentagon geometry

Here is to insanity!

All the best and keep up the insane thinking, trying and making!

Thorsten

[Toastie]

Holy crap, I forgot!!!

@zephyr1934 - Benn, I completely forgot (and this is terrible), that the making of the coupling rods of the 89 is >heavily< borrowing from your design; this is what I used as reference, i.e., your Brickshelf repository: https://brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=510263

Let me explain: I happen to have a mechanical engineer in my research group, who is currently doing his PhD thesis in mechanical engineering, however, for designing/making things for our group, in projects that are dealing with advancing metrology for crazy things like wafer scanners; @JopieK certainly knows which company in Veldhoven is meant here. He is jointly paid by me and my colleague in mechanical engineering. My group has a Tractus3D printer at hand, and my colleague has a bunch of others; one can actually handle 1x1x1 m3 large "things". So he looked at your Brickshelf and told me that he needs some more data. I told him that that is also available somewhere else (the technic hole dimensions etc.) and he used that.

To be absolutely clear: The shape of this rod is close to what you designed and offer in your shop. I sincerely hope this is OK.

The connecting rod is his design - I told him, it would be nice, to have a small diameter "round" rod. The reason was that a first attempt using the flat design was absolutely OK, but did "hide" a bit the coupling rod, as it is attached to the rear wheel set. The original BR89 has flat rods, but rather "tiny" ones.

Again: I hope this is OK. If not, please let me know.

All the best,
Thorsten

[bogieman]

A wonderful video Thorsten! I appreciate the time you spent to make the explanatory captions. It works flawlessly. The programming is way beyond what I can do or desire to do, I'm one to just do manual operation, but I love it.

Dave

[dr_spock]

Nice video and captioning.  Have you ever considered adding another turntable at the other end of the line? 

[JopieK]

So next thing we might get even specialized chips? The rods from Zephyr print fine on an Ender 3 too though (which might be a little more budget friendly).

@bogieman, that is where a community like ours might come in handy, we have a few programmers here so if you want to expand your horizons.

[Toastie]

10 hours ago, dr_spock said:

Have you ever considered adding another turntable at the other end of the line?

Oh man ... no, I haven't. But now - thinking of it ... it would mean that the 89 can go forward in an indefinite loop - made from straight track only ...

Best,
Thorsten 

[zephyr1934]

23 hours ago, Toastie said:

Whatever, here it is, make sure you focus on the turntable and other LEGO stuff visible and simply ignore the 89

Okay, so on the technical side that is pretty amazing. On the action side, what about punching it up a little more? First thought is to build in a random time delay. Level 1: have it wait a random amount of time between 1 and 4 min before starting a round trip, maybe also put a 5 sec pause between when the turntable rotates and when engine moves on/off it. Level 2: instead of random time between round trips, random time between one way trips. You know, so that you are up in your attic working late at night and forgot that you have the train on and then it moves and spooks you (grin). If it has a speaker, you could have it toot before moving so that you know to look over (instead of, "hey, what was that motion over there" and then miss half the trip). Level 3: make it do something, e.g., there's a switch on the right side of the track, have the engine grab a car from one side, pull it out and shove it to the other side (obviously without turning on the turntable) then pull out without the car and do a turn on the turntable, etc., again all with random delays between movements. Of course shunting a car like that would need a remote controlled switch and a decoupler unit, but those two actions could be done with a single hub. That should be enough design work to keep you out of trouble for a few days (grin).

 

 

18 hours ago, Toastie said:

To be absolutely clear: The shape of this rod is close to what you designed and offer in your shop. I sincerely hope this is OK.

I will have my lawyers contact you shortly. Seriously though, while I hope that I make a good product with the rods, I don't think I can claim that I own the idea of rods for lego steam engines. I do my best to price them at my break even point, so that if I sell a few more or a little less I have no reason to get upset. Probably the biggest way the rods make me money is by taking enough of my time that I can't spend my time (and thus, money) on building lego.

The bits I've figured out are how to produce a nice hole and produce at scale. Or at least that's what I tell myself, like last night when I had to pitch a batch of valve gear with bad holes. While I do recognize that my rods are expensive, they are both time consuming to finish off and expensive to produce. I still try to price the rods so the cost is low enough that for someone who is just building an engine the rods are cheaper to buy than to make them in small quantity. There are some economies of scale, but it is not like injection molding.

[Toastie]

5 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

On the action side, what about punching it up a little more?

These are very nice ideas! Thank you very much for taking your time writing this up. I really appreciate this!

Actually, I had level 3 on my mind when starting out with this ... adventure (it took waaaay longer than I thought ). The thing was the switch bit. Switching into the room means that I will run into shelves/rails, in other words, will break something - chances are light injuries on my head on a regular basis - however  the little breakout thingy I made for the 23 can of course be made much larger ... The thing was: I did not know what was hiding directly behind the drywall, now I know: Space. At least 15 cm, then thermal insulation stuff. Hmmm - the good thing is: My wife does not care what I change/damage up here (other than time avoiding the family ...). Oh dear ... You know what: I call that the "Level 3" project. This could also go with @dr_spock's suggestion of another turntable (the first one is located where one of the windows is ...)

"Level 3 project" ... it will have 3 hubs: 2 City hubs (as is) and additionally a 4-port Technic hub for a) the switch motor, b) the decoupler motor, c) the 2nd turntable motor, d) the 2nd turntable color sensor. I guess the ESP32 will be happy, as just now, it more or less idles all the time 

OK, levels 1 and 2 are also very good ideas ... and more straight forward to implement. Hmmm. I guess, when I call this the "Level 3" project, levels 1 and 2 need to be part of it.

Hee hee ... that's why I am on EB: As you said, this will keep me out of trouble and off the streets for a while.

Thank you all very much again!

All the best,
Thorsten 

Edited June 4, 2022 by Toastie

[Toastie]

13 hours ago, JopieK said:

So next thing we might get even specialized chips?

Who knows, but we are on the Chemistry metrology side. They do all the physics and engineering. 13.8 nm is quite the short wavelength for illumination. Turns out that chemistry gets into full forward ultra-fast mode ... 90 eV photons make every atom and every molecule very excited. They literally freak out (and have wild parties) ... and the poor mirrors designed to project that wavelength never wanted to party. Oh, well. As Alexander Makarov (on a totally different issue) asked me sometime ago: "Can't we turn off the chemistry?" I must have looked like an idiot, because he said a couple of moments later, still staring at me: "Huh. Let me guess: We can't?"

So chippy-wise, I really don't know. I can ask them - what do we want? A chip in the City hub that actually works when talking to the PUp app? 

Best,
Thorsten     

[Lok24]

20 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

 Of course shunting a car like that would need a remote controlled switch and a decoupler unit

 

here is my decoupling unit:

It's only a proof of concept, but was built by user  Ts_and shown on exhibitions fully automated

[zephyr1934]

18 hours ago, Toastie said:

OK, levels 1 and 2 are also very good ideas ... and more straight forward to implement. Hmmm. I guess, when I call this the "Level 3" project, levels 1 and 2 need to be part of it.

I think I was inspired by a recent trip to Entertrainment Junction about 90 min from me. They have a lot of trains that do that, sit for many seconds, then move 20 ft, sit a while, move back. Or the fancy ones will alternate on a switch. But when you think about it, the constant motion will quickly disappear into the background, while the intermittent motion will grab your attention due to the change.

[Toastie]

10 hours ago, Lok24 said:

here is my decoupling unit:

That is a nice decoupler! Thank you for sharing!

Quick question: There is a rather long array of gear racks to position the unit. Is this used to "find" the correct position for the decoupling, when using different length cars? On the other hand, there are two tacho motors attached to the City hub - and there is no port left for detection.

Or am I mistaken?

Anyway: Nice one. I like it.

Best,
Thorsten   

[Toastie]

8 hours ago, zephyr1934 said:

But when you think about it, the constant motion will quickly disappear into the background, while the intermittent motion will grab your attention due to the change.

Yes, this is the thing. Absolutely.

Now - I don't show all of this "to the public" in reality - family believes I am a little weird but happy, so all is good. Actually my take was trying to minimize the delay e.g. between moving off from the table and on the trip - because I wanted to demonstrate what PUp can accomplish. With an ESP32 as brain. 

But when it works, then you can go down the road you are illustrating - and I like to do that. Because it adds - life.

Thank you very much (again), and all the best,
Thorsten 

[Lok24]

10 hours ago, Toastie said:

Quick question: There is a rather long array of gear racks to position the unit. tacho motors attached to the City hub - and there is no port left for detection.

Or am I mistaken?

 

Yes it is only of proof of concept for the mechanism to separate the waggons

Have a look at Thomas (Ts_) marshalling hump, which uses this, but is fully automated. 

[Ts__]

Hello Thorsten,

 

2 hours ago, Lok24 said:

Have a look at Thomas (Ts_) marshalling hump, which uses this, but is fully automated. 

Werner has already referred to my marshalling hump. This one uses ideas from Werner's decoupler. I then supplemented the whole thing with more Lego equipment and developed it into a fully automatic operation with the PU App.

I do use it:
1x Technic Hub for the marschalling hump
1x M-motor for the clamps
1x L-motor for the carriage
1x Boost motor for the signal
1x Boost distance/color sensor to detect the coupling gap

1x City Hub in the V90 shunting locomotive
2x Boost Motor as drive (load control, the loco always runs at the same speed, no matter if 1 or 5 cars have to be pushed up the hill)

1x Lego PU remote control

all connected with a Tablet and the Lego PowerUP app. On it runs a program to control the locomotive and decoupler in automatic mode.

Here a video from BSBT2021 in Schkeuditz with my hump yard (from 3:45min):

 

And there is another video from Grimmona with explanations from me about this yard (in german):

 

If you still have questions about the technique: no problem, I'm happy to answer them

About your turntable: fancy automated ;-), runs very well

Thomas

Ps: If you bother the 2 videos about my mountain here, let me know, then I delete them in this case. I put them here only because Werner has referred to it.

[Feuer Zug]

@Ts__ Good video about the hump yard. My Deutsche is rusty, but I got the gist of the video. Thanks for sharing. That's a fine yard.

[Toastie]

Hi Thomas,

6 hours ago, Ts__ said:

Ps: If you bother the 2 videos about my mountain here, let me know, then I delete them

Huh? Are - you - crazy??? Of course you don't delete them - a started this thread and I want them here

Honestly, this a really impressive, fantastic layout/yard!!! Thank you very much for sharing. I do have more questions - what instantaneously popped up there ;) is this:

7 hours ago, Ts__ said:

1x City Hub in the V90 shunting locomotive
2x Boost Motor as drive (load control, the loco always runs at the same speed

So you are saying that the city hub does correctly handle the set speed command with the boost motors (or PUp medium linear motor, #88008)? Because the PUp app crashes when using the set speed command (icon) using the PUp L motor (#88013), when issued a couple of times, as discussed here:

That would be very interesting!

Best,
Thorsten

 

[Ts__]

36 minutes ago, Toastie said:

So you are saying that the city hub does correctly handle the set speed command with the boost motors (or PUp medium linear motor, #88008)? Because the PUp app crashes when using the set speed command (icon) using the PUp L motor (#88013), when issued a couple of times, as discussed here: 

Hello Thorsten,

I had written the PU program in January 2021 and had no idea that there are ready-made commands for it. I simply programmed a loop for each motor that compares the target and current rotation speed and adjusts the motor accordingly. Since it works, I have not changed it until today.
Therefore there are no problems with the PU APP and its bugs. I use a fairly current tablet, which also has a high speed. And you must not forget: the locomotive runs very slowly in automatic mode with 20 RPM at the motors.The locomotive also runs slowly overall, it is a shunting locomotive and a controlled slow speed was important to me.100 RPM is max speed in Hand mode.

Here is a screenshot of the motor control part:

In the picture: 2x control loop for 2 boost interactive motors in one locomotive
v = target rotation speed locomotive
p/x = target rotation speed drive 1/2
u/w = current rotation speed drive 1/2

36 minutes ago, Toastie said:

Honestly, this a really impressive, fantastic layout/yard!!!

Thx. I haven't presented the marshalling yard here at Eurobricks yet, since I'm still building it. For each exhibition there is an extension or it is what more developed. The whole thing is a long-term project and I've only done maybe half.

 

@Feuer Zug: thanks

Thomas

Edited June 6, 2022 by Ts__

[Toastie]

12 minutes ago, Ts__ said:

v = target rotation speed locomotive
p/x = target rotation speed drive 1/2
u/w = current rotation speed drive 1/2

How nice is that! Of course you can do hat, very nice!!! - see this happens when I get older: Lost in memory. About 10 years ago I did something similar with an engine operated with a 9V train motor, an onboard RCX and a rotation sensor - wait let me dig that up (first I need to grab beer ...)

back - holy crap, that was my first post on EB, 12 years ago:

 

and there was exactly one reply from @JopieK The good old days. Well and a bump and some mod flak about that bumping.

As far as I understand your code (I simply can't get into the blocks of the PUp programming environment), you are using proportional control (P), is that correct? For the train motor with its weird torque/speed behavior, that was not sufficient; I needed to implement I and also D, and PID control made the train motor behave decently with regard to constant speed independent of load.

Your solution would also work on an ESP32 (with Legoino onboard) just hiding somewhere in the layout or dangling from a shelf (held by the USB power cord) and then use the "SetSpeed" command - the medium linear motors repond quite well, even at a speed setting of 5%, which is really slow (that is what I use for my 89). The nice thing is that you can also set the acceleration and deceleration time, which then results in very smooth operation, using one command: SetSpeed, as the ac/dc times need to be submitted only once - or better upon change.

Anyway, I like your programmed version a lot, must be fun to watch the tablet!

All the best,
Thorsten