I have a Fleischmann 6652 turntable (similar to 7286), a CS2 and a LDT TT decoder that are all functioning properly with Rocrail control. I have it set up so that the house on the bridge is on the +ve side of the TT block. So all is fine as long as I stick to that setup. Locos enter the positive side of the block and back into the roundhouse stalls or aux. tracks from the positive side. Locos exit the spoke tracks on to the -ve side of the bridge in order to depart the turntable area at the house end of the bridge.

Where I am having a problem is when I try to enter a loco on the opposite side of the bridge block. I get the Ghost train even though I have that route defined. Sometimes I just want to move a loco from one stall to another without having the bridge rotate 180 degrees multiple times to have the bridge house in the correct location and the loco backed into the spoke track. What am I missing in order to set up the TT control for Rocrail to accept a loco coming in from the opposite side of the block?

Peter

Edited by user 28 March 2022 18:45:14(UTC)  | Reason: Changed -ve side to opposite side

Thanks Jean.

The LDT TT allows for 48 positions.

The only difference I can see in your setup compared to mine is that you have 3 bridge sensors and I only have 1.

I have this bridge sensor configured as Enter2In on both the +ve and -ve enters to the bridge block. So I do not understand why I get the Ghost Tarin when I come in from the negative side. I wonder if it has something to do with decoder position and opposite track position. The CS2 doesn't seem to care where the house is as long as the tracks are aligned properly. Rocrail cares and that may be where I am missing something.

Peter

Double checked and triple checked! That's not it. I read on the Rocrail forum something about the opposite track that needs to be set up properly. I am assuming that is where I have an error that is causing this in the Route setup. I'll figure it out eventually.

I see that you have set up the decoder for all 48 steps. Perhaps that is the difference. I have set mine up only for the actual tracks leaving the turntable. Therefore, if I have an exit on track 8 and the opposite track 32 they both have the same decoder address since as previously mentioned the CS2 doesn't seem to care where the bridge house is located.

Regarding the contact blades, I took care of that several years ago when I first set up the turntable.

Peter

Hi Peter
So I read again your first post.


I am puzzled by exactly what you do:
- are you running a schedule going through the TT?
- are you in a fish bowl mode?

What puzzles me is:
- in both cases, the route leading to the TT will only be open (loco sent to the TT) only if the TT reports a valid position, otherwise the loco waits in the block before the TT until the TT position is reported to Rocrail as valid (expected)
- on my TT, the entering side matters, not only because I have 3 sensors on the bridge (you would get a ghost if you enter on the wrong side) but also because Rocrail decides if the loco goes in the same direction or the reverse one after the destination is reached.
- if using a schedule and forcing the loco to drive (if it did not started by itself) to the TT then you will get a ghost train EVEN if the bridge is correctly positioned by Rocrail (but apparently did not get the valid feed-back).
- Because you use only ONE sensor, Rocrail has no way to know which side you are entering so if you get a ghost, it means Rocrail IS NOT expecting the loco to enter the bridge because it is not reported as properly positioned.
- Rocrail definitely needs to make a difference between entering on the plus or minus side, otherwise it won't know it it needs to change direction or not depending on the loco orientation on the bridge and its destination track.


IMHO, if you drive your TT with 48 positions, then you need to report on the used track a specific sensor and you need to tick the "move bridge if target position is opposite"
Conversely, if you drive your TT with 24 positions, then you need to untick the "move bridge if target position is opposite" (in Turntable/general).

Note: Rocrail Wiki says:
all blocks facing a TT must have their minus side oriented towards the TT. Is it the case for you?
Are you using a position reached signal (to be filled in TT/Properties/interface "Position sensor" ) or a specific sensor for each track (to be filled in TT/Properties/Tracks in the column "position sensor")?
Cheers
Jean

Now that I have my servo driven roundhouse doors all functioning properly in Rocrail, it is time for me to go back and refine my turntable operation. Below is my Rocrail turntable area screenshot.



So as stated previously, my turntable works properly when I enter the bridge at the positive house end (green dot) from either the TT Etr or Exit N blocks. (Shown in the snip is entrance from the negative side of the TT Etr block to the positive side of the TT01 block. Note: The TT01 position sensor is showing green instead of red because I took the snapshot while offline) Once the loco is on the bridge it reverses direction and the turntable can go to any of the 6 roundhouse blocks, the 2 coaling station blocks or the water crane block. Once the destination is reached the loco backs into the selected location, stops and changes direction, and waits.

Now if I want the loco to leave any of these 9 tracks, the turntable rotates so that the bridge house is on the opposite side of the track that I am leaving from, with the locomotive pointing towards the house. This is fine if I am exiting the turntable area through either of the entrance or exit tracks. However, here is where the problem comes in. If for example I brought a loco in to the water crane block Wtr and then want to move it to either a roundhouse stall or one of the coaling station tracks, the turntable rotates 180 degrees, the loco enters, but is now facing the wrong way when it reaches the selected location. So what I was trying to achieve is to have the loco enter the turntable without the 180 degree rotation. If I set up a Wtr- to TT01+ route, it gets ignored and the bridge still rotates. If I try to set up a Wtr- to RdHs6- route I immediately get a ghost train when the loco enters the bridge. If I try to set up the bridge block TT01 as a crossing block the loco never stops and runs right off the bridge.

So I have reached the conclusion that every move in the turntable area in Rocrail needs to be a 2 step procedure, which is fine. However, where I think I am missing a step is not being able to move a loco from a roundhouse stall to either the coaling stations, water stations or another roundhouse stall without the 180 degree turns and the loco entering those locations in the wrong direction.

Peter

Thanks Jean.

I realize it is a configuration issue, I just cannot isolate what it is. When I go through your points, I have most of that. Point by point:

"On one side you must configure all the used track positions in the TT properties /rails in a 48 position method"

As previously stated I only have the 11 used positions entering the turntable configured. I can redo that to all 48 positions to see if that has an effect.

On the other hand you must configure all routes accessing the TT in BOTH directions and include a "sensor" to block either the access to the + or - side of the TT.

I have that.

This means having TWO routes between the TT and each access track.

I have that.

Note: attention the detectors on access tracks must be AT LEAST one loco length from the TT. Otherwise there is a risk of having a GHOST train when leaving the TT: the loco is detected when reaching the access track sensor clears its location on the TT but if some axles are still on the TT there is a ghost train

Not an issue.

Hello Peter,

Just a question: How is managed your TT bridge block ? Is it managed as an embedded block or do you manage it manually ? see https://wiki.rocrail.net....php?id=turntable-gen-en

In the past, I've managed it manually and never had an issue as you report, even with one sensor on the bridge (enter2in)

In the rocrail doc, it is stated that if you use a single sensor for the bridge, then the loco event timer will be used to trigger the virtual in event.

Right now, I've not yet experienced the new mode (managed+embedded), because I'm changing the TT with a Fleischmann one...

Cheers
Fabrice

Hi Peter, Fabrice
My TT is managed in automatic mode with 48 track exits, the Block on the TT is declared externally (I have no experience declaring it internally)
The set-up works in full automatic, in manual and in simulation.

I have one remaining observation: on my TT with 3 sensors, of course the loco direction is totally controlled by Rocrail (it decides how to leave it from the + or - side providing a loco direction change when appropriate. And - this is my main point here- I don't see why it shouldn't be the same when using only one sensor on the TT. This means that if the loco enters on the wrong side of the TT, Rocrail won't notice it BECAUSE YOU HAVE ONLY 1 TT SENSOR (as opposed to my case where entering the TT on the wrong side will cause a Ghost Train immediately) but when leaving the TT, the loco will land on the wrong track from Rocrail perspective.

Also on your diagram I see 11 access tracks meaning that the table must contain up to 22 lines (decoder values). I say up to because some tracks may be opposite to another track (in this case for each occurrence you substract 2 from the 22 total)
Just trying to help
Jean

Hi Peter

I am glad if you get near a solution. In all honesty, it took me a while to solve all issues.
I thought I read somewhere in WiKi that Rocrail does not generate routes going to / from the turntable. I generated all mine manually. No big deal
Enjoy your TT
Cheers
Jean

Hi Peter
Thanks for the explanations on route creations around the TT.



I cannot answer your question as it rests uniquely with LDT (which I am not using). Definitely the CS2 does not care and simply transfers orders to the LDT decoder.
I will check LDT manual if I can find one.

Note: in my case, because the number of addressing track was limited to 24 (see below the DigitalBahn configuration tool), I had to use the RS232 direct link between the decoder and my PC

Cheers
Jean

I am referring to page 7 Section 4.1 of the LDT instructions where it discusses the keyboard pages 14 and 15 , the associated addresses and the 48 step turntable.

Peter

Hi Peter

Yes, because my TT decoder understands the 48 positions, only one command is to rotate to any of the 48 position. There is an optimisation in the rotation to select automatically the good direction to arrive faster to destination

Example: to go from shed track 202 to the DS1 (TT) there are 2 routes:
- one is to go to DS1 on + side [202-]-[DS1+] and the decoder code is 26
- one is to go to DS1 on - side [202-]-[DS1-] and the decoder code is 2

Note of course reverse routes are the same [DS1+]-[202-] and [DS1-]-[202-] with the same decoder codes (resp. 26 and 2).

Now what to do in your case?
I would try a second command in the command of the route
- the first to drive the TT to track 1 to 24
- the second to order a 180° turn if needed. This may be made by creating a fictitious switch with the address 225 + x (the address to order a 180° turn, sorry I don't have the LDT user's manual handy)
It would be a little more complicated to optimize the rotation but it may be do-able
Cheers
Jean

Hi Peter
I am not sure I can answer directly your question.
Here is what happens on my layout.
Suppose a loco leaves track 1, forwards and enters the TT from the PLUS side
Then (remember I have 2 routes for accessing and leaving the TT):
- if the next route on the schedule is to go to ANY TRACK from the PLUS side of the TT, the loco will reverse and go backwards
- if conversely the next route on the schedule is to go to ANY TRACK from the MINUS side of the TT, the loco will go forwards to the selected track

Notes: I am in 3 rails so I have no concern with polarity change (it may be different for you I don't know)
As explained, of the 2 parallel routes to go from the TT to track n, only the decoder code will change so that there is a 180° difference (e.g. Track 2 or Track 26) and only one route is validated by its sensor, the other one is locked by its opposite number (e.g. Access Plus resp. Access Minus)
Of couse this is also true for the 2 parallel routes from track n going to the TT

Cheers
Jean

Hi Peter
I am not lucky. I am the one to tell them (the German Rocrail forum and Robert Versluis thanked me for the finding) how to deal with what I try to explain to you for many posts. Just read.
Cheers
Jean

All problems solved!

After more than a week of thrashing around with this, all the issues have now been resolved and the TT works the way I want it to using Rocrail in Auto. Key things I have learned:

1. When setting up the TT in Rocrail all blocks need to be created with the -ve side of the block pointing to the TT as explained in the WIKI.

2. Rocrail by default will always select entry and exit of the loco to/from the +ve side of the bridge block (the house side of the bridge).

3. To set up the LDT TT decoder you only need to program the decoder steps for the house side of the bridge connection to a spur track. These decoder tracks are then setup in the Rocrail turntable track table with the opposite side identified by either a plus or minus 24 track positions depending on the location. This is where I went wrong by trying to define a decoder step for each of the + and - connections to the bridge. In my case of 11 connections, I only needed 10 decoder positions.

4. The TT option of selecting Manage Track Blocks under TT Properties generates a complete set of possible routes to and from the TT each time Rocrail is started. However, it does not save them unless you go into each desired Route and uncheck the Automatic generated option. However, using Manage Track Blocks also selects the Embedded Block option. Both of these options need to be turned off in order not to get the Ghost Train each time the loco enters the bridge from any direction. Very important since this is what caused me to create this thread in the first place since I could not understand why every move created a Ghost Train.

5. The routes created are identified as either "TT Manager: To bridge" which identifies a route entering the +ve side of the bridge or "TT Manager: To bridge reverse" which identifies a route entering the negative side of the bridge. To start with I only selected all of the "TT Manager: To bridge" for saving and discarded all of the rest. This gave me 90% of the operation that I wanted. I could enter the TT area and back into any of my spur tracks. Exiting any spur track on the +ve side of the bridge allowed me to back into any other spur track since the loco will always reverse in this configuration once it is on the bridge. However, I could not exit the TT area in a forward direction. Therefore, this necessitated that I needed to select one of the "TT Manager: To bridge reverse" routes. This is where it becomes a little more tricky because you need to be able to select which route to activate because of the default condition of item 2.

6. There is a Rocrail WIKI only in German that explains the procedure to accomplish the route selection to enter/exit the -ve bridge side. You need to generate a toggle switch that Inhibits or maintains the default +ve Rocrail function of item 2. For this switch you need 2 Actions to be defined for On and Off. This toggle switch then gets entered in the +ve TT route as an output in the Sensor tab. If the toggle switch is Off, the default +ve TT route is selected. If it is On, the default route gets turned off and the -ve TT route is selected which then turns the TT 180 degrees, does not change loco direction and allows the locomotive to leave the bridge in a forward direction. This Inhibit output can be placed in any of the +ve route sensor tabs.

While this was quite the exercise, I learned a lot mainly because item 2 was never clearly stated in the documents that I looked at.

Many thanks to Jean, Fabrice and Gerd on the Rocrail forum that helped me with this endeavour.

Peter