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Asymmetrical Braking and DCC Decoder


Ben_T

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Hello All,

I am brand new to DCC and have spent a good few months now researching various ways of achieving a complicated system of signalling and automatic stopping at red signals for my new layout. 

I have been speaking with Clive at Heathcote about one of their boards, the IRDASC-5. This seems to do everything I need regarding the signals, and also creates an isolated section of track up to a red signal to stop the train using asymmetrical braking (I believe this is also called ABC?).

One question I have, and it is going to cause me issues, is when the train enters the isolated section, surely the lights and sound will stop working!? If so, does anyone know of a way of stopping this heppening? It would look and sound awful if a train pulling nicely into a platform suddenly went dark and silent!

It would also be great to know if anyone knows of any DCC sound decoders that support this function or any way around it. 

I have read about "brake on DC" but I hear it's not as good!

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks

Ben

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Having isolated sections of track defeats the whole objective of DCC and is not recommended. What you need to happen is that the train is instructed to stop via the DCC control signal. Therefore sorry, but ideally you need a different solution. I'm sure someone on here will know what will work..........

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The sections for ADCC (asymmetric DCC) / ABC (automatic braking control) are not fully isolated, they are normally just a break in one rail at the extremes of the section. The ADCC module connects across this break and induces an asymmetric into the DCC signal which a suitable decoder sees as DC and reacts as programmed.

 

This same discussion also going on on other forums if you want to read the same answers twice.

 

Rob

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Hornby Sapphire, Lenz Silver and Gold (or latest named version) are supportive.

 

I know the Sapphire can be set uni or bi-directional, which is handy. For example you may want to run into a bay platform and stop, then be able to reverse out or you may want to slow or stop at a station in one direction but run through at speed in the other direction.

 

Rob

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Thanks all. That is very helpful. I'll have a read in the other forums you mentioned.

As far as sound goes, and assuming I find a decoder that supports sound and ABC, does anyone know if the sound will disappear when the loco enters the "isolated" section?

Many thanks so far

Ben

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The problem with sapphire ,lenz silver and gold is that these are not sound decoders 

And TTS decoder does not support asymmetric braking. All my kit is 2000 miles away so I can't even test a Loksound 3.5 for you with a simple 5-diode Lenz BM1 equivalent module.

Rob

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