LionChief Gateway Project (3-29-21 Update)

JD2035RR posted:

Ryaninspiron posted:

I was wearing my LC Gateway board with a battery all mounted to a lanyard.

That alone must have alerted his curiosity Can you elaborate or do you have any pictures of your LC Gateway Board fixed to your lanyard?

 

Congrats, nice to hear positive news!

Probably, at least I hope it did . There is not much to go into, I took the board that has been running my gateway code all along and used a screw terminal breakout board as a mounting plate for the Lipo battery. Then I also added a relay with a status light to show something physical getting triggered besides just the alpha-numeric display.

Eventually I will get some all in one circuit boards produced so I don't need to use off the shelf (more expensive) components anymore. This board of mine is like an early engineering prototype right now. It works but its ugly. Plus I still have unknowns about the limits of the Bluetooth radios with regards to multi loco control. I will know more once I get my second LC loco tomorrow.

The hardware I use is practically changing by the week these days. I already have a small pile of components that turned out to be incompatible with different combinations of the train, the remote, or the app so far. Adventuring into the unknown is fun but also not cheep!

Update 1-28-2020

Track power control for postwar via LC remote works! Video here: https://youtu.be/ZABna2tu9bE

I also picked up my new Union Pacific NW2 LionChief+ loco from TrainLand and am ready to start developing consists using the LC App and Remote.

Excellent news. Thanks!

Landsteiner posted:

Excellent news. Thanks!

Glad you like it.

I do have a bug to work out though. I haven't looked at the output with an oscilloscope yet but it seems my board likes fresh ac power straight off the transformer (aka a pure sine wave, not the chopped up version modern control boxes put out). I used the same technique as other transformer control boards, so it appears to not be too happy when you try powering it off another transformer's output. I am sure I will probably be able to work that out though.

For now it prefers direct transformer connections like Lionel's Powerhouse for example. It may also work as is with postwar transformers, I am pretty sure they also have pure sine wave outputs.

Time for a little progress report.
1. Still no contact from Lionel, I still need to send that email.
2. I managed to blow up one of my Bluetooth gateway boards during my track power project work. I can only figure some wire got crossed and severely overloaded the module. That set me back over a week. Still nervous to hook a new board back to the same circuit. Especially until I take some precise measurements. Post-War track power board will have to stay on hold until I do a little root cause analysis.
3. I joined a local train club, Train Masters of Babylon. Great people with a huge layout in a 4000 sq ft rented warehouse space. I already got to run my LionChief LIRR M7 at a public open house. Had a great time doing it. It was awesome to see the kids chasing my train along the subway line into a miniature Penn Station. I also got more ideas to try. Such as adding motorized doors to my LionChief M7 train. 
4. Motorized M7 Door project. Since my M7 comes with a lever to slide the doors open I figured I could add a motor to it and add control of it to the LionChief remote. Attached is a video of the preliminary results. I still need to add the Bluetooth control from the LionChief remote but it should be easy. trying to figure out a possible tether system to avoid dedicated Bluetooth boards for this in each passenger car though.

Let me know if I should open a new thread to show how I did it.

5. Thanks to some inspiration from running on the club layout I decided I wanted to make some ATC (automatic train control) system. Basically autopilot for LionChief. but it will be done to prevent actual train collisions on a large scale layout like the one at my new train club. No matter what control system the other person on the line is using, my train (though a Bluetooth gateway project connection to the layout block signal lines) will automatically stop in front of red signals and slow down in front of yellow ones. To try this out I bought several accessory activator FasTracks to create the block signal system on an oval track.(Perfectly the same size as a poker table it turns out). Soon I will hook up the same gateway board I already have been working on. This will allow me to prevent the collision of two trains on the same line running at different speeds.

6. I also would like to make a infared object triggered train speed syncronizer. It would either suggest or force an even spacing on two trains in on the same line. in suggestion mode it could simply act as a tool to assist drivers with spacing, but the force mode could also do it for you. I would just have to count the time since the end of one train to the start of the next to get a follow time.

Kinda like the adaptive cruise control ..on today’s vehicles. Great thread ! Love the doors !

Nessmuck posted:

Kinda like the adaptive cruise control ..on today’s vehicles. Great thread ! Love the doors !

Exactly. It came to mind when I was sharing a single loop line during an open house run session with another member of the train club. We had one close call and one very slight rear end collision resulting in a minor derail. It happened because we got a little distracted with a conversation, no damage, but I thought it would be cool to flip a switch and go hands off without stopping my train on a siding. Now that I have two LC locomotives I can test this out at home. I plan on using that same little loop track I set up to test it out. My goal is to have my M7 space itself evenly apart front and back from another freight train on the line.

And thanks, I also plan on syncing the door closing action up with the door closing sound made by the announcement button.

@Ryaninspiron, can you share what you learned about the BLE protocol being used, such as what you are sending along to the 0xE20A39F4 , 0x08590F7E service and characteristic combination?

bmoran4 posted:

@Ryaninspiron, can you share what you learned about the BLE protocol being used, such as what you are sending along to the 0xE20A39F4 , 0x08590F7E service and characteristic combination?

A very loaded question. At the moment I am trying to do some bridge building with Lionel but I'm also trying to get their exact feelings on the project. As some others have mentioned I want to avoid triggering an MTH style reaction to all this. 

In my opinion sharing is caring. Now considering that they have opened up the TMCC and Legacy protocol in the past, I do not yet see a reason why they might avoid the same treatment for LionChief.

I also would like to avoid the technical deep dive on this thread since things would get way too technical for most members to follow. BLE has a lot of tricks to it.

For now I am focusing my efforts on doing things that are supposed to be impossible.

Next priority on my list is dual locomotive control from the LionChief app. This has been delayed due to a bit of a communications issue between two of my modules. I am trying to keep all of this on a microcontroller level to avoid any computers including the raspberry pi. 

I am also adding Bluetooth control to the e-unit, couplers, and lights on a postwar locomotive from 1954. I figured it would be a neat idea to leave the original e-unit installed but trigger it with Bluetooth independently of track voltage.

My only suggestion to not lose sight of the relatively more important (at least in my mind ) goals.  Using the universal remote to talk to TMCC/Legacy locomotives is number one. Unifies the product line over the last 25 years.   Getting the universal remote and the app to talk with non-command (prewar and postwar, MPC) type locos would be the second priority.  Unifies the product line over the last 120 years.   Adding speed control to LionChief only locos would be number three.  The other items are lesser priorities (although good fun and worth doing at some point).

OMG, this is great, a super job, my friend, well done!    Feels like it's starting to turn into Legacy & LCS like features ( and then some) for LionChief.  Way cool

Landsteiner posted:

My only suggestion to not lose sight of the relatively more important (at least in my mind ) goals.  Using the universal remote to talk to TMCC/Legacy locomotives is number one. Unifies the product line over the last 25 years.   Getting the universal remote and the app to talk with non-command (prewar and postwar, MPC) type locos would be the second priority.  Unifies the product line over the last 120 years.   Adding speed control to LionChief only locos would be number three.  The other items are lesser priorities (although good fun and worth doing at some point).

Thanks for keeping me in line lol.

Getting the LionChief remote to speak to TMCC locomotives will be easy enough because the train club I just joined has a legacy system. Unfortunately according to my reading I will need to acquire an LCS SER2 module to do legacy control since the port on the back of the legacy base only supports up TMCC level commands. At least according to what I've read.

I'm not sure if legacy locomotives can respond to TMCC commands, or is my only option to get that SER2 module I mentioned.

Also now that I have a LC+ locomotive, I can see that the firmware has a few more neat features I can take advantage of in the LC+ remote. For example I could repurpose the built-in volume control as an accessory selection tool while in drive mode via my gateway.

Casey_Jones posted:

OMG, this is great, a super job, my friend, well done!    Feels like it's starting to turn into Legacy & LCS like features ( and then some) for LionChief.  Way cool

Why thank you very much, That's what I am going for. 

"I'm not sure if legacy locomotives can respond to TMCC commands, or is my only option to get that SER2 module I mentioned."

Absolutely can, no problem.  Legacy locos can be controlled by the original 1996 TMCC command base and cab-1 .

Ryaninspiron posted:

Landsteiner posted:

My only suggestion to not lose sight of the relatively more important (at least in my mind ) goals.  Using the universal remote to talk to TMCC/Legacy locomotives is number one. Unifies the product line over the last 25 years.   Getting the universal remote and the app to talk with non-command (prewar and postwar, MPC) type locos would be the second priority.  Unifies the product line over the last 120 years.   Adding speed control to LionChief only locos would be number three.  The other items are lesser priorities (although good fun and worth doing at some point).

Thanks for keeping me in line lol.

Getting the LionChief remote to speak to TMCC locomotives will be easy enough because the train club I just joined has a legacy system. Unfortunately according to my reading I will need to acquire an LCS SER2 module to do legacy control since the port on the back of the legacy base only supports up TMCC level commands. At least according to what I've read.

I'm not sure if legacy locomotives can respond to TMCC commands, or is my only option to get that SER2 module I mentioned.

Also now that I have a LC+ locomotive, I can see that the firmware has a few more neat features I can take advantage of in the LC+ remote. For example I could repurpose the built-in volume control as an accessory selection tool while in drive mode via my gateway.

Legacy will respond to tmmc commands but ideally you would want to use the legacy protocol on legacy locos and the TMCC Protocol on TMCC locos. You can send either information through the SER2 or with the WiFi module and the free LCS LE monitor. The thing we haven’t figured out is to get a legacy command initiated from a 3rd party won’t update the speed graph on the cab-2. I think someone said the iCab app would but I personally don’t have the app to verify. If that is true then it’s capable of updating the Cab-2 via serial commands but not sure if the command needed. 

Landsteiner posted:

"I'm not sure if legacy locomotives can respond to TMCC commands, or is my only option to get that SER2 module I mentioned."

Absolutely can, no problem.  Legacy locos can be controlled by the original 1996 TMCC command base and cab-1 .

Thanks, glad to hear it.

zhubl posted:

Legacy will respond to tmmc commands but ideally you would want to use the legacy protocol on legacy locos and the TMCC Protocol on TMCC locos. You can send either information through the SER2 or with the WiFi module and the free LCS LE monitor. The thing we haven’t figured out is to get a legacy command initiated from a 3rd party won’t update the speed graph on the cab-2. I think someone said the iCab app would but I personally don’t have the app to verify. If that is true then it’s capable of updating the Cab-2 via serial commands but not sure if the command needed. 

I have done a little research into the 9 bit legacy commands and it seems that if I can talk to the base with 9 bits of data then I should have no problem sending legacy data directly. I'm not sure if it makes sense to worry about sending Legacy format commands from an LC remote since I would already be short on input buttons. I wonder if I am sending TMCC commands to a legacy locomotive via serial, can you still send legacy commands from the cab-2 remote at the same time? Does the locomotive have to switch modes or anything when going between TMCC and Legacy commands? 

As for updating the speed on the cab-2 then I would say if the iCab app can do it, then it can be reverse engineered at least.

After pulling an all nighter, I got the dual Lionchief  locomotive code running. Using my gateway it is now possible to run multiple(up to 20 in theory) locomotives at once from the Official Lionchief remote app.

Video update coming once I get some sleep.

Wahoo!   

looking forward to the video!

It works! Dual locomotive control from the LionChief app is up and running!

I also figured out synchronization of speed at least at the low end. Arguably a very useful feature.

Theoretically I can do 20 LionChief locomotives like this. No idea how many will work in reality. 

Video below.

youtu.be/mYDu9uKFSws

Let me know if you guys like it.

Just saw the video,  nice work

Is their Anyway you can control each loco independently?   For example, even on a bedroom/spare room layout, you may have a switcher working a siding and a passenger train running around an outer loop at the same time, each going at different speeds and directions.   Also and horns, bells, and crew talk independently?  Kinda like the BlueRail app,   Or is that a Lionel app re-write?

Thanks