Model Railroad – Robert Heller

Railroad Archive by category "Model Railroad"

Sir Top'm Hat gets a new hat and starts
work at Raspberry Pi Junction at Mile Post 314

RobertHeller June 3, 2017 June 3, 2017Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

The hardware I have designed an add on circuit board for the Raspberry Pi to control stall motor turnout motors. This board uses a quad op-amp circuit to drive a quad output transistor to drive the motors. It also features a 74AHCT00 Quad 2-input Nand Gate IC, wired as a…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Programming the Arduino

RobertHeller March 1, 2015 December 26, 2018Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

The code to download to the Arduino is in available for download as SignalDriverMax72xx_Ardunio.zip. It uses the LedControl library, so the code starts by including the header file: #include <LedControl.h> Then since it is using scanf() and various string function, it includes stdio.h and string.h: #include <stdio.h> #include <string.h> Then…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Assembling signal targets

RobertHeller March 1, 2015 March 1, 2015Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

The next step is to assemble the signal targets. I used 2mm x 1.25mm chip LEDs, made by Osram and sold by Mouser (part numbers Green: 720-LGR971-KN-1, Yellow: 720-LYR976-PS-36, and Super Red: 720-LSR976-NR-1). These are $.10 each in single quantities and the price goes down to about five and a…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Signal Driver board cables

RobertHeller February 24, 2015 March 1, 2015Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

Nine conductor ribbon cables (DigiKey part number MC09G-25-ND) is used to connect between the Signal Driver Board and the signals. One end gets a 9-pin header plug and the other end gets a small circuit board with small screw terminals. The actual LEDs in the signals are connected to wire…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Connecting the Signal Driver Board

RobertHeller February 24, 2015 February 24, 2015Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

The Signal Driver board is connected with a home made connector cable. The cable is a six conductor ribbon cable (DigiKey part number MC06G-25-ND). One end of the cable is attached to a 6-pin .1 inch (2.54mm) IDC header plug and the other end connected to a "plug" made from…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Signal Driver board

RobertHeller February 24, 2015 February 24, 2015Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

The Signal Driver board is assembled on a piece of "strip board", specifically a 3.5 inch by 2.5 inch piece cut from a BusBoard Prototype Systems BPS-MAR-ST6U-001 (included in the Mouser project). After cutting this piece from the board some of the copper foil needs to be carefully removed. This…

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Introduction

RobertHeller February 24, 2015 February 24, 2015Model Railroad, Railroad, What's on the bench 0

I will be building an interlocking plant module with 5 two-headed signals. To drive all of these signals I will be using an Arduino and a Max72XX Led driver (see http://playground.arduino.cc/Main/MAX72XXHardware for more information about general uses for the Arduino and the Max72XX chips). This article describes the hardware involved,…

Amherst Railway Show Last Weekend

RobertHeller January 27, 2014 January 27, 2014Model Railroad, Railroad 0

This gallery contains 15 photos.

I addended the Amherst Railway Show last Saturday. Here are some of the pictures and videos I took.

N Scale signals

RobertHeller October 7, 2012 May 29, 2014What's on the bench

I have assembled the N scale signals for the Two Siding Oval layout. This assembly consists of a BLMA Models #1000 non-operating N Signal Head (mounted on a piece of styrene), a length of fiber optic cable (Mouser #630-HFBR-RNS001Z), a two color (red/green) LED (Mouser # 696-SSLLX5099GIWCA), and a small…

Coming Soon

RobertHeller September 26, 2012 April 20, 2013What's on the bench 0

I am about to build a pair of demo Model Railroad layout modules: A 2’x6′ N scale oval layout, with a pair of passing sidings. This layout is designed to run two trains in opposite directions. It will be automated using a computer (using parts of the Model Railroad System),…

Category: Model Railroad

Sir Top'm Hat gets a new hat and starts
work at Raspberry Pi Junction at Mile Post 314

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Programming the Arduino

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Assembling signal targets

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Signal Driver board cables

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Connecting the Signal Driver Board

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Signal Driver board

Model RR signals with an
Arduino, Introduction

Amherst Railway Show Last Weekend

N Scale signals

Coming Soon

Additional Places