That's my cheat sheet for the staging yard switch numbers. When I started, I built my own Arduino staging controller and control panel. One push button would align all the switches for a track. I was particularly proud of the code; nice and compact with clear routing logic. When that coil driver board died I decided to change everything over to DCC stationary decoders (Digitrax DS52). Throwing each switch to route a track got old so that's when I started playing with JMRI. It doesn't feel near as elegant but is significantly more flexible.
I don't know how I've missed this thread before now... I am really impressed! Electronics are right up there with heavy construction in terms of Least Favorite Model Railroad Activities so I have particular respect for those who can tackle it (what is this "JMRI" of which you speak?). I had been to "West B" in person in the early part of this century, when the now-defunct small software company for which I worked thought it had a potential customer in BNSF. It was one of the visits we made to railroad shops on the line, which also included Alliance, Nebraska and Springfield, Missouri, as well as BNSF Headquarters. No business resulted-- the IT powers that be quashed the initiative that had been started by the Operations Group ("you get your solutions through us, and us only, and anyone you contacted is now permanently disqualified")-- but it was certainly a treat to do some "railfanning" at my then employer's expense!
A couple of updates to the BN Ottumwa Sub. I finished all the code 40 switches on the West end of the yard. I still need to ballast them. I did get the main ballasted up West Burlington hill. I also finished Borax (Iowa Soap Company Mfgrs). This is kit bashed from Walthers/DPM modular buildings. Not exact, but I'm pretty happy with it. Then I got back into signals. I designed a PCB to go in place of the walkway on a signal bridge. That way I don't need to run 4 wires to each head and only need to run 4 wires total to the signal bridge. (My new Scale Trains SD40-2s showed up today)
The signal mast solders into the 4 large holes. Then I run a 40awg wire from each pin on the LED down to one of the 3 holes in the PCB to the side of the mast. For the upper head I run them down the center of the mast. For the lower ones I just run them directly from the LED to the PCB. Those LED wires then go to an I/O expander (PCS9655 to be exact) - i2c in, discrete LED control out. Here's an early picture of of the build that shows the wires better. The 4 wires that go from the PCB down to the connector are power, ground, clock, and data for an i2c interface to my data concentrator (Arduino Teensy 3.2). My data concentrator then talks C/MRI (RS845) to my computer running JMRI that drives each aspect along with reading detector, turnout position, and facia switches inputs along with dispatcher input for the logic necessary to clear a control point. Each data concentrator can drive up to 4 signal bridges but typically just 2 along with optical detectors and the facia switches. Enough for a control point. Here's a simplified schematic of my layout electrical:
Looking great. I’ve just started the process of planning the signals on my Boise Division. I’m going to use the DIGITRAX SE-8 and SE-74 modules. I really would like to have functioning semaphores but that’s tough in nscale.
