开云体育

Hello,

So, after reading a lot of the JMRI online manual, lot of articles and
watching a lot of videos, I have still some difficulties to understand
to which extend JMRI already do what I wanted to develop myself.


# What I need to do

I want to add some precision to what I need to develop.
But to not make it to complex, I will also re-explain what I need to
develop.

So, for the bachelor work I need to do for the school, I have to develop
something that can:

"Automate train movement by detecting their precise location."

By "automate movement", they mean regular service and maneuver. Especially
composing and de-composing trains, and distribute wagons on different
tracks.

By "detecting precise location", they mean with 2 to 3 cm accuracy. And,
as the system need to maneuver the vehicles composing the trains, it need
to detect position, beginning and end of each of these vehicles.
Including the position of the couplings.

I can use any solution, but I am not allowed to:

* Cut the track into pieces

* Re-do something who is already seen as state of the art

For obtaining the train position, I measure it or calculate it from
other measured values.

The state of the art including hardware and software made by railway
model makers. Whether they are companies or hobbyists.


# What I planned to do

After passing a looooot of time documenting the state of the art on the
hardware side, and evaluating the few detection methods that are
available and not in the state of the art: I've finally decided what to
develop.

The majority of methods that I?have documented only detect the passing of
a train or a block occupation. The only few that directly measure the
precise position are either impracticable in some situation or completely
vanished.

So, I decided to use 2 consecutive IR detectors, working by reflection
against the train, to measure speed. By using the raw value of the
detectors, I also hope to detect where begin and end each vehicle and
where the coupling are. Or even each vehicle signature. Then, using a
modified JMRI, calculate the exact position of the train and where each
vehicles and coupling are.

Of course, this only work if trains maintain their speed after the
detectors, or only stop and restart. But, I could also use the speed
values measured by the detectors to build a speed table of each
locomotive. And then use these tables to estimate new speed in case of
speed change.

After having the precise position of the trains and wagons, I planned to
modify JMRI?add what miss to manage train composition and de-composition,
and wagon distribution, from a high level interface with abstraction of
the moving management needed for each maneuver.


# Is JMRI already capable of all of this??

In my long documentation of state of the art, I've forgotten to check
the state of the art for the software side. Because the solution I?have
chosen use a software to calculate the train position and automate all
movements.

By reading the JMRI manual [1], I have seen that it can detect train
location when they entering a bloc. And all other positional information
can be calculated with at must the track speed of the train and the
length of the path.

But what kind of position calculation?? Is it only a point of the map??
Or is it also the beginning and the end of the train with position of
each coupling??

From where the track speed of the train come from?? Also by using 2
consecutive detectors??

Is this calculation can use the length of the train?? If yes, from where
this information come from??

I have also seen that the JMRI Dispatcher System could automate train
control [2]. But it only control the movement from point A to point B
and executing pre-written script at point A or B??

In the manual of the dispatcher, I didn't found a more high level
control. Like, you choose which wagon and locomotive compose the train
and JMRI will automatically do the maneuver to build the train and then
send it to the next station where JMRI will distribute the wagons on
different tracks. From what I understand, all the maneuver need to be
scripted in advance. Or did I miss something??

Before starting to develop anything, I need to know if JMRI, or any
other software, can already do what I plan to do, in the way I plan to
do it. Because if it's the case, I cannot do what I plan and need to
found another way.

The only other software I know is TrainController. But from what I
understand, it only do train position based on block occupancy
detection.



[1] ,
section "The Importance of Block Path Lengths"

[2]


Best regards

-------
Gendre Sébastien





Sébastien Gendre <seb@...> writes: