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Seems
there are guys out there that hate momentum!
Musings from Jim Betz, adapted for this web page by yours
truly… December 27, 2011:
In the Bay Area there is a
new acronym which is growing in popularity. It is "DCS" ... and
stands for "DC Syndrome". When you operate in DC you twist up the
throttle until the loco starts to move ... and adjust from there. In fact if
you 'crack the throttle' and it doesn't move you crack it a bit further ... and
if that doesn't work you spin it to full on and see if you have power or not.
That behavior is "DCS".
In order to properly operate
a DCC loco, whether it has any momentum or not, the best thing to do is to put
in just a few clicks and then WAIT and see what happens. And if it doesn't move
put in a few more clicks (say up to about SS 10 - at the most) and wait again.
If it doesn't move then ... you probably haven't acquired the loco, the brakes
are on, it is sitting on dead track, the layout power isn't on, there is a short
... or some other such problem. Did you
acquire the loco? Toot the horn or ring
the bell. The will tell you everything
you need to know. The main point is ...
you don't need to try full throttle to see if it is working.
DCS is an insidious disease.
There are -very- few of us who don't
have it. Even if we have a very slight
case of it – and are rarely caught displaying the telltale symptoms ... almost all
of us have it and our operations are affected by it. Consider this example. Just last night I was 'showing off' my
switcher ... to the guy who had asked for it to "spin up before it
moves" ... and I was showing him how it worked and he loved it. Then I put the throttle in his hands and told
him what to do to get it to behave the way I had it behaving. And he loved it. So he starts 'playing' and
goes to actually switching some cars in the yard. And quickly starts over twisting
the throttle (as in no "wait") and finally tells me that the DT402D
he is using must have a problem with the "ballistic". And I tell him "no, it's the momentum
and the way that the loco is set up". So he concludes that he wants to use
a knobby (UT4D) so he has easier control of how far the knob twists….
The point - in just the time
between when I was telling him how to use the throttle+loco ... and when he
decided to try it out with some cars ... he had a "relapse" of DCS! Please remind yourself - this example was
"of the guy who asked that the loco sound and behave more like a real loco"
... but when I showed him how he can have it do that - he quickly fell back
into DCS mode.
Jim
So, what’s the point?
It’s not so much the mechanics of using momentum but that some operators
really don't like it. It does take
somewhat longer to switch a yard with momentum, but often times when folks
switch without it, it destroys the realism of the op session anyway. Better would be fewer trains instead of yard
goats running at 50-60 mph up the ladder tracks and across the runaround
"to get to the other side before the through freight gets in." Besides, it can be done with momentum anyway.
It just takes planning the moves
better. Watch a typical operator and I
bet they are doing 50% extra moves than needed. Slowing down allows some
thought between moves, and makes the whole operation more efficient. And by golly, it looks better too!
All the best.
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