I was surfing youtube videos and I ran across this. It's a pretty awesome demo of a automated fiddle yard. [video=youtube;dxRJ9rdyX4c]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxRJ9rdyX4c[/video]
Looked good...other then he has rockets on rails !! That or the video was sped up for demostration purposes...LOL
The video has definitely been sped up for demonstration purposes. I've seen this video before, but I'm still impressed every time I see it. That is the way to do staging!
You know I don't diss the work this person has done and the level of technology that went into it, but are we getting to the point where sitting in front of the computer is taking the place of the fun of running trains? And of course the big question. What happens if the puter gets a virus? Does the thing go wild and start shooting trains out on the main to where it looks like a California freewy pile up?
Very cool. I've actually considered something like this for a display, but I now see how much effort it would take. To me, the ultimate use for this would maybe be a museum display, where you have one scene that the trains travel through, and all the sorting stuff is hidden. People would wonder how the heck so many different trains are passing by. Extend the length of the whole thing with longer trains, and you could recreate a scene from a busy mainline, like the BN racetrack or something. He could probably sell this to people.
I agree with DaveD, this technique would be a major asset to small museums with relatively small layouts. Automated staging and control would allow many different trains to cycle on the layout throughout the day, which would create more interest than could be had with just a few trains always visible going around continuously.
He has another video on youtube that shows his layout. Still in the construction phase but it's going to be pretty nice.
