Long Range Dispatching

Here are the details:

• Publication in USA: N Scale Railroading, issue #48 July / August 2008 (article in "americaN" language)
• Publication in Germany: FREMO Hp1, #2 2008 (compleate article in German language, published by permission)
• How to build a Skype-Radio-Modem

And here it happened:

The fifth americaN-weekend was in November 2007. With 37 meters (120 feet) this was the longest module-arrangement so far:

The highligt of ths meeting was the first session: the dispatcher Carsten L. Lundsten was working from Copenhagen/Danmark, the arrangement was 1.000 km away.

We used Skype and as specially built hardware develeped and made by Michael Prader. The train crews talked to the dispatcher via radios and Skype. And we had another premiere: this was the first session of americaN in English language (all the ones before wer in German).

Here you can see a screenshot of a ms graphics dispatcher paneel, which Carsten used to ceep control of the movements many hundred miles away. On its way is train #31, the container hotshot with engine BNSF 9647

Carsten at his home layout.

Origin:

Author:  Bernd Schneider, http://www.america-n.de/, (c) 11/2007

published with permission