par gottardo » 08 Janvier 2012, 19:39
J'ai trouvé [b]un didacticiel simple de FRED en anglais[/b] qui pourrait éventuellement vous servir.
La langue de Shakespeare étant en France plus abordable que celle de Goethe, vous trouverez certainement quelqu'un qui pourra vous aider.
Bon courage
What is a FRED?
For many years the FREMO-community has been using a simple hand-held throttle with just a rotary knob for Speed Control and a Direction Switch. This throttle has proved very successful and user friendly in analog DC-operations
The FRED is an operationally and form-factor look-alike of that throttle for use with Loconet® of Digitrax.
The FRED-throttle was developed by Stefan Bormann and Martin Pischky to be used at FREMO club meets with DCC-operation. The idea was that, by limiting the functions of the throttle to the essential ones, inexperienced users would also be able to operate a loco with this throttle, without having to learn the intricacities of a DT100.
So the FRED is in fact a SimpleLocoNetTHRottle. As SLNTHR would not be easy to pronounce, Bart Bakker coined FRED as short for Fremo’s Einfacher Drehregler (rotary-throttle), or in english: Fremo’s Easy Digital throttle. (With his apologies for possible confusion with a flashing rear end device ;-)
Nr. Meaning
1 Function Button F0
2 Function Button F1
3 Function Button F2
4 Statusled (red, green, yellow possible)
5 Speed Control rotary knob
6 Emergency STOP (for this loco)
7 Direction Change
8 RJ12 socket (LocoNet) with cable
Colors of the status-LED:
LED-color Function
flashing yellow after plugging in: a loco has been allocated to this FRED
green loco allocated, reconnect protocol succesful
flashing green “turn to zero, dummy!!”
red no loco assigned to this FRED, can be done by a DT100
If the LED does not light up, the FRED is not yet connected to the LocoNet. Even if the RJ12 seems to be plugged in, it may be badly connected: so just plug it out and in again.
What is a FRED capable to do?
Quite a lot and also quite little ;-)
One can drive a locomotive, but one cannot select it with the FRED. This function has deliberately not been built in, to prevent that an inexperienced user would accidentally ‘steal’ someone elses loco.
You have to acquire a loco by having it selected and dispatched through a throttle that has more rights, like a DT100.
With the FRED you can operate one (your) loco and are not able to change any parameters of the loco’s decoder. But you can control direction, speed, lights other functions (F0, F1 and F2).
How do I acquire a loco?
Via another throttle that is capable to select a loco, like a Digitrax DT100 or a Uhlenbrock / Modeltreno Intellibox. Needless to say that you also need a Fred and a loco that will be assigned to your FRED.
First you select the loco with the DT100 as usual. It is a good idea to confirm this selection with a short test-run on the track.
To make this loco available for the LocoNet, push first [SEL/SET] on the DT100 and then [MODE/DISP].
Please note. The Chief can only dispatch ONE loco at a time for selection. Therefore it is wise to inform all other DT100 users that you are going to dispatch a loco.
Then push EMERGENCY STOP (6) on the FRED and hold it, followed by one of the Function Buttons (1,2,3).
If the loco is properly acquired the LED changes from red to green.
How to operate a loco?
Plug the RJ12 plug (8) in a LocoNet-box. Ortherwise nothing will happen…
Then check whether that loco has been acquired. The color of the LEDcolor of the LED (4) will tell if this is the case. If no loco has been assigned to this FRED, is should be done now (see above...).
Now the loco can be controlled in the same fashion as with the familiar analog Fremo-throttle.
The Speed Control knob (5) is a old-fashioned potmeter: if turned in the zero-position (maximum to the left) the loco stands still, if turned to the right speed increases until 100% speed is reached when the knob notches to the right. The Direction Control switch (7) controls forward/backward.
Please note: if the direction is reversed when the Speed Control (5) is not at the zero-position, an Emergency STOP is invoked for this loco, which is indicated by a green flashing of the LED.
When the Speed Control (5) is turned to the zero position the Emergency STOP is released.
Because you can walk around with the FRED, it may happen that the Direction Control switch (7) points to the right, while the train moves to the left. This is quite normal for DCC-operation, because ‘forward’ is defined as a characteristic of the loco: boiler end for steam engines, ‘F’-marked end for diesels.
The FRED has some extra buttons, which do not appear on the standard analog FREMO-throttle.
The STOP Button (6), to the left of the Speed Control Button (5), invokes an Emergency STOP when pushed. Only for this loco, not global for the whole section. Turn the the Speed Control (5) to the zero position to release the Emergency STOP.
The three buttons at the top operate Functions F0, F1 and F2 of the decoder in an on/off mode.
How can I clear the loco?
Exactly in the same way as you acquired the loco.
First push STOP (6) and hold it. Then push one on the Function Buttons (1,2,3).
The LED changes to red.
What to do when everything seems to fail to work?
Don’t rush to call the dispatcher to halt the fast clock, but verify everything is set up right:
Is it plugged in correctly?
Did you try to change de direction of a moving locomotive?
Was the STOP Button accidentally pushed?
If those things are all right and nothing happens, it might help to unplug the FRED and plug it in again after about 5 seconds.
Cordialement
Alain
