Please advise me on my setup

[Martex]

I posted a message earlier in the welcome section where I apologized in advance for all my pending questions. I am looking forward to getting Stated with Rail Pro.

To be honest I am still on the fence but leaning strongly to toward Rail Pro. I currently have no home layout I operate on our club layout which is Digitrax. We recently added a computer and a loco-buffer so we can use our cell phones as walk around throttles.Using JMRI has made programming some decoders much easier and Others impossible,

I bought a Sporg IIv4 for use at home to do repairs and programming g for the club and it is a step up but I hate trying to read decoder manuals and figure out the correct values for each function. I currently have a small investment and I wan to get this right before I take the plunge.

I am thinking i wan to get one Module and the CI-1 to use with my lap top. My Sprog was special ordered with a 14 volt power supply so I should be good to go for power it will run about 10 locomotives without a booster. This will give me the opportunity to tryout Rail Pro while continuing to support the equipment I already own.

1. My understanding is that with the CI-1 I can control and program any locomotive that has a Rail Pro module. Is there anything I cannot do with the CI-1 that I could do with the HC-2 (other than carry it in one hand?

 Using the Sprog as a command station control and power would allow me to operate my existing equipment. I believe  read that I can also run the Rail Pro equipped loco on the club layout as DCC or With Rail Pro since it uses only the track power.

2. When operating an RP LSM on DCC how will functions show up on my throttle?

3. Is my concept plausible or any lost in space?

If no one has done this then I am willing to be the test dummy if you experienced users think this is do able. Thank you in advance for your advice and please do not hesitate to comment good bad or otherwise I will not be offended if you tell me I am off my rocker. I look forward to your replies>

Aloha

Gary

[KPack]

Welcome Gary!  Where you are at is where I was when I got into Railpro.  No real home layout of my own, just a club layout that used Digitrax.

To answer your questions:
1.) the CI-1 and HC-Sim (program on the computer that uses the CI-1) can do everything that a HC-2 can do.  It is not dumbed down at all.

2.) Not sure I'm fully understanding this question, but if you're asking about how functions will show up on a DCC throttle when running Railpro in DCC mode, then the answer is that you control what functions are assigned to which DCC function.  On the Railpro throttle (including HC-Sim) you have 16 function slots that you can make into whatever you want.  While you are setting these up you can set which DCC function button they are mapped to (F4, F5, F6, etc).  It is extremely easy to do.

3.) You're right on target with your thinking.  Railpro can be used at home on your test track and at the club with no problem.  I highly recommend getting a second locomotive module so you can test and enjoy the automatic load sharing.  And I recommend testing out the load-sharing at the club using the CI-1 and laptop combo.

Let us know when you get started and if you have anymore questions!

-Kevin

[Martex]

Kevin,

Thanks for the quick response to my questions. You answered my all my initial questions even thought the second was not so clearly stated.  So bottom line is I should do my function mapping in Rail Pro before I put it on the DCC layout. That makes total sense to me as Rail Appears much easier than anything else I have done. I agree that it would be better to have two modules in stalled in 2 dissimilar units juts to show how well they work together.

I recently spent almost 4 hours speed matching one Atlas and 2 identical Athearn Genesis units so they would work as a consist and they still would not work as a mid train helper. The 2 Athearns were hardest to match even though they came from the same batch,

I know at least one other member of our club is already leaning toward Rail Pro because I have been doing all of his programming. and I keep sending him every Rail Pro video I can find. Now i just have to make arraignments with my finance officer ( my wife) as I am recently retired. It should be a soft sell, I don't drink or smoke so trains are my only "bad habit"

Aloha

Gary