Where is the you tube link?--Wha's Neat

Where is the "What's Neat" You Tube link for Ken Patterson's article in the Jan. MRH?

John

Oops

Okay all fixed!

BLAZIN' FAST n FREE!

What could be better?  I got an AT&T fiber to the premise (FTTP) drop last month, 100MBS up and down. 

Then I found out this week that the the entire library of MRH was available to DL for free and badda BING badda BOOM this ol' man is poppin off issues to my terabyte HD as fast as he can click the keys!  Seriously, I click on an issue DL button and it is in the folder. 

For some reason the newer 6 or 7 issues DL kinda slow, but once ya get to mid 2019 they drop instantly.  It was so fast I thought it wasn't downloading, and I actually wound up with three copies of June by the time I realized what was happening, HahA! 

Thanks to all you guys who make this possible. 

Now if I can just figure out how to install an Arduino Nano with a bluetooth card in my locos, with a small enough (SD?) chip to store sounds, then program everything to run from a smart phone app, I will be up and running the way I really want model railroading to be in 2020 w/o spending $1000 on clunky outdated and over-priced DCC controllers and boosters, and expensive $25 - $125 decoders in every loco.  And my teenager can DL the app to her phone and she will have herself a ball running her own consist from her iPhone X.  

What better way to engage the youngest generation in our ancient hobby and get the kids who are buried in their phones interested and excited about this fascinating art of building sets, running action, and sharing vidz and pix?  I mean, she shares a photo of every meal she eats at a restaurant, I'm quite sure she will find sharing shorty vids of running trains over interesting scenes just as much/more fun to share.   

Arduino is $3.00, bluetooth is $1.00, sound cards are $4, and I already have the smartphone and power sources so I can get the system online for $8.00. 

Reality check, DCC manufacturers:  Your 20-year strangle hold on over-priced equipment is coming to an end.  We can do it all ourselves for next to nothing - and probably better if we can get enough young folks interested start writing free-ware for us old-timers who know jack about programming.    

January 2020 Issue of MRH

I am going back and re-reading this past years issues of MRH and, in doing so came across your editorial in the January issue.  

I model a prototype railroad in a manner that allows me to do operations fairly easily.  My railroad is nearing a point where I hope to begin these operations in the near future.  I've been interested in joining the OpSIG but, as you state in your editorial, I've not done so primarily because of the learning curve that I anticipate.  I am new to operations and, when I read the topics on the OpSIG, I get the sense that I'm very late to the dance.  I need a primer, not the doctoral class.  If even a "back to basics" column was started, perhaps it would be a way to get started.  I'd love to join the OpSIG but am afraid it will be just to complicated.

So, all this to say that I not only agree with your thoughts in the editorial, but I'm hoping that the folks at the OpSIG consider a way for us simple folk to get started.

Craig Wiilliams

Lititz, PA

@ Craig

Consider joining the OpSIG and purchasing the Compendium.  You can read thru that as a complete novice and learn as much as you want about many different aspects of operations.  I found reading the book really helped me understand operations and it gave me some hints to make minor adjustment to the layout which will improve ops.  Money very well spent.

Not me

Not my experience. The book throws you in the deep end and doesn’t give a total newbie a good sense of how to start simple and work up to more involved ops. I felt like I had fallen into a graduate course and was desperately seeking the 101 Intro course for ops.

DAN W.