Geoffwba,

I would strongly advise you have look at the www.brian-lambert.co.uk web site, you will find all the information you require.
Brian has kindly allow you to down load articles for your own use. I highly recommend this page as it written by an ex railway signals engineer.

 

*** Norman, Brians site is good for conventional wiring but it will not help in any way with Cobalt Alpha Switch which needs NO manual complicated connecting of wiring as its all plug and play... it makes control panel creation dead easy with zero wire cutting and zero soldering. The switches also incorporate the leds.

Geoff, The instructions show the options clearly - there are also added instructions online and very soon a video which shows most common usages (its in final edit now)

Alpha switch is one switch per change required. Therefore two per point.

* A siding is one per route = 2, yes.

* A crossover can use two or three depending on how you want the panel to look (one for crossover one for straight, or one on each straight in parallel and one on the crossover centre.

* Re the triangle yes, one per route is fine - its simply a matter of interconnecting accordingly as it is with the crossover. Use the Y connector to link switches.

If you get stuck email please - we can walk you through any of the trickier switch combinations possible.... and it'll still stay 100% plug and play

Kind regards

Richard

 

I think I may be interested in using Cobalt Alpha for a new layout but, apart from knowing that it is some way of doing a point control panel with little wiring, I have no idea what it is, how it works or what I need to buy. I have read Richard's "Alpha Story" pdf (twice) but that does more to confuse than explain. Does anyone know of a document which explains Cobalt Alpha in simple terms?

Regards
Peter Lucas
MyLocoSound

 

*** All it would take is a simple email or call and you could have a copy of the full 32 page overall Alpha Manual. as a PDF

Here is an edited copy to lower file size - I deleted non specific pages. There are a couple of minor changes due (for example Roco does NOT need adapter leads) but otherwise its OK. I show some complex uses here as well but it can be very simple.

View attachment ALPHA_manual_edited_LR.pdf

Sometimes simple concepts are so simple that its hard to grasp, and publicity takes time to arrange so it can be many months before supporting articles are at hand from users etc. We are also finalising videos now, so within March they will be online. Alpha is indeed a simple concept that totally changes the way control panels are made and allows super-simple manual control of digital devices.

We will be demoing most of it at Alexandra Palace Show in March.

--------------------------------

In the mean time. Specific questions can be answered, but I do not want to turn MRF into a customer service place.

This summary gives you the very quick basics.

Alpha is a system / range of units not a single item. They can take away wiring complication and they do this really well. Using Alpha is as easy as assembling Lego. To create it we didn't just make electronics - we also developed a specific switch and wiring system to make it even easier, integrating the LED into the switches

* Alpha itself allows you to interface any form of momentary switch and convert its output to a digital command reducing wiring to the layout to 1 cable. It is versatile and can even be used to interface diode matrix structures and it will even turn stud and probe use into digital commands.

* Alpha-Switch products extend this simplification... to allow a full control panel to be made without cutting wires and soldering.

Alpha Switch A (analog control of cobalt with full plug and play panel wiring)
and
Alpha Switch D (control of digital accessory devices and panel creation that is totally plug and play)

So - both follow this "make it simple" concept.

* Alpha central combines Alpha and Alpha Switch in one really well presented product that is for some modellers as simple as "Open the box, plug it in and change points". NCE can just plug it in via RJ12. ALL brands can connect via Alpha-Box. It is a direct connect at bus level for some systems and others can connect via interface adapters because they use different plugs.

* Alpha Box is an intelligent power booster for all brands that also integrates Alpha to your control bus and will allow ANY unit to increase power our while improving overload protection and is an upgrade for anything from the basic EZ command to NCE Power Cab to ECoS power-wise. Used with Alpha it ADDS accessory control for DCC systems that do not offer it. It extends accessory address ranges for others, NCE can just plug it in via RJ12. ALL brands can connect via Alpha-Box. It is a direct connect at bus level for some systems and others can connect via interface adapters because they use different plugs.

* Another Alpha product is due soon... It will be called Alpha Mimic, and I can add more when I release it. This one will also make creation of the panel itself easier with a totally new LED concept + some useful computer tools to help you draw panels as free add-ons.

As to more detail.

There will also be Alpha articles in 2 of the main mags soon - Written by users and creators of project layouts.

Plus...

This is the preface from the mini-mag with the latest BRM.

Quote:

WHY COBALT ALPHA?
One of the first, and most appealing features claimed for Digital Command Control (DCC) was very little wiring, yet it's something that never
actually happened. Nowhere is that more obvious than when you create a control panel.

Of course, wiring for DCC uses less wire and is significantly simpler than with traditional DC sectional control, but wiring the track-work is only a
small part of it. Even if you manage to get the wiring neat and tidy under the layout, there are can be literally hundreds more wires to be connected if you
want a professional looking control panel.

Modellers often tackle the major challenge of layout wiring as simply something that just has to be done. But while we all want to have one, many really do
not look forward to the creation of a mimic-type control panel at all because it involves hundreds of small soldered joints on unfamiliar small parts; then
the completed panel needs dozens more wires to connect it to the layout.

At DCCconcepts we had already reduced this substantially by creating accessory decoders that draw so little current they can be connected directly
to the track bus, adding frog polarity control to decoders and point motors and removing the need for added switching technology by integrating LED
and switch control, but that still left the potential nightmare of mimic panel creation and connection.

Our Cobalt α Alpha range was created to correct this and it does it beautifully, making control panel creation virtually 'plug-and-play' and reducing wiring
to as little as one cable or pair of wires between panel and layout.

It's clear however that just because we made it to simplify wiring, it doesn't necessarily mean it's easy for a modeller to grasp the Alpha concept. In this
mini-mag we'll cover the range, model-by-model, step-by-step to show you how straightforward it can be.

End quote:

Kind regards

Richard

 

QUOTE (Richard Johnson @ 13 Feb 2016, 15:06) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>*** All it would take is a simple email or call and you could have a copy of the full 32 page overall Alpha Manual. as a PDF

Thanks for the info Richard. I tried asking "What will Cobalt Alpha do for me that wiring the Cobalts directly to a panel won't" in an email and all I got in reply was "Alpha Switch would significantly reduce your wiring requirements and solve all the configuration issues you mentioned in your previous emails". Well forgive me but that doesn't exactly inspire me to rush out and spend the $... I can accept an awful lot of "wiring requirements and configuration issues" for the cost of Alpha :-D

The PDF manual may have helped. As would some video of what it does.

My query in context was:

"I want to have a control panel with switches to manually change points / crossovers. Not interested in route planning / points combinations at this stage.

What will Cobalt Alpha do for me that wiring the Cobalts directly to a panel won't?"

The info you posted here will help. I'll have to see if I can track down a BRM for the minimag too.

 

Simon,

You did better than me. I emailed Richard last Monday with a similar query but got no reply. So this week I put some time into reading and re-reading all the documents and web site info I could find and, once I got past the sales hype, now have a reasonable understanding of Cobalt Alpha.

To answer your question "What will Cobalt Alpha do for me that wiring the Cobalts directly to a panel won't?", my understanding is:

* Reduced wiring. I used direct wiring on a previous layout and it involved on wire daisy chained from point to point on the layout, one wire daisy chained from switch to switch on the control panel, and one wire from each switch to each point. Each of these had to be soldered. With Alpha you just have short, snap in ribbon cables from each switch to the Alpha switch unit which lives under the control panel. This, in turn connects to the Alpha main unit which converts switch settings to DCC commands. The Alpha main unit connects to a two wire bus which runs round the layout. Each Cobalt IP digital point motor is connected to that bus by two dropper wires. If you are using NCE DCC then that is all you need. If you are using analogue DC or any other kind of DCC then you need an extra interface box.
* Easier maintenance and fault finding. With much less wiring it will be easier to locate and fix faults. However if a fault occurs in one of the Alpha units then figuring out where the fault is and how to fix it is probably going to be really hard.
* Better control panel indication. Using the Alpha switches the switch mounted lights will give a clear indication of the current setting of each switch. A power off memory ensures that all switches will show correct indications when you power up. Mind you, on my previous layout I just used simple toggle switches on my control panel with the direction of the lever showing the point setting.

With my new DCC layout, I want to use route selecting and have decided to use Cobalt IP digitals wired direct to pushbuttons on the control panel. I concluded that the cost and learning curve of Alpha was not worth the marginal reduction in wiring.

Regards
Peter Lucas
MylocoSound

 

*** I am sorry if I have been slow - I am just back from an overseas trip of ore than 4 weeks with little email contact during much of it, and little time when I was online.

Alpha is NOT a marginal reduction in wiring - it takes control panel-to-layout to One simple connection - about a 99% reduction for most.

Alpha videos are in preparation... as are other guides. It takes time unfortunately.

The most difficult thing to explain is just how radical the reduction in wiring really is...

Richard