[NTLK] Serial-Out for Trains?

[Anthony Velasco]

Very nice, Dennis! I know that Marklin are the “Mercedes” of trains - excellent German craftsmanship and engineering! I could never afford the hobby that my uncle enjoyed, even when his collection sold after he passed. It would have been wonderful to share the same enthusiasm and joy that he had by carrying a childhood hobby into his career! I suppose we all are sort of doing the same with the Newton platform, however. Viva la verde! ;-)



> On Jul 22, 2019, at 8:15 PM, Dennis Swaney <romad at nvwisp.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi, Anthony
> While I can't help regarding this, I wanted to mention I still have the Märklin trains my father bought for me 65 years ago in Kaiserlautern, Germany. In addition, I was stationed at Cooke Barracks, in Göppingen, Germany from '84 to '88 and toured the Märklin museum there by the factory.
> 
> Sincerely,
> Dennis B. Swaney
> 
> "Cogito Ergo Mac"
> 
> 
>> On Mon, Jul 22, 2019 at 3:19 PM Anthony Velasco via NewtonTalk <newtontalk at newtontalk.net> wrote:
>> Hello Steve - 
>> 
>> My uncle, Dr. Thomas S. Catherall (deceased), was a professor in the Recreation Department at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. He also was the (or "a") U.S. representative for Marklin Model Railways, and published regularly in their newsletter, which may still be available. Much of his work centered around the use of digital controls for model trains, and he used these to study cooperative play and interactive learning while teaching computer skills.  I remember seeing some of his set-ups in his lab where he was using an Apple II for programming the controls. He even built a larger scale system in a city park in Springville, UT with a sizable grant he received. 
>> 
>> Here are a couple of links that I found to some of his publications and a patent that has many of his Marklin newsletter publications listed in the Lit. Cit.  
>> 
>> Good luck, Steve and HTH!  
>> 
>> 
>> https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/036013159090005R  
>> https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1991-11053-001
>> https://patents.google.com/patent/US7904215B2/en  
>> 
>> Anthony (Tony) Velasco
>> 
>> ========
>> Date: Sun, 21 Jul 2019 00:34:10 -0400
>> From: Steve Craft <craft.steve at gmail.com>
>> To: newtontalk at newtontalk.net
>> Subject: [NTLK] Serial-Out for Trains?
>> 
>> 
>> Hey all. An uncle gave a full old-school train set to me (my kids) and I was thinking that it might be fun to control the track switching and other things in the set from an eMate. Can anyone recommend a way to use the serial port (or anything else) to send a signal from the eMate to something outbound? Of course there is also the software side of things...
>> 
>> All ideas appreciated. At first I thought I might do this with an Apple II, but this will be even more fun. 
>> 
>> 
>> Thanks!
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