Icosahedron

I was only using the as examples of microcontrollers. Plus, an RCX can fit into a tender if it is rear-facing and turned 90°, or placed into the well of a condensing tender.

That space crisis can be alleviated if one were to replace the receiver and battery box with an RCX, NXT, or Scout hotwired to an IEEE 802.11n-compatible transceiver and then have the motors and compressor hidden in the tender. One must remember that the only thing the motor powers is the compressor, and not necessarily the cylinders. Regarding efficiency, the total amount of air compressed would depend on the gearing of the compressor, not so much the size or output torque of the motor.

kyphur, What you said is true. However, if one were to replace the existing magnets in the couplers with neodymiums that have some ridiculously huge strength, then overall the length of the trains would increase dramatically because you can afford to stack more cars on and not worry about the magnetic fields that bind the cars together. Frankly, I think that your statement on the amount of traction that the locomotive has is irrelevant. That is because this thread only covers the method of locomotion, not the locomotives themselves. The issue of traction on the locomotive would have to be dealt with by the builder of the locomotive, just like any other power system, whether it be 9v or PF.

Most of you out there hate how 9v track always drops voltage at the far end of the track. Also, I'm sure that most of you hate the ludicrous cost associated with fully motorizing a PF-powered train. The cost of these methods, the hard-to-find 9v track and the expensive PFs, is too high. In concert with the recent rising in the amount of steam locomotive MOCs, why not install a computer-controlled air compressor in the tender of the locomotive, then run the hose through to the cylinders? In other words, why not make pneumatic locomotives? Right now, pneumatic components aren't particularly expensive, and economic prudence would tell locomotive builders to at least try this method of construction. Not to mention that there is insane pulling power that can be yielded from these cylinders. Using the equation -----c P (d)^2 s TE = ----------- ----------D Please note that these figures are calculated for the 64mm pneumatic cylinders and BBB large driver wheels. This also assumes that your compressor is operating at at least 20 psi. c = 0.85, P = 20psi, d = 2(0.5), s = ~2.52, D = ~1.2, we find that -----0.85 20 2(0.5)e2 2.52 TE = --------------------- = ~35.7 lbs. --------------1.2 That's an insane amount of power for a LEGO locomotive; however, if you use different drivers and air pressures, your figures might be different. Even if it is slightly financially unwieldy to have a pneumatic train, just look at the benefits! Your locomotives would be able to pull far longer trains than any 9v or PF locomotive!

In this situation it would be helpful to have a tag on each car so that they can be sorted accordingly in "smart yards." This would cause switch engines, with a smaller microcontroller, to go into that particular area of the yard and retrieve the car, then assemble the outgoing train automatically, and finally send the train with its own microcontroller on its way. That'd be pretty cool, no?

HENRIK You should make a stupidly long train that contains all the locomotives and rolling stock made by TLG in the last 10 years. That'd be amusing to see Super Chief, EN, Red Cargo, Yellow Cargo, etc. all in one train!

I think that making intelligent layouts with Atmel or Freescale 68k-based microcontrollers is entirely possible. If one were to have a microcontroller embedded into the train's locomotive, a central microcontroller with more storage could store what each locomotive is pulling. When the station knows that a particular train has passed by a reader at some point on the track, it can switch the direction of the points accordingly to match where that particular train must go. I think what you're doing is very cool, and that this should be looked into by the majority of the community.

this locomotive is a giant bucket of EPIC WIN

Blocked in the eastern US. FFFFFFFF-

It shouldn't make a difference in speed since it's already powered, but if you pull long trains you'll need a powered coach somewhere along the line. LEGO's magnetic couplers only hold so much.

Well there are only two things that you can aim for with train gearing, speed or torque; not both. If the driving gear were an 8T and the driven gear were a 24T, then the torque would tend to be about 3x more than that generated by the motor but wouldn't go fast. If the driving gear were a 24T and the driven gear were an 8T, then the speed would tend to be about 3x more than that generated by the motor but you would have difficulties acquiring momentum.

Looks cool.

The stuff that you guys mentioned is coming with the next part of the essay.

Let's take this steam locomotive... ...and push it... ...somewhere else!

roamingstudio, If this carbon tax is what you are saying it is, then the tax would be variable to the purity of the coal, and thus its carbon content. Is that not what you are saying, or is the tax imposed on coal in general? In that case, I used bituminous coal in the example because it was commonly used in steam trains. I agree that there is a certain "golden spot" where fuel efficiency and loading weight meet at an optimum, before which or after which the locomotive becomes too encumbered with either variable. Should the train have too high or too low loading weights on each axle, then fuel efficiency will inevitably drop. Regarding your statement on nuclear fusion I am skeptical. This seems to contradict your earlier statement on locomotive weight in that you need very heavy lead shielding to protect the fireman from ionizing radiation.