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IF U HAVE A NUMBER OF TRAINS THAT R ELETRONIC AND U PROGRAM 1 TRAIN ON THE MAIN THEN THEY WILL ALL BE PROGRAM WITH THE SAME # . THE IDEA OF THE PROGRAMING TRACK IT IS SEPERATE FROM THE MAIN TRACK BY USING INSULATERS.OR 1 SINGLE TRACK HOOK UP TO THE DCC.
As Skip says, you can’t tell the system which locomotive to program, it will program any (or all) locomotive it can find. So if you program on main, then you need to have just the one locomotive on the track (or a way to isolate the others). With a separate program track, you put the locomotive you want to program on that track. What many people do is set up a spur or siding on their layout which is insulated from the main layout and have that do double duty as a program track.
Simply put, programming on the main let’s you specify which loco you are programming while using Programming Track method allows you to program all of the locos on the track at once. One reason you might want to do this is if you are setting up a multi-locomotive consist and want to have them all set with certain identical settings, like momentum, that act together. Also, there are some advanced functions that cannot be set up when programming on the main. Refer to your DCC systems’ user manual.
Physically, as Skip mentioned, the Programming Track can be a separate length of track or an isolated siding on your layout.
Sorry, Dale you are wrong programming on the main will program all loco’s on the Main to the sane address having a separate programming track lets you program that loco only and also programming on the program track the display will show you what you are doing where as on the main it does not. I set up a siding and used insulated joiners and then wired a double pole double throw switch so that when I go to the programming track and throw the switch it isolates the main track. when you want to run a consist of different loco’s you can do this on the hand piece and enter the different loco numbers to that consist however you will need to speed test the locos so that they run at the same speed for the particular throttle setting that you want. see the manual on how to do all this. hope this helps.
Sorry Kevin. You are so wrong. If a DCC system has the option of programming on the main, the first thing the system asks for is the current number of the engine you want to program. If it’s a new loco then you can put 0003 in as the code of the engine you want to reprogram. Then it asks what number you want to loco code to be. When you enter the new number, the system reprograms only the loco number that you input first. It does not affect any other engines on the layout.