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Model Railway Computer Control Centre

Introduction

The signalling and interlocking on Horton is performed using the Model Railway Computer Control Centre software. MRCCC was developed by member, Stephen Parascandolo specifically for the needs of Horton, but it is fully data configurable to any layout.

The Software is available through the MRCCC website.

Software

Model Railway Computer Control Centre (MRCCC) is a Windows software application created to provide a user interface and interlocking for the model railway that closely replicates real modern UK signalling practice. MRCCC is designed to be the signalbox - it does not attempt to control the trains or allocate controllers and traction power feeds. However, it is a flexible system and complex additional logic can be built up if required using any of the signalling states, which MRCCC knows about.

The software is freeware and can be downloaded from this website free of charge. The source code (MS Visual Basic .NET 2003) is also available. MRCCC is not intended to be a commercial product and as such help and support are limited but I'll always try to help.

The software will only currently work with MERG RPC hardware running in RS232 mode. However the structure of the code is such that it would not take much additional work to code alternative hardware platforms or communications protocols. MRCCC looks and behaves like a real VDU based signalling control centre.

Some essential simplifications have been made - overlaps, approach locking and sectional route locking for example are not required for model railway use. Equally detail like point and signal identities are not required on the screen. The aim has been to recreate the appearance of a real system but without reliability, safety and availability features essential on the real railway.

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