Switching lights

In LoDi-Aura you light up houses, stations and street lamps by hand, at fixed times or at random – just like the windows of a town coming on one by one in the evening. This page shows you step by step how to put a light into the track plan, connect it to its decoder and switch it.

What you can switch

Step 1: Put a house or lamp into the track plan

1. EditClick “✎ Edit” at the top of the track plan.
2. Open the paletteOn the left, expand the “Buildings” group.
3. Add the partA click on “House” or “Street lamp” puts the part in the middle of the visible area. Its inspector opens on the right.
4. Position itDrag the part to its place. Rotate it with “⟲ 30°” and “⟳ 30°” in the toolbar or with the R key.

Part of the “Buildings” palette group

Step 2: Name, type and windows

In the inspector, give the house a name and choose the type – from a home to a factory. For the type “House” you also set the “Look” (Plaster, Brick, Stone, Concrete) and the “Roof”.

Under “Addresses / windows” you list every window you want to switch: one address is one window. A new house already has one (“Light 1”). Use ＋ to add more and − to remove one.

Give each window a meaningful name, such as “Wohnzimmer”, “Laden” or “Halle” (living room, shop, hall). That is the name you will find it under later in the Accessories window.

For a street lamp the section is called “Lights / addresses” and works the same way.

An engine shed with the window “Halle” (hall) on the LoDi-Shift-Commander

Step 3: Connect it to the decoder

For each window, choose the device that switches the light under “Command station”. The matching fields then appear:

• LoDi-Shift-Commander: Under “Node on the Shift-Commander”, choose the entry from the device's command list, e.g. “Hallenlicht · Addr 7 · 2 aspects”. The list comes straight from the Shift-Commander; “↻” reloads it. The device has to be online for this.
• LoDi-Rektor and other command stations with DCC or Motorola: Under “Protocol”, choose “DCC” or “Motorola” and enter the address of your accessory decoder under “Accessory address”. If the lamp is lit while LoDi-Aura shows “off”, set “Which output means "on"?” to “on = red” instead of “on = green”.
• “— no command station —”: The light only shows in the track plan (“no command station — display only”). Handy as long as the decoder isn't fitted yet.

Below that, “after startup:” sets what the light does as soon as the command station is connected: stay off or come on – on the Shift-Commander this is “Aspect 0 (off)” or “Aspect 1”.

Step 4: Set switching times

Under “Switching times (model time)” you say when the light switches by itself. Without a switching time it shows “— none (manual switching only) —”, and you only switch by hand.

Fixed time: “＋ Time” adds a line. Enter the time, use the button next to it to choose “On” or “Off”, and click the days of the week on which the line applies – highlighted days apply. For “on in the evening, off at night” you need two lines, such as 19:00 On and 23:00 Off.

Random 🎲: A click on 🎲 turns the line into random switching. LoDi-Aura then switches the light on and off at random between “from” and “to”, on average as often as you enter under “ø every … min”. If “from” and “to” stay empty, the randomness applies around the clock. This makes a street look lived-in, because the windows don't all light up at the same time.

A street lamp on DCC address 21 with random switching between 18:00 and 23:30

Step 5: Switch during operation

Use “▶ Track plan” to go back to operation. A click on a window or on a street lamp switches the light on or off by hand. The picture changes as soon as the command station has confirmed the command. Whatever you switch by hand takes priority over the switching times.

All lights at a glance: the Accessories window

“Accessories ⧉” at the top right opens a separate window with all turnouts, signals and lights in your track plan. With the “Light” filter you see only the lights – with name, building, address, device and current state.

In the “Control board” tab, every light has a tile with buttons: “On” and “Off”, or the aspects “0” and “1” for a node on the Shift-Commander. This lets you switch your lighting without opening the track plan – for example on a tablet next to the layout.

Switching lights with automation

Should a light come on when something happens – say the platform lighting as soon as a train pulls in? For this you build a sequence in Automation: a trigger such as “Block occupied”, “Time of day” or “Button”, and the “Accessory decoder” node as the actuator. Simple sequences need the Standard licence tier.

To get a button in the track plan that switches a light directly, use a “Push button” from the “Automation” palette group: in the inspector, set “Triggers” to “an accessory directly” and “Kind” to “Switch — latching”. More in Drawing the track plan.

Station, buffer stop and loco lights

• Station: A station is a building too. In the station's inspector, under “💡 Lighting / switching times”, use ＋ to add lighting zones – one address with switching times per zone, just like a house.
• Buffer stop: Enter a lamp on the buffer stop in the buffer stop's inspector with “＋ Light”: command station and address as for a house, plus switching times. During operation, a click on the lamp switches it.
• Light on the loco: The headlight is usually the loco's function F0. You switch it in the throttle. With the setting “Lights on locos always on”, LoDi-Aura switches it on by itself when connecting, see Driving.

Problems?