Hornby RFID Locomotive tracking (Lots of RFID readers)

Projects General Guidance
1

Hi all,

I'm currently playing around in advance of making a new Hornby Train layout. My idea is to place RFID readers (ATM they are: RFID RC522 readers) and place small RFID tags on the base of the locomotives and coaches etc.. Allowing me to track the location of each loco on the board as they go over the track sections with readers under. Experimenting I got a single RFID reader working and assigned each card ID to the ID of a locomotive and it all worked nicely. However I want to know how to use multiple (lots of RFID readers) and distinguish the location of the scan.

Reading up it seems I can just extend the pins of the wired reader over to more readers at different points in the track and they will all work, but I would have no way of distinguishing which of all the readers was the one to actually detected the trains tag.

Hoping somebody can shed some light on how to use multiple RFID (RC522 preferable) readers and distinguish which reader the tag was picked up on.

Using the Arduino Mega as controller.

Hope the above makes enough sense to somebody and look forward to a response,
John.

2

Can you post a link to the datasheet for the RFID reader you are using.

It may not be necessary to have readers in many places. There is limited scope for where a train can go and a computer could infer which train is which from the start point and the route selected.

...R

3

Hi,

Sure thing:

http://www.nxp.com/documents/data_sheet/MFRC522.pdf (This is Reader)

Also, Iv been working with the "AddicoreRFID" Library. But I have no preference to which library I use, I have no program made ATM and I'm just testing my theory.

Thanks for your help,
John.