Building embankments/tracks rising/descending on land

bedraggledfox

New member
How do I raise/descend track smoothly on land like you see on already-installed layouts like Glasgow-Falkirk? It's one of those useful things that is never mentioned in the manuals. I seem to have tried everything; raising the track then raising land underneath then using the plateau tool. Do it the other way and the track is all bumpy when you run trains on it. Either way the track just looks like a roller-coaster, which you don't really want. How do layout-building experts do it? :confused:
 
How do I raise/descend track smoothly on land like you see on already-installed layouts like Glasgow-Falkirk? It's one of those useful things that is never mentioned in the manuals. I seem to have tried everything; raising the track then raising land underneath then using the plateau tool. Do it the other way and the track is all bumpy when you run trains on it. Either way the track just looks like a roller-coaster, which you don't really want. How do layout-building experts do it? :confused:

When you say "do it the other way", do you mean SMOOTH SPLINE HEIGHT? I have had success modifying "already installed layouts" using it. I would sure like to know what "the other way" is other than the plateau tool.:eek:
 
Open track editing, use the get height tool from advanced bar, get height from a spline point, then apply the same height to the same spline point. This will make the spline and two adjacent splines become yellow, indicating they have a set vertex height, causing the track between them to ignore the terrain and rather follow the set height.
 
Or use the height adjust tool to click on the white circle, although this sometimes shifts the height slightly if you're not careful.
It is faster than Get/Set Height, but not as precise if you want to keep all heights as is.

:cool: Claude
 
What I normally do is to work out the gradient of the track, use this to find out the height of the far end of the track, and raise it to that height then use "Smooth Spline" to raise the Terrain underneath the track.Then I manually alter the sides of the embankment to about 45 degrees so that it looks more like a real embankment.Merely usin Smooth Spline produces unrealistically wide Embankments and Cuttings and the track hovers about a foot above the embankment, so its important to raise the embankment under the track and close the gap.:wave:
 
Sorry manjoe, I should have mentioned that the 'other way' meant doing the opposite, when you raise the land and then smooth it using the plateau tool THEN built the track on it, like I do with roads. Often when I do this however, the track is all bumpy because the land you've raised is still uneven in places, although for some reason it's never that noticeable when you're actually building it. :confused:
 
As soon as you use the adjust spline height buttons the track will smooth out, going through or hovering over the ground where necessary. Then use the smooth spline button on the section of track and the ground it goes over will raise or lower as needed to conform to the trackbed.
 
Altering embankment angle.

What I normally do is to work out the gradient of the track, use this to find out the height of the far end of the track, and raise it to that height then use "Smooth Spline" to raise the Terrain underneath the track.Then I manually alter the sides of the embankment to about 45 degrees .

How do you do that?
 
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