Can you convert height units to something usable?

[martinvk]

Trainz vertical unit doesn't correspond to any whole measuring unit.

Not sure where you get that from. If I raise or lower water or any object by say 5 whole units, that results in a change of 5 meters. Now if the creator of an object wants to label that 5 inches, 5 hands, 5 feet or some other random body part, they are free to do so but in game, meters rule except perhaps in a few lessor developed countries like Liberia and Myanmar, with apologies to the people living there.

 

[JCitron]

Not sure where you get that from. If I raise or lower water or any object by say 5 whole units, that results in a change of 5 meters. Now if the creator of an object wants to label that 5 inches, 5 hands, 5 feet or some other random body part, they are free to do so but in game, meters rule except perhaps in a few lessor developed countries like Liberia and Myanmar, with apologies to the people living there.

I made that error when I first built my large route back in January 2004. I set the measurements in the create route to Imperial and built away only to find out much, much later that everything was really steep and chasms way too deep. Once I got that figured out, I started over again and off I went again building. It was a lot of wasted time, I though back then, but then again, I learned a lot and was able to do things better the second time around.

 

[rick1958]

Not sure where you get that from. If I raise or lower water or any object by say 5 units, that results in a change of 5 meters. Now if the creator of an object wants to label that 5 inches, 5 hands, 5 feet or some other random body part, they are free to do so but in game, meters rule except perhaps in a few lessor developed countries like Liberia and Myanmar, with apologies to the people living there.

I get it... 1 Unit=1 Meter (real scale)
But now to convert it to HO

HO Layout base = 50"
7.25 ft in HO equals 1 full size inch
50 x 7.25 = Layout is 362.50 scale feet or 110.49 Meters tall
If 1 unit equals 1 meter I'd have to sink the floor 110.49 units to get my 50" table height

Time to put this to bed. I'm way too old... LOL

 

[rick1958]

I made that error when I first built my large route back in January 2004. I set the measurements in the create route to Imperial and built away only to find out much, much later that everything was really steep and chasms way too deep. Once I got that figured out, I started over again and off I went again building. It was a lot of wasted time, I though back then, but then again, I learned a lot and was able to do things better the second time around.

Yeah, I guess since there's roughly 3ft in a meter, all your hills and valleys would be roughly 3 times too tall or too deep. That would make a difference.

 

[JCitron]

Yeah, I guess since there's roughly 3ft in a meter, all your hills and valleys would be roughly 3 times too tall or too deep. That would make a difference.

Yup. It sure did make a difference.

 

[OddRails]

The 50 inches or 1.27 meters is a real world measurement. No need to convert it to 1/87 HO height.

The fun starts when you calculate different heights on the layout. Say a hill is measured as 57" high from the floor. You can divide 57 by 39.37 to convert inches to meters. You end up just short of 1.45 m height from the floor.

If you are copying the layout exactly, you don't need the equivalent HO height just go straight from inches to meters.

They probably give the length and width in inches. You can convert those to meters as well. Since the height is in meters it might be easier if you use the same units in horizontal measurements.

Juggling too many conversions confuses me. I end up running simple test numbers through the equations to see if the expected result comes out. If successful, then the actual values are run through.

I copied a layout several years back, but messed up using Transdem to import the track plan image. Had to convert all the measurements to the new size of the plan.

 

[martinvk]

The 50 inches or 1.27 meters is a real world measurement. No need to convert it to 1/87 HO height.

Yeah, the track plan might be in HO scale but the table itself and the room it is in is not, its in real scale, otherwise you would also have to be in HO scale or you wouldn't fit.

 

[stagecoach]

The top of your HO model will be the baseboard at the 0 level. Drop the room floor area by -15.05 (50") to give you your room floor level. For your layout area, use HO scale measurements to create your working area. Once you have your base, you can HO scale for laying track and scenery.
In HO a 3ft (0.9m) wide work top would be equal to 263.8ft (80.4m) in real scale.
Edit route from the surveyor dropdown menu allows you to alter the scales at any time. The ruler will always use what you have set.
Only use real scale for height measurements, as the rulers as objects don't adjust.

 

[TSwenson]

Now that I've stopped laughing at the tit for tat, back and forth commentary on the inadequacies of our respective measuring systems... two things...

First, rick1958, suck it up like the rest of us and do the "math" to put real measurements in to the game like the rest of us (heck, the computer does the hard bits, you don't even need scratch paper). If you need a handy quick reference, make one up in a spreadsheet and print it out. If you are super resistant to change, use your slide rule (like my father, who used one professionally into the 21st century) and do the calculations manually, handwriten on paper.

Second, everyone else... on the Windows calculator, where the heck is the "furlongs per fortnight" selection?

 

[rick1958]

Now that I've stopped laughing at the tit for tat, back and forth commentary on the inadequacies of our respective measuring systems... two things...

First, rick1958, suck it up like the rest of us and do the "math" to put real measurements in to the game like the rest of us (heck, the computer does the hard bits, you don't even need scratch paper). If you need a handy quick reference, make one up in a spreadsheet and print it out. If you are super resistant to change, use your slide rule (like my father, who used one professionally into the 21st century) and do the calculations manually, handwriten on paper.

Second, everyone else... on the Windows calculator, where the heck is the "furlongs per fortnight" selection?

Thank you for that reply. Every once in a while I'll post something, forgetting the old Trainz community is gone. Refresher well taken.

 

[TSwenson]

Thank you for that reply. Every once in a while I'll post something, forgetting the old Trainz community is gone. Refresher well taken.

Don't take it wrong.... this issue frustrates the daylights out of me, if we can change the horizontal units, we should be able to change the vertical units! These are basic software functions and have been for the last 20+ years. My guess, and it truly is a guess, is that it wasn't put in (or was cut out of) the initial program to cut down on the CPU load and it's "too hard" to retrofit. That this is still unresolved after all this time and is usually deferred with the "it's too hard" response reinforces my opinion that programmers do not act like skilled craftspeople carefully building a prideful masterwork, but more like unwilling teens making a chair out of building blocks for a school project they don't understand.
That being said, if they haven't changed it in all these updates... I'm not holding my breath. I'm waiting (patiently) for the operating rules the AI runs under to be released... again not holding my breath.