Chunky Track?

[Chris004]

Is that the stuff with a meter or 5 of ballast under it?

If so, that's what I need. Is there one that's basically "1 track wood damp" with gray ballast?

Or could someone kindly point me at a generic mesh and the tutorial that shows me how to texture it?

I have been using the spline smooth function but it makes a really wide swath (suitable for a 2 track line). I'm playing with TransDEM and I don't want to smooth out everything, but I don't like my train behaving like a small boat in light chop.

Ideally, there's a chunky dark or damp wood with varying track condition (rust or not, bad sleepers or not, weeds or not). Back when I was making lots of catalog routes I thought I saw a group of track like this - though I don't remember if it had a chunky. Sure do wish I could find my way back there; too many miles of catalog routes, saved too many different times. 300k+ items is a blessing with a curse, isn't it.

Alternately, someone could help me learn how to search. Search of track keyword chunky returned 5 results 4 of them 36in ga. Without the keyword 6,893 results...

Always appreciate the help. Thanks, People

Chris

 

[cascaderailroad]

I would not go any farther down the quality scale than MP Track Wood v2, and MP rusty, MP Tunneltrack Dark, MP Transition ... most of the rest of chunky mesh tracks are flat, one dimensional, or are tube rails, or flat bar stock ... I have tried thousands of tracks out there ... most are ridiculously high poly, kink badly in switches, or have swirlies in the ties when viewed afar ... most are unweathered, and have no occasional ballast on the ties, and are so clean and perfectly milled, that they look like he Bon Amy cleaning lady comes out daily, and polishes the tracks with Lemon Pledge, and scrubs them down with Minwax wood restorer.

Almost all tracks float 0.20 m above the terrain (because of TRS2004 track flickering), which must be manually adjusted by hand.

You do not want any multitrack (2 track, quad track) on your routes, always use single track

 

[Ricke82]

I don’t think you mean “chunky” track. It’s sounds like you’re looking for track with a built-in embankment that extends below track level to fill in minor dips in the terrain. If that’s the case, I’m not sure there is a generic term for what you’re looking for. JR has some which they call “terrain” track. I’ve also seen the term embankment (or just emb) used. There are probably other terms I’m not aware of.

 

[pcas1986]

Rick is right. There was an asset Kind called Chunky-Track but it is obsolete and replaced by Kind Track. I think it was more about the way track was constructed as a mesh rather than physical characteristics.

... most are unweathered, and have no occasional ballast on the ties, and are so clean and perfectly milled, that they look like he Bon Amy cleaning lady comes out daily, and polishes the tracks with Lemon Pledge, and scrubs them down with Minwax wood restorer.
....

I intend to make some T:ANE track when the specs settle down and will be sure to employ Consuela (Family Guy) to clean up the track with Lemon Pledge. :hehe:

 

[RacerTodd]

Check out the UltraTrack by mcguirel. It comes in a variety of ballast and wood colors, with rusty, very rusty and clean rails, with and without oily ties. The series includes end caps (to hide the end of the spline), lever/signal ballast track objects (a bit of ballast on the side to go under a switch lever or signal). The regular versions has a long repeat interval for straights, the "Kinky" versions (letter K on the end of the name) has a shorter interval for use in curves. I just use the Kinky version everywhere.

Under the name UltraTexture, there is a matching texture for each color of ballast for texturing areas near the track.

The reason I use it include:

A very wide ballast mesh that allows me to place track without having to add a lot of ballast texture next to the track.

The ballast mesh is about 1/2 meter deep. That allows you to raise the track up a bit off bumpy DEM terrain giving you a smooth track without a lot of terrain manipulation.

The ballast mesh is not the typical flat mesh, it's modeled to look like proper ballast - flat across the ties and sloping downwards away from the ties. Looks very real when raised up off the terrain.

The ballast texture is of a higher resolution that most tracks. Some of the classic tracks are low poly, yes, but they have horrid low-res ballast textures that totally ruin the illusion for me.

Todd

 

[Chris004]

Thank You

Thanks, Folks.

I don’t think you mean “chunky” track. It’s sounds like you’re looking for track with a built-in embankment that extends below track level to fill in minor dips in the terrain. If that’s the case, I’m not sure there is a generic term for what you’re looking for. JR has some which they call “terrain” track. I’ve also seen the term embankment (or just emb) used. There are probably other terms I’m not aware of.

Rick is right. There was an asset Kind called Chunky-Track but it is obsolete and replaced by Kind Track. I think it was more about the way track was constructed as a mesh rather than physical characteristics.

Track with embankment. That's right. Not chunky track then. I'm guessing I'll have to take an existing embanked track and learn how to re-skin it.

I've seen the terrain track. A little weird, as the sides of the fill are vertical. Probably quite useful in certain situations though.

You do not want any multitrack (2 track, quad track) on your routes, always use single track

One of the first things I did in surveyor was to rip up 2-track (I think it was '06 version of Electric commuter - then Razorback [that took a while and my 1st mandatory '06 re-install happened right after, so I did that at least twice]). That's how I learned to replace one segment at a time.

Almost all tracks float 0.20 m above the terrain (because of TRS2004 track flickering), which must be manually adjusted by hand.

Do that pretty regularly. Almost all of the spline-points on the routes I use are yellow. Do a lot of J-K: get gradient - apply gradient.

Check out the UltraTrack by mcguirel. It comes in a variety of ballast and wood colors, with rusty, very rusty and clean rails, with and without oily ties.

Funny you should say that. I downloaded much of that right after posting this thread. Haven't even looked at it yet. Good to know that's what I want, at least as far as the track-variation is concerned.

... lever/signal ballast track objects (a bit of ballast on the side to go under a switch lever or signal).

Shiny! I was wondering what that was about...

I just use the Kinky version everywhere.

Me, too. I pretty much only download the 2m versions when there is one. Do you know if there's a performance cost doing that? I may have to rip up my straight sections if there is.

The ballast mesh is about 1/2 meter deep. That allows you to raise the track up a bit off bumpy DEM terrain giving you a smooth track without a lot of terrain manipulation.

That'll help a lot.


So I guess where I'm at is: if I want a track with embankments that looks like the rest of my track I'm going to have to make one. Can I just apply the textures of the track I like to an existing embankment mesh? (maybe that's a new thread...)


I really appreciate all the thoughtful replies. Very helpful. Thank you, all.

Chris