Marking track while in Driver

avsteve

New member
My greatest frustration in creating routes is the difficulty of fixing bumps in the track. Let me be clear. I lay track, put a loco on it, and switch to Driver. I drive down the track and try to make notes about all the bumps and dips. But I'm working on a route that has 100+ miles of track, mostly desert and lots of curves, few landmarks. So when I return to Surveyor I have to search the general area inch by inch. Been doing this for at least six months, it's a major job, track still bad. (It's rough because it was from a fishlips map and the terrain just is what it is!)

I've installed mileposts, every mile, but they are too imprecise. A mile of track is a big stretch if you're looking very close for a flaw.

It would be wonderful if Trainz had a hot key in Driver that would (figuratively speaking) toss a beanbag out the cabin window. Said beanbag to settle on the terrain next to the track, and be visible in Surveyor. It seems like an obvious feature in such a complete and well thought out program. Of course it need not be a bean bag, how about a hot pink texture sprayed on the ground?

Anybody know of such a feature?
Steve

Trainz 2006 ver. 2.6 build 3337
 
Hi Steve,

I don't know if the feature you describe is available, but I have a few suggestions.

1. Why don't you level the tracks as you're laying them? Are you using the "Smooth Spline Height" function in the Tracks section while in Surveyor? Also, lay shorter track lengths.

2. When I'm trying out new Trigger locations, Triggers don't show up in Driver. But while in Surveyor I put down some Object, like a tree or a car, so I know where the Trigger is. Other times, I've laid a short piece of track and placed a loco on it. This way, I can use the "Find Object" function in Driver. Just make a note of which loco you used and where it is. This worked better that the first suggestion when I used it to place a bunch of locos as placeholders to see how my double crossovers were working. I was able to find each loco and wait there until the trains passed.

Art
 
I don't know if this will help but make a train in surveyor and move it down the track that should show if the track is leval. You can look at the train at all angles while moving it.
 
I always place mileposts at 1/4 mile intervals. Narrows it down when I need to go back and fix something. Sure it takes more time, but in the long run, it's worth it. And besides, REAL railroads have mileposts at 1/4 mile intervals anyhow.

Just my two cents worth.

Dave
 
Surveying (laying objects) in driver is impossible.

The only thing remotely possible is saving a session with a loco at a problem spot.

I have practiced grading a DEM with fairly resonable results.
=======================================
In wireframe mode, adjust the day/night time so that the see through color is very dim like twilight.
=======================================
First ... Use FT 1000m Straight Track over all the straight segments, forming a divider tool shape. http://www.stanleylondon.com/dividers.htm

Next overlay a peice of real spline track over top of the FT Track (one end will require the need the hold shift key).

Then measure @ 200' back from the divider points crossing on each straight section leg of FT Track, leaving visible a ruler rainbow tool line.

Insert 2 raw add spline points at each 200' marking.

Connect a spline point track, connecting the 2 raw spline points.

Straighten the straight legs, leaving the connecting curve unstraightened.

As you go down the track apply a gradient of 0.25%, or 0.50%, or 1.00% at spline points, keeping the height arrow well within a 5m spacing.

When a curve is complete you can delete the FT Straight Track, and any unecessary track.

If it is too deep, it will cut a too deep channel ... and if it is too high it will leave a very unrealistic fill bank.

I have just perfected using this technique, after doing it all wrong, for years on end.

When a curve is completed you can delete the FT track
Screen_004-14.jpg

Screen_005-11.jpg

Screen_006-11.jpg

Screen_007-12.jpg

Screen_008-7.jpg

Screen_009-6.jpg
 
Last edited:
Steve,
My suggestion is to add the MC Custom HUD V2 rule to your loco. This will give you an odometer that displays distance in 0.01 increments. By starting test runs at reference points and reading the distance to track problems, you should be able to go to Surveyor and use the ruler to measure from reference points and find you problem areas.

Bob Weber
 
I always place mileposts at 1/4 mile intervals. Narrows it down when I need to go back and fix something. Sure it takes more time, but in the long run, it's worth it. And besides, REAL railroads have mileposts at 1/4 mile intervals anyhow.

Excellent advice, Dave - I shall do this from now on as I've had problems in the past like the OP. (Why didn't I think of this earlier? As you say, it's prototypical - which must be what we're aiming at.)

Ray
 
Thanks for help on bumps etc.

To all who responded: I was amazed to get so many wonderful responses, and in just 24 hours. Thank you very much. :):mop:

This is a busier week than usual, I don't have time to give these ideas the attention they deserve. In a few days I will respond to each one separately. Every response had at least one usable idea, no fooling around here!

Steve
 
A further thought - if, like me, you made the mistake of trying to represent a prototypical route but forgot to space the stations at the correct distances apart, the mile and fraction posts could be spaced at less than the correct distance to give the illusion of distance ('modeller's licence'?).

If one's main interest is station operation, this could be a useful dodge to avoid there being too long an interval between periods of action - an old model railway trick. In other words, apply a scale reduction to space, just as it is possible to apply a scale reduction to time in Trainz.

Ray
 
In the route I'm currently working on, I'm no where near placing any mile posts, buildings (except industry). I basically have hills, mountains, rivers, textures and track.

What I have found easiest for myself to help narrow down the location of bumps, etc is once I have the track where I think I want it, I make a train of 10 engines per baseboard. I then start driving, and when I hit a bad bump, too tight of a curve, ground still covering the track, I stop the train. Decouple the last engine and start driving again. Once I've used the last engine, I go back through them 1 by 1 to make sure they are on or at the offending part of the track, svae and exit.

All my bad spots (sometimes) are now marked with easily findable locos. So in a way, they're like several ton beanbags. :)

Eric
 
I generally do it all in surveyor - unless the section is intended to be a grade, all the nearby splines should be the same height. So click the advanced tab;

94601817.jpg


Get vertex height for the one I want all the others to be at, then click the Apply Vertex Height button, and click on all the nearby splines to set them all to the same level.
 
whyfly2
Thanks, you probably put your finger right on the root problem. I "laid" the track (speaking loosely) at breakneck speed, miles at a time. To control the curves I used many spline points, later removed most of them. They may have left some disruptive residue. Considering re-doing the whole route, but hate to abandon so much work.
Steve
 
OP's comments

Thanks to all who responded to my post of Sep 26, wonderful response and everything usable even if not for the immediate problem. I had problems while entering my followup, so I’ll start over.

whyfly2
Art, you’ve probably put your finger on the core of the problem. I laid track like crazy, putting down as many spline points as it took to control the many curves, later used “straighten track” which is a fine tool but in this case it made things worse where I had a spline point at the bottom of a dip – it extended to dip instead of correcting it.

danny5
Dave, I was going to do that but it wasn’t clear how to enter fractions on the Auran milepost. Doesn’t take fractions or decimals (that is, USA decimals with a period not a comma). So I figured maybe that’s not prototypical. How do you handle this?

cascade railroad
It looks to me like you showed be the solution to a different problem, one that I also have on this route. I.e., putting curved track onto wavy terrain without using spline points. Looks like a wonderful tool and I’d like to give it a real try.

I did a test curve on a baseboard with one little hill. I was totally befuddled by putting one track on top of another, using FT, etc. I will say that it worked! I wonder about a few points. How to you set the angle of the divider arms? Is there anything special about the 200 ft measurement or was that just a for instance? Can this be used where two curves to back to (left hand curve followed by a right hand curve)? I’d like to try this again, with your help. Thanks!

R weber95
Bob, I just LOVE that odometer, use it a lot, but I can’t use it to set mileposts so for that I use the one mile train. And there’s a small difference between the two tools. Over the many miles, it adds up. Looking back, I could probably test one section at a time, say 5 miles, starting at ) miles each time. That should work.

ray whiley, Sep. 28
Well, yes, though on this route I like the long runs and expect to eventually put them to good use. Aside from that, it was a terrain-provided route that could not easily be edited for shorter runs between towns. Even if I could chop out strips of terrain, thee remains the problem that the terrain wouldn’t match anywhere. I don’t think I mentioned that this is Cajon Pass and it’s pretty mountainous territory, and lots of hills in the “flat” area, nothing is flat for very far.

eswearingen
Eric, all I can say is, Why didn’t I think of that? It seems like a direct attack on the problem. Yes, that should work, I’ll try that in my next session. I’ll put the focus on the LAST car in the train, when it hits a bump/dip, its just stop train, uncouple last car, and continue. Easy. Thanks.

sniper297
Yes, that’s more the way I should have done it. I would have seen trouble gradients developing before its too late. Although, it’s hard to know where the vertexes should be because the terrain is 2% average gradient and for each track segment I’d have to compute the vertex height based on that gradient.

My thanks to all !!!
Steve
 
Hi again Eric
I seem to have taken the wrong step somewhere. I uncoupled the engines one by one, checked to make sure they were dropped off along the track, and saved the session. Now the session is accessible only to Driver module. I cannot tell Trainz to open the saved session in Surveyor. Or can I?
-- Steve
 
Hi again Eric
I seem to have taken the wrong step somewhere. I uncoupled the engines one by one, checked to make sure they were dropped off along the track, and saved the session. Now the session is accessible only to Driver module. I cannot tell Trainz to open the saved session in Surveyor. Or can I?
-- Steve

Steve,

I wonder if Eric meant pushing the 10-engine consist along the tracks to look for dips and bumps in Surveyor rather than Driver makes a lot more sense.

Try the ALT+Y walk-mode, which puts your eye-view at ground level. This is helpful too when searching for lumps, holes, and other oddities. It's also helpful too just to look around and see what the scenery will be like, and it gives you a chance to lay things out in a realistic way.

John
 
JCitron

John, thanks for the time about Alt-Y. It gave me a good look at track that was otherwise hidden by the faces where a hill had been cut way back when. Amazing detail, too!
Steve
 
Back
Top