Looking for a real-world intro to air brakes

Way, way back in the age of Apple ][ computers, the manual for Simulogic's Flight Simulator 2 (which eventually grew into Microsoft Flight Simulator) stressed the importance of learning proper technique early on, because in stressful or emergency situations, people tend to revert back to their earliest familiar ways of doing things.

A future career as a freight conductor is not out of the question, and, well, I'm pretty sure I'm learning bad locomotive habits in Trainz. I'm finding, for example, that one of the more effective ways of stopping a train without dynamic brakes seems to be to throw it into reverse. I have no idea if that's an acceptable practice or not... I suspect it's all right for the diesel, and I'm not spinning the wheels, but in between the two I bet it makes the generator and traction motors pretty warm!

I've seen lots of pages that explain how an air brake is constructed, how the triple valve works, etc... but I haven't seen a good tutorial on how to use them correctly. Can anyone point me in the direction of a good guide or video?

Try, "Management of Train Operations and Train Handling."

http://www.amazon.com/Management-Train-Operation-Handling/dp/B000M8YAE2

Note that there are documents around the internet using that name, including at DOCSTOC, but they are NOT the same.

Nelsona8c said:

I'm pretty sure I'm learning bad locomotive habits in Trainz. I'm finding, for example, that one of the more effective ways of stopping a train without dynamic brakes seems to be to throw it into reverse. I have no idea if that's an acceptable practice or not...

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In the real world, that would get you fired for several reasons:
-Abusing the equipment; One loco cost more than your life-time wages.
-Safety Violations; You are certainly not "in control" of your train if you need to throw it in reverse to stop.

A word of advice: DO NOT TELL your potential Railroad Employer that you "play Trainz"...Railroads are serious business, and though they like "railfans" playing games instead of playing on their real trains...they don't want "Train gamers" playing on their real trains as employees either.
--No major North American Railroad considers ANY video game a "Simulator" in a sense that gives you actual experience...there are "profesional simulators" for a reason.

If you want some insight, I suggest typing something to the effect of "NS locomotive engineer handbook" into a search engine. Their official training handbook should be among the results. It will teach pretty much anything you want to know about locomotive operation.

As far as Trainz is concerned, outside of dynamic braking, you can usually bring a train to a controlled stop by making a brake application and lapping it after a desired reduction has been made. The "lap" function will be listed somewhere in the manual. This will basically hold the train brake at the desired setting. You can handle smaller trains with the independent/engine brake. I've found it usually works for me to make a slight reduction with the train brake, slow the speed to around 10 MPH, then feather the indy brake to desired stopping point. Depending on train size.

Also, I have to second what KingConrail76 has said... Unless you have real, honest-to-God railroad working experience, do NOT let on that you have any interest in railroading. Probably one of the biggest ways to not get hired.

d0g said:

As far as Trainz is concerned, outside of dynamic braking, you can usually bring a train to a controlled stop by making a brake application and lapping it after a desired reduction has been made. The "lap" function will be listed somewhere in the manual. This will basically hold the train brake at the desired setting. You can handle smaller trains with the independent/engine brake. I've found it usually works for me to make a slight reduction with the train brake, slow the speed to around 10 MPH, then feather the indy brake to desired stopping point. Depending on train size.

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The above thing is one of the most annoying things about the train physics in Trainz. In real life, you can apply the train brake incrementally, whereas in Trainz you only have lap, and fully applied.
Even though MSTS has poorer graphics, and really annoying gradients, the controls and physics in MSTS are a lot more realistic.

Good Morning TorenHynes
There are two types of train (air) brake controls available in Trainz.

First is a non self-lapping brake (these tend to date to pre 1980s locomotives). These will be the brakes with 'release', 'lap', 'application', 'emergency' and possibly a 'handle off' position. To make an incremental brake application you move form the release or lap position to the 'application' position, and then release the desired amount of air, then move back to the 'lap' position. The 'lap' position is sometimes also known as 'hold' on some locomotives/companies (real ones that is).

Note, use the 'equalizing reservoir' pressure, not the train pipe pressure, when running long trains. The equalizing res shows the pressure that the brake pipe will drop to. The time it takes for the train pipe to equalize depends on how long your train is (and some other factors in the physics of the wagons).

The second type is a self-lapping brake. These tend to be on more modern locos. The further you move the brake handle from the release position, the more air will be released. Moving to the 'full application' position makes a full brake application. Moving to the emergency position makes the same application at a far quicker rate.

Regards

ZecMurphy said:

Good Morning TorenHynes
There are two types of train (air) brake controls available in Trainz.

First is a non self-lapping brake (these tend to date to pre 1980s locomotives). These will be the brakes with 'release', 'lap', 'application', 'emergency' and possibly a 'handle off' position. To make an incremental brake application you move form the release or lap position to the 'application' position, and then release the desired amount of air, then move back to the 'lap' position. The 'lap' position is sometimes also known as 'hold' on some locomotives/companies (real ones that is).

Note, use the 'equalizing reservoir' pressure, not the train pipe pressure, when running long trains. The equalizing res shows the pressure that the brake pipe will drop to. The time it takes for the train pipe to equalize depends on how long your train is (and some other factors in the physics of the wagons).

The second type is a self-lapping brake. These tend to be on more modern locos. The further you move the brake handle from the release position, the more air will be released. Moving to the 'full application' position makes a full brake application. Moving to the emergency position makes the same application at a far quicker rate.

Regards

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@ZecMurphy or anyone honestly. Apologies for resurrecting an old thread, but it's at least semi-related as I'm hoping to find out if the "Independent" brakes also can be controlled in a similar way (within Trainz, I know it can be controlled that way in real life) as to what was described above similar to the "First" type noted in the quoted response above. By that I mean can the Independent Brake be setup in an asset to use a 'Release', 'Lap', 'Application' positions, etc. which would more accurately mimic controls for the Straight/Independent brakes on older Steam Locomotive Brake systems like the Westinghouse SWA/SWB (The old Schedule A-1 Brakes with Straight Brakes for loco and tender) and the 5-ET and 6-ET (Engine tender brakes). The only info or examples I could find (for Trainz) provide the ability to operate independent brakes in such a way that the further you move the handle, the greater the brake application for the independent brake and vice-versa. I'm also looking to see if the operation of the Independent brake could be extended to the locomotive tender (like the aforementioned SWA/SWB, 5-ET and 6-ET brake systems would have) as well as the locomotive asset itself.

Please see (and reply to) my original post in the 'Content Creation Support' forum which has further details:
https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...rols-possible-in-Trainz&p=1883910#post1883910

Regards and thanks,
Mark Cole

This page might be useful: https://web.archive.org/web/20130925121400/http://www.alkrug.vcn.com/rrfacts/brakes.htm

64Warhorse said:

This page might be useful: https://web.archive.org/web/20130925121400/http://www.alkrug.vcn.com/rrfacts/brakes.htm

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Thank you for the response, but I’ve already done quite a bit of reading on the prototype, with a particular focus on brake systems in use from around 1900 through the 1950’s. What I’m trying to find out (and asked in my post) was is if implementing something in Trainz was possible (to more accurately represent the prototype). I was asking here simply because it’s about the only place I saw that someone took the time to describe the two types of (automatic) brakes that were supported in Trainz. Please see the question (and quote) in my previous response above as well as the link I provided to my original post, which I will provide again:

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/sho...rols-possible-in-Trainz&p=1883910#post1883910

Edit: I see now in my original question above (although much more clear in the linked post) that it was not clear that the intention was to find out if Trainz was capable of simulating the control style of older independent brake systems as would have been in use on most steam locomotives (at least in the United States of America) in the steam and transition era, and if so, guidance on how to accomplish this within an asset.

Regards and thanks,
Mark