Is there a limit to the length of a single track or spline?

I am experimenting with pre-making blocks of 20 boards long by 2 boards wide with four tracks and catenaries. The idea is I can use the merge route function to quickly create long straightaways on a fictional high speed route and then go back later to add scenery and landscaping. The problem I appear to be having, however, is that when I add the catenary and track, it disappears. The spline end circles are there, but the catenary and track is not being rendered. I broke the catenary down into 5 board stretches and was able to transverse the 20 boards that way. So there is a work around. But that leads to the obvious question - is there a limit to how long you can go with a single length of spline? Or is there something wrong at my end?

Thanks!

NJCurmudgeon said:

I am experimenting with pre-making blocks of 20 boards long by 2 boards wide with four tracks and catenaries. The idea is I can use the merge route function to quickly create long straightaways on a fictional high speed route and then go back later to add scenery and landscaping. The problem I appear to be having, however, is that when I add the catenary and track, it disappears. The spline end circles are there, but the catenary and track is not being rendered. I broke the catenary down into 5 board stretches and was able to transverse the 20 boards that way. So there is a work around. But that leads to the obvious question - is there a limit to how long you can go with a single length of spline? Or is there something wrong at my end?

Thanks!

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Sounds more like a limitation of your Video Card being able to render the scene. I've had similar happen, even with shorter spline lengths, but with a high amount of high poly speed treez and trackside grass splines.

As an experiment, after you lay your long spline, go back and add spline points with the extended tools tab...If it renders the nearest segments of spline, but not teh distant segments, then you can be more assured it is the video card.

There is a length limit, but I'm not sure what it is (WindWalkr has told me that long spline lengths are bound to cause problems) - it's not a graphics card issue as such that I'm aware of.

However, if you 'break' the spline at certain points (using the Insert Spline tool) you may be able to get round the issue.

Shane

Newer "splines" are of kind track which employs LOD so that may be a factor. Although, I can hardly imagine a LOD level that would be invisible!

There is no limit - not that I have discovered anyway - to the length of spline you can draw out in one go, but there is deffinitely a practical limit to the length of spline that will successfully render. I suspect the limit has somthing to do with the local machine specs and something to do with the way splines are rendered in game. For normal purposes though a couple of hunred meters is a practical limit, and where there are lots of splines - or hi-detail splines - you need even shorter lengths than that. Certainly drag the spline out in one go to get it dead straight, but you then gotta go back and insert spline points every couple of hundred meters at a minumim. 20 boards though? A whole series of 10-mile straights?

Thanks guys. It may be a local problem since I am running on a laptop, which I know is not ideal, but is all I have for now. I have learned how to be economical with assets to maximize performance and I have a feeling this is one of those cases.

I am planning route that includes high speed passenger service. I have started and stopped this route a bunch of times because I would get a better idea or learn something and it was just easier to start over. But I was finding in some tests that even in AI my trains were running signals when the blocks were shorter - as if they just didn't have enough time to react, hence my settling on a 20 board block for the high speed straightaways. I will add some curves between some so it's not all just straightaways, but once I get a block set up with the tracks, cantenaries, and some basic texture and trackside brush, I can save time by merging and then just linking the spline ends. I can go back and make the scenery more interesting, but the repetitive boring bit is already done!

I would think that if a track was offered in a 5m repeat rate ... and another in a 20m repeat rate ... the 20m would be less impact on framerates, using a really long segment of track.

Also some super detailed high poly tracks are very bad framerates ... where as MP Track Wood v2 by Philskene is a chunky mesh type, is super smooth and bendy, and has almost no effect on framerates.

In a tunnel you could use BNSF50 invisatrack, if the track is not going to be seen.

I'm using Jointed Rail track because I really like the detail. The idea that my laptop is choking on it makes sense, but the catenaries I am using are not hyper-detailed and yet that was where I first noticed the problem. I put together a 5x2 board and will start bashing those together to make up my 20x2 basic block to use as described.

Unfortunately, I am now having other issues where Trainz had reinitialized for no apparent reason as if it were the first time I was using it. When I re-entered my serial number and setting preferences, it downloaded the latest patches and now some of the locos no longer work. I have been peripherally aware from postings on here that some updates seem to have been causing a lot of folks grief, so maybe that's part of my problems too. But I've taken one step forward and two steps back! I am starting to think the name should be changed from "Trainz" to "Computer Engineerz" because I spend more time troubleshooting the software than building and playing with routes!

Dermmy said:

20 boards though? A whole series of 10-mile straights?

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Yep, how about North Dakota west of Fargo? 78 miles.
Or Australian Nullobar plains? 300 miles.

Even though maybe prototypical, 10 or 300 miles straight is usually experience as "pretty boring". A "trick" route builders than usually take is to shorten it a bit so by the time you get this "boring" feeling, you end up "on the other side".

Let me put it this way:
10 miles at 60 miles/hour will take 10 minutes of doing nothing more than just watching my screen. Unless you have really fascinating and changing scenery (which is really hard on a straight piece of track), I can think of better ways to spend my life.

oknotsen said:

doing nothing more than just watching my screen.

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Isn't that what we all do? Stick it in run 8 and just sit back. :hehe: