Track gauges in regards to content creation

Greetings.

This is just a thought that's occurred to me on occasion, usually when a creator announces or releases a non-standard gauge train or locomotive. The basis for this discussion is a suggestion for creators of assets especially those for which gauge is important (eg. infrastructure, track and trains), that if the gauge being modeled is close to standard gauge, consider adapting it to standard gauge either via "photocopier" wholesale scaling or minor modeling adjustments.

Understandably, there's something to be said about striving for realism and I agree. On the other hand, our creations are not independent but coexist with other creations within the realm of the Trainz ecosystem. That is to say, the usefulness of a gauge-affected asset is often only as good as the availability of assets for that same gauge. I have on a few occasions "converted" (for private use of course) trains to standard gauge by swapping out bogies so that they are compatible with the vast majority of standard gauge content and routes. To have a train of non-standard gauge x, one would need x-gauged track and accompanying rolling stock in addition to quality x-gauged routes which is rarely the case especially for some less popular gauges.

A good example is a Russian/Eastern European track set that's been popular in recent years. It's fantastic in both quality and variety the only caveat being it was made for 1450mm IIRC. This "minor" difference may be tolerable to some but not others. At a distance it isn't obvious but closeup you'll easily note that some wheels look quite ready to fall between the rails. There are also many gauge-related aspects that cannot be adjusted by the user such as loading gauge width, coupler heights and for unique bogies, the gauge as well. Having content of the same gauge allows more people to use it especially outside the modeled region. A decent South African steamer can be reskinned and used on a North American standard gauge route as an "export" for example.

What do you guys think? Is it worthwhile having a bit of artistic flexibility and trading in a bit of dimensional realism in exchange for more standard-gauge compatibility and wider use-case possibilities?

I think this is a good idea, and is something I try to do if appropriate. For example I made a loco for the 2ft 6in Leek and Manifold Railway but there's far more 2ft gauge content for Trainz so the loco has scripted bogies that let you choose 2ft or 2ft 6in. Similarly a lot of Irish content is modelled at standard gauge instead of the correct 5ft 3in gauge.

On the island of Ireland [i.e. both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland (part of the UK)] the system standard is the 1,600 mm (5 ft 3 in) Irish Broad Gauge which is the same gauge as the (Australian) Victorian broad gauge (which DOES have some Trainz track). I can't say whether other aspects of the Trainz VR track would match Irish broad gauge track, either in the past or present


It seems that only the island of Ireland and Brazil have used 1,600 mm (5 ft 3 in) gauge since the 19th century. See


5 ft 3 in gauge railways
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5_ft_3_in_gauge_railways


Personally, I would prefer Irish locos and rolling stock to use 1,600 mm (5 ft 3 in) gauge and run on the exixting or modified VR track.


However, there are now a lot of Irish locos and some rolling stock set up for standard gauge and there are Irish routes that use standard gauge too, so this may not be truly feasible.


Peter.

A good idea. There are so many different track gauges in Australia, it can be difficult trying to find rolling-stock and track to match.

Cheers,
Roy

I found a great track that looks really close to 36" gauge

Via estrecha tm 1000 mm 2 mts - by Joxemai <KUID:148561:38004>

edh6 said:

I think this is a good idea, and is something I try to do if appropriate. For example I made a loco for the 2ft 6in Leek and Manifold Railway but there's far more 2ft gauge content for Trainz so the loco has scripted bogies that let you choose 2ft or 2ft 6in. Similarly a lot of Irish content is modelled at standard gauge instead of the correct 5ft 3in gauge.

Click to expand...

This seems to be the best approach when there is a difference that is not insignificant. A couple of creators of 2'3" gauge stock have gone for straight 2' gauge and this also seems sensible for such a small difference in gauge.

The OPs example of South African stock is going too far though. 3'6" is much different to 4'8.5", if you try scaling stock by this much it will start looking odd against people and buildings, not to mention 2' gauge stock where the two systems meet.

Slightly off-topic but Ed's system could have a use if anyone tried building an SAR class 91. Class 91 bogies used to be exchanged with "Bigfoot" bogies so that they could run on Cape Gauge to and from workshop visits.

You do realise that it's easy to change gauge with procedural track, using the lateral offset settings in the config, 2ft to 2ft 6" or 2ft 4" just requires a change in value for rails left and right, chairs left and right and fishplates left and right.

Dean_Forest said:

The OPs example of South African stock is going too far though. 3'6" is much different to 4'8.5", if you try scaling stock by this much it will start looking odd against people and buildings, not to mention 2' gauge stock where the two systems meet.

Click to expand...

My bad, I was thinking of RSA Trainz's Red Devil which in my mind looked pretty hefty from memory but looking it up on google now says otherwise (look at the cab area and compare with eg. 844's cab).