Long Pauses Continue

Ver: 97420

The route includes the large Rigby Yard. I set the engine 4 switches away from a string of box cars to which it will couple. Each switch is controlled by a dwarf signal. Start the session and the engine moves a few feet and stops - red signal. In fact all signals on the route are red. I thought that only the signal closest to the on-track boxcar would be red, preceded by a yellow and then a green as appropriate.

So, when the train stops it waits about 30 seconds and all the switches in the route to the boxcar change state and back to the original - direct to the box car. The engine moves maybe 1 foot. Stops for 30 seconds and the cycle repeats. After many cycles the engine reaches the next switch. and the show begins again. Leaving the session on natural time or fast-shift time does not change anything. That route is unusable. A conservative response would be that the weird long stops have worsened.

Submitted report.

Moved to a yard with a perfect 5 ladder yard. No signals. All went well the engine went to the last branch and coupled as instructued. It had a ridiculous 2 mph run than was very long and for no reason. That dropped to a short 1mph run and the 5mph to couple with a nice delecate click indicating the ne fiberglass coubplerd designed to reduce noise.

Same yard and same setup except placed JR Safetran dwarf signals at each involved switch. Engine passed first yard entry switch normally. However, on the first yard switch it sent into the 2mph, 1mph, super slow creep 0mph routine. I did not waste any more time and just gave up.

Generally I find it better to have no signals when entering a yard but have all lines signalled for exiting the yard. If it is a dead end yard have a buffer and an invisible signal at every track end and still no signals for entering except the one for exiting the main line.

Also find the speeds and stops for coupling are a bit off, the loco will approach it's stop point at 2mph then couple at 5mph. This should be the other way around, approach the stop point at 5mph then couple at 2mph.

Cheers,
Bill69

Like Bill I signal on exit. I don't care if the AI don't put the consists right up to the bumpers/buffers because that little slack helps when I'm switching.

But even with my signaling and setup I've used for ages from TS2010 right through T:ANE, the AI are creeping at 2 mph and stopping instead of coupling. I waited about 30 minutes as an AI driven train crept along at 2 mph and sometimes 1 mph as it went about coupling. Eventually I couldn't take and moved the train within a few hundred feet and let it drive again, except instead of coupling it decided to take another track and go around the consists and then couple to it at the end it was supposed to anyway!

Something's up and I can't pinpoint what happened. This is as if the AI issue in T:ANE SP1/SP2 has been magnified 100 X over.

I will say that today must be AI mess up day. Yesterday I drove the same route, my Gloucester Terminal Electric, which is a nice switching an operating route that can keep me busy for hours, and it did yesterday without problems. Yesterday's operation even with the new update was well over 8 hours and finally I had to quit so I could go to bed. During that operation, I had the AI switching cars, driving to industries while I drove my own switcher along with the AI-controlled trams working on their schedules without jamming up. Today, however, they must've gone to a football game first and had a few brews before showing up for work.

Hi John,

The invisible signal that I put at the end of a yard does not make the AI drive right to the buffer, it is only there to permit the train to enter the yard under a caution rather than a red signal.

Cheers,
Bill

Drive manually, with hands on the cab controls ... problem solved

Bill69 said:

Hi John,

The invisible signal that I put at the end of a yard does not make the AI drive right to the buffer, it is only there to permit the train to enter the yard under a caution rather than a red signal.

Cheers,
Bill

Click to expand...

Oh I see. I must try that then. Thanks!

cascaderailroad said:

Drive manually, with hands on the cab controls ... problem solved

Click to expand...

Yeah if I want to drive.

There are times when I want to be the conductor on the ground moving the junctions and prepping the freight cars for coupling. Once I've set them up, I order the AI to couple to the freight cars, wait, then move on to others. When operating correctly, this operation can keep me busy for a good part of an afternoon or longer as the rest of the AI drivers do what they're supposed to do, usually.

I have seen the Invisible Signal at the Buffers. Wondered as to its purpose. Double edged sword - misery likes company in these cases. I wonder if NO signals existed on a route if the pauses would occur.....

Made up a simple test system. Main line. PLAN - Engine enters via switch from right (direction of travel) turns left on next switch to a trackmark. No other equipment is on-track. Each track is equipped with a signaling buffer/stop.

Engine starts toward the mainline entry switch and slows to 3mph, then 2 mph and now setting stopped just after entering the mainline "waiting for instructions". If you look closely the engine is actually VERY slowly moving forward. Anyone who has the patience to watch that ****.

The symptoms probably vary according to the trackage and the distance between switches.

With or without Safetran 04 signals the scenario fails reasonable expectations.

In my case, the product has no use until repaired.

Tried similar situation in TANE and same issue. Only commonality is the same track. 1 track wood TANE.

Since nothing was working well I tried Kickstarter. Placed a car in the large yard and a few miles away an engine whose task was to couple to that car. All went well unti the engine came within about three signals of the target car and the slowdown ritual began. So I tried a different track. Same thing. I then placed the target car in a small yard an from a few miles away had the engine couple. Same routine - SLOWDOWN and as usual to zero speed which is actually a ft per second, or something like that.

The only common element is Windows 10. I am awaiting word from N3V management to see if I should report this to Microsoft.

Send your simple test case route in and QA will take a look. Include instructions of what to do, what to watch for, what you expect to happen.

Tony, Thanks for the reply. The real test case is Kickstarter. There is a small yard (Gard's) and a larger one at the factory. I place a boxcar within either yard, and instruct a locomotive, setting outside the yard, to couple to the box car. The long pauses/delays occur once the locomotive enters the yard. Note: JCITRON reports the same behavior. I am continuing some more tests today. Used Blue Comet and it stopped at the signal outside the Gard Family forestry on a red. after almost a minute the signal blinks green then red and the engine move about one foot. This process goes on forever - blink - move.

I restarted Windows10 and re-positioned the target car to Fogarty's station and the engine just across the bridge from the station. There is one dual head signal between the station and the engine. The Blue Comet starts and runs at the proper speed. When it get within some prescribed distance from the signal it slows to 2mph to creep upon the signal the signal is double red at this time. The engine arrives at the signal, briefly goes to 0 mph. The engine proceeds. BUT the red signal remains red. There was an old problem where it looked like a red was run but in fact it changed to green for a VERY brief time. The red resumed, due to engine proceeding "past" the signal. Insufficient time was not being allowed to see the green before the moving engine triggered occupancy on the other side of the signal. Somebody had their hands in the AI code. Why vary few people experience this is a mystery. If I had a known stable copy of the current version that I could reload I would. But I will not go through the string of updates to get there!

Hinton: Unlike Kickstarter, Hinton has performed flawlessly in 4 different sessions of moving an engine about a yard, coupling and moving the "coupled car" out of the yard to an industry. I will leave the troubleshooting to those who get paid do do it and I will see what I can do to bring Hinton to match my needs. Eliminating the whitewashed trees was my first task. Adding foliage is the next. West Virginia forests are dense and a darker green than the stuff NV forces onto a route. Making forests dense and darker will be a long process due to the size of the route. The Hinton yard was well done with no attempt to make all the switches perfect or the tracks all straigh. While the yard is no longer there The TS19 presentation seems plausible.

Hi Boleyd
If you have created a session with the driver commands configured in Surveyor (rather than loading via quick-drive, or loading the session into driver, then assigning commands) then please can you send us the session so that we can test with the exact setup that you are using. Otherwise there are a lot of variables that we are going to be guessing on, and hence may not be able to reproduce the issue the same as you are seeing it.

Regards

Hi Boleyd, just a follow up post. Could you possibly confirm for me if you are using the 'Kickstarter County' route or the 'Kickstarter County 2' route, as these are different routes and may behave different in TRS19.

Regards

Kickstarter 2 vs original and a copy of the test route - forthcoming...

Attached are CDPs from Kickstarter2 route, session,and when train stopped at all-red signal.

Kickstarter ORIGINAL operates as it should and is OK!



https://drive.google.com/open?id=1eeyLvZjVmBrh8EDcdTPwh5bWkr-NjpVz

Unwanted Pauses Update

At the advice of Zec (N3V) I tried the Original Kickstarter route. I had been testing with The new Kickstarter-2, personally modified route, which paused, and sometimes stopped, at signals and switches. The OLD ORIGINAL Kickstarter functioned as it should - no unexplainable delays. I have reported this in my original message with route CDPs.

You're missing a required dependency in your .cdps: <kuid:371377:100004>

If you are using driver command extensively, I suggest you investigate the Enhanced Interlocking Tower rules from pguy. By linking together junctions, you're able to tell your trains to pass from one block to another keeping them on track and on time!