Catenary Spline ?

I never build a route with catenary on it because i just get frustrated with the positioning of it, now i know there are splines that have complete catenary that you can jjst place and go, can anyone point me to such packs that are good to use. I dont mean just wire or just the poles i mean a complete thing that you can place as a spline.

I cant seem to find any but i do know they exist

There are lots of them. UK style, German, Japanese, US, etc. You may need to check the DLS for assets.

Here's a couple:

Catenary 1 Track

Catenary 2 Track

And there are gazillion more I have installed from the DLS and elsewhere.

Some tracks and tunnels have a catenary included when you place it

On flat baseboards catenary is a breeze

Believe it of not a catenary zig zags down the track, so it doesn't wear a groove in the electrical pickup pan/shoe

I feel the same way...

Kermondale549 said:

I feel the same way...

Click to expand...

Glad im not the only one, back in trainz 12 when i was making a route i eventually just gave up with trying to place catenary because it drove me crazy trying to line it up. Now im no perfectionist but it does have to look fairly decent for my eyes. So easy to place catenary splines is something i wanna use for electrified pieces of track. Now i found NSWGR Catenary on the DLS andits the only one that actually work right, the others all end with thewiring on the ends and then you still have to connect that by hand so that was not my thing. The NSWGR ones you place it and done, sure you still have to allign it with the track but that aint too hard,. Still looking for other packs that are like that though so suggestions are welcome

Patrick31 said:

Glad im not the only one, back in trainz 12 when i was making a route i eventually just gave up with trying to place catenary because it drove me crazy trying to line it up. Now im no perfectionist but it does have to look fairly decent for my eyes. So easy to place catenary splines is something i wanna use for electrified pieces of track. Now i found NSWGR Catenary on the DLS andits the only one that actually work right, the others all end with thewiring on the ends and then you still have to connect that by hand so that was not my thing. The NSWGR ones you place it and done, sure you still have to allign it with the track but that aint too hard,. Still looking for other packs that are like that though so suggestions are welcome

Click to expand...

It looks like you've found one of elstoko's catenary assets. There are over 30 on the DLS and each one has a specific use. Remember that the "wire and gantry" assets are track objects and there is no height adjustment, however his spline assets can be height adjusted to match the pantograph on the consist you are using. They were originally designed for the NSWGR 'electrics'.

Cheers,
Roy

Roy3b3 said:

It looks like you've found one of elstoko's catenary assets. There are over 30 on the DLS and each one has a specific use. Remember that the "wire and gantry" assets are track objects and there is no height adjustment, however his spline assets can be height adjusted to match the pantograph on the consist you are using. They were originally designed for the NSWGR 'electrics'.

Cheers,
Roy

Click to expand...

Thanks for the extra info, yeah those are the ones and work perfectly for me. If you know of others that work just like this please do let me know.

Here's one I've used on my Gloucester Terminal Electric:



BDW IRM Trolley Pole #1

<kuid2:405066:85:2>

There are others in the series plus connecting wire too. It's all one piece.

Thanks John but those are more for trolley cars.

Another annoying thing i find with placing catenary is constantly having to adjust heights even with splines you have constantly go into driver drive a train see how the height is go back adjust the height and over and over until you finally got it. Unless there is an easy thing that does that then im all ears lol

I use KUID:2:41462:23996:1 Because it is white, is easy to see the black or dark wire. Use <control> with spline height for fine adjustment. The most tricky part is to install catenary splines high on a bridge and in a slope, but it can be done using all the resources available. If you really want to see a pantograph loco without having to go to driver, use a loco that has the pantograph extended by default. At least there is one made by Mistral 69, I think KUID:548299:734 or 767 or 676 (one of them has it). The contact area matches the white tool above.

llebrez said:

I use KUID:2:41462:23996:1 Because it is white, is easy to see the black or dark wire. Use <control> with spline height for fine adjustment. The most tricky part is to install catenary splines high on a bridge and in a slope, but it can be done using all the resources available. If you really want to see a pantograph loco without having to go to driver, use a loco that has the pantograph extended by default. At least there is one made by Mistral 69, I think KUID:548299:734 or 767 or 676 (one of them has it). The contact area matches the white tool above.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the tips, gonna try them out later today. Firat i need a couple hours sleep already 10 AM here and been up all night. Hours on hours are going into trainz again but its fun figuring it all out again. Been a couple years since i was able to play around with it because my old pc couldnt handle TANE so now that i got a new pc that atleast can run 19 maybe not with all on top quality but still high enough to enjoy it.so now im back into it and addicted to not just driving trains and enjoying the routes but also building again just for fun. Now to get into the catenary lol that and interlocking tower stuff

Straighten the straight catenary splines, others on curves leave un-straightened ... Measure the track spline point height ... apply that same height numeral to the catenary spline point, slide it into place, slightly off register of the track spline point (so you can move or adjust it easily later on)

Patrick31 said:

Thanks John but those are more for trolley cars.

Another annoying thing i find with placing catenary is constantly having to adjust heights even with splines you have constantly go into driver drive a train see how the height is go back adjust the height and over and over until you finally got it. Unless there is an easy thing that does that then im all ears lol

Click to expand...

I know this is for trams, but I was showing an example.

Paul Z May (paulzmay) made some tram poles and bits and pieces, I know tram cat parts again, but one of the items I found useful for bridges is catenary bridge, bridge supports. (Sorry I can't get the kuid at the moment because I'm not at my Trainzing PC). These items put small supports under the tracks since they are track objects. I get the height of the track, and use that for the spline points and adjust the position of the bridge supports to match up with the catenary posts.

Since splines are now a kind track rather than a spline but are splines and not tracks because then your signals and track marks would attach themselves to the splines I mean tracks..., (It's a complicated thing to explain so we'll keep at that for now), they bend a little nicer when following heights and curves so setting them the same as the track heights at specific points went a lot faster than it used to. It was still a pain, and only took me 45 minutes to fiddle with this using the parts above, than it does the old fashioned way.

cascaderailroad said:

Straighten the straight catenary splines, others on curves leave un-straightened ... Measure the track spline point height ... apply that same height numeral to the catenary spline point, slide it into place, slightly off register of the track spline point (so you can move or adjust it easily later on)

Click to expand...

Is there something easy to use to measure the heights?

Patrick31 said:

Is there something easy to use to measure the heights?

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For a simple height measure you could use this <kuid2:46819:214663:1> JS Height Gauge, note though that's height above terrain and not relevant for spline points which you can measure using the advanced section of the spline tab.

clam1952 said:

For a simple height measure you could use this <kuid2:46819:214663:1> JS Height Gauge, note though that's height above terrain and not relevant for spline points which you can measure using the advanced section of the spline tab.

Click to expand...

Thank you, I tried doing it through the advanced get vertex height but when i set all the spline points to the same height using that it didnt set it right, some were smaller then others probably because of terrain difference in height.

llebrez said:

I use KUID:2:41462:23996:1 Because it is white, is easy to see the black or dark wire. Use <control> with spline height for fine adjustment. The most tricky part is to install catenary splines high on a bridge and in a slope, but it can be done using all the resources available. If you really want to see a pantograph loco without having to go to driver, use a loco that has the pantograph extended by default. At least there is one made by Mistral 69, I think KUID:548299:734 or 767 or 676 (one of them has it). The contact area matches the white tool above.

Click to expand...

kuid2:41462:23996:1 is a height tool it says and do you know the name of the locomotive from Mistral69 because the Kuid nr doesnt get me anywhere and on the site from Mistral it doesnt list kuid nrs just names