Page 1 of 1
| Worse (train) performance options please. 23/04/2023 at 03:32 #151398 | |
drew
69 posts |
Maybe not such a problem for the UK sims, but with the tyranny of distance in the antipodes, getting a train to perform badly enough for a given maximum speed is difficult. As an example, a 115km/h intermodal train that is already nobbled to Very Slow / Heavy, and still gains time on a real world timetable. Same in other categories, 80km/h full load freights at Very Slow / Heavy but they are arriving unfashionably early over longer distances. A little bit of gained time is probably preferable to late running, but the grosser the quantity, the harder it is to justify. I suppose feasible current workarounds include making the maximum train speed lower than the prototype, ie make your 80km/h train a 70km/h one. Easy enough to have multiple versions of the same consist and Cat change back and forth as required. Looks odd to me though. Another option is to eschew real world timetables and run to whatever sectional running times the sim is capable of. That’s kind of waving the white flag though. Plus real world timetables come pre-made and (mostly) ready to use. The train planners have done most of the hard work for us. The further you depart from the times, the more things you break and have to work around. It would be nice to have options to more finely tune train performance. Perhaps a different metric from the current normal/heavy/light etc? Power to weight ratio, or something? Log in to reply |
| Worse (train) performance options please. 23/04/2023 at 05:59 #151399 | |
flabberdacks
580 posts |
I think the main reason trains gain time is something that's built into SimSig - trains immediately accelerate to the track speed as fast as their settings allow, and then they stay perfectly at track speed the whole time until there's a reason not to (restrictive aspect, responding to a steep grade etc). On the Central Coast sim, it's certainly noticable, all late trains gain a bit of time over the course of their runs, even trips that usually wouldn't regain time on the real short north. I'm not really sure how to make it more realistic. It is true to life that some trains always do better than their table - empty coal off the north into Sydney hauled by the 4x82 for example. Heavy trains rocketing up and down Cowan Bank was an issue during development of Sydney North, I've done the best I can to get heavy freight to slow right down and actually run C-schedule times without hitting the light/empty consists that can keep pace with an Oscar. I also logged a feature request a while back, asking if it's possible for trains to take longer to move off if they are brought to a stand on a steep grade. I think if there was some sort of setting that allowed trains to vary their speed within a certain range slightly under the permitted track speed it would help. Log in to reply |
| Worse (train) performance options please. 23/04/2023 at 10:54 #151404 | |
|
drew
69 posts |
flabberdacks in post 151399 said:I think the main reason trains gain time is something that's built into SimSig - trains immediately accelerate to the track speed as fast as their settings allow, and then they stay perfectly at track speed the whole time until there's a reason not to (restrictive aspect, responding to a steep grade etc). Yes, that’s certainly a factor. Freight trains in particular are more strategic and will roll where they can, and go slower than track speed to avoid braking unnecessarily. But there could still be a way to set the performance in the sim to get a realistic sectional running time. Sometimes it flukes it, I find C1 is pretty close to Low/Normal/80, for instance. The train isn’t going to do the same speeds in the same places, but it keeps time OK. flabberdacks in post 151399 said: On the Central Coast sim, it's certainly noticable, all late trains gain a bit of time over the course of their runs, even trips that usually wouldn't regain time on the real short north. I'm not really sure how to make it more realistic. It is true to life that some trains always do better than their table - empty coal off the north into Sydney hauled by the 4x82 for example. Empty coalies are very well found, power to weight. As long as you keep them moving they’ll chase an all stations pass in a lot of places. flabberdacks in post 151399 said: Heavy trains rocketing up and down Cowan Bank was an issue during development of Sydney North, I've done the best I can to get heavy freight to slow right down and actually run C-schedule times without hitting the light/empty consists that can keep pace with an Oscar. Full load balancing speed on the ruling grade should be in the vicinity of 20-25km/h for most diesels. Faster is OK, but slower isn’t realistic for a healthy train. I’ve seen this with Moss Vale on the mountain. Apparently the sim rates power based on top speed. So for otherwise identical trains with different top speeds, which would really settle at the same speed on a grade, the faster train has an advantage. The sim isn’t a train simulator, and it works pretty well for what it was designed to do. We’ve just found a situation that it struggles with is all. flabberdacks in post 151399 said: I also logged a feature request a while back, asking if it's possible for trains to take longer to move off if they are brought to a stand on a steep grade. That would be prototypical. Most heavier Westinghouse braked trains descending long falling grades end up braking in cycles. The speed rises and falls. Again on Moss Vale, I’ve Cat changed my heavier freight to do 25km/h after Summit Tank on the up, where the maximum is 30, because they’d actually be cycling between 20 and 30. They run a little less early that way. Log in to reply |