Lua and bin Files

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

I believe AI runs in Simple Mode. For otherwise the previous scenario timings would be off due to the slow braking.
Running the same Sherman Hill scenarios on TS2015 without the advanced braking locomotives should prove this. On TS2016 any scenario involving Sherman Hill locos in advanced braking mode would be so much slower in their gameplay.

The advanced braking script as used in SH 2016 locomotives appears to be universal and also controls the emitters, both sound and particles.
The SD70 amps needle is broken, the SD40-2 has fallen back to an older, cruder cab interior, the ES44 has some non-functional switches. None really back breaking, and some more easily rectifiable than others.
I am not really sure the exhaust smoke emitters respond to engine load, the exhaust seems fairly clean and even.

One does wonder how DTG will implement advanced braking in the XBOX version of TS2017. Are the Konsole Kiddies really patient enough for and appreciative of advanced braking? And even more advanced releasing where it could take up to 15 minutes for a 120 car train's brakes to release sufficiently to allow you to start moving? Run8 added a cheat, not without reason, to immediately refill the entire train's reservoirs.

Also, is it wanted by players of UK and German trains? So far I haven't read a thing about it on UKTS board or rail-sim.de.

So perhaps DTG will imply it in TS2017 as default and stipulate its use on all future USA content?

[buzz456]

I have watched a hell of a lot of trains in my day and I've never seen one that took fifteen minutes for the brakes to release. Granted that most trains that long around here particularly in the Winter months usually have a locomotive midtrain or on the rear to help keep the air up, but I have never seen one that had to stay stopped for that long after coming to a stop.

[mrennie]

The SD70 amps needle is broken, the SD40-2 has fallen back to an older, cruder cab interior, the ES44 has some non-functional switches. None really back breaking, and some more easily rectifiable than others.
I am not really sure the exhaust smoke emitters respond to engine load, the exhaust seems fairly clean and even.

None of that has anything to do with the advanced brake scripting. True, I integrated my work into the existing scripts, but I had no remit to correct anything else except for the brakes. So the advanced brake scripting did not break anything - it was either already broken or was broken for other reasons beyond my control.

One does wonder how DTG will implement advanced braking in the XBOX version of TS2017. Are the Konsole Kiddies really patient enough for and appreciative of advanced braking? And even more advanced releasing where it could take up to 15 minutes for a 120 car train's brakes to release sufficiently to allow you to start moving? Run8 added a cheat, not without reason, to immediately refill the entire train's reservoirs.

That's why the advanced brake script includes the ability to select the braking difficulty. If you select "easiest", there's no propagation delay at all (but other than that, the rest of the simulation is the same - it's only the delay that is dumbed down).

Also, is it wanted by players of UK and German trains? So far I haven't read a thing about it on UKTS board or rail-sim.de.

So perhaps DTG will imply it in TS2017 as default and stipulate its use on all future USA content?

I've absolutely no idea about that. You'd have to ask them.

[mrennie]

I have watched a hell of a lot of trains in my day and I've never seen one that took fifteen minutes for the brakes to release. Granted that most trains that long around here particularly in the Winter months usually have a locomotive midtrain or on the rear to help keep the air up, but I have never seen one that had to stay stopped for that long after coming to a stop.

It can take that long if the train is dry, meaning no air at all in the auxiliary and emergency reservoirs, so that as well as filling the brake pipe itself, the reservoirs also have to be filled up. It takes a lot of time, but you can actually get to that situation in the sim now, if you deliberately release and apply the brakes often enough, without allowing enough time for the reservoirs to recharge after each application.

However, there's no option in the script to deliberately start the scenario with a dry train, because nobody would really want to sit there looking at the screen for 15 minutes or more while the train line is recharged (just like they wouldn't want to wait for two hours while a cold steam locomotive is fired and brought up to steam).

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

I have watched a hell of a lot of trains in my day and I've never seen one that took fifteen minutes for the brakes to release. Granted that most trains that long around here particularly in the Winter months usually have a locomotive midtrain or on the rear to help keep the air up, but I have never seen one that had to stay stopped for that long after coming to a stop.

It sometimes takes awfully long in Run8, where the DPU's actually supply air. In Railworks I am not so sure about that.
Perhaps only a complete refill after an emergency application takes that long?
I often listen to RailroadRadio.net while playing Railworks, so I must take a note of timings next time. Perhaps the stalled train was trying to re-start uphill? All railroads rule that a train must be completely refilled on any significant grade before being allowed to continue.

Normally, a service application isn't more than 20 PsI reduction on the train line, resulting in 50 PsI in the car's brake cylinders. Which is sufficient for a full stop and holding the train on a grade. I don't know exactly how much actual air must be pumped in the car's aux reservoirs for the brakes to fully release themselves. From the air brake documentation and TOB calculations I gather all freight cars are about the same in reservoir size, so the length of the train equates linear into the time to release all brakes, season's influence not taken into account.

Perhaps a locomotive engineer on the board can tell about his experiences on 400+ axle trains with and without DPU?

[mrennie]

I don't know exactly how much actual air must be pumped in the car's aux reservoirs for the brakes to fully release themselves.

Not a lot. On freight cars with AB brakes, the triple valve piston moves and releases the brakes when the pressure in the branch pipe is around 1.5psi above the pressure currently in the auxiliary reservoir. At the same time as the brake cylinder vents to atmosphere (or into the quick service reservoirs if it's the initial reduction), the auxiliary reservoir starts to recharge from the branch pipe via the feed groove. The venting is over in almost no time, but it doesn't happen as soon as the brake pipe pressure starts to rise - it happens as soon as that 1.5psi increment happens. What takes time is the recharge of the reservoirs, because the feed groove is narrow.

When I say the venting is over in no time, that's at a single car. What does take time is the propagation of the pressure wave down the train line. The last car in the consist won't see the pressure rise 1.5psi until the cars nearer to the head end have already released their brakes. The brakes come off in a ripple down the train. That's what you can see in the F5 HUD if you watch the "brake cylinder pressure" reading. It's the car brake cylinder pressure averaged over all the cars. It doesn't start to fall as soon as you start to release the brakes. Instead, it stays steady until the brake pipe pressure has risen high enough and then it falls over a few seconds - the time it takes for the wave to travel down the train.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

However, there's no option in the script to deliberately start the scenario with a dry train, because nobody would really want to sit there looking at the screen for 15 minutes or more while the train line is recharged (just like they wouldn't want to wait for two hours while a cold steam locomotive is fired and brought up to steam).

We'll have to wait and see how the XBOX version of the game is, and wether the PC version will lead of follow its development and funtionallity.
From market analysis reports on computer games I have gathered that the PC gamer is a dying breed. Consoles and gaming tablets have the future, are easier to develop, sell, maintain and service. It could very well be DTG ditches all the previous and precious advanced functions to make the game more playable on the console and living room TV. Market research and development will tell. Then there is the limited number of buttons on the controllers, and the fact that joysticks are of little use in driving a train with its notched controls and functions. It could also mean a revival of specialised controllers like the RailDriver. I for one am eagerly awaiting my Saitek tractor steering wheel, pedals and control joystick console I pre-ordered for Farming Simulator, a very successful game on both PC and console.

I personally doubt, from watching my nieces and nephews playing console games, that even waiting like two minutes for a train to be pumped up is already too much for them. In scenarios one can provide some diversion by having some AI move across your screen, but not all scenario writers cater for that.

[Mavadelo]

Highly interesting topic, learned a lot here. If i ever come around to make the engine I want to make ( A dutch Steam engine) I think I have to follow DTG and pay mrrennie a substantial amount of money to have him script my brakes, because if I see this correctly it is simpler to "model" then to script lol
(by which I will not imply modelling is easy, far from that)

[mrennie]

OK, about the SH advanced brakes ....

I've just looked at the SH EMD SD40-2 for the first time since getting TS2016. It was working fine when I handed my stuff over to DTG but Edwin is right, it's been broken. Somebody must have meddled with it before it was released. The brake gauges in the cab show nonsensical readings now, making it un-useable. The horn is broken too. I'll discuss this with DTG as soon as I've had a look at the other SH locos, in case they've also been broken.

EDIT: I've had a look at the other SH locos and they appear to be working fine. It's just the SD40-2 that doesn't work.

[jalsina]

As I understand the GTEL has the advanced brakes. I notice they brake pretty well and have that detente notch at 17%. However there is something I don´t think should be that way.
When applying (easy) brakes (watching the HUD), the brakes normally set into a first stage at 24%, crossing from Release to Apply and to Hold Lapped (thus applying what seems to be a correct braking force). In many cases that would be enough to reduce speed to keep with the road max values.
However when you want to apply more brakes and go from 24% to about 40% or more, you watch alternate animated multi-jumps between "hold lapped" and "apply" states and back at a fast rate, until the pressure equalizes. Once it equalizes if you want to apply more brakes, in some cases it will do those jumps but most of the time it won´t.

Sometimes you may even "kill the brakes" . You watch the left pressure gauge with the needles going down to zero and staying there. In some of those cases the turbine (spooled at high rpm) will loose gear or switching (It will not respond when applying throttle - no amps). I have recovered from some of those situations applying emergency and then back to normal, but it may not respond fast. But if this happens in a grade you may have a non-controlled train going downhill with no brakes.


EDIT: I would suggest trying a Quick Drive scenario of the GTEL with 70 freight cars, setting from Granite to Hermosa (grade 1.5% going uphill) and see how complex is starting the train in that steep grade with those advanced brakes. I don´t say it is impossible, but 4 out 5 players won´t be able to do it.

[mrennie]

As I understand the GTEL has the advanced brakes. I notice they brake pretty well and have that detente notch at 17%. However there is something I don´t think should be that way.
When applying (easy) brakes (watching the HUD), the brakes normally set into a first stage at 24%, crossing from Release to Apply and to Hold Lapped (thus applying what seems to be a correct braking force). In many cases that would be enough to reduce speed to keep with the road max values.
However when you want to apply more brakes and go from 24% to about 40%, you watch alternate animated multi-jumps between "hold lapped" and "apply" states and back at a fast rate, until the pressure equalizes. Once it equalizes if you want to apply more brakes, in some cases it will do those jumps but most of the time it won´t.

Sometimes you may even "kill the brakes" . You watch the left pressure gauge with the needles going down to zero and staying there. In some of those cases the turbine (spooled at high rpm) will loose gear or switching (It will not respond when applying throttle - no amps). I have recovered from some of those situations applying emergency and then back to normal, but it may not respond fast. But if this happens in a grade you may have a non-controlled train going downhill with no brakes.

You mustn't look at the F5 HUD at all when using the advanced brakes - as it explains in the manual, the F5 HUD values only give some small insight into what the script is doing in order to make the simulated cars' brake cylinder pressures behave correctly. As far as the brakes are concerned, the only meaningful value in the F5 HUD is the "brake cylinder pressure" which is actually a measure of the average pressure in the brake cylinders of all the cars in the consist - keep in mind that when releasing or applying the train brakes, they don't apply at exactly the same time on all the cars (instead. it happens as the pressure wave travels down the train). The other brake values in the F5 HUD have some meaning only to the person who wrote the script but they don't correspond at all to what you see in the gauges in the cab.

The constant switching between release and apply, and eventually resting in hold/lapped, that you see in the HUDs (including the Fisher Price HUDs) is because they show the notches of the TrainBrakeControl, which is what the script does after reading the VirtualBrake and then doing its calculations. It's not the position of the lever that you can see in the cab or the HUD, but something that is manipulated by the script and used by the core code to govern the brake cylinder pressure.

The really annoying (for me anyway) thing about the HUDs is that, although the levers now correspond to the virtual controllers (that is, to the levers in the cab that the player operates), the notch names that appear alongside in the HUDs, and in the F5 HUD, are the names of the notches of the "internal" controllers. At the moment, there's no way for the script to substitute those for the positions of the visible levers, thus hiding the value of TrainBrakeControl from the HUDs. So for now, it leads to confusion. I'll suggest that as an improvement for TS2017.

[Mavadelo]

fisher price hud, i keep falling off my chair everytime i see that and so a well deserved name it is too
i know you are familiar with havners trainsimhelper Hud, so do you have any idea if the values in his hud are accurate when it comes to the brakes?
i can't imagine running that fisher price Hud anymore after having used that plugin but i also wonder if it might interfere somehow with other scripting in the gtel as sometimes during a run i suddenly get a message pop in (top right) telling me the turbine is already spooled up, or on the BR155 9perhaps other PZB enabled engines as well but i play them not enough0 that PzB can't be enabled or disabled while driving
Perhaps Havner is reading this as well and might provide insight in this? (one can try right?)

I for one am a huge fan of the adnvanced braking systems, so much better than the old one

[mrennie]

fisher price hud, i keep falling off my chair everytime i see that and so a well deserved name it is too
i know you are familiar with havners trainsimhelper Hud, so do you have any idea if the values in his hud are accurate when it comes to the brakes?
i can't imagine running that fisher price Hud anymore after having used that plugin but i also wonder if it might interfere somehow with other scripting in the gtel as sometimes during a run i suddenly get a message pop in (top right) telling me the turbine is already spooled up, or on the BR155 9perhaps other PZB enabled engines as well but i play them not enough0 that PzB can't be enabled or disabled while driving
Perhaps Havner is reading this as well and might provide insight in this? (one can try right?)

I for one am a huge fan of the adnvanced braking systems, so much better than the old one

I've seen that message pop up too but only near the start of a scenario where the turbine has been configured (via the auto-numbering) to be already spooled up.

The accuracy of the values shown on Havner's HUD will depend on which control values he's reading. If it's the ones that are connected to the needles in the gauges (which it probably is, given that Havner is certainly clever enough to understand that), then all will be okay. The problem with the F5 HUD is that it's hard-coded to use the core code's internal values, which in the case of the advanced braking do not correspond at all to anything you see in the cab.

[jalsina]

You mustn't look at the F5 HUD at all when using the advanced brakes - as it explains in the manual, the F5 HUD values only give some small insight into what the script is doing in order to make the simulated cars' brake cylinder pressures behave correctly. As far as the brakes are concerned, the only meaningful value in the F5 HUD is the "brake cylinder pressure" which is actually a measure of the average pressure in the brake cylinders of all the cars in the consist - keep in mind that when releasing or applying the train brakes, they don't apply at exactly the same time on all the cars (instead. it happens as the pressure wave travels down the train). The other brake values in the F5 HUD have some meaning only to the person who wrote the script but they don't correspond at all to what you see in the gauges in the cab.

The constant switching between release and apply, and eventually resting in hold/lapped, that you see in the HUDs (including the Fisher Price HUDs) is because they show the notches of the TrainBrakeControl, which is what the script does after reading the VirtualBrake and then doing its calculations. It's not the position of the lever that you can see in the cab or the HUD, but something that is manipulated by the script and used by the core code to govern the brake cylinder pressure.

The really annoying (for me anyway) thing about the HUDs is that, although the levers now correspond to the virtual controllers (that is, to the levers in the cab that the player operates), the notch names that appear alongside in the HUDs, and in the F5 HUD, are the names of the notches of the "internal" controllers. At the moment, there's no way for the script to substitute those for the positions of the visible levers, thus hiding the value of TrainBrakeControl from the HUDs. So for now, it leads to confusion. I'll suggest that as an improvement for TS2017.

I seldom use the F5 but the F4 HUD. I never have used the other toy HUD either (don´t mess with me Mavadelo). In a locomotive as the GTEL, I combine mouse and keyboard to control the train. For me the F4 is a requirement to be able to watch the route speeds, the grades and whatever is coming.
I use F5 in steamers to watch dampers status and very few times remaining tender coal and water.
I always watch the pressure gauges for the brakes (even in older non-advanced brakes). And you have taught me to read chest pressure for the Connie and FEF-3 in their gauges.

I am aware that the HUD F4 doesn´t show the real notches and detentes of brakes. In most cases the cab controls are very complex to use without loosing sight of the tracks. The case of dynamic brakes in the GTEL which require forgetting about the front view if you want to use the cab control. And in other locos the position of train brakes make that very difficult. I am not a fan of 3D cabs and I miss the old MSTS 2D cabs.

Anyway, the changing brakes status are a sort of visual annoyance in the F4 HUD and people use to interpret it as a bug (as the 17% detente), though it seems the brakes are doing their job (if you do not mess them as I have in some cases with the GTEL).

[buzz456]

Not that I am not enjoying this but there is some serious navel gazing going on here.