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Changing Trackrule of already laid track?

Unread postPosted: Sat Apr 24, 2021 11:37 am
by aCup0fBlackTea
Yeah basically while building my route, I forgot to set the correct trackrule and around two switches and a curve have the wrong trackrule. Is there any way to change the trackrule without tearing up and relaying the track? Any help in any form is very appreciated *!!thnx!!*

Re: Changing Trackrule of already laid track?

Unread postPosted: Sat Apr 24, 2021 12:37 pm
by minerman146
Unfortunately, the track will need to be relaid using the correct rule.

Re: Changing Trackrule of already laid track?

Unread postPosted: Sat Apr 24, 2021 4:47 pm
by jlms48

Re: Changing Trackrule of already laid track?

Unread postPosted: Sun Apr 25, 2021 7:52 am
by GreatNortherner
The key answer that is buried in the posts linked above is this:

Yes, track rules can be changed after track has been placed.

All you need to do is to open the tracks.bin of your route (Content\Routes\[your route UID]\Networks\) in RW Tools, and then use its built-in search & replace function to swap the paths and file names of the track rules. Be careful when swapping track rules from different provider/product sets that you do it in one go, by replacing the entire block of Provider/Product/Track rule so as not to interfere with other Provider/product paths (such as of the track lofts).

And as always when doing surgery with RW Tools: keep those back ups in a safe place. ;-)

You might encounter one side effect after doing this, which is that some/all of the switches on your route might become "unrendered" (where they end up looking like two overlapping normal track lofts, without any frogs and check rails). When this happens you can fix it, but it requires manual editing of each affected switch: use the Split tool directly on its root node (the red triangle where the switch begins), then join it together again with the Weld tool and voilĂ , the switch is fine again.

Cheers,
Michael

Re: Changing Trackrule of already laid track?

Unread postPosted: Tue Apr 27, 2021 10:22 am
by aCup0fBlackTea
GreatNortherner wrote:The key answer that is buried in the posts linked above is this:

Yes, track rules can be changed after track has been placed.

All you need to do is to open the tracks.bin of your route (Content\Routes\[your route UID]\Networks\) in RW Tools, and then use its built-in search & replace function to swap the paths and file names of the track rules. Be careful when swapping track rules from different provider/product sets that you do it in one go, by replacing the entire block of Provider/Product/Track rule so as not to interfere with other Provider/product paths (such as of the track lofts).

And as always when doing surgery with RW Tools: keep those back ups in a safe place. ;-)

You might encounter one side effect after doing this, which is that some/all of the switches on your route might become "unrendered" (where they end up looking like two overlapping normal track lofts, without any frogs and check rails). When this happens you can fix it, but it requires manual editing of each affected switch: use the Split tool directly on its root node (the red triangle where the switch begins), then join it together again with the Weld tool and voilĂ , the switch is fine again.

Cheers,
Michael


Thanks very much for that tip! I will try it out tomorrow, I hope it works. Btw. have you ever thought about making a heavyweight observation car?