Drop off instruction problem !

[whittaker]

Who would have thought a couple of wagon numbers could cause all the problems ,job done.

thanks all

joe

[Rockdoc2174]

That's not true, Andi, in my experience. In a scenario for Woodhead, I had a freight moving from the main line onto the freight line at one point and the despatcher kept changing the points under my train. I solved it by putting a time instruction onto a marker on the freight line so that the whole train was past the point by some margin.

Keith

[AndiS]

In practice, the major source of switches changing under the train is incomplete signalling. The dispatcher only locks switches under the train from link 0 to the last numbered link. If he is friendly, he does the same in the opposite direction. I.e., signalling for one direction may well get you on safe grounds as far as the dispatcher is concerned. But if there is no signal at all, the dispatcher does not make the link between the train location and the switch location.

I would be interested in knowing whether this is the case in the place you mention. If there is a signal for one direction only, this would also be interesting - if it is for the other direction, this would falsify the assumption that the dispatcher uses those to block the switch if there is not signalling for the direction of movement.

It's not like I feel I understand the dispatcher. Is more like I felt the need to stay something clever after missing this numbering issue in the case at hand, too. You really need solid QA scheme in a complex system like a railway simulation. Rolling stock creators don't put scenario woes into the foreground of their mind and scenario creators don't mess with rolling stock configuration files. And the programme is right in getting messed up if two wagons have the same primary, supposedly unique, id.

[Pjt1974]

There should be a 10 year course in scenario creation on the Open University resulting in a PhD, SBHH and a CTD after your name.

[Rockdoc2174]

Andi, the train was moved over beyond Penistone on the way to Woodhead Tunnel, the point being just beyond a bridge IIRC. I was fine with the change of track as it fitted the premise of the scenario but, initially, I found the point switching to be difficult to pin down. It seemed to be controlled by a time-lapse because it did not occur under the same wagon every time and I could sometimes get through without a problem if I really pushed the loco. From memory, there is a marker fairly close to the point on the freight line, presumably to allow forced routing, but making that a timetabled point, with a time that was well after the train had arrived no matter how steadily I drove, the problem disappeared.

Keith

[AndiS]

The suspicion is increasion.

The hard question is: When you go to route editor and click in the signal protecting that switch (plus a few others, maybe), do you see a olive green arm linking the signal base with a track link (arrow and cube) that is placed beyond the switch?

The dispatcher changes switches 5 seconds after he thinks you cleared the junction, that is 5 seconds after you cleared the (last) numbered track link on your path through that junction. This could explain why the switching did not occur at the same position of the train - if and only if the switch was not properly included in the junction, but an orphan a few seconds down the track from the last numbered link of the signal that appears to protect the whole junction.

[Rockdoc2174]

I honestly couldn't say. Hertsbob tried to indoctrinate me in the intricacies of editing track and signalling within scenarios but all I did was get in a bigger mess than ever!

Keith

[AndiS]

Let me give you an introduction in safe encounters with route internals.

§1 As Bob says, the red button with the white X on the top right corner is your only friend. So start RW in windowed mode and whenever you panic, your you are not sure whether what you did will later lead to panic, close that window and answer No if you are asked about saving your changes. Sure it takes a bit longer to restart from Steam but you can be pretty sure that you don't create a mess that way.

That said, you open the route in a scenario of your choice and get to the place of interest in a way you are comfortable with.

Then you press Crtl-E for Edit. Try focussing on the signal in question. If you click on it once, you should see a number of olive green triangular prisms extend from a place that is either the foot of the post or the foot of the signal head or whatever the signal builder chose. Not your problem at all.

You will see that these olive bars connect to cubes with arrows pointing into the direction of travel of a train that observes this signal. One of them, more or less next the signal post, is not numbered. The others are.

The million dollar question is: When you follow the train path from the unnumbered path through the switches in question, up to the next straight of track, do you last encounter a numbered track link (cube with arrow), or a switch?

The way things should be is all the switches lying between the unnumbered track link and the numbered ones. No switch should lie beyond the numbered track links. From the numbered track link to the unnumbered track link of the next signal, there should only be plain track, not one switch.

If you are sure you did not change anything, you can click the play button bottom right. If you feel insecure, remember Bob's first commandment.