Problem with adjusting terrain, help needed please

XPTE · Post by **XPTE** » Fri Aug 29, 2003 2:30 pm

On part of my route there is a steep uphill gradient of 1/75 for about 2 miles. However I am an encountering an annoying problem with unburrying the burried track pieces, because when I click on the pieces which are burried and press Y to unburry them it unburried the track pieces in question but it then also goes and burries the preceeding track pieces! And then I press Y to unburry the preceeding track piece and it then goes and burried the preceeding track piece before that! And it just goes on and and on like that. It's a no win situation! I've tried a number of times but to no avail.

Any help on this please?

It's too late to alter the gradients to not so steep gradients, as I've completed all the trackwork beyong this section and don't want to have to do all that again, and I'd like to keep the gradients as they are on the real line - STEEP!

ianm42 · Post by **ianm42** » Fri Aug 29, 2003 2:52 pm

Yep, the Ctrl Y thing is OK most of the time, but in the end you have to sort out the individual points one at a time. Switch to the mesh view, select the terrain adjust, hover near a point so you get the white circle, then use the numeric keypad up and down arrows to move the point. Watch out, because the circle can skip to another point as you go past it and you start moving that one instead.

Move the mouse pointer to the far distance and you will see the terrain mesh as it is optimised (fewer points) and some new green lines might cover your tracks. You then need to adjust the points at the end of these.

Long job of trial and error.

XPTE · Post by **XPTE** » Fri Aug 29, 2003 3:06 pm

thanks for that info. However I'm not getting on too well with trying to sort it out. Would anyone be willing to sort it out for me please? We're only talking about 2 miles of trackwork where this is the problem. If so please PM me and I'll package my route again(because I've made changes to all the station loading times and platform lengths) with Route Ritter, upload it and send you the link to download it. Not sure how long it would take you to sort it out exactly if its 2 miles of trackwork, but do it in your own time when you have the available time. And I'll have to put the route on hold until it's complete.

It's either that or leave it as it and have about 3 pieces of trackwork burried along a 2 mile stretch of line.

gooneebird · Post by **gooneebird** » Fri Aug 29, 2003 4:49 pm

It would appear that your two-mile stretch has long track pieces. How about replacing them all with shorter ones, because -- from my experience -- it seems that the CTRL-Y function has larger elevation-averaging to accomplish when bringing terrain to underlie successive, sloping long track pieces (as opposed to shorter ones)?

Other than that, two miles' worth of track really isn't all that much mileage to replace; it shouldn't take that much time. (Altogether my fault, I had to relay more than 60 miles' worth because my network has a lot of undulating route to it that initially had slopes that were too much for steam or old diesel locos to climb. In the beginning, I ought to have fully read the trusty documentation I obtained to learn the maximum size of slope for the kind of activities I have in mind; or, if I properly read some other documentation, I could have overcome the train-stalling problems by lowering the gravity factor, which is one of the major properties settings of any MSTS route. Oh well, too late now [the initial visuals of the exagerated slopes were really pleasing].)

Cheers

http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/Bayou/4804/ a fictitious network serving London, Weymouth, and points in between

COLTRANE · Post by **COLTRANE** » Fri Aug 29, 2003 10:29 pm

I've always just taken a small road section say 10 meter straight, changed the width and embankment levels to 88 and width to 10 m, then place the road section over the offending terrain and press the Y key
it always works for me anyway.

andrewgadd · Post by **andrewgadd** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 12:47 am

Once you have laid your track and banged away with the Y key, go back and bang away again, but this time change the width value in the terrain box, from the default 18 down to 3 or 5. For some reason width also means length????

Also try to introduce the gradient gradually, one 100m length at a time, increasing the grade as you go.

Good luck.

gopher · Post by **gopher** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 7:25 am

andrewgadd · Post by **andrewgadd** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 8:24 am

Sorry Gordon, I sometimes forget the basic rules as well.

gopher · Post by **gopher** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 8:33 am

Hi Andrew

Had to go back into the RE and check myself as I have not layed any track for a few months now

Gordon

P.S. Just noticed your sig. I take it you dabble about around Didcot? Must check on the progress of the Railmotor.

saddletank · Post by **saddletank** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 11:20 am

I was going to say what Gordon said. But he said it first

Using short lengths also helps.

XPTE · Post by **XPTE** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 3:02 pm

Thanks for the advice. I'll try again and see how I get on. If it means changing the gradients though it would mean me not only relaying those 2 mile, but also the additional trackwork I have done beyond that which includes 9 stations and a freight yard.

Don't want to have to do that all over again if possible.....not just yet anyway.

Personally I don't think those 3(or is 4) burried track pieces would deter from the enjoyment of driving the route that much. As when you drive up the section it'll only take a few minutes anyway and only a fraction of that time will you see those burried track pieces. Allthough not sure what others would make of it. I won't mention any names but I notice that some freeware and even payware routes features some burried track pieces, allthough not 3 or 4 pieces in such a short short space.

JohnKendrick · Post by **JohnKendrick** » Sat Aug 30, 2003 7:03 pm

My Scarborough Whitby section has several miles at 1 in 39 and 1 in 41 so I certainly know the problem!

Using the methods outlined do work - shorter track sections to replace long ones and pressing 'Y' on the way down does resolve it.

Something not already mentiond is pressing F7 to see the tiles. Right click in a tile and set the Error Bias to 0 (it defaults to 1). This draws the grid in greater detail and stops sections burying themselves one minute and not the next!

If you have a specific problem piece after that, select the grid join near the offending spread in Wireframe mode (W) and lower it a fraction manually with the down arrow key on the number keypad.

John

XPTE · Post by **XPTE** » Wed Sep 03, 2003 5:17 pm

Yep I tried again, and all I had to do was work downwards rather than upwards. And it worked without any probs. Thank goodness for that, as I had visions of having to leave all those several burried track pieces as they were or having to tear down all those several miles of trackwork and relaying it all over again.

Cheers for the info.

gopher · Post by **gopher** » Wed Sep 03, 2003 8:59 pm

Navvy for hire. Downhill work only

Careful with error bias set to 0 in dense object areas, it will hammer frame rates if you go over the top.

Gordon