Telegraph wires

ARG706 · Post by **ARG706** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 7:09 am

Does anybody know of an efficient way to add these to a route that doesn't result in one pulling their hair out?

Would gantries be a suitable option?

Cheers

bigvern · Post by **bigvern** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 7:54 am

I have used gantries for fences but some hand tweaking was necessary.

Use Trainz where the telegraph poles (and fences) come in nice easy to install splines...

3DTrains · Post by **3DTrains** » Fri Aug 31, 2007 5:49 pm

Here's how I do mine. Somewhat complex at the start, but I've yet to see anything faster overall, or yield better results...

I created separate poles and wires, and then added their definitions to a copy of my Global\tsection.dat. I then created a backup of my route files before doing any further editing.

Poles were set up as short intersections (0.25m, I believe), so that the wire shapes could be plugged in from several directions.

Basic lengths of wires (set at 50m) appeared to look proportionally correct to what's used here in the states, with other lengths were created as needed (to span a river, pass over track, etc.). Wire shapes were split into separate groups with different numbers of wires and other additions.

To solve getting the wires to follow curves, and not have to define curves in the tsection.dat, I used various angles from 0.25d to 15d (right and left). This kept all wire lengths to 50m.

To minimize having the wires appear to pull-away from the poles when on a slope, I set the world axis for both poles and wires at about where the Z-center of the wire group was. Thus, I could tilt the wires to pretty severe angles before I noticed the wires severely overlapping or separating.

I also added "marker guides" to the wires in the shape of a single poly (pointed in a forward direction to look like an arrow), and begining at -6.096m from the world axis (-20'), I added several more downward and separated by about 10'. This allowed be to visually set the wires at various heights depending on the need (short, medium, tall), which keeps everything proportional as the poles/wires followed hills and valleys. The markers use a temporary texture (defined as Trans), so I can use an alpha channel to hide the markers when testing in the sim. Once the route is complete, I'll re-export the wire shapes without the markers to help reduce polys. The shapes are fairly efficient anyway, but every bit helps.

Everything is added in RE thus: Pole, Wire, Pole, Wire, Pole, Wire....

Finally, I used a search and replace program to change the definitions of the poles and wires in the World files to Static shapes, and then extracted a "clean" copy of the route's TDB, TIT, RDB, and RIT files from the backup made prior to adding the poles and wires. I also go and remove the temporary entries in the Global\tsection.dat used for the wires and poles.

An example of the results:

http://www.3dtrains.com/screens/c006.jpg

Same thing was done for the barbed-wire fences in the above scenes (as well as many other items). Once the scenery is complete, I'll go back through the World files and give the poles dynamic shadows.

Getting things set up takes the most time (modeling, adding entries to the tsection, testing, cleaning up, etc.), but you can lay connected wire throughout a large route in a few evenings.

Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.com

Buckeye · Post by **Buckeye** » Sat Sep 01, 2007 1:47 pm

Hi Marc.
Brilliant photo, how about a tutorial.
I'm sure many of the route builder's including myself would appreciate guidance in editing the tsection.bat file.
Field textures look good also, are these applied with Mosaic.
Regards
Buckeye.

3DTrains · Post by **3DTrains** » Sun Sep 02, 2007 11:34 am

Thanks, but I believe the basic outline above is best left to those that are familiar and comfortable tinkering with the Global\tsection, as even a minor mistake can render the entire sim useless.

Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.com

Buckeye · Post by **Buckeye** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 4:16 pm

Hi Marc.
Thanks for your response.
Have fun.
Buckeye.

DarwinS · Post by **DarwinS** » Mon Sep 03, 2007 5:41 pm

I feel a little scared of tinkering with the t-section.dat...

But 3D trains mentions:

Finally, I used a search and replace program to change the definitions of the poles and wires in the World files to Static shapes,

Now what search and replace programs can do that? I have spent some time manually editing .w files and might need such a utility again...

Buckeye · Post by **Buckeye** » Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:10 am

Check Word Pad!

Make a complete copy of MSTS before any editing.

Buckeye.

alanch · Post by **alanch** » Tue Sep 04, 2007 7:28 am

The best Unicode editor that I have found is the free Context from http://www.context.cx/ with the MSTS highlighter plugin from http://steam4me.railpage.org.au/trainsi ... ntext.html, where the tutorials on using it are.

It is always good to have a full backup, but if you are only editing one route, a backup of the route folder will be enough.

Alan

Please have a look at my railway photograph site - http://alan-lewis-chambers.fotopic.net/ - lots of British steam and early diesels

DarwinS · Post by **DarwinS** » Tue Sep 04, 2007 5:37 pm

...thanks guys I have wordpad and context... though i didn't ever get the pretty colours working on context! but that is what i call manual editing, you have to open and replace in each .w file... when you have one object to replace on many tiles it would be nice if there was a program to edit all the files in the folder at once in such a way!

alanch · Post by **alanch** » Tue Sep 04, 2007 6:14 pm

You can get a programme to do that, but I don't know any that are freeware. Next best is a programme that will search a folder of files for a text string - Google for Superfinder - and then use Context.

The Steam4me plugin for Context works very well - highly recommended.

Alan

3DTrains · Post by **3DTrains** » Thu Sep 06, 2007 2:59 am

http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm

I use it on tons of things, is more robust than most apps, and works especially well on Unicode files.

Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.com

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