Small Small Track Sections

[inflammable]

Has anyone ever made a Track Section shorter than 1 foot?

I looked at Xtracks, the smallest there ( for A1 track) is a 0.3 and a 0.2 meter pieces, 1 foot and 8 inches, but the 0.2 shape isn't there.

I looked at ScaleRail, and the shortest there ( 1 track) is 0.3 meters, 1 foot again.

Okay, good point, why would anyone need a piece shorter than that? I don't know. I was making some small pieces, and went to test out my 4 inch piece, and it kept crashing. Tested several other shapes, checked and then rechecked my Tsection, and couldn't find any obvious problems.

I really don't need a shorter piece than 1 foot, I'm just wondering if it's an MSTS thing, that others have noticed.

James

And I also wanted to break the 2 week staleness of the Scenery object forum. I wanted to justify it's existance.

[BNLover]

Here's the shape for the A1t0_2mstrt.s if you would like.

http://www.trainsim.com/ts/user_files/113999.zip

[Hack]

There's a .2 ScaleRail section, which will be in the next build (0.65617'), but FWIW, MSTS has a problem with anything smaller, as the end node tolerances are too close for track (and IIRC, road sections can only be as small as 2m before other goofy errors pop up).

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

[link:www.3dtrains.com/products/index.shtml|http://www.3dtrains.com/images/pro_funit_atsfmain.jpg]

Pro Series v4.0 SuperPacks

[charlie]

>I really don't need a shorter piece than 1 foot, I'm just
>wondering if it's an MSTS thing, that others have noticed.

James,

Well yes, this was noticed several years ago. The 0.3 m pieces are just about the shortest that can be used without an eventual confusion of the TDB, as you have already noticed with your really short piece experiments.

The TDB will accommodate gaps of the order of about 0.1 m without TDB problems. In other words, blue poles will link properly across the gap and provide a whole path without real troubles. May look bad and be a little bumpy, but it works.

If you use the 0.2 m piece, eventually the TDB will become confused as which blue pole gets linked to what across the piece, and a re-linking will occur. You don't have to touch this junction to get this to occur, it will happen on its own as you continue in other areas. Then in the old days we had to identify the problem and clean up the mess. :)

It's my recollection that this is the reason that the 0.2 m piece is not even mentioned in the "Track charts" section on the Xtracks web page. Further, I think that the only reason that the piece is still in the Standardized Global Tsection.dat is that it had already been used in some routes before the troubles were noted...

The 0.3 m pieces (std and narrow gauges) are very handy. I agree the there are sufficient selections of others available the 0.2's are just not needed. Best not to use it.

regards,
charlie

EDIT: Upon further review, the 0.2 m piece was probably never part of Xtracks (I checked all the way back to v3.2). Some European add-in set comes to mind...

EDIT-EDIT: Upon further-further review:
Sections 32950-32986 are Dietmar Jülich's track sections
Haven't heard from him in about 4 years...
I can remember OkrasaGhia's comments on this piece, but I can't find it today. :)

[inflammable]

Thanks for your input, guys. I wanted to see if more experienced people had found the same thing, and your thoughts on work arounds or solutions.


Thanks

James