Classic Trains in Computer Simulations (Trainz, Train Simulator 2020)

Welcome back, BaltACD. Thank you for providing the historically accurate details of how the engines were changed at Harmon! It would be interesting to see the Century and all of its sections changing engines at Harmon. IIRC, sections of The 20th Century Limited were 15 mins apart from each other. If there were three sections of the Century, the last section would arrive Harmon 45mins later than the first train wasn’t it?

Btw, you could drive the Century in the Trainz simulator. [tup] But the route in the video is not available for purchases…

I can’t say that the move I detailed was used - however, if the move displayed was used the car knockers would be standing there for five or more minutes without a engine attached to the train and the clock would be ticking.

One thing you learn working with T&E personnel - they KNOW HOW to get the job done with a minimum amount of work in a minimum amount of time.

Happy New Year to everyone!

After a long vacation, I finally reunion with my own PC again! I am glad to see our forum is alive and kicking during the long holiday. These are some pics captured in the computer game TrainZ Simulator by me and my family members who love trains. Some captured moments of the 3D NYCentral Dreyfuss Hudson and PRR’s legendary duplexes racing for fun! Videos will be uploaded asap, please enjoy! [swg]

(The S1 on the left is freeware which has been released a few years. We re-skinned and improved the texture of it for better realism. )

(Player can customize the trains fleet number)

We converted and customized some cars from N&W The Powhatan Arr

Every Picture Tells a Story

Perhaps I should have said “S1 to S1b” to make it a bit clearer. Big Engine vs. Niagara. A few nominal DBHP down but better working adhesion at most speeds for the 4-8-4. Also the advantages of Timken would be seen over the older style of lightweight motion.

Additional fun if you modified a RailDriver or similar platform to have proportional controls and effort for each of these locomotives, and simulated ‘typical’ or exemplary PRR and NYC enginemen handling the acceleration to speed. (Do the passenger cars have prototypical engagement of the undercar Spicer generators? if not, that’s a good thing to implement…)

Pity the comparison of T1 to S2a wouldn’t tell us much about Franklin type A…

I also hope that there was an official testing report focus on the differences of performance between PRR S1 and NYCentral S1b!

Why would the engineer want to do that?

Can we please arrive at a common term in this discussion for ‘cutoff’? I would suggest for example ‘short’ and ‘long’ with the understanding that short is the same as early: the valve gear cutting off admission relatively quickly so that only expansion finishes the stroke. Using “low” and “high” leaves it critically ambiguous whether the mechanical effect of the gear or the results in steam admission are meant.

It makes no sense to me that early cutoff, particularly in a radically short-stroke design like the PRR S1 (the effect of 26" stroke being even more pronounced with the 84" drivers than it would be on the T1s) would produce better starting in any respect. We might remember that in the C&O testing of the T1, the actual “problem” reported in starting was not slipping, but a stall even with longest possible cutoff.

In spite of this, I believe what Jones1945 is actually saying is not that the train ‘starts better’ with 20% cutoff, but that it just slips wildly and produces no effective TE until cutoff is reduced to that point (which might indicate that the throttle steps or control are too crude). I hope he will provide a bit more detail (or some video clips!) showing what is going on. In actual practice ‘driving on the throttle’ with the valve gear kept down in the corner usually reduces slipping, for a variety of reasons.

Something Porta proposed to get around the starting consequences of ‘limited cutoff’ in the ACE3000 was the use of what he called “Weiss ports” (which were also used in some PRR locomotives under a different name) - these are very narrow ports near the end of the cylinder which are fed steam early even when cutoff is limited by port placement or design otherwise, or is advanced som

[quote user=“Overmod”]

…In spite of this, I believe what Jones1945 is actually saying is not that the train ‘starts better’ with 20% cutoff, but that it just slips wildly and produces no effective TE until cutoff is reduced to that point (which might indicate that the throttle steps or control are too crude). I hope he will provide a bit more detail (or some video clips!) showing what is going on. In actual practice ‘driving on the throttle’ with the valve gear kept down in the corner usually reduces slipping, for a variety of reasons…

…Something Porta proposed to get around the starting consequences of ‘limited cutoff’ in the ACE3000 was the use of what he called “Weiss ports” (which were also used in some PRR locomotives under a different name) - these are very narrow ports near the end of the cylinder which are fed steam early even when cutoff is limited by port placement or design otherwise, or is advanced somewhat. This has the effect of eventually increasing cylinder pressure at low cyclic rpm for better starting without compromising design or tuning of the main ports and valve gear for more efficient operation at higher speed. But these are not going to help the effect of short stroke and low relative rod angularity in starting a heavy train at low speed…

…I have to think the reported effect is a programming artifact, especially since Jones1945 notes the program does not take into account any of the special characteristics of valve gear. If ‘horsepower’ is calculated in the program with something like modified PLAN, it might suffice to use a common piston-rod thrus

Which suggests your simulator assumptions are wrong. How does your simulator decide the engine is supposed to slip?

I am not the developer of any train simulation product but a user of them. I am afraid that only forum member who knows how different 3D physics engines work and the formula they are using could give you a satisfactory and satisfying answer.

Rendering of wheel slip of a locomotive is not something new, the Microsoft Train Simulator from 2001 can render a locomotive wheel slipping if the engineer(user) applies too much power to the drivers.

At least it is historically correct that PRR S1 #6100 was prone to wheel slip and “starting problem”. If a simulator using 3d physics engines could not simulate such a situation, it is not a realistic simulator in my book.

What a 3D physics engines in 2009 can do:

This is another train simulator “Railworks Train Simulator”, the rival of Trainz Simulator. The game using a better graphics engine but focus on the UK and the EU market. Editing the configuration files in this simulator or creating your own trains is for “PC Guru” only. This video shows how it simulate wheel slip of an engine.

This is the first video of me “driving” the 3D NYCentral Dreyfuss Hudson and the 20th Century Limited in the Trainz Simulator, more video will be uploaded for fun!

Great effort!

Minor complaints - NYC and most US roads operate on the right hand track in double track territory. The 20th Century, I belive had a 5 PM departure and was rarely on the track in the early afternoon as your lighting would indicate.

Well you drove that Dreyfuss pretty well Mr. Jones!

A lot better than this kid drives his streamliner.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ox3IAwYL2w

By the way, how’d you get the locomotive to pass through the bridge without wrecking it?

Oh, I know, it’s a “Ghost Train!” BOOOOOOO!!! A dream of things past!

Thanks a lot, BaltACD! haha, I knew people will mention about the “driving on the wrong side” thing, but no worries, I am gonna make another video for another Dreyfuss Hudson which using Boxpok drivers.

The time was set in the early morning in this video for better lighting so the next video will show the Century depart at 5 PM, but since the route I used run north to south in the UK so the shadow on the train probably won’t be historically accurate. I am still searching for a proper route set in America for testing these high-speed engines.

On the other hand, I am gonna add more cars to the 20th Century. IIRC the maximum length of the Century was 18 cars wasn’t it? [:)]

[quote user=“Flintlock76”]

Well you drove that Dreyfuss pretty well Mr. Jones!

I want to share one more video before I start re-skin the PT tender for the Dreyfuss Hudson. This is a video I made earlier and never think I would share it on YouTube. In this video, you could see the Dreyfuss Hudson have better acceleration rate with much lighter load behind her while the PRR T1 could reach higher top speed.

Nothing unpredictable, just for fun! [:P]

This post is dedicated to NYCentral’s Dreyfuss Hudson and the 20th Century Limited, therefore I can promise you that the next video is all about NYC’s renowned trains, including the Niagara and special guests. [C]

5 PM departure of the 20th Century Limited (Unstreamlined J3a + PT tender):

PRR S1 #6100 chasing NYC Dreyfuss Hudson at 100mph:

Thank you for watching. [D]

Well. That Pennsy engineer must have been asleep at the switch to have let the Century get that far ahead of him!

No matter, he more than made up for it!

Of course, we have to remember that both NYC and PRR officials always insisted there was never any race between the Century and the Broadway! [:-^] [swg] [(-D]

Or maybe the S1 engineer was just messing around with the Century? [:)] I know it was not a fair “race” since S1 was too powerful, but it is all for fun. I think a NYCentral J3a vs PRR K4s would be a nicer match.

Working on it:

I am not going to re-skin the 20th Century Limited train set to 1940s scheme. Thank you K&L TrainZ for letting user reskin their 3D model!

In case you feel extremely bored:

[C][swg]