Whew, what a day! It’s been one thing after another just about non-stop since 4:30 this morning! So while my day’s been dragging, I’ve been wondering how many people use fast-clocks during their operating sessions? And if you do use a fast clock, what ratio do you feel works best? How do you handle switching in the yard and so forth? Jobs that typically take about the same amount of time no matter what type of clock you use?
As always, I’m looking forward to your comments and opinions!
I don’t use a fast clock or any clock. Since I normally operate by myself, and I don’t multitask, sequential operations work quite well for me. When the train has been made up, it’s time to depart. When the local has completed its run, it’s time for the passenger run, and so on. Less stress, works great for this simple mind.
Even with 2-3 operators, sequential ops works pretty well. I come up with a “mission” for each operator that can be performed in parallel with the other operators without too much interference. Any and all needs for the same track are directly coordinated by the operators involved. When all the parallel missions are complete, it’s time for another set of parallel missions. The ribbing the last guy to finish the mission takes are a lot of fun - but we all have a sense of accomplishment when all the missions are completed.
Probably because of the nature of my various money-earning past times (aircraft maintenance management, project management and scheduling), I have no burning desire to incorporate a clock or clock pressure into my layout operations. Besides, my very small main line running lengths and challenging switching are not very compatible with a single clock of any speed.
The way I approach it, there is a certain amount of work that can be done in a certain amount of real time. As long as you keep the amount of real work you can do in a real amount of time the same, you can use any fast time you want.
The only time you get in trouble is if you keep the number of activities per unit of time the same and scale the time (i.e. 1:1 time you have 10 activities and 4:1 time you have 40 activities). That will NOT work. As long as you keep the number of activities per unit of real time the same, the fast clock speed doesn’t matter,
I have at various times had dreams of a big layout where I would want to have timetable operation. I aspired to model passenger operations in where twice a day there was a set of interlocking movements, including a rolling meet.
The morning rush:
7:55 AM #16 CHIEF arr from . Switching #16: One baggage-express removed, One baggage-express and one RPO added.
8:00 AM #5 Mail train arr from . Switching #5: Two baggage-express cars removed.
I already operate on a “fast clock” and think I always have for that matter. I’ll head for the basement to work on my trains at say 1:00 in the afternoon and before I know it the wife is next to me asking if I’m coming up for dinner or planning on spending the evening in the basement as well.
Where does the time go? Only yesterday I was 18, now I’m an old man, what do I need a “fast clock” for?
By the way, for any of you who happen to own a “real clock” all you need do to speed up the time is to shorten the pendulem, the shorter the faster, the longer the slower. This is easily acomplished by the adjustment screw at the bottom of the pendulem. I did this for a short time in my “younger” days, used an old “regulator” clock and adjusted the pendulem where it ran about 3 hours to 1. All I did was start it at the beginning of the operating session and stop it when we were finished. one winding lasted for several weeks instead of one week as normal.
Like Fred, my operations are/will be sequential. An operating “session” might last 20 minutes or it might be 8 hours. A complete “day” on the layout could take weeks or even months to complete. I’ve no desire to introduce any clock, fast or normal, into my operations.
In our round robin group we run our modular layout with a timetable and a fast clock, set at a 1:3 ratio. As it adds a lot of stress to operating the layout, we have noticed, that our engineers try to beat the clock by exceeding the posted speed limits along the line, just to make up time to let it go a little slower at the stations.
Running on a timetable and fast clock adds to realism, but it is exhausting and may take away a lot of fun - it is hard work!
My normal operating sessions have three to four operators. I have a list of trains that are run in a 24 hour period and their start times are about 15 minutes apart. About half of the 24 hour period gets worked during a normal 5 hour session.
I use a computer generated manifest program called Rail Op. The computer generates random but typical car movements for each train.
With the size of my layout - it takes about an hour (running the local) to run from one end to the other - with the usual stops at each town to switch out the cars and make the pickups as well as keeping clear of the thru trains.
This is assuming that my operators run at somewhat realistic speeds and take their time doing the required work (which doesn’t happen that much)!
As for the main line runs - the operators that do run slow are given those trains so they effectively keep the layout running at the proper speed.
My yard operators - HAVE TO run at normal time - as they have a lot of work to do - so speeding up the time and therefor the schedule would only make their life worse!
They don’t HAVE to run at normal time, you just choose to run at normal time. The key is keep the activities at the same relative place with regard to real time and then you can use whatever fast time clock you want.
If you yard can handle 6 trains per session, 3 trains in and 3 trains out, as long as you keep the SAME number of trains and they are spaced the same amount throughout the session, the fast clock time can be anything you want an should have ZERO stress on anybody.
When a fast clock adds stress is when you tie the activities to the schedules and keep the schedule iron clad while adjusting the time. That is pretty much guaranteed to fail.
For example, my last session was run at real time because I had loaned my fast clocks to another layout. I got my fast clocks back so my next session should be run at 4:1. If you video taped the sessions without showing the clocks, you shouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them. The yard will have the same amount of real time to switch the trains, the trains will originate at the same relative positions in the session, the trains will run at the same speeds across the layout. The only difference will be the times on the clock and the times on the schedule.
The PLAN - run a 5:1 fast clock, with a similar scale reduction of the physical distance between stations (2.5 meters representing a scale kilometer that should be 12.5 meters long.)
REALITY - sequential operation of that portion of the railroad that currently exists, with a lot of backing, filling and pre-staging between.
The fact is that true fast-time operation won’t be possible until the physical plant approaches completion. At present, even the benchwork has a long way to go…
When I reach the point when I can do so I will be operating to my prototype’s rather hectic timetable. To facilitate reality, I have identified all of those times when no train is supposed to be moving. These are my designated pause points, times when I can stop the fast clock and catch up with yard work, or run a train on another railroad (I’ll have five to choose from,) or take a break for a meal, or get on with the rest of my life. So the instant when the DOWN train has pulled into the platform track at Tomikawa but the UP train is still waiting for the switches to be aligned may stretch from a 12-second ‘scale minute’ to several real-time minutes, to a half-hour ‘run the coal unit to the colliery,’ to seventy-five minutes for dinner, to a couple of weeks while my wife and I drive 2/3 of the way across the continent to visit our offspring and their offspring…
Interestingly, midnight is NOT a pause point. So, when the clock/calendar reaches 2400 hours on 30 September, 1964, the layout drops through a time warp. One 12-second ‘minute’ later, it will be 0001 hours, 1 September, 1964. The only way to detect this is to watch the date-time display on the CTC panel.
I have never used a fast clock. I start with some sense of how much operating time I have, and then can decide if I just have time for the “mine run” or if I should also run a passenger train or run the log cars to the mill.
I was in a club one time that somewhat regularly tried to operate with a fast clock. It always seemed to end up with a lot of pressure and finger-pointing among the different operators. While I understand that adding that aspect contributes to prototypical operation, it does not contribute to a “recreation” for me.
I use normal time so my operators can use their watches. But someone always gets behind schedule and it turns into sequential operations. The time is just to give operators an idea of how long they have before they have to clear the main or classify the next incoming train.
Using my local club for an example, we also run on normal time, evben with a dispatcher. Thing is that each session tends to be a testbed for time spacing, so that we get enough throughs to keep everyone busy while the yards keep building locals.
While we’re on the subject of time, I’d like to steal the light and ask your guys thoughts on passenger time. namely, the time we take for station stops and LCL unloading. Every Op I’ve seen, even on normal time, shortens the stop X-minutes (technically, fast-time in its own right, no?). What do you guys use for X?
A passenger train/first class train has to make the station stop time shown in the time table. It can’t “shorten” the stop by X or any amount of minutes. You can only make the station stop longer.
To repeat what Dave says in other words (which helped me understand better what he was saying the first time I saw him say it):
If it takes you 20 real minutes to switch a town or put together a train, then it takes 20 real minutes, no matter if you say that those 20 real minutes represents 20 simulated minutes (on a 1:1 clock), 80 simulated minutes (on a 4:1 clock) or 200 simulated minutes (3 hrs 20 minutes on a 10:1 clock).
In one real hour of an operating session, you only have 3 such 20 real minute time slots.
Running a fast clock will make it appear as the activity takes longer than it really does. But what creates stress is not what the clock shows. It is when you forget that you are operating in real time, not simulated time - i.e. if you come up with the idea that in 80 simulated minutes on the 4:1 clock, you should be able to do 4 times as much work as you can in the 20 minutes of real time you actually have.
That does not necessarily work.
If it takes 15 real minutes to put together a train in the yard, and one real minute to run the train from the yard to the next
Right, but in a 1:1 scale world, a station stop is easily 10-15 minutes, maybe even longer depended on the railroad, the station, whtether they habe to double stop the platform, wait for them to offload the chickens from the REA car, etc. None of the operating sessions I’ve been to have had crews wait an actual fifteen minutes, so even on an otherwise normal time, the passenger loading time gets sped up. (so the operator isn’t standing in one place doing nothing for 15 minutes. I wanted to know what everyone used for their passenger time. One minute? 3? 5? Make em’ suffer the 15?