I've attached several Amtrak coaches to the F7 and everything looks ok, but the brakes on the coaches won't release to allow you to drive the train. Is there a trick to this, is it a bug, or is this just not possible due to real-world issues? It would be really nice to be able to pull people with the F7s thanks and best regards
I have tried it and found it inconsistent, sometimes I have been able to move and sometimes I haven't. Make sure the rotair valve is set to passenger. If that doesn't work you could also try putting a cab car or locomotive on the back of the formation
The F7 doesnt pump the brakes to 110psi, only 90, so it cant get the brakes off the coaches. This won't be resolved in the timeframe of the formation designer but is something that I want to get looked at, at some point.
Getting that resolved would be great. The ATSF F7s are desperate for some passenger coaches - even if the coaches themselves are incorrect for the locos - but that’s currently not doable with the defunct brakes.
Matt. I guess that are going to be many instances like this. Where locos and wagons don't work together in real-life but where, from a game-play point of view, it would be useful if they did. (I'm also thinking of the Seacows and Turbots which I believe have different braking systems in real life but which do, in this case, seem to work together in the sim). Is the DTG view that we should stick to real-life or will you, as seems to be suggested in your earlier post, drift towards a game-play first view so long as the outcome isn't too ridiculous?
So the seacow YGB is an airbraked wagon, but has a vacuum through pipe. The ZCV turbot is a vacuum braked wagon. So there's a limited compatibility there - in that if you use a vacuum brake loco then only the turbot's will actually brake, the seacow's will just pass the vacuum on. If you have an air braked loco then only the seacow's coupled to the loco will do braking - if you make thefirst wagon on the loco a turbot then i'd not expect any braking ability at all. I dont know what was actually implemented in the wagons in game, but that's what id expect for behaviour. We can't make it so that you can couple a vac to an air and have it work, and currently if you do things that have incompatible pinouts on the electrical connectors they wont pass signals properly either - logner term we are looking at an option for an automatic adapter which might translate these electrical signals but that's not something we're actively doing right now beyond some discussions on how to improve this going forwards. In some cases our pinouts are not accurate as the data was not available (or in many cases still isnt) or there has been an evolution of understanding - so somethings wont work together electrically that maybe should in reality. So mixing brake systems - probably not. Mixing couplers - probably not. Mixing electricals - not right now, but likely in the future. Caveat to all of the above: Barrier wagons cure many ailments. Maybe the option is to provide some barrier wagons that mix and interface various couplings and brake systems
Ahh that gives me something new to have a play with. I'll let you know how I get on. Now that sounds like a good idea. Is that reasonably do-able for DTG? I suppose, in some ways, it's similar to having an inner and an outer with the JNAs?
Essentially they are like the JNA Outer - that's basically a translator wagon just for coupling. I've got this crazy idea for a repurposed BG coach with a bunch of equipment inside you can interact with to configure and manage the electrical and brake conversion hah. Someone from the team will read this and slap me later i'm sure.
Just did some tests with a CL66 and a rake of 18 Seacows, and then a rake of 18 Turbots, applying the brakes at 30mph. The Seacow rake more or less stopped on a sixpence. The Turbot rake started a very gradual slow down as I applied the brakes and probably took 10 times as long to stop as the Seacows. (Presumably that is because it is only the loco doing the braking?). I guess I can 'improve' the stopping performance of the Turbots by either adding an extra loco or 1 or 2 seacows to the rake? (I'll do some more playing.......I mean investigating).
How about a Habbiins with a Schaku on one end so we can tow dead German DMUs and EMUs too? Wouldn't need electrics at all, just mechanical coupling and HLL/HBL connections.
Just to Clarifiy, the Seacow is actually a YGA not a YGB as modelled and the TOPS panel is in error. It doesn't have a vacuum through pipe (nor should it really as most Seacows were YGAs). As such you cannot mix them with the Turbots at all. The only way in reality you could do it is to pull the strings on the Turbot and Seacow and Run unfitted with a brake van. Sadly no release strings in game. They don't work together in game either but the brakes are so awful on the seacows they basically do nothing, you can easily drag them with the brakes hard on and not notice. Don't think the Turbot brakes are worth much either!
