Is the BR Class 31 really crap at accelerating and braking, or is something wrong with my game. It takes ages to get any speed up and the braking is more or less non-existent. I’ve had to resort to emergency brakes quite frequently. Surely it’s not that bad?
It’s an old locomotive. That’s how they were. Nice and steady. The braking works fine on it, just not like a modern unit. You have to anticipate stopping early and use nice gentle braking for a nice smooth deceleration. If you’re having to use emergency brakes then you are driving too aggressively, going too fast, or reacting too slowly to what’s coming ahead.
I started to brake around the 1-mile mark, but the brakes just hiss and there is hardly any bite to them. Are there any brake settings I’m maybe missing/failing to change?
As far as I know the brakes are automatically set correctly for whatever service you are driving, in TVL at least, but I don’t know if they are set correctly in the other routes. They are set to whatever brake type the wagons or coaches are fitted with. If you’re driving a passenger service in TVL pulling the class 101 then the brakes are vacuum. I can’t recall what they are for the freight wagons but I would assume they are air brakes. In WSR the brakes are vacuum and on the tour in ECW they are air brakes. What services are you having trouble with?
I haven't bought the Class 31, but I had a similar kind of trouble on the NTP after buying the Heavy Freight Pack. Some services for the Class 40 (with van wagons) aren't setup correctly and I couldn't find the lever to change the type of brakes. I only found the reason when trying the same service with the Class 47.
When you apply the brakes, make sure the brake pressure raises. The next step is to file a report ticket.
It has quite a character to the brake system in Tsw. I noticed the same, put it on initial and it hardly has any brake force compared to the other BR blue locos. I noticed that the brake pressure needle hardly moves. It requires about an 80% application to get 1 bar of pressure according to the guage. Then it behaves more like the other locos. The problem then is it takes soooo long to come off the brakes. I'm still learning it, but have found that the class 31 will drop approx 20mph from 80% application to completely off when you release the brakes. It just takes that long to come off them. Edit: And approx 10mph with a 50% application then full release. Still learning.
She’s definitely a unique beast. I’ve been watching videos on YT and it seems what I’m experiencing is normal. Acceleration did seem slower on mine though. On YT videos she can accelerate reasonably quickly, but I might be messing up the controls. I’ve noticed the HUD jumps about a bit - especially the Amp Meter.
The brake selector in the Class 40 is only in the No.1 end cab (marked inside the cab, and shown as the "pointy-end cab" icon on the map). It's actually quite a nice detail... ;-) The (freight) vans on NTP are vacuum braked, but the Class 40 is usually set to Air-Passenger. So you have to head over to the No.1 cab to switch them over to Vacuum-Goods. The No.2 end does have an indicator panel above the door on the right, which will tell you what the brakes are currently set to, so you don't have to walk over, just to check.
That's what I found out, yes, but as said before I couldn't switch to vacuum. Thanks for the description. Found that switch and the indicator panel now.