PRR Eastern Region Activities

[Don6218]

Hello, I just got all the downloads finished and the route up and running with one of the included activities.

It looks great so far!

My question is will the Activities, Passenger & Freight that are in the FL work with Open Rails? The newest seems to be about 2009.

So far the activity is working, as basic as it is without issue.

[MMSS]

Don,

I found they work. If fact I been running a few of them from the F/L over the pass few weeks myself. You just have to make sure you have up to the proper update fix installed for the one you want to run. You should be covered for them all if you installed all the fixes up to "prrfix06". But you should go into the AE, open the activity and then click on save to re-save it to update it if the activity is older that the update it was for.

I have a few in the works mostly around the NYC to Philly, New Jersey, The Mainline to Harrisburg & Wilmington, DE areas (The areas I know most about). They will have activities for the PRR, PC, RDG, PRSL, CNJ, CR, CSAO, Amtrak & NJT. They are being done to actual timetables or events that happened during their periods of time. Meaning I am not going to put PC stock in an activity that is meant for a modern NJT activity.

What I love about running this route in ORTS is that you can put a decent amount of traffic and loose consists in if you have a decent PC & graphics card and get very good FPS rates.

Hope to have 1 or 2 uploaded this month. I been making a few activities for the PRR-ER, Steve Durham's Blue Comet route and Richard Shirey's LHR 4.0 route. A couple of the Blue Comet ones I uploaded already, with the freight acts for it coming with in the next week or 2(Hopefully) after I test them.

And with all the great products BLW/ZT has been releasing & having some time on my hands here to learn MSTS AE & Skyline Computing's Activity Generator. I am finally getting around to making a few activities for PRR-ER & the other ones I mentioned. So I can share them with the community here on TrainSim.

So keep an eye out for them.

[philabos]

Looking forward to your activities.
Couple of things I noticed while running the long local activity from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia in OR.
OR was recording an ascending grade of 4+% eastbound in the Millerstown area. Assume it has something to do with the route construction.
Ran into a stray GP9 sitting on the main line all by itself near Paoli. Ran into a standoff with a westbound just short of Philadelphia.
All of these could have been to the age of some of the activities vs, changes in the route over time.

[Komachi]

The only problem with ORTS and the PRR.E.R, is the signals that never change from Red. Such as Southbound at Baltimore Penn, Northbound at Perryville, and I think one or two other locations.

[Vince]

All,
The PRR-East has three problem signals that will not clear that I know of;
(there may be more)
1. Southbound main #3 at Trenton Fair Interlocking Signal 50R. .
2. Southbound main # 2 at West Baltimore Bridge interlocking.Signal 28.
3. Northbound main # 2 at Prince Interlocking Signal 2N.

The signal numbers are from the official 1992 Amtrak signal-track maps.

The Track-Signal Map Symbol index: >>>===> http://www.blockstation.net/symbol-index.html
Index to the maps: >>>===> http://www.blockstation.net/AMTK-Phila-Div/index.html

I manually edited the database files to correct these errors per the Steam4Me tutorial:
Steam4Me Tutorial Remove Phantom Signals >>>===>http://msts.steam4me.net/tutorials/phantom_signals.html

My original post on the subject: https://www.trainsim.com/vbts/showth...51#post1886051 uses a slightly different method that works well also.

regards,

[buttercup]

Would replacing the .tdb file with a "good" one do the trick without having to go thru the editing process and if so could the "good" .tdb file be made available?

[Don6218]

All great answers, looks like this is a popular route!

I will also be looking for those Activities! Thank you Mark. I just went into the view Ctrl 9 and changed the red to "Proceed" and it worked.

A new Tdb would help those of us who trouble with the editing side of things. Old=Bad eyesight and no patience! LOL

I am very happy with what I have seen so far.

One thing that does bother me, OR & MSTS is the insistence of route builders to use the European Style of end of track bumpers when there are great North American styles to choose. I think it just ruins the sights when a huge block of Yellow Beam shows up. I have replaced them with the GNR ones and the look os great.

[Vince]

Would replacing the .tdb file with a "good" one do the trick without having to go thru the editing process and if so could the "good" .tdb file be made available?

No.
A phantom signal is a signal that is defined in the TDB-TIT but not defined in it's associated World file. There are three files involved. TDB, TIT & the World file. All have to be as they say, 'in sync'.

No entry in the World file means it cannot be selected thus cannor be removed by normal (editor) means.
The fix I described in the December 9 post involved me getting the required info from the TDB-TIT and pasting it into the world file. Doing this allowed the signal object that was previously invisible (as described in the Steam4Me tutorial ) to be visible so I could select it and delete it.

regards,

[buttercup]

Thanks for the info Vince.

[Vince]

Hi Eric,
I see I didn't completely answer this question.
Can a 'good' tdb be made available?

Kind of impossible as I've done a lot of re-doing / re-locating signals, adding speed limits ect. on the north end of the route in addition to the work at Perryville and S Baltimore. Lots of world file changes and I wouldn't know how to get the files I've changed.
If I figure a legal way to release a database with world files I'll post.
regards,

[MMSS]

My original post on the subject: https://www.trainsim.com/vbts/showth...51#post1886051 uses a slightly different method that works well also.

Vince,

I used your method when you posted it back in December to clear the problem up and it worked the best. After following it to a "T", double and triple checking it then holding my breathe when I hit save. Low & Behold, it worked great. You are the man !

If I remember correctly I had a problem once with a signal by COLA interlock on the Port Road. But I think it was cleared up after fix 05 came out. I have to run the section of the route again to make sure.


And Don, I was going to tell you to replaced the bumpers with the GNR ones if you have them (Which you do). They do improve the route quite well.

If anyone reading this is still looking for the bumper download. It is still available on the Internet Archive site.
http://web.archive.org/web/200803120...om/scenery.htm

[Don6218]

Yes, I have replaced them and the improvement is visually much better. They are free to use, I don't know why all these routes keep showing up with the European style, unless that is what is in the Track Data they are using. I don't know how to build a route so that is only a guess.

Nice route though, I am now using ZosaTrains GG1 and some better Pennsylvania Coaches, Much Better even on what is an Explore Activity.