LYR - Heartland - 1920

It's been a bit quiet in here for a few months, so an announcement is imminent.

Having got the Huddersfield and Environs 1920 and LMS 1930's versions, and Black Country 1920 and LMS 1930's versions out in the public arena, I started to look at an 'old' route that I've had in the back of my mind for years.

The LYR Heartland route - this route covers the LYR main lines from Upholland Tunnel to Summit Tunnel, both via Manchester Victoria and by the Bolton / Bury line and a number of other north-south cross-country lines - see attached map.

Stage 1 will essentially be the main lines from Victoria through to Summit Tunnel, with stubs radiating off the main lines. Stage 2 will be the Oldham Loop and the Bury line via Heaton Park, and associated minor lines. Stage 3 will go west from Victoria to Upholland Tunnel, via Walkden and Wigan. Stages 4/5 will be all the other lines to the west of Manchester shown on the map. I'm expecting around 12 - 18 months work to finish this route.

Once the 1920 version is out, then I'll do the LMS 1930's version to match the others.





Regards, Brian

Hi Brian,
There's no stopping you, is there, mate?!!

I'm sure it'll be just as good as your previous routes - looking forward to this one!

Cheers,
Ged
.

A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all fans of the L&YR.



Regards, Brian

I haven't posted on here for a while but I still look in most weeks. The Christmas Screenshot is superb and I wish you and your family a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

In the screenshot above, you can see the 'only' LYR signal box shape available from the freeware downloads. Unfortunately, this is in faded BR maroon livery, right out of character with LYR 1920 era. Also as I was progressing through the route, I realised I needed several other signal box shapes.

So, I built a 'kit' of new LYR signal boxes in LYR colours.



These make a HUGE difference in the appearance of the route.

Regards, Brian

. . . and very nice too!

Coming Soon !!!



The Final Beta is currently out with the testers.

Release hopefully by the end of April.

Regards, Brian

LYR-Heartland V1 is now available for download at UKTS

I have already started laying track for V2.

Regards, Brian

Hi Brian.

Thanks very much for the new route.

Route_Riter tells me that LYR-Heartland-1920\ttype.dat calls for

DemoAutoSound/curveswitchtrackin.sms
DemoAutoSound/curveswitchtrackex.sms
DemoAutoSound/switchtrackin.sms
DemoAutoSound/switchtrackex.sms
DemoAutoSound/curvesquealtrackin.sms
DemoAutoSound/curvesquealtrackex.sms

which don't exist (anywhere in my MSTS installation).

Is there a fix?

Regards,

Bob.

The answer is in the Guidelines document :

extract----------------------------------------------------
Automatic Switch and Curve Sounds

Open Rails Version 1.3 added the ability to apply automatic switch and curve squeal sounds throughout a Route. To activate automatic switch and curve sounds, there are two components, one component must be setup in the \xxxxx\Routes\LYR-Heartland-1920\sound\DemoAutoSound folder. The other component must be setup in the specific Route folder.

The DemoAutoSounds can only be downloaded direct from the Authors (Carlos Santucci) site http://www.interazioni-educative.it/Varie/DemoAutoSound.zip
Make sure you read the installation and copyright information included with this file. The copyright does not allow me to include this with the route, the user must download and separately install the DemoAutoSound set themselves.


I have already included the necessary 'other' files within the route download, so as long as you have installed Carlos's sound files in the correct location, the auto sounds within the route will be activated.
_______________________________________________

Regards, Brian

Thanks Brian.

Bob.

I've downloaded the sound add-on and installed it according to the instructions.

Route_Riter now tells me that it's missing file x_Switch.wav As a workaround I copied Switch.wav and renamed the copy as x_Switch.wav and then Route_Riter was happy.

I'll see if I can get hold of the add-on's author.

Bob Latimer wrote:I've downloaded the sound add-on and installed it according to the instructions.  

Route_Riter now tells me that it's missing file x_Switch.wav As a workaround I copied Switch.wav and renamed the copy as x_Switch.wav and then Route_Riter was happy.

I'll see if I can get hold of the add-on's author.

G'day Bob,

I found that missing x_switch.wav problem as well, and fixed it the same way you did. I'm surprised that Carlos hasn't found it and corrected it in his 'master' download.

My Open Rails installation consists of 22 routes, a good mixture of NSWGR and LMS routes, and I have installed the automatic switch and curves sounds in all 22 routes - the difference when running trains is just amazing !

Regards, Brian

I got this reply from Carlo:
"Hi Bob,
yes, that file is recalled in two .sms files but is missing.
It is however recalled in the ScalabiltyGroup ( 0 ) block, which is the one MSTS uses for AI trains and which is not used by OR. So it is not something that influences the execution of the .sms files. If you want to get rid of the Route_Riter warning, you can make a copy any other .wav file (e.g. x_switchfast.wav) and rename it x_switch.wav.
Regards
Carlo"

So it appears our "solution" was okay.

Bob.

Hi Brian

Many thanks for another excellent looking, and intricate route.

Your efforts are very much appreciated.

Mike

Hi Brian.

Another great route, thanks.

I had trouble getting it to load at first, then I noticed it mentioned turntable in the OR error message, so I downloaded and installed "UKTS_38587_Global_Turntable_Files", all good now.

The trackwork for Version 2 is now done - see the map below "



That's only the track, still heaps to do before V2 is released.

Regards, Brian

Time for a little teazer !!!

Here's a shot of a Manchester Bury electric set sitting in Bury Bolton Street waiting to depart for Manchester Victoria.

Bury Bolton Street will be coming in LYR Heartland V2, to be released in the coming months - the electric set will be released in conjunction with the route. Pity that X-Tracks doesn't have any 3rd rail track sections.




Regards, Brian

What a superb picture of brilliant modelling both for the station and the electric unit!

Time for another little teaser.



A Blackpool to Manchester express is running through the Up Fast as it swings through the famous curved West Junction at Bolton Trinity Street station.

The V2 route is not far away now - about 90% complete. Hopefully it should be available by the end of the month, or early next month. I've also re-visited sections of V1 and added /upgraded to V2 standards. I've also built some LYR non-corridor stock to replace the 'generic' LYR non-corridor stock, and also built a set of arc roof and a set of elliptical roof corridor coaches, so we can now have some 'proper' LYR express corridor trains.

Regards, Brian

Lovely shot Brian, and great news about the forthcoming extended / upgraded route.

Kind regards
Mike

Looking good Brian
As regards 3rd rail sections, I'm sure that a man of your talents could come up with a selection of single rail, static objects which then could be aligned with, and placed alongside, the x-track sections. Would involve some work in the actual placing, and would increase the tile object count, but the result should be worth it?
Cheers
T

terrycunliffe wrote:Looking good Brian  
As regards 3rd rail sections, I'm sure that a man of your talents could come up with a selection of single rail, static objects which then could be aligned with, and placed alongside, the x-track sections. Would involve some work in the actual placing, and would increase the tile object count, but the result should be worth it?
Cheers  T

I've already been there, months ago - that was one of the first things I thought about.

Actually, I've tried two different techniques - the first one was to lay a mix of 'standard' X-Tracks track in conjunction with 3rd rail straights from UKFS - I had to use single track sections, as the track centre spacing for UKFS double track is much smaller than X-Tracks - secondly, the rail section and ballast textures just didn't 'gel' together, it really looked like a 'dog's breakfast'.



The second technique was to make a short 10metre 3rd rail overlay, which had both the 3rd rail sitting up on a couple of insulators and a 4th rail between the running rails - this was designed to be placed by the 'Autogantry' method. I laid a sample of this on some plain FLAT track and it looked OK, but read further ..........



The actual 3rd rail line as modelled in Heartland is from the terminal platforms at Victoria through to the main platforms at Bury Bolton Street. The two ends of the electrified line fall on MAXIMUM object density tiles - even if I did manage to lay 3rd rail overlay, it would NOT BE POSSIBLE to get the 3rd rail overlay track any closer to either end of the line than around one to two miles, because these tiles are already at MAX size.

For the rest of the 'plain' track between these two points, it seemed possible to lay the 3rd rail overlay track, BUT it didn't work out that way. The overlay track fits very nicely on FLAT TRACK ONLY. Unfortunately, most of the line from Cheetham Hill Junction to Bury South Junction is on GRADED track. In theory this shouldn't matter, BUT when you lay graded track and use the N key to fit the terrain to the track, it DOES NOT set the terrain perfectly to the underside of the track, the terrain grid will only fit 'closely', but with a very distinct stair-step effect along the track - i.e. the terrain is not a SMOOTH fit to the underside of the track. When you use the Autogantry to place objects along the track, the placement is NOT SET to the track, but to the TERRAIN underneath.

As soon as I placed the 3rd rail overlay on a sloped gradient, the overlay sections went 'haywire' pointing anywhere except aligned with the track. I took a small section of about half a kilometre, and started to try to align the 3rd rail overlay with the track manually - two hours later, I still had a mess - when you try to tilt a section manually, even if the centre of the object is its natural centre, the manual tilting skews the object, and it is nearly impossible to align correctly with the track sections underneath and the ends of the adjacent 3rd rail sections. I persisted with this for a few extra hours, but gave up in the end.

The method works well for FLAT track, but as soon a a gradient is involved it just all goes to rubbish !!!

Once V2 is out, I still have to do a V3 yet - I might have a break between them and have another try to lay 3rd rail overlay track - if successful, it would be released as part of V3.

Regards, Brian

And ......................... here's another shot of the Blackpool to Manchester Express swinging through Bolton Trinity Street West Junction

LYR Heartland V2 is now available from the UKTS downloads area.

I tried uploading it four times from Australia, but for some reason each time it timed out and failed. So, I Dropboxed it to Darwin Smith, who uploaded it locally for me - thanks Darwin.

Now that V2 is out, I'm moving on to the V3 trackwork stage - V3 (which will be the last one for Heartland) will continue west and north from where V2 left off - the final extent of the route will be Upholland tunnel in the west, Gathurst on the Southport line and Blackrod / Horwich branch / Horwich on the Preston line.

Enjoy,

Brian

Thanks Brian.

It all sounds good, just off to download it.

Time for an update - I now have all the V3 track laid. Heaps of short 'stub-track' 'cross-lines' around Wigan, but these will be setup for AI traffic as you run the LYR services through the area.



V3 will be the last version of LYR Heartland - once I have the final version out in the downloads, I'll work on the LMS 1930's version.

That will complete the 'double trilogy' that I had originally planned :

Black country - 1920 and LMS 1930's
Huddersfield - 1920 and LMS 1930s'
LYR Heartland - 1920 and LMS 1930's

I might take a break from route-building at that stage and do some other things for a change !

Regards, Brian

The 'final' LYR Heartland V3 should be available just in time for Christmas. LYR Heartland LMS 1930's version will come early in the new year.

At around the same time, I will be releasing a pack of LYR Aspinall Short Bunker 2-4-2T's - these will complement the existing long bunker versions by Bran/Walker from the Skipton to Carlisle 1920 route and stock pack.



These will have some of the new OR steam effects - including, injector steam leaks under the cab, steam leaks around the cylinder area, steam leaks around the safety valves and also water trough pickup effects.

Regards, Brian

After a comment from a user, I did some extra research and added the 'missing' Bolton FC - Burnden Park. It's only a basic model but as the FC was so prominent beside the line, it had to be done. The models are actually taken from some I did for a NSW route over 10 years ago - unfortunately, I lost the TSM originals, so I was unable to modify the grandstands to more closely resemble the real Burnden ones. However, beggars can't be choosers - it looks the part.



Regards, Brian

Time for another little teaser.

The LYR Breakdown Train returns to Horwich Works :



Coming soon - will make a nice Chrissie pres !

Regards, Brian

Looking good so far North!

Though is that wrecking crane new or has it always been available?

stlsf4003 wrote:Looking good so far North!

Though is that wrecking crane new or has it always been available?

No, it's an existing one, slightly modded for the LYR, from my pack of NSWGR Accident Cranes (available on Coals to Newcastle website) - it is a 30T Cowans Sheldon steam crane.

The 4-w Packing Wagon, and 6-w Crew Van and 6-w Tool Van are new though.



The main LYR mods are : change from 'air brake' to 'vacuum brake', deletion of visual air brakes on match wagon chassis, addition of visual UK style wagon brakes on match wagon chassis.

The NSWGR pack also contains -
- 15ton Cowans-Sheldon hand accident crane
- 30ton Craven Brothers steam accident crane
- 35ton Ransomes and Rapier steam accident crane
- 70ton Craven Brothers steam accident crane
NOTE : the NSWGR Accident Crane pack has AIR brakes, not Vacuum brakes, so if using on UK routes, will need to have the WAG files amended to suit.

Regards, Brian

And ........................ just in time for Christmas............

LYR Heartland 1920 V3 is now available for download on UKTS.



I tried, but failed four times to upload to UKTS, so I Dropbox-ed it to Darwin, who uploaded it on my behalf.

Enjoy,
Brian

Update on BBS

Well, things are improving. Last week I had to go back into hospital to remove the final pieces of infected bone and totally clean the wound out - the surgery was successful, and I came home yesterday. I still have around 6 weeks of home nursing before the wound fully heals.

While I was in hospital, it gave me time to think about my future and what I wanted to do with train simming.

Ordinarily, my next move would have been to make LYR Heartland LMS 1930's, but I got thinking and have changed my strategy. I've now been building routes (both NSWGR and LMS pre-grouping) for well over a decade - in all that time I've never really sat down to look at making Activities. I now have more than enough routes and stock to keep me running trains quite happily for my remaining years.

So, my new strategy is, I have two 'final' route building projects that I want to finish, then I can move into Activities and just simply enjoying the fruits of my labour.

I'm going to announce the first project here now ....................................

When I built Huddersfield, LYR heartland was only a vague idea in the back of my mind, so when I set the 'bookends' for Huddersfield, the west and east limits were Sowerby Bridge and Thornhill - this enabled me to have both LYR lines between, the Calder line through Brighouse and Mirfield, and the Bradford lines through Halifax, Low Moor and Heckmondwyke (as well as Huddersfield itself and the Penistone line with its three branches).

Then along came LYR Heartland - what has now stood out so sharply for me is the gap between the two routes - I thought about trying to merge both, but the origins of both routes means at the Summit tunnels the lines are over half a mile out of alignment - too far to fudge.

But, I have come up with an acceptable alternative - Huddersfield is to be EXTENDED west from Sowerby Bridge to Winterbutlee tunnel - the only bit missing is the several miles of tunnel in between. This means that we can then run all the way from Manchester Victoria to Bradford Exchange - run from Victoria to Summit on one route, close and open the other route and resume from Winterbutlee tunnel to Bradford. And vice-versa on the way back.



Also at the eastern end, I have extended from Thornhill through Healey Mills and Horbury and Ossett, where the line splits, including a section towards Barnsley through Crigglestone, and to the north to Wakefield Kirkgate with further stub lines towards MR Normanton (and Leeds and York) and towards Goole (and Hull).



Basic track has already been laid for these west and east extensions.

I won't announce the second (and last) route building project until after Huddersfield V5 has been released.

Regards, Brian

Brian
I'm so very pleased that you are steadily improving, and let me wish you well for for the continuing recovery.
The additions you are intending will once again rekindle interest in MSTS/Open Rails, and I look forward to seeing the results in due course.
Finally I would stress that your main objective should be a full recovery.
Take care and all the best, Alec.

Hi Brian

Great news that your surgery was successful, and best wishes for a speedy recovery.

Many thanks for all the excellent routes produced, and for the forthcoming extension to Huddersfield.

From a purely personal point of view, I am pleased that you will be concentrating on activities in the future, as these seem to be very few and far between lately.

Please take care of yourself.

Kind regards
Mike

Hi all,

At long last the FINAL version of Huddersfield and Environs 1920 is released on UKTS.

When I first started Huddersfield the 'bookends' of the LYR Yorkshire main line was Sowerby Bridge and Thornhill - LYR Heartland wasn't even on my radar at that stage. So, Once Heartland was done, the glaring gap was between Sowerby Bridge to the Summit tunnels system.

This final version of Huddersfield enables one to run from near Normanton and from Bradford right through to Manchester Victoria - start your train near Normanton or at Bradford, run up the Calder valley to Winterbuttlee Tunnel, stop, close the route, then open Heartland and resume your train to Manchester. Or, of course, vice versa.

One of the subtle changes - when I first built Bradford Exchange, I made the platforms too short, only 4-6 coaches in length - all Bradford platforms have been extended by two coaches, so are now 6-8 coaches in length.

So, this closes a Chapter of my route building - when I announced this upgrade, I said I had TWO announcements to make - this route expansion.

Have Fun !!!   Enjoy the route !!!

Now I can release the SECOND announcement .......................................

LYR Heartland is going to the EXTENDED once more - this time there are TWO new sections :

The line will be extended from Wigan (Gathurst) right through to Southport Chapel Street, and

the line will be extended from Wigan (Upholland) right through to Liverpool Exchange

The track for the Southport line is already laid, and the scenery underway.





As the Liverpool-Southport electric line and the Liverpool Ormskirk electric line have been done by at least two other route authors, I will not be doing these lines - However, there will be 'stub' lines to allow AI electric trains to run to/from Liverpool and Southport and Ormskirk in conjunction with the LYR main line steam traffic. I have already started on a set of Liverpool Area electric stock to supplement my Manchester-Bury electric stock.

Once this FINAL version of Heartland is released, you will be able to run continuously from Liverpool Exchange or Southport Chapel Street right through to Manchester Victoria, Bradford Exchange and Wakefield - albeit across two routes.

Stay tuned for further details as they come to hand.
Brian

Coming Soon !!!!!!!!!!!!
I was trying to include an embedded screenshot - BUT it seems that the Forum owners have now removed the ability to host a picture on their site, it can only be added now as an attachment.

This will be the last version of LYR Heartland. It is currently out with the testers, and should be released next month.

Hi Brian.

I use Imgur now to host pics for forums, it's free and easy to use.



Looking forward to seeing the route.

Hi Brian,

I certainly have not made any changes to the picture hosting capabilities.
I remember from when I set the forum up years ago that the site came with free image hosting via servimg, and this is still functioning to this day.
If I recall correctly when anybody signs up you get the free image hosting given to you.



Yup, Still working.

Justin

The FINAL LYR Heartland 1920 V4 should be available for download in the next day or two.

The route itself is finished - however, over the last 24 hrs I tried to upload to UKTS 8 times and the upload failed 8 times.

Accordingly, I have DropBoxed the route to Darwin Smith, and he has kindly offered to upload to UKTS on my behalf (just like the last version !).

The route should work for both MSTS and for ORTS - however, be aware that when run in MSTS you will encounter the dreaded 'White Void' problem when running from Liverpool and Southport towards the east - this is a well known problem in MSTS, and the readme file describes how to 'live with it'. Thankfully, the problem does NOT occur when running in ORTS.

In this final version of Heartland 1920, I have attempted, for the first time, to provide a few interesting sample activities with extensive AI traffic - I hope you enjoy them.

Now that my days as a route builder are winding down, I intend to turn my hand to trying more activities, and will attempt to release an activity upgrade pack for Black Country 1920 and Huddersfield 1920 (although Huddersfield does already have around a dozen excellent third-party activities available).

I hope you enjoy the new sections of the route.

Regards, Brian

All sounds good.

The dreaded white void was cured by installing MSTSbin as I recall, I never encountered it again after installing MSTSbin

Markh5682 wrote:All sounds good.

The dreaded white void was cured by installing MSTSbin as I recall, I never encountered it again after installing MSTSbin

G'day Mark,

Here's a response that I sent to John Barron on UKTS:

johnbarron wrote:I thought the "great white void" problem had gone away when using MSTS BIN. IS that not the case?



I'm not sure about that ???

My MSTS installation definitely HAS got BIN installed.

However, when working in MSTS RE around Southport and Liverpool areas, I DID experience the Great White Void, so if it occurs in RE, it must surely occur in MSTS when running trains. I'm not in a position to check if running the route under MSTS BIN works, as the way I've setup MSTS is only a very stripped down installation, just enough to use RE and AE - I run trains ONLY under OR.

Regards, Brian

Here's a screenie of what I got in RE :

Even though I do have BIN installed, I still reckon the GWV problem is alive and well !!!

Brian

Hi Brian.

It may only clear the void in game rather than in the editor, I would test it myself but I cannot run MSTS any more on this PC, only OR.

Maybe someone else will be able to run the route under bin and let us know.

As posted in UKTS I have nearly completed stock checks apart from

EngineData ( InvisLMSPP InvisLMSPushPull ) referenced in activity G-Wigan-Aintree

and I need help finding it. Once this is found I will attempt to cross the "Great White Void" using my copy of MSTS with BIN installed and operating using Windows 7.

Hi Alec

I had the same problem yesterday and foumd the required file at UKTS 29974 LMS_Push_Pull.

Thank you Brian for the extended route and the activities. I am looking forward to running these.

Regards
Mike

Last missing stock item has been added and an explore route was carried out between Wigan and Liverpool Exchange and no "white void" was encountered. I run MSTS with the latest BIN and Windows 7.
This is an excellent route and seeing stock in the sidings - including the odd wagon from my own uploads - really does add to the experience when exploring the route.
Once again thank you Brian for this superb route.

Firstly I notice that the Folder name included in UKTS Upload 38865 "LYR-Non-Passenger-Coaching-Stock" has 32 characters and hence MSTS doesn't like it as it limits names to 30 characters. However in Open Rails this is not a problem.

Had a drive on this route using Open Rails and here's a screenshot.