Steam mod (V2.0) Final

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Singaporekid
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Steam mod (V2.0) Final

Post by Singaporekid »

Have you ever hated it when steamers reach their full speed and then stop giving out large steam puffs?
I modded the dat file so that that steamers give out steam puffs all the time, even when they're stopped
But since i only had 8 sprites to squeeze 45 sprites into, the quality isn't good
If anyone wants me to improve it, tell me a way that i can add extra sprites to a xml file
Here's a screenie and dat file of it


Edit: I found out how to make the thingy add more sprites, so now it does not have any quality loss (See the new screenshot)
Attachments
STEAM.zip
(5.15 KiB) Downloaded 814 times
Extra_steam.PNG
Extra_steam.PNG (103.04 KiB) Viewed 10512 times
Last edited by Singaporekid on 01 Oct 2004 10:39, edited 3 times in total.
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Post by Singaporekid »

After working on it for quite a long time, i finally made it work correctly
It is now exactly the same as the normal sprites
I have updated the download in the above post
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Re: Steam mod (V2.0) Final

Post by Born Acorn »

singaporekid_92 wrote:Have you ever hated it when steamers reach their full speed and then stop giving out large steam puffs?
No, its very realistic, it shows when the train has stopped accelerating.
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Post by Singaporekid »

But when they reach their full speed, they still need fuel to keep going
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Post by Born Acorn »

yes, but no extra steam is wasted, becuase it isn't needed.

It all goes into the pistons instead of out the chimney.

They really chuff on gradients though
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Post by uzurpator »

Born Acorn:

Steam locomotive is steaming regardless of speed. It does less so at high speed, but still it is quite A LOT.
All art and vehicle stats I authored for TT and derivatives are as of now PUBLIC DOMAIN! Use as you see fit
Just say NO to the TT fan-art sprite licensing madness. Public domain your art as well.
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Post by Born Acorn »

it does steam in game too, but little amount
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Post by Singaporekid »

Which is about nothing
Besides, IRL the steamers give out the most smoke when they're at top speed
If im right, steam goes into the cylinder and comes out the chimmey
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Post by PurdueGuy »

Looks like a cool mod to me.
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Post by Captain Kidd »

Here's the short answer, if you see smoke, the fireman's doing it wrong*. Smoke is unburnt carbon, basically unused fuel. With good coal, proper firing should produce no more than a slight haze at all times. With bad coal, well, you’re SOL. What’s probably confusing a lot of people is photos and movies almost always show big billowing clouds of black smoke. We will overfire the locomotive ourselves for photo run-bys. That’s 99% hype and unfortunately has become thought of as what a steam locomotive should look like.

Steam does exit via the stack. After leaving the cylinders it has one last function to perform. Entering the bottom of the smokebox, it passes through a nozzle located just below the stack entrance. Due to a venturi effect, the blast of steam exiting the smokebox via the stack and creates a vacuum which then pulls the heated air and gasses from the firebox through the boiler tubes (thus imparting the last bit of energy into the water in the boiler, most of the heating comes from the water around the firebox) and up with the steam out of the stack. To replace this pulled-out air, fresh air (i.e. oxygen) is pulled in from the bottom of the firebox, though the grates and thus fuels the fire. So the more steam going into the cylinders, and out the stack, pulls more air out which forces more air in which causes the fire to burn more. So in that sense a locomotive is self regulating on airflow (it’s called a forced-draft system). Most of the time you won’t see the steam, but if the conditions are right, say a foggy morning, you get huge, clouds of white steam.

Percentage of steam used versus speed is a bit trickier. Like an automobile, a steam engine uses two controls for speed, reverser and throttle. The throttle controls how much steam is being allowed to go to the cylinders, obvious. The reverser is like a car’s gearshift. It controls the direction the engine will go, but it also controls how much steam can enter the cylinders. When it’s “in the corner” or at maximum, the steam can enter the driving cylinder (the one of the bottom) for almost the entire piston travel, as it is ‘hooked up’ the steam chest (usually a smaller cylinder on top of the driving cylinder or a box-looking bulge on older locomotives) allows less and less steam into the cylinder. To get the train started, you put the reverser to maximum and open the throttle a bit. The maximum amount of steam enters the cylinders and can therefore do the most work. You need less energy to keep something moving than you do to get it moving, so as you speed up, you started allowing less steam into the cylinders. The throttle and reverser work in harmony, although good engineers can open the throttle wide and start and stop the train using the reverser alone.

*There are exceptions as always. We had some bad coal last year that was horrible to work with, clinkers constantly forming and killing our grate surface, and half a scoop would produce chokingly thick smoke. When tested, the lab results (chemical analysis of the coal) were horrid, looked like we had gotten the edge of the coal seam and there were rocks mixed in. This year the coal we have, new supplier, is great, you have to work to get any smoke to show.

So… I guess in summary, if the Locomotion fireman was good and had good coal, the steam engine would almost always look like it does at full speed. Bad coal and/or bad fireman, and you get smoke all the time.

Having said all that, I like the idea having constant smoke for Locomotion.

So, how many eyes have glazed over now? Heck, how many read this entire post? :D
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Post by Patchman »

Born Acorn wrote:it does steam in game too, but little amount
It doesn't steam at top speed, there's just a little smoke coming out.

But in real life, steam locos are actually working at full power when they're at the top speed, because P=F*v (power equals force times velocity), to counter the forces of friction and air resistance, it needs to work more the faster it is.
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Post by Captain Kidd »

Patchman wrote:
Born Acorn wrote:it does steam in game too, but little amount
It doesn't steam at top speed, there's just a little smoke coming out.

But in real life, steam locos are actually working at full power when they're at the top speed, because P=F*v (power equals force times velocity), to counter the forces of friction and air resistance, it needs to work more the faster it is.
You forgot about inertia, conservation of momentum. Think of a car, when you're accelerating, you push further down on the accelerator than you do while maintaining a constant speed. That's beacuse your engine is trying to overcome the tendency of the car having been stopped to want to remain stopped. Once you get moving, you don't need near as much power.

Same goes for trains. We're talking thousands of tons here, the average diesel locomotive weighs in around 150 - 200 tons by itself. It takes a heck of a lot of energy to get 10,000 tons moving, but once it is moving, it isn't going to want to stop; therefore, little energy (relatively) is needed to keep it moving.
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Post by Patchman »

Captain Kidd wrote:So, how many eyes have glazed over now? Heck, how many read this entire post? :D
Not mine, and I have, with great interest. Great post! (And I concede your other point about inertia.)
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Post by Miles »

Read it, liked it!
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Post by Steve »

So let me get this straight.. there is actually someone on this forum that drives trains? Maybe it seems obvious.. but i wouldn't be suprised if noone did :)
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Post by Captain Kidd »

:D :D :D

Heh, yeah, well, it's kinda addicting. I'm a mechanical engineer and these things scream engineering.

It helps with TTD and Loco but it hurts too. Crossovers especially, "hey stupid, that siwtch is obviously aligned for you so ignore that other train and go!"
I got a couple pictures and a video clip I want to include to have a visual aid to what I said, but can't access them here at work. When I get home I'll post the links.
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Post by maartena »

Captain Kidd wrote: So, how many eyes have glazed over now? Heck, how many read this entire post? :D
I read it all actually, very interresting stuff! I take it you are driving a steam locomotive then?
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Post by Daan Timmer »

Patchman wrote:
Captain Kidd wrote:So, how many eyes have glazed over now? Heck, how many read this entire post? :D
Not mine, and I have, with great interest. Great post! (And I concede your other point about inertia.)
I second that

however, I somehow have the feeling you didnt wrote that yourselfe :roll:
even so, very interesting, do you perhaps also have a picture of the a steamloco with most parts described or something?? :-o

that would make it all a bit more clear :P
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Post by uzurpator »

All art and vehicle stats I authored for TT and derivatives are as of now PUBLIC DOMAIN! Use as you see fit
Just say NO to the TT fan-art sprite licensing madness. Public domain your art as well.
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Post by Daan Timmer »

nice one :) thanks!
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