TS2016: SH SD70M Amps needle?

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

It is not there!

Only when you switch on the instrument lights, the needle appears. When you switch them off, the needle disappears again.

Can anybody confirm?

[StrategyFirst]

Light on.


Light off.

Yes, I can confirm this. I hadn't noticed.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

I've looked into this needle, and think that it is dependent on the "efforts" transformations in the sd70Cab.GeoPcDx.

From the value of <ControlContainerBlueprint-cInteriorVisibilityObject d:id="2809977"> I assume this is the gauge's dial when lit.
Id="280985" is the gauge's dial unlit.

The needle is "efforts" further down with id=" 281017", which is initialized when the instruments are lit?
Then there is no "effortsoff" defined in the blueprint for the unlit needle? Adding that transform name for the values of -1 to 0.5 didn't make the unlit needle appear on my dial.
Or the unlit needle is rendered invisible??

Somebody with more knowledge of shaders and GeoPcDx files might better look into this.

Just to confirm, the previous TS2015 SH SD70M's gauges were always lit, and the amps needle was therefor always visible.

[mrennie]

I suspect the needle has been positioned too close to the gauge face - does it appear and disappear when you zoom the cab view in and out?

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

I suspect the needle has been positioned too close to the gauge face - does it appear and disappear when you zoom the cab view in and out?

No, alas, zooming didn't make the needle appear as a solid shape, though there is a flicker pointing at -900 amps, so that is probably wrong also. Is appears to sit too deep, rather than too close, but that is very difficult to tell.
Would that make a difference between lit and unlit gauges? The efforts.ban file seems to be the same as in the previous version: 356 bytes.
I still suspect they forgot to add the unlit needle to the tabview. Have you looked at the InstrumentLights <ControlVariable>
All gauges have four elements, dial and needle, both lit and unlit. Only the amps meter "efforts" misses the unlit needle IMO.

When you zoom in real close you notice the gauges and controls are live, they wriggle about a tiny bit.
It seems you've missed the opportunity to animate the airflow gauge in advanced braking as it is live as well but unused in the blueprint.

[mrennie]

I suspect the needle has been positioned too close to the gauge face - does it appear and disappear when you zoom the cab view in and out?

No, alas, zooming didn't make the needle appear as a solid shape, though there is a flicker pointing at -900 amps, so that is probably wrong also. Is appears to sit too deep, rather than too close, but that is very difficult to tell.
Would that make a difference between lit and unlit gauges? The efforts.ban file seems to be the same as in the previous version: 356 bytes.
I still suspect they forgot to add the unlit needle to the tabview. Have you looked at the InstrumentLights <ControlVariable>
All gauges have four elements, dial and needle, both lit and unlit. Only the amps meter "efforts" misses the unlit needle IMO.

When you zoom in real close you notice the gauges and controls are live, they wriggle about a tiny bit.

Lit and unlit gauges could make a difference. They're implemented with two different faces (surfaces) and if one happens to cover up the needle when it's enabled, that would explain it. Anyway, it's up to DTG to fix it now (if they want to).

That wriggling seems to affect other locos too. I've noticed that when the GTEL is sat still (supposedly), everything is jiggling about in the cab, making it look as if the screws holding the placards in place are all loose. It must be a core code thing.

It seems you've missed the opportunity to animate the airflow gauge in advanced braking as it is live as well but unused in the blueprint.

Ah, pity ... I didn't know it had an airflow gauge.

[MontanaRails]

This appears to be a problem with other motive power on Sherman Hill, after the TS2016 update. The ES44 ammeter bar graph (which goes from -12 - 18) doesnt display anything, and the SD40-2 ammeter needle stays full scale against the negative limit. Have tried a few things to fix it, no luck.

[_o_OOOO_oo-Kanawha]

This appears to be a problem with other motive power on Sherman Hill, after the TS2016 update. The ES44 ammeter bar graph (which goes from -12 - 18) doesnt display anything, and the SD40-2 ammeter needle stays full scale against the negative limit. Have tried a few things to fix it, no luck.

AFAIK, the amps bar of the ES44AC has been dead forever. There is a BEF animation defined, that is the small green bar right under the amps bar, which is alive.
Tractive effort should go there, and I sort of got it working by defining a TractiveEffort pseudo controller and using its value. However, TE is negative when going forwards, so the readout was erratic. Plus the scale was too small to be really useful. TE is taken from a table in Railworks, not really calculated. Must look up one of the ES44 manuals available online, IIRC, a numeric value is displayed in the prototype SDIS.

On the SD40-2, which I haven't checked over yet, perhaps the amps value is now also scripted? Perhaps there has been a change of sign by the script?

[MontanaRails]

AFAIK, the amps bar of the ES44AC has been dead forever.

Not sure about the Sherman Hill ES44's, but it works correctly in the ES44's included with the coal district route (although the colors are reversed green/yellow which I fixed by editing a cab texture).

As for the SH SD40-2, the needle appears to be stuck at the positive end of the scale (1500), not the negative (I was wrong in my last post). There's an instrument lights switch that moves in this cab, but it doesnt appear to turn anything on when thrown, and it doesnt somehow make the amps needle appear correctly, when on (like the SD70).

If, however, you are at track speed and increase the dynamic control, the needle in the SD40-2 will come alive. At about -580 amps (according to the HUD) the needle centers itself at the zero mark. All sorts of messed up.

Interesting that they went to the trouble of apparently re-exporting the shape files for the cabs so the bail-off and switch animation works, but they didn't use the new SD40-2 cab geometry, instead using the old KUJU cab.

Oh well.