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WIP Bristol Summer 2010

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 14/05/2010 at 17:07 #1257
y10g9
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895 posts
Hi all. As many of you may know i am relatively new to SimSig.
However, as i like getting stuck into things, i have set myself a challenge to try and create a working weekday timetable for bristol.
Because the summer 2010 timetable come out very shortly i though i would have a go at creating it.
Now i am able to construct all of the hst passenger services and construct the rest of the passenger services without knowing what class stock they are (except for the class 67 loco haul service and class 57 loco haul service) so is there somewhere that i would be able to find out what class of dmu serves the routes.
Also as it stands i do not know anywhere that i can find the freight services and empty coaching stock services without applying to freight master which really i don't have the money to do that. If anyone knows where i could find that info it would also be appriciated.
Hopefully there will be positive news from my end as time goes on with this timetable.
Regards
Nath

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 14/05/2010 at 17:07 #9148
y10g9
Avatar
895 posts
Hi all. As many of you may know i am relatively new to SimSig.
However, as i like getting stuck into things, i have set myself a challenge to try and create a working weekday timetable for bristol.
Because the summer 2010 timetable come out very shortly i though i would have a go at creating it.
Now i am able to construct all of the hst passenger services and construct the rest of the passenger services without knowing what class stock they are (except for the class 67 loco haul service and class 57 loco haul service) so is there somewhere that i would be able to find out what class of dmu serves the routes.
Also as it stands i do not know anywhere that i can find the freight services and empty coaching stock services without applying to freight master which really i don't have the money to do that. If anyone knows where i could find that info it would also be appriciated.
Hopefully there will be positive news from my end as time goes on with this timetable.
Regards
Nath

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 15/05/2010 at 03:37 #9156
UKTrainMan
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1803 posts
Hi Nathan - good to hear your interested in doing this.

In answer to your first question, you can sometimes found out this information on Wikipedia - although it's not totally 100% reliable it's relatively accurate and may mention the class of train used on a certain service. Simply find a station along the route and it may list the class of train used and on what sort of service it runs. Another alternative is to do a search on YouTube for a station along the route as you may find someone has filmed some trains there and you may either recognise or be able to work out the class of train from the numbers (usually on the front/rear). Of course if you're still having troubles with this you can ask me any questions you have via PM and I can either do some research for you or call someone I know from the Bristol area who ought to know the answer. Or you could even just post the question here and perhaps someone will know.

Regarding the freight and ECS workings, I personally don't see a problem with making them up, call it an 'artistic license'. For ECS workings this may mean taking a 'pot shot' guess at the timings and hope they're OK, but of course if they are not then you could just go back and edit them accordingly if the train consistently gives a late timing for a certain timing point. Assuming you're creating the timetables within the simulation itself then you may find it easier to run two instances of the simulation, one with the actual timetable itself and the other with a blank timetable. Basically create the individual workings in the second one, test it to make sure it runs to time, then if it works you can merge that timetable with the one single train into the main timetable in the first one then save it. So basically you'd run Bristol twice, create trains in the second one and then merge them into the main timetable in the first one then save and repeat the process. Hopefully that makes sense?!! A bit different perhaps but it may be of use to you.

And as said, the freight workings could of course be made up however you like. If you don't identify exactly what the freight is then you could, in theory, have it coming into the simulation from anywhere you fancy really. Although that said you may have to do a bit of research into this as some 'entry points' (i.e: certain sidings, yards, etc) may not exist any more so to have a train coming in from there on a 2010 timetable when the yard/siding/depot/line closed in 2009 obviously isn't totally utterly realistic - then again you may want to call it 'artistic license' again and imagine that the place the train entered from has been reopened.

A final idea is that there are a number of "Gen Groups" on Yahoo! Groups who often have a lot of members and some of these members post timings of some freight and engineering trains for others to go out and photograph or film. You may be able to find one of these groups covering the area in question and see if you could use the information posted....but you may be required to ask permission from either the group owner and/or the person who posted the information in the first place before you could use it and hope they don't object.

I hope this gives you some food for thought and perhaps some ideas to tinker with. If you need any further help then you're of course welcome to PM me directly or just post a reply in this thread and I'm sure either myself or someone else should be able to help. Otherwise, I wish you good luck!

Any views and / or opinions expressed by myself are from me personally and do not represent those of any company I either work for or am a consultant for.
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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 15/05/2010 at 09:23 #9159
Underwood
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748 posts
Well I don't know much inside info, so I'll give some local knowledge (of personal observations of my area)

Severn Beach is usually booked a Class 143 Pacer (was as of 2008 stock diagrams, but that's rather old now) and there is/was a morning one that turned up a 150 or 158 (as it worked elsewhere after the morning trip). Weston to Bristol Parkways can be anything from a Class 143, 150, 153 and 2 car 158. Cardiff Pompey services are booked 3 car 158s, but still a 150 can take its place if theres problems.

Weymouth services are usually 150 or 153 (more rare 158) but there would NOT be any class 143s due to the 3rd rail system in the Weymouth area. Weymouth's can have a 143 produce but the stock is usually changed at Westbury.

Are you going to add the new XC service from Bath Spa too?

Oh and for diagrams, the only place I know of for HST diagrams is one that ends this may (pre timetable change) but does list ECS moves though...

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 15/05/2010 at 12:19 #9160
y10g9
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895 posts
Thanks for the help UKTM. i will contact if i need any more help
Underwood. Thanks for that additional local info for me. i know from experience of about 8 months the working of the class 57 loco haul (which was the class 67s) and the other passenger services down the taunton to bristol line. if they are now going to bath spa then yeah i guess i will add them in too. The HST Diagrams will be very useful thanks. from what i've done so far the timings don't seem to of changed so the fact that it is slightly out of date, it will still be extreamly useful.
Regards
Nath

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 15/05/2010 at 14:12 #9164
Underwood
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748 posts
Hello,

Sorry should have left a link for the HST diagrams, oops:

http://www.icrs.org.uk/Site/Rolling%20Stock/fgw_hst.htm

The station codes are at the bottom, but one it doesn't explain is PH, which is Plymouth.

Cross Country isn't going to Bath as such, only one voyager will start from Bath Spa (from 23rd May) at some early time of 06xx and goes to Newcastle I think...

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WIP Bristol Summer 2010 15/05/2010 at 15:53 #9165
y10g9
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895 posts
kk cheers.
did a google search and came up with the same data just in a pdf rather than the website. i've also found which sets are the 7 cars and which are the 8 cars which is good.
ahh kl. i'll come across it at somepoint then :D
Nath

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