New to RailMaster

[Chrissaf]

Conqui98,

It perhaps would have been better if you had placed this in the Railmaster section and it may get moved by one of the Mods. One easy option is to place say 3 or 4 long track sections across the top of your design screen [joining them end to end]. Depending which track piece you select this will be good indication of your plan [like a scale rule]. You could do the same down one side. If you have an idea of your likely baseboard plan then select the right number of track pieces to represent this size.

I think you can actually select a plan size and no doubt someone will be along shortly to advise how to do this.

[Chrissaf]

Hi all,

I have just got the Western Master trainset with E-Link and Railmaster for xmas. I am not ready to set the track up yet as I am still building my baseboard/folding table. I have installed and activated Railmaster onto my PC to explore some of the features and thought I would begin to work on a layout for me to work towards when I eventually get things going.

 

My only concern is, how big can I go on Railmaster with my design? I don't want to make a design, come to physically build it and realise it only fills half of my baseboard, and equally, I dont want to make a design, come to physically build it and realise my baseboard is now too small. Is there a way to know how big my layout is on Railmaster in terms of real life sizes?

 

Thanks in advance, 

Conqui

[Conqui98]

Thankyou for moving this post Chrissaf, I didn't realise there was a railmaster section of the forum until another member replied, so I apoligise for this mistake

[37lover]

The Mods are on fire tonight!

[Conqui98]

Always a good thing, just as I posted my reply to you, and checked, it had already moved.

[westernwill]

You cannot use RM to design your layout, it is not to scale.

I would suggest downloading and installing the free SCARM software. It has the Hornby tracks, as well as many others, and will enable you to design a layout that will fit within your baseboard. It will also provide you with a list of the track components that you need.

An excellent piece of software.

[Chrissaf]

Conqui,

No need for apologies. If I understand your question correctly you would like to use the RailMaster track design part of the application to perform your actual base board layout design. This, with respect, is not what the track design part of RailMaster is meant for. The RM Track Design feature in the RM application is not actually meant to be used to design your track. It is meant to represent diagrammatically the layout you have first designed and built by other means.

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These other means could be for example:

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1. Following a pre-designed track plan from a book or the Internet.
2. Creating a track design in Hornby TrackMaster (now an obsolete Hornby application).
3. Creating a track design of your own design in Anyrail (Paid for application).
4. Creating a track design of your own design in SCARM (Freeware).

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None of the above methods will import into RailMaster. RailMaster has no import track design capability.

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The function of the Track Designer in RailMaster is to create an impression of your final built layout that is not an exact scale replica of it. To that end, the canvas size in the RailMaster Track Designer is virtually limitless. Once the schematic of your track is built into RailMaster Track Designer, you place icons on it representing DCC controlled accessories. For example, points, signals and other accessories such as for example a turntable. These icons are then configured to send DCC commands when you click them, to make the selected accessories operate remotely via static Accessory Decoders.

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So in conclusion and put more simply.

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You first design and create your layout using something OTHER than RailMaster. Once the design is complete, you then create a schematic representation of the layout.

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Just to give you a flavour of what a finished RailMaster Track Plan might look like here is an image of mine, as you can see this plan would be as much use as a 'chocolate teapot' from the point of view of actually building the track on a base board..

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/media/tinymce_upload/35e32ae48337b6d2b72e9671198c0957.jpg

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The same layout as above is now shown below as a proper layout design created in SCARM. This design came first, and once built was then represented within RM by the image above.

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/media/tinymce_upload/d7e4da2269e086a7c0ca40c499435bd6.jpg

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[Conqui98]

Thankyou for the responses. I am going to download SCARM and have a play about with that. If I find a design I like, and come to build it on RM, how do I know how big to build it or does it not matter, aslong as the general shape is there to replicate my own track? Also, is the AnyRail software you mentioned worth the money, or is it better just to stick with SCARM?

[96RAF]

You can download free plans for Anyrail and try a free version of the software, which although limited to how many bits you can use in a build will read the full plans.

 

Google free model railway plans.

[37lover]

Conqui98,

I must offer my apologies for my earlier posting, I was confusing the Railmaster design layout with Anyrail.

I used Anyrail to design my current layout and I think the free version is limited to using 50 track pieces. I simply saved a plan when I reached the 50 piece limit, renamed and saved again and deleted most of the track except the few pieces next to where I wanted to continue. Then selected new pieces and continued my plan. And repeated. Printed off and stuck the various plans together. The 50 piece limit is how many on each saved plan, you can chose different pieces from a large library for each saved plan.

I haven't used Anyrail for a few years but I'm sure you can set the plan area.

[Chrissaf]

Conqui,

Having looked at your other posts, I see that you are building your baseboard first without any clear plan of what you intend to lay on it track wise. This is to quote some metaphors, 'putting the cart before the horse' and 'running before you can walk'.

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It is more normal to design your layout first, check it for size to make sure it will fit in the physical space available, then build your baseboard to suit.

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SCARM has many tools you can use, some relating to layout and layout size.

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• There is a mouse controlled measuring rule that will allow dimensions to be measured.
• You can place dimensioned custom shaped baseboard boundary lines on your SCARM plan area so that you know what area you can safely lay track pieces within.
• There is tool that will auto calculate the total length of the selected track pieces laid on the plan. This could either be a few track pieces or the whole plan.
• SCARM also generates a track part list, using the manufacturer order part numbers from your chosen track brand (SCARM has a library of different track brands to choose from).
• SCARM can turn your 2D flat design into a 3D representation with 'Flyby' capability so that you get an impression of what the design will look like in the flesh. Sample 3D images of the plan in my earlier reply are included below.

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/media/tinymce_upload/cf5dacbb8d8fb033ecde8ec0bca8c2ba.jpg

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/media/tinymce_upload/5ee8d715a7a5b74020db155979827876.jpg

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[Fishmanoz]

To answer your last question conqui, it matters not one wit how big you make it in RM track design.  The sole purpose of the design is to place your points and other accessories in positions that are a reasonable representation of your layout to help you to operate them with RM and maybe to set routes.  In fact, the track connections between points and accessories are completely irrelevant to RM, which would operate exactly the same if you left out all the connecting track pieces and only included the points and accessories.  Size is the last thing to even give a passing thought to here.

 

Just on SCARM and Anyrail, I suggest you download both and have a play.  If you like SCARM, then you needn't spend a penny and you have all the track design software you need.  If you prefer Anyrail, and it is my preference, paying for the licence is excellent value IMO.

[HornbyRailMasterSupport]

Just to add .... although a RailMaster MIMIC-style track diagram (like those you see in signal boxes) is not to scale, you can achieve a layout size of very approximately 50m x 50m which should cover most requirements.

 

[96RAF]

I think the original problem was the other way round, that of dreaming up a complex layout then finding it wouldnt fit on a smallish board. The mimic plan of course has bothing to do with scale nor even the real thing as has been shown earlier.