... that whichever curve I want to change is never the one that comes up first! posted: 22 Feb 2008 17:50 from: richard_t Paul Boyd wrote: I'm with Brian on this. It does get a bit tedious having to keep telling Templot to "Don't bother telling me again" every time something new is attempted in a session. Thats what hibernate on modern PC's was invented for. Start Templot, answer all the questions, load your project, background shapes, etc. When you're finished for the day, instead of shutting down, hibernate instead. Turning the machine back on, Templot is ready waiting for you with your project/background shapes where you left them. posted: 22 Feb 2008 18:13 from: Roderic Cameron Paul Boyd wrote: On the transition curve thing though, I thought whichever curve came up as default was fairly random. I don't have it here to check though. I do know that whichever curve I want to change is never the one that comes up first! Oh yes! posted: 22 ...

... shown in the upper part of the diagram. The Y-turnout has a 9ft switch and a 1:4.95 V-crossing. The linking roads are straight, so in order to complete the design in Templot you need to do some additional work to terminate the turnout curves at the V-crossing. You could use partial templates as shown split at the fine point (CTRL-4). The pink template is a 1:4.95 straight half-diamond, again split at the fine point. Or you could instead do it all in one template by putting a zero-length transition-to-straight at the fine point. Either way however, using a regular crossover like this is not the best design and is very wasteful of space: 2_031930_100000000.png You can save about 100mm (4 ") in 4mm scale and have an easier radius in the Y-turnout by making a curviform crossover instead, as shown in the lower part of the diagram. In this case the straight turnouts are B-7. I did tools> ...

... 33 from: Martin Wynne Mark Leigh wrote: Rescaling (effectively halfing the size) was for paper saving measure...then I noticed you can print at the end you can print at a variety of sizes but actually it seems to have worked out well as I printed out a test at 33% Hi Mark, If you are not printing your wiring diagram 1:1 to match the finished track on the baseboard, it's questionable whether all the work of producing coloured partial templates in Templot is justified. You could instead: 1. Export a DXF file from Templot of the rails only, and open it in a CAD package. All the rails in the DXF output are made up from multiple short line entities which can be edited in CAD, using the selection fence method. Select the required lengths of rail and change their colour. Working in CAD then allows you to add all the other circuitry and wiring symbols very easily. This is a quick extract from TurboCad showing such editing: 2_040524_200000000.png Or for a smaller-scale wiring diagram ...

... down specification for a minimum to this gap? Hi Brian, I've never seen it written down, but I believe "one rail-width minimum" is the accepted rule-of-thumb to clear all wheel-backs. That's 2.75", i.e. a 1" clearance on the normal 1.75" flangeway gap. So your screenshot is very close and no doubt adequate even for the wider 2" flangeways in P4. I do know that switch openings in level crossings and roadways are allowed to be only 3" instead of the usual 4.25", and it's unlikely that a moving part would be set to the very minimum. So 2.75" as a working minimum seems entirely reasonable. The minimum clearance allowed along the back of an open switch blade is only 2", but of course that is effectively flared in by the curve of the rail. Even so, wheel backs are not intended to contact an open switch blade for fear of damage to the stretcher bars and detection gear. So in theory you could go down to only ...

... conversion changed some of the dimensions/angles of the two turn-outs but the remainder appeared fine; some resetting of them using F9& CTRL-F12 soon had it right again. 3469_151246_090000000.jpg The centre is a bit tight and may give me problems to build, but I am going to have a go; I have given myself a problem due to the space it is to fit in, so I will see how it goes. If this is too difficult to get working, I will attempt a half-scissors instead. Cheers, Bryan. posted: 15 Oct 2017 21:57 from: Tony W Hi Byan. You have discovered the hard way one of Templot's main characteristics. It faithfully copies the settings of the starting template to the next, so if you start off with the wrong settings they will be duplicated every time you create a new control template. These include, scale, gauge, radius, sleeper lengths/ spacings, rail lengths, track centres and many other things, so it is worth getting them the way ...

... the colours and styles. (Use the temporary export menu for these until I have the export dialog fully working.) The PDF output defaults to 180mm x 260mm page size, but you can easily create very large PDF pages for wide format poster printing by changing that to say 900mm x 3000mm (approx 3ft x 10ft). regards, Martin. posted: 3 Jun 2011 20:57 from: Paul Boyd Hi Martin Everyone seems to have gone quiet! In my case it's because I'm actually building track on the bench instead of the computer Anyway, I tried the PDF output, and it works. I always default to black and white so I don't really want to comment on colour choices. I used the Output -> export file route and was presented with a dialogue box. I noted that colours and styles needed to be set in the same way as for printing so went back and did that. (Could line thickness be one of the saved preferences, please? I always forget to set that one!) Edit- I ...

... fills colour between the stock rails. If one or both stock rails are missing, it can't. Before using TDV it's a good idea to read the change log: topic 1511- message 9413 from which: output in diagram mode -- solid colour infill between stock rail edges Important: not available for partial templates if stock rails omitted -- temporarily lay plain track templates across complex formations to create diagram-mode output. If you do need partial templates to show on the sketchboard you must change to detail-mode output instead. On the sketchboard control panel click the trackplan tab, untick the in diagram mode tickbox and then click the update now button. regards, Martin. posted: 26 Feb 2012 15:21 from: stuart1600 Martin, Thanks as ever for your rapid response, and apologies for troubling you with something that had been covered elsewhere already. I had a (very!) vague recollection of having read something about this issue. It must have been a few months back that I looked at the change log when I first ...

... plain track, I get a bonus timber thrown in (see below). I've also noticed the last few times I've started Templot that when I use the command to hide the name labels, they do not immediately disappear. I have to do something else, like zoom in on a portion of my plan before they vanish. Hi Alan, Thanks for the report. I think you may have been working for some time with templates which have had a bonus timber added, and then omitted in the shove timber function (instead of being removed if not wanted). When you insert a turnout in plain track, any timber shoving is cancelled, and any omitted timbers restored. You can prevent this happening by selecting the tools> make tools: options> retain shoved timbers menu option. However it would be better to remove them from the templates before inserting the turnout -- real> timbering> bonus timbers> remove menu items. If you copy your templates to the control and then observe the above menu items not greyed out, it would ...

... below the layer of the track templates, but because the white is solid, it covers more of the track plan background than required. Any ideas how I could do this on the workpad, without having to going through Sketchboard? All the best, Brian Nicholls. 1853_021535_320000000.png Attachment: attach_1377_1856_Wall_Shape_2.png 56 posted: 2 Mar 2012 21:10 from: Martin Wynne Hi Brian, The background picture shapes do not support transparency as part of the original image file (i.e. saving as transparent option in an image editor program). Instead, tick the transparent box on the dialog: 2_021605_160000000.png You can do this with any picture shape, whether it was saved as a transparent image or not. The effect is not quite the same as normal transparency in that the colours will change. But it allows you to see the underlying detail, which is the object of the exercise for Templot use. Note that this option uses more memory on your graphics card -- zooming will be slower, and you may not be able to zoom in so far. regards ...

... for the greatest accuracy at the join the slewing zone should end at the template boundary. It may be worth moving the boundary or splitting templates to achieve this (not necessary in straight track). If the length of the template is appropriate the slewing zone can be quickly set to match the full length, using geometry> slew (nudge)> change slewing zone length> match length to template menu item. Here's the result of that on this example: slewed_approach_long.png (You might think that you could use a transition curve instead, but in this case that wouldn't work. The reason is that in this example the 1st and 2nd radii would be concentric -- a condition which produces an infinitely long transition zone.) Instead of slewing one track by the full amount, you can split the required amount of slew between both tracks, either equally or in any desired proportion. This usually results in smoother curves. Here I have slewed the purple and yellow templates by 8mm each, increasing the space between them by 16mm in total: slewed_approach_both_long.png The ...