How Many Here do Operations with Car Cards?


dthurman said:
Why not get a clinic started here? I think it would do well. Also it more then likely would get it's own section? I love operations. Reading it over at "the other place" right now.

Well, I'm not as diligent a forum citizen as Joe F. I don't think I could keep a virtual clinic going in both places at once -- though he does it with ease. Maybe the next one I'll do here ...

By the way, there's also a lot of ops discussion at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Ry-ops-industrialSIG/

... for those of you who can manage yet another forum ...

Regards,

Byron
 
I'm in that group, they get pretty intense :D and are very informative.

I just figured you might get better staying power here. I know what you meant by the goods one dropping to obscurity over yonder.
 
A re-visit to Waybills

Byron

Why not get a clinic started here? I think it would do well. Also it more then likely would get it's own section? I love operations. Reading it over at "the other place" right now.



Guys I know this post is old but....

Would you all be interested in discussing waybills systems etc... a good over all discussion on this would be great! I have the SHENWARE program and am learning to use it at this time. Also it comes with MiTrains as well. I have got all of my rolling stock recorded (which is also growing) but am in the process doing the photos. The loco roster is done and growing :D here is the link for a free trial. The 2 programs work in tandem and does real well. You can also get Indman "free" which is cool too. http://www.shenware.com/

Let me all hear ya thoughts and types of systems you use!
 
Ok I'm still very new to MRR and would appreciate it if someone could give a generic explanation of waybills sytems. Also what would be done in an operations system as far as determining what other operators do on your layout.
 
Okay,

I'm sure someone will jump in here with a booklet, but to get you started thinking about it waybills are the paperwork representing real world cargo. Car cards are something modelers use to represent cars (locos and caboose). The car cards are folded to form a pocket. What modelers do is create a quadruple way bill that has 4 logical destinations for a car that can be repeated. IE. Coal goes from mine to yard, coal goes yard to treatment plant, empty goes to yard, empty goes to mine.

These are written on the waybill so that 1st destination is on side one top and only it shows in the car card. Second destination has you rotate the waybill so that the bottom is now showing. Side 3 you flip the waybill over. Side four you rotate the waybill so that side 4 is up.

Each time you deliver a car, you rotate the waybill.

The car card stays with the car--so you either leave it in a slot (on the facia) the represents the track in your industy or yard, or you carry it with you if it is on your train.
 
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yeah it sure did...I guess not many people use a waybill system...maybe they do not see the need or maybe do not understand it or dont run operating sessions. An big advantage of having one...is having an inventory of your rolling stock and locos....hmmmm.....I am surprised of how this quickly lacked interest....
 
yeah it sure did...I guess not many people use a waybill system...maybe they do not see the need or maybe do not understand it or dont run operating sessions. An big advantage of having one...is having an inventory of your rolling stock and locos....hmmmm.....I am surprised of how this quickly lacked interest....

I don't think that it's from a lick of interest, so much as a lack of knowledge and/or experience with "formal" op sessions.

Since the mid 1970's I learned operations and have participated in them using the car cards. I've even used tab-on-cars, colored thumb tacks, and even have used a computer based waybill system.

It is a program called COSS,(Computer Operated Software System), that generated waybils for each car at the start of the session. Setup was just like any system you use. You had to determine which industry, needed what car and at what time and where the destination was, On layout, Off layout, yards, etc. When told the # of waybills to generate, it would do so. Only "bad" part was you had to "manually" decide which trains got which waybills. Best part, it was free, and has been in use since before there were programs like this on the market. It was written by a good friend who is no longer an MR, but it still works.

There is also switchlist generators TAG being one. The program was offered in an issue of MR way back in the mid '80s, but you had to type the program in yourself. It was originally written by Robert Fink and still is being used around the country today. It ran/runs in DOS.

Switchlists are different from waybills in one big way. You only carry one piece of paper that give you reporting marks, car types and destinations. It will also give you a list of pick-ups based on which train you are, and where you're going.

Rex uses Rail-Op, which seems to me to be the best system out there. There is a demo available for download, (free), and you can "run" an op session using the info in the demo, but you can't change anything in the system. You can view the system and what it can do at http://www.railop.com

Check it out, you may like it enough to buy it.
 
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I've pretty much decided to go car cards and waybills, but that's as far as I've thought it through. I have some 20 named businesses and not enough locos or rolling stock to service them. Of course, I still haven't started the bench work so I have some time.

What I haven't decided is how I'm going to move trains. My inclination is Train Orders because that is what is used on both layouts I operate on. However, the SP (and the rest of the world) was dark in the 1880's so I'm thinking some variation of signal blocks via telegraph. I just haven't figured it out yet.
 
I model passenger operations, and use a modified waybill/card system. It works like this:

1. A train consist is assembled in coach yard, and brought into Union Station to load

2. Each passenger car card is grouped with a route card in a slot (I have 1 slot for each platform) IE: A Hoosier route card, plus 2 amfleet coach cards.

3. When the train leaves US, the cards go into that route's sleeve in a binder, and the train goes to hidden staging.

4. When the train returns, the same thing happens in reverse, and the cards go into a "yard box"
 
What I haven't decided is how I'm going to move trains. My inclination is Train Orders because that is what is used on both layouts I operate on. However, the SP (and the rest of the world) was dark in the 1880's so I'm thinking some variation of signal blocks via telegraph. I just haven't figured it out yet.

That of course is completely independent of what you use for freight forwarding (car cards, switchlists, tab on car, wheel reports, totally random car spotting, etc). Totally different systems.

My club uses car cards and waybills for all our car forwarding and it can be a pretty powerful and flexible system.
 
It does take some time to come up with everything to start a car card system, from making the cards to go with all the rolling stock, to figuring out all the car routing. We do this at the local club layout and its tied into atleast 5-10 home layouts that interchange either with industries on the club layout, or interchange with other members thru the club layout. Seems to work good once its up and running, then its easy to just make up new car cards when new rolling stock is purchased. Some cars just go to an off layout staging area to simulate time away from that railroad as the car is taking to some distant location to be unloaded or reloaded. Mike
 



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