Grade Easements

[gunrunnerjohn]

I've searched and see all sorts of discussions on easements on curves.  However, I don't have any luck finding if AnyRail handles easements on grades.  I have a plan that has a 2.4% grade to the second level, and I wanted to be able to specify a couple of feet at each end to create grade easements.  Personally, I think this is more important than easements on curves, but I can't seem to find anything about it in the program or on this forum.

[RhB_HJ]

So far I've always generated vertical transitions via the slope feature, short sections using short sections of flex. But it would be a neat feature to be able to generate them just like the track curves.
How much additional calculation would that require??

[Nick the Cabin Boy]

I wonder if any calculation is necessary. If you cut your board (preferably plywood, but chipboard also works), so that the start of the gradient is a tongue, when you raise the elevated end, the board will take a natural curve of its own, which will act as a sort of easement.

But, thinking about how else it could be done, it might be possible to create a vertical former to which the board could be attached, to force whatever result you want.

Just my 2c worth, off the top of my head with not a lot of thought!

Cheers,

Nick the (ex) Nomad
Geelong

[Sven]

Yes, agree that this would be a helpful feature.
As a workaround I define the first and last sections of a smooth slope with a smaller percentage manually by changing the height of the corresponding tracks to a value that the percentage is about half of the desired slope percentage.
E.g. if the desired slope is 2.4%, then after the first 20-30 cm of the slope (depending where the piece of track ends) I define a height value so the 20-30 cm will receive a percentage of 1.2%.

[J Anderson]

There's no automatic way for it, but you can adjust height by clicking connection points. Then set the height manually.

If you want a 3* incline over 100" with a 1* easement of 10" on each side:

* Add a piece of track at base height
* Connect a 10" piece of track
* Connect a 100" piece of track
* Connect another 10" piece of track
* Connect your top piece of track

Now set your height on the top piece of track to whatever you want (say, 3").

Lock height on the top piece and the bottom piece.

Set height on the first connection between 10" and 100" piece to 0.1" (1% rise over 10" using rise over run formula).

Create an incline through the wizard with your start (0.1") and end (2.9") heights, with 3% as the incline you want. We get 2.9" by subtracting the 0.1" we'll use at the top to do the same 1" incline and get us up to 3%. Then add the last 10" at 1% piece at the top.

It's a lot of manual work and would be nice to have an easier way, but at least we can do it this way for now.