Using The ShipIt! Computer Program On An ISL

[FCIN]

How about this:

That's an interesting concept there Gary. Might have to give that a shot and see how it works. I keep feeling like there is a way to make it work as I would expect, but just haven't found it yet. As it is right now, I've gone back to having the feed mill setup with 2 car spots. With my limited train length, it seems to work okay about half the time. Works out good if I have 2 cars at the mill - 1 gets pulled and another gets spotted.

I'll keep playing with ShipIt and see what I can do with it, but I think there are just too many prototype situations that it can't duplicate so once the ISL is officially in operation, I may just do my own thing. I probably expect too much from this program having working in the industry. Over all I think it's pretty darn good for most model railroad situations, just takes some fine tuning as you set it up.

As I mentioned in my last posting, in many cases just picking out an inbound car for each industry then placing and pulling a car at each industry results in a nice 45 minute to 1 hour operating session without having any need for a switch list. Some times I'll just bring 1 or 2 cars on to the spur and pull 3 or 4 or vice versus. Can throw in other random situations if the mood strikes, such as holding a car to be spotted the next session.

I'd never given any thought to more than just operating the layout by myself, but a friend dropped by this evening and we operated layout with him being engineer and me the conductor and we had a ball. He's been planing something on the order of a 4x16 foot round and round HO layout, but now is interested in doing something similar to what I'm doing, not to mention going to DCC. We have an ISL convert!!!

[Gary S]

That's an interesting concept there Gary. Might have to give that a shot and see how it works. I keep feeling like there is a way to make it work as I would expect, but just haven't found it yet. As it is right now, I've gone back to having the feed mill setup with 2 car spots. With my limited train length, it seems to work okay about half the time. Works out good if I have 2 cars at the mill - 1 gets pulled and another gets spotted.

Let me know if It works.

I'd never given any thought to more than just operating the layout by myself, but a friend dropped by this evening and we operated layout with him being engineer and me the conductor and we had a ball. He's been planing something on the order of a 4x16 foot round and round HO layout, but now is interested in doing something similar to what I'm doing, not to mention going to DCC. We have an ISL convert!!!

Cool, sounds like y'all had fun, and always good to convert someone to ISL!

[Russ Bellinis]

Gary, regarding your loads that are unloaded at an industry. If the cars are not in captive service (it looks like the SLC reefers might be in captive service) then empties might well just go back to the yard to wait for another industry to need that type of car to load. this would be especially true if the car was owned by SF or SP (I think you were modeling SF, but don't remember for sure). A class one railroad would not ship their own cars all over the country empty unless they had a shortage of cars and a lot of loads to go out in another part of the country. If they could hold a car in the yard for a few days and then get a paying load locally to go some place else, they would do it to make the money on the car.

[FCIN]

Divide the spur into two industries, one for the extra spots and one for the mill. The extra spots receive "grain 1" and ship "grain 2". The extra spots receive product "grain 1" from staging. There, "grain 1" is "unloaded" and then the empty car is "loaded" with "grain 2" at the empty spot. The feed mill receives "grain 2". So, the extra spots will ship grain 2 to the feed mill. ...
Let me know if It works.

Gary;

I set up ShipIt the way you suggested - two individual spots for the feed mill that I'm calling Mill and Hold. I set up a shipment of Feed from the Yard to the Hold spot, then created a shipment from Hold Spot to Mill spot. Shipments of Feed from the Yard to Mill spot, I gave a higher priority then the moves to/from the Hold spot. Then began generating test sessions...

Here's a simple diagram of the industry set up:    
Test Results (I hope this is clear)

### Denotes incorrect car movement
The letters inside the brackets show car positions at the end of the operating session, where:
[M - car at Mill spot, H - car at Hold spot, X - nothing on spot]

Start Fresh - ShipIt placed a car at both Mill spot and Hold spot [M, H] - Okay so far...
Session 1 - Load from Yard To Hold spot - Load at Hold spot moved to Mill spot - Empty pulled from Mill spot [M, H] - Off to a good start here!
Session 2 - Cars at Mill and Hold spots both pulled as empties to Yard [X, X] ### - I'm assuming that ShipIt pulled both cars due to the initial set up placement, but actually, the car on Hold should have been a load to move to the Mill spot.
Session 3 - Empty from Yard to Hold spot [X, H] ### - Now ShipIt is filling the request for the load from Hold to Mill which should have been done in Session 2. Nothing is spotted at Mill.
Session 4 - Empty from Yard to Hold spot - Load moved from Hold spot to Mill spot [M, H] ### - Now we move the car from Hold to Mill, but again move an empty to Hold for loading, which really should have been an inbound load.
Session 5 - No activity
Session 6 - Load from Yard to Hold spot- Load moved from Hold spot to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] - Car movement is what I want to see.
Session 7 - No activity
Session 8 - Load from Yard to Hold spot - Load from Hold spot to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] - Looking good!
Session 9 - Load from Yard to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] ### - This time, the Hold car did not move. Guess you could justify this by saying that the inbound car from the Yard was needed before the car on Hold.
Session 10 - No activity
Session 11 - Load from Yard to Hold spot - Load from Hold spot to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] - Good car movement again.
Session 12 - Load from Yard to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] ### - Again, the Hold car was not moved and a new inbound load was spotted at the Mill.
Session 13 - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [X, H] ### - Here we pulled the car from Mill, but let the Hold car sit.
Session 14 - Load from Yard to Hold spot - Load from Hold spot to Mill spot [M, H] - Okay, Hold car moved to Mill spot and new car placed at Hold.
Session 15 - Load from Yard to Mill spot - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [M, H] ### - Spotted car at Mill, but again did not move Hold car.
Session 16 - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [X, H] ### - Hold car still has not moved to Mill.
Session 17 - Load from Yard to Hold spot - Load from Hold spot to Mill spot [M, H] - Okay, Hold car finally spotted at Mill and a new Hold car takes its place.
Session 18 - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [X, H] ### - Again, Hold car does not move and nothing is spotted at the Mill.
Session 19 - Load from Yard to Hold spot - Load from Hold spot to Mill spot [M, H] - Hold car spotted and new inbound car placed on Hold. Correct car movement on this session.
Session 20 - Empty from Mill spot to Yard [X, H] - And again, Hold car does not move and nothing is spotted at the Mill.

Starting with Session 6 - a pattern developed that is working correctly about 30% of the time. As you can see (I hope) too many times, the Mill has nothing spotted for unloading, when there is a car on Hold that should be spotted, but isn't until the next session or even after two sessions.

I have generated a total of 50 test sessions so far and have not again seen an empty moved from the yard to the Hold spot for loading, but the pattern of correct car movements occurring only about 30% of the time continues. I'm not sure what, if any adjustments can be made to get a consistent pattern of always having a car spotted at the Mill whether or not there is a car on Hold and if there is a car on Hold, getting it to move to the Mill spot, before a newer inbound car is spotted at the Mill, or worse yet, having a car on Hold and nothing spotted at the Mill. Even reducing the load time for the Hold car did not seem to make any difference. So it's probably back to having the Mill with 2 car spots and if 2 cars are spotted and pulled at the same time, then so be it.

It was a good idea, but just seems like I can't get it to work in a prototypical manner. I was really hoping that this would work as I can see you having the same situation with your Mountain King Potatoes industry. If you have cars spotted for unloading and some waiting to be spotted, you wouldn't want to spot newer inbound cars ahead of the waiting cars, especially dealing with perishable commodities.

So will I use ShipIt as the basis for my operating sessions? Perhaps, if I just forget about some of the random type moves I'd like to duplicate. Car movements on and off line are pretty random, so that part works well for me, but for now, it looks like the only way I can duplicate certain types of car movements is to just handle making up the switch list myself.

[FCIN]

Since I've been mentioning using my own switch lists if I don't go with ShipIt - thought you might want to see examples for versions I've made up.

This one is more or less a typical style switch list of the type used before the computer age took over although I have omitted a contents field and only show cars as Load or Empty. Note that generally you wouldn't see UMLER car codes on this type of switch list, but rather simply B, C, F, T, etc. On the L&N in the 70's, we would use them on our switch lists like this as the information was on the waybills or consists that we used to make up the list.     Computer generated switch lists would vary from company to company depending on what software is used and what sort of input is required to create one, but here's what one might look like (much simpler to put together on your home computer). Note that most all of the computer generated switch lists would show UMLER codes for cars as the car information is kept on the computer system. The IBM system we had on the L&N would automatically insert the correct UMLER code when you entered a car number for a waybill or train consist.     Although I like the look of the first version, I'd most likely use the computer generated version, because it's little more than just typing out the information, line by line, using a fixed width font to keep things lined up.

[Gary S]

Thanks for generating all the sessions and doing the experiment. There has to be a way to make it work, what with all the options that ShipIt has.

You are correct that MOuntain King should have cars on the spurs waiting to be spotted when other empties are pulled. I was over there today, and all ten unloading spots were full, and five more cars were sitting on the spur with their diesels running, indicating that they were loaded. So these cars would be spotted when the other cars were unloaded and pulled.

I'll be re-reading the ShipIt instructions and coming up with alternate plans of attack. Again, thanks for all the experimenting you have been doing.

I like the first switchlist you posted. Looks nice and clean and simple.

I really do want to use a computer program for my opeartions. With the staging at both ends, and with 20+ industry spurs, I don't want to have to come up with all that info for every session.

[BR60103]

Ed:
I assume Shipit has a facility where you can tell it that a move didn't take place?
If you give the 3 cars in a siding a 3-day unloading time but only add one each day (deny delivering the other ones), could that give you one-in&one-out per day? We used to use the phrase "Lying to the computer".

[FCIN]

Thanks for generating all the sessions and doing the experiment. There has to be a way to make it work, what with all the options that ShipIt has.

Have to admit that all this experimenting has been interesting. Does seem like there must be a way to get this to work correctly. Other than getting this car on hold to spot issue working, everything else seems to work pretty well.

I confess that I haven't spent a lot of time with the ShipIt manual, especially pertaining to how all the options are supposed to work. So I'll be doing some more reading and experimenting tonight. While looking at the program tonight, I have seen a couple of options that I didn't have turned on that might give me better results. In particular, there is an option "Force Usage Of Existing Empties At Industry" that I didn't have set, which probably explains why ShipIt pulled the two cars as empty in Session 2 in the other post.

I really do want to use a computer program for my operations.

I really would like to be able to use this program and I'm stubborn enough to keep trying to get it to work right or at least "close enough". I like having the ability to just make a couple of quick selections in this program and have it give me a workable switch list in just a few seconds. So I'll keep experimenting.

Ed:
I assume Shipit has a facility where you can tell it that a move didn't take place?
If you give the 3 cars in a siding a 3-day unloading time but only add one each day (deny delivering the other ones), could that give you one-in&one-out per day? We used to use the phrase "Lying to the computer".

David;
Actually ShipIt keeps track of cars that don't move - what it calls "Stuck Cars". Also keeps track of Industry car requests, Industries that aren't paired up with shippers, etc., but it doesn't give me the ability to tell the program that cars aren't moving. I'll just have to keep playing with it some more tonight.

[FCIN]

This is another thread that I haven't updated in a long time, and am trying to catch up on a few that I feel need updating.

After spending more hours then I care to think about, fiddling with the ShipIt program and actually using it to create switch lists; I've pretty much decided that I won't be using it myself.

Too many prototype situations that, try as I might, I can't get ShipIt to duplicate. The switch lists don't look like anything that I've ever used or seen used and use a lot of paper. Even the "Condensed" switch list form option, which does resemble a prototype switch list, is a mess, with everything jumbled together and it's very hard for visiting conductors to understand as it uses short abbreviations for the towns/industries and is not split into groups for each town/industry as you'd see on the prototype.

I find that spending about 10 minutes making up my own list works much better and allows me to incorporate some other prototype situations. At some point, I'll set up a form similar to railroad demurrage forms to keep track of what cars are spotted where and when and use that to keep track of car movements. Not as easy as just pressing a couple of buttons on a computer program, but does allow me to assume the roll of railroad agent and even the customers.

I do like the randomness that ShipIt tends to produce, but it takes so much time to fine-tune it's just not worth it to me. I will say that the program would probably work fine for many modelers, so if you're looking for a computer program to generate switch lists and keep track of your cars, try it out. Perhaps having worked in the industry for many years and in several different positions slants my view of the program, but it's just not for me.

[tetters]

Well, let me at least applaud you for all your efforts!

I still have the program myself, and to be honest, have not ran it for months. Only because I have had so many other items to focus on and complete that any effort to set it up has gone by the way side. I'll be sure to revisit this thread in the future though as I am sure it will be an immense help to me.

Once again, Thanks!

Shane

[FCIN]

Well, let me at least applaud you for all your efforts!

I still have the program myself, and to be honest, have not ran it for months. Only because I have had so many other items to focus on and complete that any effort to set it up has gone by the way side. I'll be sure to revisit this thread in the future though as I am sure it will be an immense help to me.

Once again, Thanks!

Shane

You're more than welcome Shane. Hopefully, my testing and modifications will help someone or at least provide some ideas for different ways to use the program. Overall, I think it's a pretty good program. Not something to easily program with all the variations that you'd find in handling rail traffic. You may find the program very useful, after some fine-tuning and playing around with, but be prepared to spend a LOT of time working with it.

[Puddlejumper]

I also appreciate your efforts. I had been considering using this or a similar program for my layout. Not that I would be able to use it, since my layout isn't even started yet.

[FCIN]

I also appreciate your efforts. I had been considering using this or a similar program for my layout. Not that I would be able to use it, since my layout isn't even started yet.

Dave;

Got a track plan? If so, you might consider playing around with ShipIt! just based on your track plan and how you'd operate it and see how it works for you - something to do until you get started building your layout. All I've succeeded in doing at this point is just temporarily putting down my track so that I could actually run a train and do some switching, but in addition to seeing how my proposed plan would work out, it also gave me the chance to see just how well ShipIt! would or wouldn't work for me.

I'd really consider using it myself, IF I could just get it to duplicate a couple of prototype situations and the generated switch lists were more like the prototype or could be modified in some way to look more prototypical. Over all, I'd rate it 9 out of a possible 10.

[Puddlejumper]

No track plan. I'm working on it though. Thanks again for your effort. I thought it looked pretty good from watching your thread, I may give it a try.

[gdhampton]

I am new to this forum. I am currently developing an operating program or my Cleveland Belt Line. This fictitous line is owned an operated by the NKP & NYC serving the Cleveland Ohio area. I have not had any formal operating sessions but I have set up the necessary cards and waybills for the Carcard & Waybill System.
This thread is interesting because I have been working on a switch list program in Dedoder Pro. It is found in Panel Pro under Operations. I learned about this program when I read 2 articles by Dennis Drury in the July and October 2011 issues of the OPSig Magazine the Dispatchers Office. I have been working with it for about 2 months and while I may have some understanding of the concept I am a long way from using all of the strengths of this program. I am currently having email conversations with an individual in Houston who has been a great deal of help. However like all computer programs there are a number of different ways to do the same thing. Which means you have to tough it out on your own.

Jerry