Ops

Some games have more rules than other games, Sometimes more rules can add value, sometimes more rules can add more frustration.  It can be a fine line.  Some complicated rules only need to be understood by a critical few people playing the game, some basic rules need to be understood by everybody.  A train crew really doesn't need to understand car service rules.  A yard master maybe a few.  The person setting up the car fowarding system more so.  One can set up a car forwarding system that complies with all the AAR car service rules and the operators need not even know what car service rules are or that they even exist.  

A lot of the time people teaching timetable and train orders are teaching a course in how to be a dispatcher or train order operator.  What most people need is how to be a train crew which is a much smaller subset of rules than a dispatcher and train order operator.

Operations can be as simple or complicated as you want it to be.

Walthers 419-035 Operations Kit

Many people enjoy ops when they can take part in a tuned system that someone has already developed and set up. And debugged and fine-tuned. Setting up an operating system can be overwhelming, because, like scenery and wiring, it's a part of model railroading that doesn't come as a shake the box kit.

As Az says, it's the process of getting goods from one place to another.  It's a role-playing game, not a model-building exercise.

@AzBaja Another positive post

@AzBaja

Another positive post I see. As you clearly have all the answers to what makes the perfect Ops article/video, how about you submit an article or video, instead of heaping scorn on those who have taken the time to do so. 

Just a game

Every sport is ridiculously simple without rules. Run around the bases. Move the ball across a line. Drop a ball through a hoop.

it’s the addition of rules that make sports both challenging and entertaining. First, another team will try to stop you. Maybe, you can’t use your hands. No fouling! Then, deliver three boxcars to two doors.

It isn’t really a game if there aren’t rules.

So, here is my version of an operating session...

I’ve been hosting operating sessions for the past 9 months. Total 5 guys including myself. My layout, while not large, is complex. There’s a dispatcher, yardmaster and three engineer/hostler positions. Everything is staged at the beginning of the session, unless a train was left in the yard due to time constraints, and will be worked at the start of the next operating session.

I have signals on the layout that are manually controlled by the dispatcher and signals to and from the yard controlled by the yardmaster. I don’t use a timetable. Instead, I have 7-8 jobs that are assigned at the start of the session. All jobs are printed on index cards for ease of assignment. Four locals that require an engine and caboose that come up from the engine terminal area (it’s a two level layout). Engineers call out to the dispatcher as they clear certain interlocking locations. In addition, I have 3 trains that go to the yard, cars are dropped and engines run light to the engine terminal. There are two trains that do not go to the yard – my intermodal train and auto rack trains since those areas are along the outer part of the layout. In a 2 hour period, the guys can move 9-10 trains. A total of 14 industries. Let’s not forget on a rare occasion, one of the guys like to run a passenger train, so that gets thrown into the session. Average running time is 2 hours - 2 hours 15 minutes...

We enjoy the operating session, the comradery and of course running the trains. It took me a number of months to get the sessions running to the point where everyone knows every part of the railroad. I do rotate positions. Everyone gets a shot to dispatch and run the yard. One guy is going for his NMRA dispatcher’s achievement certificate, and is qualifying on my layout for certain parts of that certificate.

Everyone has their own way of running their railroad and how they perceive their operating session. I’ve operated on layouts where you grab a sheet of paper with a job, get your train, and go. Another guy holds operating sessions with dispatchers where you communicate via phone. Car cards, timetable and fast clock. Both are interesting and different, yet enjoyable to run. Best thing you can take away from those sessions is that every person has their own way to have an operating session. I’m sure some folks may not like my types of sessions, but at the end of the day, or session, the guys enjoys it, and I enjoy other people running my railroad….

Neal

Another positive post I see.

I'm not a writer and it would be a total waste of my time.   What Joe has pointed it out,  no one will read it or like it.  Operations is on the bottom of the pile, so why bother.

What I have to say or share does not mean anything to anyone on MRH in the 1st place.  If I ever do write or publish anything it will be in the proper publication like OpSigs.org Dispatchers Office, or one of the N scale Magazines.

Neal, this is what I'm looking for

Neal, this description of your sessions is the Kind of thing I'm looking for for the club. A series of Jobs or Turns combined with a handful of through trains.

Question, what do you use to determine what cars specifically get sent to which industries? Is it all adhoc? A computer program?   

As Az says, it's the process

 And it is as simple to set up too.   You have a spot that needs 1 box car,  figure out the box car you want to go to that spot,  waybill it.  And switch it into that spot,  you are operating.  

Tuning,  not a fan of that term at all,  more like adjusting flow or traffic flow.  if you have too many car showing up at that spot, remove that waybill or car.  If you are not seeing the number of cars desired at that door or spot add a car or waybill to the cycle.

Like water after a few cycles of the layout during operations it will find it's own level,  they layout tunes it self.  If you see a flood remove a little water aka remove a few cars and waybills,  if it is running dry add a few cars and or waybills to your mix.

Again the layout is like water, it will self level after a few cycles and you will find the blockages,  correct those, unless that is done on purpose. 

They layout will flow, run less cars and waybills than you think you need,  it does not take much to clog the system and be honest with what the layout is trying to show or tell you.  if you see a clog, remove those cars and way bills. 

Layouts are like a yard, do not fill it to max capacity or it will not function.

Some games have more rules

Start with the basics,  build from that point.  You do not need a ton of rules at the start.  Once you have the layout working and feel it needs a little more add that extra rule if you feel it is needed.   If it is not needed or causes too many problems remove it.  Let the rules find the level for proper functionality of the layout. 

If you are starting out do not expect to use every rule in the book,  just make sure you have something that works and then add to it.

I see a lot of people with dispatchers...  Is that position really needed?   Yes or No.  Does it add the value needed to run the railroad or not?  Seems a lot of railroads run via VTR "Visual Train Rules"  Communicate your intentions to the train crews in your area or destination and do not run into anyone.

This is for the people that are scared of TT&TO or TW or what ever train control system is used,  no paperwork needed.  Not prototypical but requires less paperwork and not as scary for some.

 Everything is staged at the

sequential order not staged,   When the session is done it stops and the next session picks up where the last left off.

Trains come out of staging as per a list,  but locals and transfers (On Layout) from the yard run as needed.  Let the YM decided when a transfer needs to be run.  YM has 20 cars that need a transfer he looks at the call board and gets a crew to move that train.  This might not make the customers happy in the real world but a switching job to a town or industry will not be dispatched tell it has a minim of 12 cars in it.  So one Town might not get switched every session but every other etc.  As jobs are run ass needed.  

As for crew call,  we do not have people sitting around waiting,  So when a crew call goes out the job is put up on the board and whoever is available can take the job and run it after they finish the job they are doing now.

Once the YM calls a Job he will no longer add cars to that train,  if he gets more cars that would go into that train, those cars get added to a for next or tomorrow track etc.  or start building the next version of that train, but once the train is called,  nothing gets added to it.  

Seems like every person has their own idea..

Seems like every person has their own idea of what an operating session should be and what they want out of their session. As AzBaja pointed out to one of my references, I need to re-stage just one industry, and that's the power plant which receives coal hoppers. At the start of the session, empties are pulled out, and dropped in the yard. When coal cars are available, they're picked up at the yard and delivered to the power plant. Every other industry or train is a continuation of the previous session. 

At the start of the session, the dispatcher and yardmaster discuss the moves and the yardmaster will tell the dispatcher what sequence he wants the trains to move. Not rocket science here, and I can only have 5, maybe 6 people total for a session and that includes the dispatcher and yardmaster. 

The layout is only 20 'x 20' 2 level, so not a lot of room to move around. I've had many sessions and the guys enjoy running my railroad. if not, I show them the door and never invite them back. For the record, I've never had to throw anyone out...

Neal

Open top cars

 That is not so much restaging as a necessity do to the car type,  loaded vs unloaded hoppers.

What I'm talking about in restaging or staging.  Is the layout that runs the same do over again or has the same 4 events etc.  All car must be in the exact spot before the session or it will break down,  One Layout runs the exact same day and time.  So he returns everything to start after an ops session.  He spends hours getting all the cars back in the original order in the yards trains etc.  He then complains about all the work needed to set his layout up etc. and how much he hates operations, but does it so he can get people to come see his layout during the big operations events.  Come to find out he made one set of paper work based on 1 day in time that he was able to copy from original paperwork he order off of eBay.  His complaint is it was too hard to copy all this and match all the car numbers again to the paper work, and that is if he can get another set of paper work from the original railroad. 

I have seen this happen in varying degrees.  I operate on a layout, he hands you out the Switch list and work from them,  but each switch list is based on the last session, so he needs to go and make sure everything was spotted correctly etc. this way the next session, the new switch list will function.  It is not that big of a deal if a session is completed etc. but during ops events when new people operate on the layout.  Lot of things do not get finished or spotted correctly.  This layout can not run back to back ups in the same day. 

The issue is we end up with an imbalance for the weekend if we have 40 operating spots for guest spread across 10 layouts.  If a layout can not run back to back or turn around over lunch or only one day.  It puts us at an imbalance for guest operators so no at this phase of the event we only have 9 layouts operating and now have 4 extra guest with no positions for them to operate on.   The fix is to cut back operating spots on the larger layouts that need 10,12, 14 or more operators when all layouts are open to buy 1 to make sure we have open spots for the layouts that are not running all phases.  This also means we need to cut back the guest list from 40 to 35 etc.  all this does not look that hard to implement on paper, but getting people to the correct locations in the real world space is an entire operation on it's own.  

Restaging

That's not what [re]staging means on most layouts. I've never heard of anything quite that rigid before.

It's not about moving *everything* back to some predetermined start point, it's just "turning" the trains in staging. Depending on the car forwarding system you use, this might just be flipping all the waybills or tags around to their "inbound" side, or breaking down and rebuilding different trains in staging, but stuff on the layout isn't going touched (other than flipping the waybills or tags on cars at industries to make them ready for pickup - but cars aren't moved). And yes, flipping the waybills or tags if you use that system, and adding/removing loads to open-top cars is part of the "staging" a layout for ops as far as I'm concerned - anything you need to do the prepare the layout for a new session.

If you run a computerized switch list system, "restaging" is probably mainly clicking the button to print new switch lists.

Operating Systems Pros and Cons

This is the typical downside of any computerized/switch list car forwarding system. If a car doesn't get connected or spotted properly, you have to update the system before printing new lists.

The advantage of non-computer systems like waybills or tab-on-car or something similar, is that if a car misses a connection or doesn't get classified in a yard, or doesn't get spotted because an industry spur is full, it just continues from where it left off on the next session with no intervention. This is why the system is often called "self-healing" as no corrections are required, whereas many switch list systems can expect each car to make specific connections, and fall apart if it doesn't. The "con" is that the layout owner has to "turn" the waybills/tabs on cars ready to be picked up, or on trains in staging manually themselves.

Continuous rollover session to session

Agreed pros and cons of car cards, switch lists, computer or not. All good, just different.

My simple short line industrial switching ops layout uses ShipIt! to generate car moves based on product orders by customers and empty car requests by shippers. It works in "24-hour" sessions and there's no need to touch the cars between sessions. In theory... 

If the crew did their work right, then Ship It! knows where all the cars are ready to allocate as needed next session. If not, I can revise the location of any misplaced car in ShipI t! and it will route it back to where it's needed on the next available train(s). Not ideal but not too unlike the real thing, and I prefer it to hand-moving cars in case of damage.   

Back in the days of in-person sessions I was pleasantly surprised that my regular crews would achieve> 98% accuracy all the time. Since COVID remote crew ops started, I'm the Conductor much of the time so if there's a mistake it's usually my fault so no one needs to know.  

One thing I do like about Ship It! is that I don't know exactly what cars will go where next session. It'll always be the right AAR type by industry spot/order of course, but which exact car is up to Ship It! not up to me.  As a regular Conductor on my own layout these days I like not having to reset all the car cards and thus already knowing exactly which car's going where.

For example, my auto parts plant has 4 load out doors. I set some conditions in Ship It! to avoid it always being "pull 4 and spot 4" every session. Last session all 4 were pulled and spotted like-for-like. But this session all 4 were pulled, one pull was re-spotted at a different door because of a loading delay in the plant, and only 1 new car needed to be spotted.  But I didn't know any of that detail until I picked up my switch list at the yard office at 8am.  

Pete         

Ops session

I use car cards and waybills.  I organize my waybills by station (switching area or "town").  Certain jobs work certain stations.  I plan my billing based on the switch jobs.

The DRE switcher runs best with between 6 and 8 cars.  I select 6-8 waybills to for cars to be spotted on the DRE.  Then I go to staging and apply those 6-8 waybills to cars in staging.  In a similar vein, I select 6-8 cars on the DRE and turn/replace their waybills to make them outbound cars.  A train carries the inbound cars from staging to the yard.  They get switched and put on the DRE switcher who spots them and pulls the outbound cars.

Not all my industries get switched each session, not all cars get moved each session.  The DRE switching area has 17 spots on 5 tracks for 4 industries,  so 1/3 to 1/2 the spots are touched.

You can do the same thing with handwritten lists, just instead of selecting a waybill and putting it in a car card, you just write that car number down on the switch list.

As for which car I chose, I pick the right car type first, then select a road name that matches the origin or destination of the waybill.  For example, I have a textile mill on my layout, if its a carload of cotton going to the mill I will try to find a car from the southern half of the country where they grow cotton.  If one of those isn't available then I pick a car from a railroad in the northeast.  Same with a carload of grain going to a feed mill, I pick a midwest road first.  Before anybody get upset over being prototypical, it takes 0 extra seconds to pick the right car, it takes 0 extra paperwork.  All it takes is some general knowledge of where cotton grows and what railroads run in that part of the country.  I'm picking a car, it just as easy to pick a "prototype" car as it is to pick a random car.  Zero extra effort.

Work Order List

One of the forms I like for a handwritten list is what i call a "work order list".

Its formatted a little different than the normal switch list but works well.

A sample work order list is shown below.  The list is divided into sections, one for each station, town or switching area.  The sample has two, Montchanin and Mortonville.  In each station there is a section for each industry, with a row/line for each spot at that industry.  If an industry has multiple tracks, each track would be its own set of rows/lines.  I did this in MS Excel but it could just as easily be done on paper with a ruler or in a word processor.

The switch list has two sets of columns.  The left set are for the cars at industry and the right set are for the cars to be spotted.

To use the list, you go around your layout and write down the cars at industry.  For the ones you want to pull, you can check off the pull box, or put a "P" in the box  and mark a destination if applicable.  For the ones that stay, you can leave the pull column blank or put an "H" in pull column for "hold". 

Then go to the yard/staging yard and write down the car numbers of the cars you want to spot in the corresponding line on the switch list.

Then just pull the "Pull" cars and spot the spot cars.

When you are done,  whip out another form and write down all the hold cars and add the spotted cars to the at industry side and your list is ready to go for the next session.

As for which car I chose, I

Same,  Way bills are set up to load onto car via geographical area and Class 1 railroads of that time feeding into my Layout  SP,ATSF,BN,UP.  Way bill via line list the initial road that the product must arrive on.  Then after the way bill is cycled most cars have a return when empty line on them,  via the SP,ATSF,BN,UP.  So in the end you will find that cars seem to regroup on their own so the train from the ATSF are mostly filled with cars from that railroad and region that it serves.  Rather surprising how well this works,

The key to remember, do not worry about connection railroads beyond your local connection,  most everything heading east and north ends up in Kansas City or Chicago areas.  So cars are just sent to the Class one that feeds those locations so I do not need to concern with the next railroad beyond that point. 

To some It might seem odd to see a BM box with a return when empty to ATSF.  The ATSF is just the connecting road from my layout to the BM.