Anyrail 6 - building a Helix into the plan

[Ian_B]

 Have we anyone in the group using Anyrail 6..38 who can explain how to build a Helix into the plan? I have been trying for some time to put a helix into my plan to drop  from an upper board to a fiddle yard. the instructions I can find are unclear and I've never managed to pull it off. am I failing to set some prerequise value?

Ian_B

[DaveArkley]

36 minutes ago, Ian_B said:

 Have we anyone in the group using Anyrail 6..38 who can explain how to build a Helix into the plan? I have been trying for some time to put a helix into my plan to drop  from an upper board to a fiddle yard. the instructions I can find are unclear and I've never managed to pull it off. am I failing to set some prerequise value?

Ian_B

Don't think it's you Ian, I'm having the same issues .I can get Anyrail to generate the helix, but not attach to the scenic section at the top and fiddle yard approach at the bottom , not least because they are not an exact multiple of 180 degrees apart. 

 

Cheers

Dave

[Ian_B]

Do the top and bottom of the helix have to be 180 degrees apart? Missed that in the instructions (shrugs). I'm attaching the top of the Helix to a piece of set-track and using set-track to form the helix itself, but without luck.

Ian_B 

[DCB]

I'm not at all sure you can get a 180 degree turn on a helix with set track.   As a user of earlier Anyrail versions I very much doubt Anyrail can cope with curves on gradients full stop.   Just start the helix on one plan for the upper baseboard and keep the same position for the lower on the lower baseboard.   Complicated maths will get the actual turn in degrees horizontally from the turn as a helix as will adding a bit of extra track at the bottom to get back to 180.  I find Tracks always look better if laid by eye to an Anyrail basic plan than if laid precisely to Anyrail parameters

[RvSwol]

Any Rail has a Helix option, but its not in the Menu bar.

Choose a rail curve of your choice and put it isolated in the layout. 
Select the curve element and click with the right mouse button.

Then you get a menu, choose helix and fill in the rest.  

 

kind regards 

Rupert 

Edited August 15, 2021 by RvSwol
translate problem Dutch to English.

[DaveArkley]

2 hours ago, RvSwol said:

Any Rail has a Helix option, but its not in the Menu bar.

Choose a rail curve of your choice and put it isolated in the layout. 
Select the curve element and click with the right mouse button.

Then you get a menu, choose helix and fill in the rest.  

 

kind regards 

Rupert 

Hi,

 

I'd got that far, but as you can see from your picture the ends are 180 degrees to each other. Since I'm using flex track I'd assumed I could just join a piece to each end but I can't get the flex track to connect and hence connect the rest of the layout to the helix.

 

Cheers

Dave

[RvSwol]

Hello Dave, excuse me for my lack of clarity. 
Ok now everything is made with flex, in the 2D mode it is difficult to find where the end point is which has a height of 30.
In the 3 D I look it up, I use very deliberately an angle of 60 , then there are always 6 rail pieces .
per 360 degrees . Then it is just a matter of giving the connecting rail the correct height and then "KliK.
Good luck with trying it out 

 

Rupert 

[DaveArkley]

2 hours ago, RvSwol said:

Hello Dave, excuse me for my lack of clarity. 
Ok now everything is made with flex, in the 2D mode it is difficult to find where the end point is which has a height of 30.
In the 3 D I look it up, I use very deliberately an angle of 60 , then there are always 6 rail pieces .
per 360 degrees . Then it is just a matter of giving the connecting rail the correct height and then "KliK.
Good luck with trying it out 

 

Rupert 

Excellent,

 

Thanks to your guidance I've got it hooked up.  Now the only challenge is to get the other track placed (double track helix). I hoped I could just use 'Parallel flex - but no such luck!

 

Thanks again

Dave

[RvSwol]

Hello Dave,
Here is an example of a double helix. I have made it a bit more complicated.
The inner cirkerl has a tighter radius. so the locomotive has a heavy vault on it if it has to climb. I made the slope smaller by adding more windings to it. So the only thing left is that the parralel distance between the two rails are equal. Otherwise they are two different spirals. If you want everything to be the same, you only have to keep the number of windings the same. Then both the distances and the height ascension are parallel. 

[RvSwol]

Hello Dave,
Here the Anyrail file.

I had to change the extension to fool the websoftware , but if you replace it with .any  extension then you have a usable and readable Any rail file. 

 

Ruert 

DD helix .svg

[Ian_B]

Rupert, is the start point the top or the bottom level?

I was using set track rather than flexi as  that was the track I intended to lay (I'm sure you realise what a pain flexi is to create  multiple turns of curved flexi without creating knuckle at the joints) but does this make any difference to creating the trackplan?

Ian

[Harlequin]

Hi Ian,

Have you seen Chadwick Model Railway's helix saga?

What sort of trains do you hope will climb your helix?

 

[RvSwol]

1 hour ago, Ian_B said:

Rupert, is the start point the top or the bottom level?

I was using set track rather than flexi as  that was the track I intended to lay (I'm sure you realise what a pain flexi is to create  multiple turns of curved flexi without creating knuckle at the joints) but does this make any difference to creating the trackplan?

Ian

Hello Dave,
In answer to your question. the starting point is at ground level, so value zero.
Then I bend the straight flex in the desired angle (60 degrees and the radius xx CM).
The next step is to select the curved flex and activate the Helix option.

 

The helix is always a 360 degree circle , where the start point and end point are 180 degrees opposite to each other.

But the start point and end point are not in the same horizontal plane,  the start point is in the horizontal plane at level 0.
The end point is in the horizontal plane at level 30. 

 

You can connect a turnout, or any other piece to the end or start point, if the correct height is assigned to that turnout or rail piece. 

 

Move it to its presumed location. There is only one connection point on that level, in this case 30, the blue dot appears, and the job is done.
If you assign a rail piece with a  height on level zero,  it will connect to the start point. 

 

It hard to translate Dutch expressions into English, think of the Dutch football trainer, Louis van Gaal, you cannot translate it 1 to 1. 

so a picture explaine a lot.

 

kind regards 

Rupert 

[RvSwol]

 

Hello Dave, 

Here is an example with factory rails. The anyrail file has been added. Just change the name, remove the extension .svg and you're done.

 

kind  regards 

Rupert 

For Dave .cvs.svg