I was reading my favourite literature - MIBA report 17 & 18: Signale by Stefan Carstens - and started to feel a little worried about my ambition to recreate the entire German signal book. I was already thinking about all the little varieties there was to every main signal category, I should have known since that particular revelation hit me the first time when I released my German speed boards back in the old days before SP3.
Then it struck me: MODULARISATION. I had to sit down for a while. Could it be so simple? It could! (pfeeew - I was seeing the order book shrinking rapidly as if attacked by Susan Powter)

The concept is simple - or as Inoue Hajime sensei my old kendo teacher said: "It's eeeasy!" ( Lots of fancy moves, BIIIG smile and a lot of baffled kendoists). Have you noticed how the graphic engine of Trainz restrains free movement of objects? It looks free from a distance, but actually all movement is made up of little increments that follow an invisible grid.
This "gridlock" is the key to my concept: If you move two objects along the same line (or spline even) they will move by the same increment, and subsequently can be placed exactly on top of each other. Are you hearing Inoue sensei as well now...?

Of course there are rules and exceptions to this concept. All of these apply to the trackside objects. The crux of this matter is the Track distance tag in the config file. Obviously only objects with similar origin (placement in relation to the grid centre in 3DS max or GMax) and track distance value can be placed directly on top of each other. But in the following tutorial I will demonstrate that this is not necessarily a problem.

Here is a little bit of rural Germany. In the heyday of Deutsche Reichsbahn Gesellschaft (former German State Railway Company) this was a busy mainline with two tracks and number of branch lines. But the arrival of the affordable automobile in the wake of the Wirtscahfftswunder the passenger traffic dwindled and the line was reduced Many of the branchlines were discontinued as well, leaving the characteristic tree covered embankments as monuments of days gone by. As diesel and electric locomotives replaced steam the line was electrified during the late sixties.

Now with a few energy crises behind us and people becoming more conscious about environmental issues the need for a commuter line to transport the many workers of the now booming electronic industry from the smaller towns to the big industry centres (without spending hours in endless gridlocks on the Autobahn) has arisen again. So in cooperation with Deutsche Bahn AG the XXheim Lokalverkehr are going to reopen one of the old branchlines connecting several smaller towns to the main line. The trains are to be low environmental impact diesel units which means no catenary.

This is the basis for my little tutorial, so without further ado.....

Point motor and lantern

Point limit marker

Catenary signal

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