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Making a plant switcher work correctly #operationspro

 

Hello again all. Thanks for the recent responses to my questions. But now I have a rather lengthy question so bear with me.
I have an ADM facility that has 7 spur tracks plus a pass track and a yard lead track.? I have a local train that brings covered hoppers from the interchange and drops then on the pass track. It then goes to the yard lead track and pulls the cars that have been left by the plant switcher and returns to the interchange.?
Let me lay out the 7 tracks for better understanding. Track 1 is to load DDG (dried distilled grain) into 4-bay covered hoppers. So they arrive empty. Tracks 2 and 3 are for loads of corn to be emptied into pits. Tracks 2 and 3 can hold 4 cars each. Tracks 4, 5 and 6 serve a dual purpose. To hold loads when there isn't room on 2 or 3.? And to hold empties that will eventually be moved to the yard lead for pickup by the local. Track 7 is for loading Ethanol Tank Cars. With me so far?
So the plant switchers job is to pull the empty cars from 1, 2 and 3 and move the loaded cars from the pass track to 2 and 3 and empty 4 bay hoppers to 1. And then move empties to the yard lead. Now whats happening is the plant switcher sometimes takes loads off the pass track and drops then onto the yard lead.? Those loads shouldn't be delivered and sent right back out. Therein lies my problem. I cannot get the yard switcher to always deliver loads of corn to tracks 2 and 3. And sometimes even it will pull what should be empties from 2 and 3 and move them to the yard lead! Yikes. So what do I do?? How do I make sure any loaded corn is taken into the plant and only empties (except the DDG cars) are moved to the yard lead?
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Ok John,
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I was holding off with a reply, figuring some help might be forthcoming.
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Since this appears to be a rephrased post from the original question, I am guessing that you didn't get the results you are looking for, from the replies you received.
Let me see if I can offer a workable suggestion that addresses your want list from the original post. ?
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The following suggestions create a basic approach to answer your issues. ?They involve all your stated tracks at ADM, but I use only the one other location for the Local train, which I call "Interchange". ?If you want to add more tracks or other locations to the Local's route, you can certainly do this, but my example needs only the one track in "Interchange".?
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The key to all this interchange of cars is the correct track-type assignments and filters thereon. ?Here are my suggestions as well as images for how I set things up...
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Locations: uses only 2
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  • "Interchange" (image 1) - served by the Local train
    ? ? ?has a single Spur-type track called "Drawers" (image 2) which in turn has a Load Option filter (image 3) and uses a schedule called "Load Exchanger" (image 4)
    ?(this location's schedule is what converts your loads into MTYs and vice versa. ?It also assigns Grain Hopp cars that are MTY, to point only as far as ADM where the program then assigns them to either Pit 2 or 3)
  • "ADM Facility" (image 5) - served by both the Plant switcher and the Local train
    ? ?has 4 Spur-type tracks (listed in image 5), each with the direction boxes unchecked and allowing in only certain car types (images 6a-9a), while also using schedules (images 6b-9b)
    ? ?has 4 Yard-type tracks (image 10), again with unchecked direction boxes, allowing certain car types, and one (Track 7) with a Load Option filter (image 10a)
    ? ?has 2 Class/Interchnge-type tracks (image 11), one each for inbound/outbound cars, allowing only certain cars/loads and limiting which trains work which tracks (images 12a-b & 13a-b)
    (additionally, by limiting which destination can be served by the "Pass" track (image 12c), no cars are allowed to move from the inbound "Pass" track back to the outbound "Yard Lead" directly)
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Car types: uses only 2 (no images, as you should know about cars and how to edit)
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  • "Grain Hopp" - loads allowed = <Corn> and <DDG>, empty allowed = <MTY> (for my example, all grain cars can load either corn or DDG, which allows respots at ADM)
  • "Tank_C2H6O" - loads allowed = "Ethanol", empty allowed = <MTY>
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Trains: ?uses only 2 (again, no images, 'cause see above about Cars)
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  • "Local train" - uses the route called "Local" and serves both Locations (though limited to only certain tracks at ADM)
  • "Plant switcher" - uses the route called "ADM Plant" and serves only ADM (is a true "switcher" thus can work all tracks, including those with no direction boxes)
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Routes: uses only 2 (images 14 & 15)
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  • "Local" - used by the Local train and with 2 lines for each location (by allowing S/Os on the first line at "ADM" and P/Us on the second, the number of cars can be controlled)
  • "ADM Plant" - used by the Plant switcher and has only one line, allowing up to 50 moves.
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Altogether, this example allowed me to build either train and see the movement results that I believe you stipulated in your post. ?One small hiccup being that occasionally, when an MTY Grain Hopp was sent to any of the Yard storage tracks (4-6), it could then sometimes be assigned to return to "Interchange" for loading with corn. ?This occured when no space was available at DDG loading when the Plant switcher was built. ?I can offer a small setup correction if you prefer this not happen, but I considered it a small offset to the overall working flow since the cars will move either way.
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If any of this seems fuzzy, let me know and we'll defuzzify with more help...
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Happy to help, hope it helps,
<Pete Johnson>

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Hey John,
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Sorry the images didn't stack very well, but if you just match the text reference to the same file name of the images, I think you'll get the gist...!
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Pete
 

Hi Pete and thank you, thank you. You spent a lot of time on this...but...theres always a but.
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When Cov Hoppers are taken to the Interchange they will be empty. When they turn around thats when the have corn in them.?
The 4bay Cov Hoppers are the only ones that carry DDG. So they would be loaded when taken to the interchange and empty when they head back to the ADM plant for refilling.?
Same with the ethanol tank cars. Loaded with ethanol when arriving at the interchange. Empty coming back to be reloaded.
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Thats all so far. I wanted to do this a step at a time to keep my thoughts straight.
Again a big thank you for your work.
 

On Mon, Mar 17, 2025 at 10:39 AM, John Buckley wrote:
When Cov Hoppers are taken to the Interchange they will be empty. When they turn around thats when the have corn in them.?
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Hey John,
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Yes, I understood that to be the case, so if you look at image 3, this is the filter on the track at "Interchange" (remember, I used only one track to have the local do it's work before and after ADM).? The filter reflects the loads and the one MTY that are allowed INTO the interchange track.? Because, for this example, I tasked the Grain Hopps to do double duty (i.e. it can load with Corn in the Interchange and with DDG at ADM), they need to be allowed in in either load state (loaded with DDG or as an MTY).? Also, look at the image (image 4) of the schedule for the Interchange called "Load Exchanger".? You will note that the "Grain Hopp" lines receive both DDG and convert to MTY, as well as receive an MTY and convert it to Corn.? The line that applies depends on which way the car shows up when it is delivered here.
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Part of the reason this may not seem right, is that I did not create a separate type of hopper for the DDG and the Corn.? This was due to the small forum discussion over whether the same car could indeed deliver corn and then reload with DDG occasionally.? Again, for my example, I supposed they could be used for both and did not create a third car type for this exercise.? If you want to have "4bay Cov Hopp" cars be the DDG vehicle, then create a new car type and substitute it into the appropriate places in my example.? Bear in mind that doing so will exclude the occasional respot at ADM from Pits 2 & 3, over to the DDG track.
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As another perspective, take a look at the attached train manifests for the two trains I used.
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This exercise was about trying to answer your original question of whether JMRI could work one industry.? Short is yes, and I built this example to show you how.? We can tweak the operation however you desire, just keep the details coming...
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Happy to help, hope it helps,
<Pete Johnson>

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I think I got it!! We are moving cars from interchange drawers to ADM Pass. Then ADM pass to the spurs, yard tracks and C/I tracks. Then to Yard Lead and back to Interchange Drawers.. Seems to be working.
Pete, a most hearty THANK YOU for all your help. I am very grateful.

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