How do I choose the best train?

[Grayhill]

It's 1975 and I'm still using the Big Boy (or whatever it's called) to pull my freight trains. I have a feeling I should be using something else, but this engine's combination of speed and higher power make it seem like it's the best choice compared with the diesels and electric engines available--plus the cargo cars limit top speed anyway. (I do use electric for my passenger trains.)

Anyway, can someone explain all of the train stats that matter and how I should weigh the information so I can always choose the best train engine, no matter the year or region?

For example, what is the difference between tractive effort and power? How much of these do I need?

[joeball123]

Another thing to consider when you're choosing what train to run is what you're actually doing with the line. Big trains are all well and good for bulk deliveries to factories, but if you're going to transfer cargo to trucks for end delivery or something like that it might be better to use a couple smaller trains than one larger one so as to avoid overloading the truck terminal.

[Nozomi329]

The game has already provided a pretty simple measurement of train performance: power rating
You can see it while you’re assembling new trains in the garage. It’s also shown on the information window when you click on each train.
It gives a grade to the power of a train (poor, mediocre, good, excellent, etc.). I’m yet unclear of what elements are taken into consideration to give this grade, but I’m glad with the results it gave me. Due to the fact that the in game map area is smaller than reality, I tend to choose those consists with good or above power rating.

[Gorby]

Originally posted by Nozomi329:

I’m yet unclear of what elements are taken into consideration to give this grade

It definitely considers power, tractive effort, and the individual weights of each engine and car. While in the "train assembly" screen, that rating also doesn't take into account what the weight of the cargo will be once the cars are loaded.

[neistridlar]

Many good answers here. There seems to be some confusion as to what tractive effort means though. Think of it like the grip of the wheels. If your loco has lots of power but not much tractive effort, it will just spin its wheels at low speed, so you don't get to utilize all the available power. On the other hand if you have lots of tractive effort, but not much power, you get to utilize that power already at very low speeds. IIRC some of the fast passenger locomotives are limited by tractive effort up as high as 80km/h, while some of the slow freight locomotives get full power as low as 20 km/h.

You can calculate this speed with ths formula: 3.6*(power in kW)/(tractive effort in kN) = (speed in km/h).

As others have mentioned though, tractive effort does not matter a lot in this game. Only case where it makes much difference is when you spend a lot of the time accelerating at low speed, which isn't really profitable any ways, so that point is largely academic. Just don't stick a high power-low tractive effort loco on a slow freight train.

[Kenny]

Double locomotives may be a good idea if it's struggles.

Overall the trains on the USA theme sucks overall, trains are so much easier on the European theme, both fraight and passenger, but mostly passenger.

[Dan]

Since people still don't understand this:

Tractive force=torque, which is how much force the wheels are turned with.
Power is simply how fast that torque can be applied to the wheels.

Basically the more stuff you have to move and the hillier the route the more torque you need, the faster you want to go the more power you need. Anything below about 80km/h you don't tend to need to worry about power, focus on the tractive force.

[Cebi]

Originally posted by dsmx:

Since people still don't understand this:

Tractive force=torque, which is how much force the wheels are turned with.
Power is simply how fast that torque can be applied to the wheels.

You are wrong.

Tractive force does not equal torque. Tractive force is the amount of force a wheel can apply to a surface before it slips.

Tractive effort is the ammount of force locomotive can utilize to pull the train from standstill. For example: If the train cars on a gradient would pull on a locomotive with greater force than its tractive effort it would not be able to move or if not equiped with traction control system its wheels would only slip.

Power determines ability of the locomotive to achieve and run at the maximum permissible speed with given load.