Simple Computer Aided Railway Modeller

Setting of heights and slopes allows deploying of layout track route in more than one level. To start doing this, toggle "View" > "Show Track Heights" from the menu. The height markers will be drawn at track ends and their initial values will be zeroes in selected measurement unit.

To change the height (or the slope) of given track (or track section), first the track(s) must be selected and then you will be able to select desired height marker with left mouse button. You cannot directly select and change heights of tracks, which are not selected.

Use the mouse wheel or '<' and '>' keys or "Increase" and "Decrease" buttons in the Toolbar to set the selected height. Hold Shift for bigger changing step. Setting of height will form the slope of selected track or section automatically. Gradient will be shown in percents with colour, depending on length and angle: up to 2.5% - green; up to 4% - yellow; over 4% - red. Positive values are representing climb to selected height, while negative values are for descend.

To review the gradients of all sloped sections in the track plan, press "L" key one or more times to toggle the track labels between Name, Number, Slope and off modes. Flat sections will be shown with zero gradient.

To set the selected tracks to the same (flat) height level, you need to select some height marker in the selection (no matter which), to adjust its height (if needed) and to press Enter – all selected tracks will receive the same height.

To raise or lower a selected section and to keep the already set gradients of the tracks, you need to select some height marker in the selection (no matter which) and while holding Alt key down, to change the height with the mouse wheel or "Increase" and "Decrease" height buttons.

For vertical transposition of all tracks and objects together while keeping the preset heights and slopes in the plan, use the “Height shift” function in the Toolbox.

If you want, you can also enter the height by use of the numeric keys. To do that, toggle the "Numeric Heights Input" button in the Toolbar. Now, when you select some height marker, you will be able to type its height value directly, using the numeric keys. Use Backspace key to delete the last digit. You can use decimal separator (',' or '.' key, depending of your locale settings) to enter the height value with precision of 0.1mm or 0.01". Note that in Numeric Height Input mode you will be unable to use '<' and '>' keys to alter the track height, but you can still use the mouse scroll wheel or "Increase" and "Decrease" height buttons in the Toolbar instead.

All type of tracks can have different heights, but only straights, curves and flex-tracks can form slopes, because only they can have independent heights on both ends. To set same heights for all tracks in the selected track section, select any height from it, set the desired height level and press Enter. Use 3D Viewer in order to see the different heights in the layout – the program will automatically place required supports under tracks with heights greater than zero.

Note The heights are set according to the level of the baseboard (table) and are measured to the base of the tracks.

Note Starting from version 0.8.4, the gradients are shown in percents by default. The setting is located in "Tools" > "Settings..." > "Dimensions" tab > "Gradients", where you can select between Percents (%) and Thousands (‰). The proportion "percents/thousands" is 1:10, so 1% = 10‰.