UTL Coupling Yard

Auf Deutsch lesen: README-de.md im GitHub-Repository.

Pre-beta – test phase. This is an early test version. Features, settings and station data may still change,
and things may not work as intended yet. Please try it in a separate save first and report problems or ideas.

Add-on for Unified Train Logistics (UTL): coupling and uncoupling. Trains leave wagons at stations, shunting
locomotives fetch, bring and park them. Made for good-looking stations and role play. Requires UTLogistics 0.0.20
or newer.

Station roles

Pick them in the UTL station window, below the UTL roles.

Wagon yard – a train stops here and
leaves all wagons behind its locomotives,
picks up the wagons waiting right ahead of it and couples them (place the stop so the train stops at the
wagons; map setting "move up to waiting wagons" lets it move up to 40 tiles slowly),
then carries on with its schedule. Wait conditions at this stop do not matter.

Mode per station: leave and pick up, only leave, only pick up. Control train limit: no train comes while
wagons still stand where it would stop (leave), or until wagons wait ahead of the stop (pick up).
- Shunting depot – depot for shunting locomotives. UTL never dispatches them. A shunting locomotive must drive
both ways: at least one locomotive per direction (e.g. one facing left, one facing right). Without a schedule it
gets the depot as its only stop.
- Turnaround – shunting locomotives use it when they can only reach a target after changing direction.

Shunting

In the station window of a wagon yard, enter Shunt wagons to: the name of another wagon yard and choose when:
right away, when empty or when full. Whenever wagons are left there, a free shunting locomotive drives to the end of
the wagons, couples them, brings them to the target, uncouples and returns to its depot.

Example: the train leaves full wagons at "Arrival" → shunting locomotive brings them to "Unloading" → when empty, on
to "Departure" → the next train picks them up there.

Several wagon yards may share a name (e.g. three tracks called "Loading bay"): the shunting locomotive takes a
free one. It arrives pushing the wagons, so dead-end tracks work; if needed it changes direction at a turnaround
first.

Relay

Let trains run only part of the way and hand the wagons over. Give a wagon yard a relay number (station window),
and wire the signal [virtual-signal=ucy-relay] Relay with that number to the train stop of a requester (or
provider). Deliveries to it then stop at the wagon yard after loading: the train leaves its wagons there – the
delivery stays with the wagons – and its locomotives return to their depot. The next train that picks up the wagons
at a wagon yard takes the delivery on to the requester.

Scenario

"UTL Coupling Yard – shunting yard" (new game → scenarios): a large shunting yard with inserters loading and
unloading, demo tracks for leaving, picking up, swapping, handover on one track and the relay, and a long line: ore
mine – wagon yard with a full and an empty track – unloading station, where the ore train swaps full wagons for
empty ones.

"UTL Coupling Yard – large network": a network of its own with 4 × 3 roundabouts, double-track lines and signals,
UTL stations and 33 UTL trains running deliveries. Two blocks hold an ore mine and a factory, each with a transfer yard
and a shunting yard: the mainline train leaves its wagons, runs around and takes the ones provided; the shunting
locomotive moves the wagons to the loading or unloading tracks and back. This scenario is still an early draft: it
shows the idea but is not yet a finished, fully tested showcase.

Tips

Build stops on the right-hand side in the direction of travel, as usual.
Leave room ahead of a wagon yard for waiting wagons, and use rail signals so trains do not run into parked wagons.
Handover on a single track: two stops facing each other at the same spot. One train pushes the wagons up to its stop, uncouples and backs off; the other comes from the opposite side, couples and pulls them away. Both need locomotives facing both ways.
UTL does not send shunting locomotives to refuel: give them plenty of fuel or a "fuel low" interrupt.

Performance

No timers while nothing is shunted. Everything starts from UTL events (train arrived, train free in depot, job
finished). Only while a train moves slowly to couple, a short timer runs.

Every coupling is announced to UTL, so deliveries and schedules survive it.

How it works, step by step: wiki.

License

MIT (see LICENSE) – anyone may use, change and continue this mod. Unified Train Logistics itself has its own license.

Made with the help of AI (Claude by Anthropic), tested by Marcel171297.