Ship It! 10 Feature List

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Ship It! Manual

Simulate, Then Optimize Operation On Your Layout

 Use Ship It!'s reports to gain insight into what's going on on your layout. The Industry Status Report lists each industry in turn and contains information about each car located there. Because Ship It! tracks all information through time, it can tell you whether a car is loading or unloading, what product is involved, how many hours until the loading/unloading is completed, or whether the car is an available load or empty. Also given is the car arrival time (what session it arrived in and the clock time). If the car is being routed across divisions, the next destination and final destination is also given. Empty Request and Load Request Reports detail exactly what each consignee is calling for in terms of AAR Type, product, and amount. This information allows you to optimize your operations and eliminate bottlenecks.

On Time Delivery!

You control how often and how many cars are delivered to each industry by product. You determine how many carloads an industry can ship by product. You set up the parameters, but the layout acquires a life of its own, because of the many tests each shipment must pass before it is okayed. See the Consignee and Shipper Browse/Edit window displayed in the main app frame image.

Duration is the time that it will take a car to unloaded (shipper) or unloaded (consignee) after delivery. The car will then become a load (shipper)or an empty (consignee).
Amount represents the number of cars that will be requested for a consignee.
Empties represents the number of empties a shipper wants to have on hand for loading.
Frequency is how often (in hours) the consignee wants to receive loads.
 Priority allows you to weight the importance of the delivery.

Staging

Ship It! supports both accessible (fiddle) staging and hidden staging. When loads arrive in hidden staging, they are automatically converted to empties. When empties arrive in staging, they are converted to loads. The type of load is determined by the program, which cycles through various shipping industries previously set up. The correct type of load is matched to each car. Each train arriving in staging leaves with the same cars, except that each cars lading has changed. Both types of staging supports off-line divisions. Expand your layout beyond the confines of your basement or spare room!

Local and Through Trains

Ship It! supports local and through trains, along with the transfer of cars from one to the other through interchanges. Through trains can also pick up and drop off cars if you wish.

Support for Multiple Locomotives

You can have as many locomotives as you wish on a train. Develop helper service by scheduling the pick up and drop off of locomotives. Ship It! helps you determine the number of locomotibves required by calculating the number of cars leaving each town. Cabin cars are also supported.

Reports

Ship It! contains over 24 different print-outs. Included are: Switchlists (includes Conductor and Engineer instructions, along with locomotive and caboose information); Industry Status Report (lists status of all cars at industries, including lading and time information); Yard Arrival and Yard Departure Reports; Train Length Report (lists number of cars on each train as it leaves each town); Car Diagnostic Report (lists locations of each car during and through multiple sessions); Loco/Caboose Location Report (aids in set-up and development of helper service); Car Starting and Ending Location Reports (aids in set-up); Empty and Load Request Reports, and print-outs for every database.

Starting Out

Ship It! comes with the ability to start out mid-stream in an operating session. It will tell you where to initially place your cars (it determines lading based on the industries there). From there, it will track the location of your cars whenever you generate a session. You can restart at any point, or you can perform a version of Start Fresh where session history is cleared and car lading is refreshed, but your cars do not need relocated. This makes system changes painless.

For The Novice

Let Ship It! help you set up your first operating session. Ship It! provides you with a framework to build your operating sessions around. As you fill in the database, you are describing your layout as it exists. You will define each industry, along with every product it ships and receives. You will define each train that you want to run, along with it's schedule. When you are finished, you will have push-button generation of realistic operating sessions. Your layout will take on a life of it's own as car traffic ebbs and flows realistically between your interchanges, yards, and industries.