This is my first post to this forum. One of my favorite portions of this hobby is what I call "pimp my route," which simply means taking an older route and making it look like a CN Blackfoot/Vegreville or an LSRC. I usually look for non-Xtracks routes, because a non-Xtrack route can have its track shapes exchanged for scale sized rail that comes with Joe Realmuto's Fine Rail (available in the Train-Sim f/l). There are other simple changes that convert an old chestnut into a gleaming new 2009-style route, two of which are using up-to-date rolling stock with scale-sized flanges and wheels as well as using Mike Sinclair's photo textures to convert old trees into stunningly realistic trees.

What, you might ask, does this have to do with the Activity Master forum? Well, AM is the other component I use. Many acts written for older routes used stock that simply can't compare to the photo-realistic stock available today. You can change these out manually using a text editor, or even use a consist editor like ConBuilder or Convoi. But it takes f-o-r-e-v-e-r already. Computers were designed to do this sort of thing quickly and efficiently, and once you've made your stock choices in the Replace Rolling Stock in Activity screen (takes anywhere from just a couple of minutes to maybe a half hour depending on how picky you are) all those consist files in your activity will be updated at the push of a button!

I've recently pimped Rory Rice's Northwest Lines v.2 route using the above techniques, and it's now one of my favorite routes. If you are reading this forum trying to decide whether to get AM or not, all I'll say is that for the cheap price it costs you'll get an invaluable utility that you'll never want to be without again. Attached are some screenies from two acts that I used AM to convert for this route: Joe Lawernce's CN Tanker local (I used AM to change the start time on this one to early evenging) and Denis Gionet's CN Westbound Coal. All the trains you see were replacement stock that I downloaded from MopHouse and Train-Sim and were swapped for default stock using AM.

Rolling through Delmenton yard at dusk with a CN tanker local
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Heading out of town with a tank train of CN Ultra tankers
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All three trains in this view were swapped using AM
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Ain't she purty!
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I've used Activity Master a couple of ways. Old activities or new ones can be changed to use the stock that is on my computer. I also use it to pair down the number of downloads a person might need to run my activities which I have uploaded. I also use many different Rolling Stock Lists. I have ones for many of the routes that select only certain equipment and railroads. I have some set up for time periods as well. I also take the time to define rolling stock, that not on my hard drive, to the types that I have defined within the program. That makes furture activities easier to change as well if the same cars show up. I have about 4500 entered in the database already. You can pretty much tailor Activity Master to your own liking in many ways. That's why I purchased the program.

Jim

Thanks for the kind words and great ideas!

--Steve