Part of the nature of the community is that you will often find that files contain just one bit of the loco. Remember that there are five parts to a loco:

• 3D Shape
• Textures (colours, liveries, logos etc)
• Physics
• Sound
• Cab View

Generally a loco download will include the first three and just refer to one of the cabs and sounds from a loco that came as standard with MSTS.

There are a growing number of Cab Views and Sound Packs available on UKTrainsim and this section will aim to give you an idea of what you need to understand to get these installed to a loco.

First, I've said it before and I'll say it again - most of these files come with perfectly good README documentation that will give you a good idea how to install the file so have a good read of that first.

Cab Views

These are (generally) located in the CABVIEW directory of the loco in question. The most important file in the CABVIEW directory is the CVF file, this contains the basic configuration of the Cab, describes how it will work and tells MSTS where to put all the other textures (ACE files) that are included in the directory.

If you open up the ENG file for the loco you will be able to find a line that looks like this:

This tells MSTS that it should look for a file called Fowler4F.cvf in the CABVIEW directory of this loco.

So if you are going to install a new Cab, you should remove any existing one (unless the instructions tell you otherwise!), put all the files for the cab view in to the CABVIEW directory for the loco and then go and find out what the CVF file is called in the CABVIEW directory - there should only be one.

Once you know the name, go in to the ENG file and change the line shown above so that it has the right name in it.

That's all there is to installing a new cab.

Sound Packs

These are generally located in the SOUNDS directory, they are a collection of WAV (Wave) files that just contain sound samples of the loco in various states (engine rumbling, brakes being applied and so forth).

In the ENG file there are two places where the sounds are configured.

for the inside-cab sounds, and

for the external sounds. Simply search for 'SMS' in the ENG file and you'll find both places that will need to be changed.

Unpack the sounds in to your SOUNDS directory as directed in the README file, then look for the SMS files that will have been created in that directory and change the ENG file to use those instead.

Introduction
Section 1: Introduction to Downloading
Section 2: Locomotives and Wagons
Section 3: Activities
Section 4: Cab Views and Sound Packs
Section 5: Routes