Modern Semi-Truck (Sleeper Cab)
A (somewhat) high-tech heavy duty truck that has a semi-automatic 9-speed transmission and a powerful engine. It is equipped with many modern technologies which include: LED headlights and tail lights, digital camera system for full vehicle coverage.
This vehicle is equipped with Air Brakes, which can fail if your air pressure drops too low. If the large "AIR" indicator in the cab starts flashing and/or an alarm starts blaring, your air pressure is getting low and your brakes have a high risk of failing. Air Brakes also use an adjustable brake bias, which can be changed from the cab, this feature is required and you MUST set your brake bias before driving this vehicle. Otherwise you will have no brakes at all besides emergency (aka the parking) brakes.
The large fuel tanks are isolated and capable of being filled at the same time, though you can get away with filling only one fuel tank if you're in a hurry. The large fluid capacity of the fuel tanks make this truck ideal for long journeys where fuel stations are few and far apart.
Any other important and/or useful features are listed below and explained in the greatest detail I can manage.
There are a great deal of features available, but I will try to explain them all in a coherent and complete manner:
1. Two stage ignition system:
- To start the truck's engine, you must change the ignition state (hotkey/number 4) twice, once for accesories power only, and once more to start the engine. Before the engine starts, a warning chime will go off, signaling to anyone nearby that the truck may start moving, allowing them to stay out of the way.
Side note about the chime: For some reason (I haven't figured out why it happens yet) the startup chime will also play sometimes when taking the truck out of neutral, or when shifting into neutral, but I guess it kind of works for this unintentional application.
2. Air Brakes:
- (Mentioned above)
Note on air systems: I have attempted to colour code things as accurately as possible, so if something is incorrectly coloured, please leave a comment so that I can correct it!
3. RGB headlights and tail lights:
- Using my custom RGB controllers (available as a standalone or in demo form) you are able to adjust (in the properties menu of the microcontrollers, located in the rear subframe) the colour balance of your running lights, blinkers and tail lights to suit your desired look. You can also change the intensity of your headlights (no colour balance, only the intensity of the white) and is applicable with HSV as well, but the colour balances will need to be corrected manually.
4. Two stage reverse switch:
- As another piece of interesting technology, the reverse switch is also two stage, pressing the reverse switch (hotkey6/number6) once will place the transmission into reverse (a white indicator will light up) and activates the reverse distance warning system. Pressing hotkey6 again will swap to the high mounted reverse camera and disable the reverse distance warning system, allowing you a reduce noise levels a little while connecting to a trailer.
5. Digital Mirrors:
- Instead of traditional mirrors (which do not exist in stormworks, but we'll pretend they do) this truck uses low, forward mounted cameras on each side of the bumper to eliminate blindspots on the left and right. These digital mirrors are located in the edges of the cab, easily visible. For added benefit and safety, the larger screen in the cab, which normally shows the feed from the front camera see feature 7, displays the camera feed of the side which has it's blinker turned on.
6. Trailer Air System and Monitor
- Underneath the large screen in the cab, there are two buttons: "Parking Brake" and "Trailer Air System" which light up as yellow and blue respectively when toggled. Next to the buttons is a small RGB indicator that will be off until a trailer is connected. If the trailer doesn't have any of the correct composite information, then the indicator will not function (Trailer Base Frame will also be available, please use it as a reference for logic mappings). Green indicates all systems good, red indicates emergency brakes being applied due to air brake failure on the trailer, and blue indicates the trailer battery system is getting low/isn't being recharged by the truck. There is also a very annoying alarm that goes off if the trailer's air pressure gets too low, so be mindful of your braking habits.
There are three fluid (air) hoses and one (electric) cable that need to be connected to the trailer in order for the trailer's air brakes to function properly, though it is an optional feature in this case (the cable, however, is not optional).
7. 270 (degrees of coverage) Camera System:
- Mentioned briefly when talking about the digital mirrors and reverse switch, there are a total of five cameras installed on this truck: 1 on the front, 1 on the left side, 1 on the right side, and 2 on the rear. All these cameras are capable of sending their feeds to the larger screen in the cab, but not the digital mirror screens. The front camera is the "standard" camera feed that gets overwritten by every other camera feed that gets sent to the larger screen.
8. It Floats:
- You read right, this 2.1 ton truck is able to float well enough to keep itself from falling beneath the waves, even with the 1.6 ton trailer base attached to it. It is a valuable safety feature that will save you from sinking to the bottom of the ocean should you and your truck fall in, giving you a semi-dry place to sit/stand while you wait for help to arrive.
9. Modular Engine and 9-Speed transmission with low/crawl gear:
- The semi-automatic transmission actually has 10 gears (-1 to 9) with 0 acting as neutral and -1 (represented as a dash on the seven segment display) acting as the low/crawl gear. Top gear will bring you up to almost exactly 200 km/h while fully unloaded. The large modular engine provides ample power, even at idle, but runs rather rough. This roughness does smooth out at idle and while cruising in high gears (or with heavy loads). However, the engine has not been stress-tested for max load nor for cooling system reliability.
If the engine has an overheating problem, please leave a comment and let me know so I can try to find a solution!
10. Semi-adjustable Suspension Ride Height:
- The front and rear suspension are fitted with linear track systems that allow for the temporary adjustment of the ride height in order to connect to a low trailer, or to clear an obstacle in your path. The suspension will not stay at your adjusted height, and will gradually return to a resting position.
