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Odd behaviour of ACs
- Thread starter arfyhun
- Start date
Thank you Ivan for sorting out the .air file for me. Do you happen to know why aired could not import it?
Anyway, problem solved and thank you for doing the other bits you found needing adjustment.
It's always half the battle knowing what you're doing. Lets me out.
Many thanks again mate,
Best Wishes for the New Year,
Graham. arfyhun.
Anyway, problem solved and thank you for doing the other bits you found needing adjustment.
It's always half the battle knowing what you're doing. Lets me out.
Many thanks again mate,
Best Wishes for the New Year,
Graham. arfyhun.
Hi Arfyhun,
Actually AirEd had no trouble editing the file. In fact that is exactly what I used.
My setup is a bit strange. I have about 350 or so aircraft in CFS. AirEd can handle that number directly. FDE can't. I prefer FDE for prolonged edits, so I put anything I am working on for a while in my FS98 installation which only has about 30 aircraft and copy the AIR file to CFS using a batch file in the CFS working directory. In that way, I have a backup as well. When I do a build in AF99, the AIR file in CFS is changed, but I don't lose my original because it is in the FS98 directory.
With the Fairey Battle, I was not expecting to do much editing and had a backup copy in the ZIP file, so I just edited it directly with AirEd. What I found that was fairly easy to correct was the foolowing:
The angle of incidence of the stabilizer was off. It was pointed down so that meant that when the plane went faster, the tail would get heavier which was the main problem you saw. As a side effect, I also noticed that the center of lift on the wing was quite a bit behind the center of gravity. On a real aircraft, this often causes instability and can cause the tail to stall first. I adjusted it forward a bit to be closer to the center of gravity. I do note that the aircraft still has a good bit of longitudinal instability which I didn't chase. When the trim is way off, you can't see it, but after adjusting the stabilizer, it is pretty obvious.
The plane also hovered about 6 inches off the ground as I could see by the shadows. I adjusted the landing gear contact points up to make the model's wheels contact the runway. There is another variable which specifies the height of the CG of the aircraft as it loads into the sim. By adjusting the landing gear contact points, the plane now loaded too high, so I adjusted that value as well.
I also found that the plane would explode when I lifted it about 3 feet and dropped it. I do this to check the damping factors. (The damping on the tail wheel is a little less than the other wheels, but I didn't bother changing it.) The plane would explode most of the time when dropped. To correct this, I changed the strength of the tail gear to match the values in the main gear. Plane no longer explodes so easily when dropped.
The Cockpit viewpoint was off by a fair amount, so I used DPED to figure out what the values should be and adjusted the flight model to match where I guessed the pilot's eyes should he.
In visiting the DP file with DPED, I found the boxes didn't even come close to matching the visual model, so I adjusted the locations fairly quickly. I did observe that the plane probably has a single wing gun but that isn't reflected in the DP.
Now you can see why I wanted the whole airplane rather than just the AIR file. Without the visual, I could not check Cockpit POV, Landing Gear Contacts, or the Damage Profile.
Let me know if you find any other goofy stuff when you try out the edited files. I didn't really check out all that much.
Happy New Year.
- Ivan.
Actually AirEd had no trouble editing the file. In fact that is exactly what I used.
My setup is a bit strange. I have about 350 or so aircraft in CFS. AirEd can handle that number directly. FDE can't. I prefer FDE for prolonged edits, so I put anything I am working on for a while in my FS98 installation which only has about 30 aircraft and copy the AIR file to CFS using a batch file in the CFS working directory. In that way, I have a backup as well. When I do a build in AF99, the AIR file in CFS is changed, but I don't lose my original because it is in the FS98 directory.
With the Fairey Battle, I was not expecting to do much editing and had a backup copy in the ZIP file, so I just edited it directly with AirEd. What I found that was fairly easy to correct was the foolowing:
The angle of incidence of the stabilizer was off. It was pointed down so that meant that when the plane went faster, the tail would get heavier which was the main problem you saw. As a side effect, I also noticed that the center of lift on the wing was quite a bit behind the center of gravity. On a real aircraft, this often causes instability and can cause the tail to stall first. I adjusted it forward a bit to be closer to the center of gravity. I do note that the aircraft still has a good bit of longitudinal instability which I didn't chase. When the trim is way off, you can't see it, but after adjusting the stabilizer, it is pretty obvious.
The plane also hovered about 6 inches off the ground as I could see by the shadows. I adjusted the landing gear contact points up to make the model's wheels contact the runway. There is another variable which specifies the height of the CG of the aircraft as it loads into the sim. By adjusting the landing gear contact points, the plane now loaded too high, so I adjusted that value as well.
I also found that the plane would explode when I lifted it about 3 feet and dropped it. I do this to check the damping factors. (The damping on the tail wheel is a little less than the other wheels, but I didn't bother changing it.) The plane would explode most of the time when dropped. To correct this, I changed the strength of the tail gear to match the values in the main gear. Plane no longer explodes so easily when dropped.
The Cockpit viewpoint was off by a fair amount, so I used DPED to figure out what the values should be and adjusted the flight model to match where I guessed the pilot's eyes should he.
In visiting the DP file with DPED, I found the boxes didn't even come close to matching the visual model, so I adjusted the locations fairly quickly. I did observe that the plane probably has a single wing gun but that isn't reflected in the DP.
Now you can see why I wanted the whole airplane rather than just the AIR file. Without the visual, I could not check Cockpit POV, Landing Gear Contacts, or the Damage Profile.
Let me know if you find any other goofy stuff when you try out the edited files. I didn't really check out all that much.
Happy New Year.
- Ivan.
Attached are screenshots which show some of the changes that were made.
The virtual cockpit viewpoint was about a frame too far back and so low that it was inside the fuselage component. Thus, you could not see the fuselage from within.
The shadows of the wheels do not meet the wheels in the original version. Note that the tailwheel is VERY thin and the shadow is a line on the runway. It is not easy to see in either the original or new screenshots.
- Ivan.
The virtual cockpit viewpoint was about a frame too far back and so low that it was inside the fuselage component. Thus, you could not see the fuselage from within.
The shadows of the wheels do not meet the wheels in the original version. Note that the tailwheel is VERY thin and the shadow is a line on the runway. It is not easy to see in either the original or new screenshots.
- Ivan.