Aerospatiale Gazelle

[Dinga69]

Ok, the flickering I experienced and mentioned in my previous post has stopped - this was after I converted all the included libraries with MCX. Whether this was purely by luck - who knows?? But, I don't mind experimenting to get some of the older bases into a newer sim. Just posting this to help anyone who maybe has similar issues, or fancies trying!!

[miljan]

Just finished checking the packages for Bosnia, at LQSV two SOKO Gaz sat for 15mins with lights on but didn't move. At another airport (stock P3Dv4.5 airport), 2 others sat the same amount of time with no movement. Serb and Mont versions with scenery seem to be flying fine. I'll look over the ADE for LQSV.

Sounds like a flight plan issue. I will take a look over the weekend.

[mage]

Just finished checking the packages for Bosnia, at LQSV two SOKO Gaz sat for 15mins with lights on but didn't move. At another airport (stock P3Dv4.5 airport), 2 others sat the same amount of time with no movement. Serb and Mont versions with scenery seem to be flying fine. I'll look over the ADE for LQSV.

I'm not certain that this is the case for you, but I've been working on overlays for civilian helicopter ops and have noticed that elements of overlays will interfere with comms in the other AFD, especially in a region close to a runway.

I think the rule is that if you are within 225 feet of a runway, that runway will dictate which comms is operational for aircraft in that zone. You can see the runway take hold as you taxy to the holding point, and suddenly you are able to request clearance due to your proximity to the runway. With a small overlay on a larger airfield, comms will be interchangeable over most of the airfield, aircraft can mingle and still communicate with their own controller, but near a runway they are forced to speak to the authority on that runway, but won't be able to.

If an overlay's runway is within 225 feet of anything in the other AFD where AI is expected to talk to someone (either at a hold-short node after arrival, but possibly also parking spots where clearances are given and taxy instructions likewise, then aircraft in the main AFD might not be able to make contact with their own controller because they only have access to the comms that relate to the overlay runway. Simply sharing frequencies isn't enough - that only means you can hear both overlays, it doesn't mean that they both co-operate!

In ADE it's possible to draw "helper shapes", and if you draw a rectangle that is as long as the overlay's runway plus 450 feet (2 times 225) and as wide as that same runway plus the same 450 feet, centered on the overlay runway, you'll be mapping the overlays area of influence. If you draw the same helper on the other AFD, in exactly the same position, you may find parking or hold-short nodes within it, and these might have problems with aircraft getting stuck simply because they can't request further instructions.

It's long been known that hold-short nodes for departures must be within about 225 feet of the runway or have AI aircraft condemned to wait before being zapped by the AI engine, and this is simply because they can't ask for departure when outside that runway zone.

This is all circumstatial evidence in your case, but what you're seeing is what happens when comms are blocked, and it might be something in the overlay that is causing it.

If you want a quick test, you can go into top-down view and open the comms window, hit control-Y (or whichever key sequence you use to slew your UI aircraft) and move around the airport looking for changes in the comms options. For example you might lose the ability to listen to ATIS, or the taxy to gates option vanishes and you can only now taxying to "parking", and these are signs that you are getting areas where one or other of the controllers (overlay or main AFD) has jurisdiction. AI can pass through these contended areas just fine provided that they're never expected to request or receive instructions from "their" controller while they're there.

I hope this makes some sense. And I got to use "their", "they're", and "there" in one sentence.

[John Young]

The problem reported by Chris was in P3D4.5. and I have just replicated that and in FSX too. However, the FS9 version works fine.

So what makes FSX/P3D different from Fs9 as far as overlays are concerned I wonder?

I think the problem in this case is the way the AFCAD is drawn, using a single entry point to the runway and a backtrack to the far end when the wind requires it. Miljan wanted it that way, but I think it would be better drawn with two separate entries, one at each end of the runway.

John

[miljan]

Only reason I wanted it this way is if in the future there is a flight plan that brings other helicopters to LQSV that are made without hoover animation. Maybe modified AFD as an option can be offered for FSX/P3D users .

[Bora]

The Gazelle looks great John, thank you for that !

Just noticed that one of the four Brüggen Gazelles (XX386) seems to have non transparent glass, see screenshot...

[John Young]

Yep, quite so. Just checked it and it's missing it's alpha channel (FS9 is OK). Sorry about that, I'll correct that tomorrow for you.

John

PS: managed it this evening. The attached zip has the corrected XX386 texture for FSX/P3D and also the corrected aircraft.cfg file that has the "_" inserted for the Gütersloh texture entries, as previously reported (all sim versions).

[Bora]

Thanks for the quick fix John !

[Delboy99]

I have been having some fun with Johns Gazelles. So far I have painted the 4 operated by 32 Squadron from at Northolt, an ETPS example from Boscombe Down and the aircraft operated by 3 CBAS Royal Marines at Yeovilton.

XW855

Northolt

XZ936_2

XZ936_Culdrose

ZA728

3CBAS_Yeovilton

For Northolt I've used Brian Clarkes scenery with a slightly modified version of Mage's overlay. Boscombe uses the MAIW scenery which already includes a Heli overlay. Yeovilton again is Brain Clarkes scenery with 2 overlays I made one for the 3 CBAS aircraft and one for visiting helicopters. Hopefully I can finish packaging them and upload them in the next few days.

[Firebird]

Oh that's nice.

[Manschy]

What a variety of these helis - great to see all these versions...

Noticed I overlooked the black canopy at Brüggen. Thanks for solving this issue...

[Delboy99]

Gazelle repaints uploaded today.

XX412_MW

XW852

XZ936

[jgowing]

Thanks John for another wonderful helicopter. There's one tiny issue with the flight plans, just for people's information: I have found what seems to be a consistent anomaly in the French ones (I haven't checked the others).

Taking the first plan as an example, and separating the legs for clarity below, the altitude and flight number parts of the code are transposed in the second leg. I suppose it's not really relevant for a short flight, but it could become more noticeable for anyone evolving longer or more complex plans using these as a basis. The helicopter will try to climb until it has to come down:

AC#1,459,1%,24Hr,IFR

,00:00:00,00:14:56,010,F,0459,LFQ5

,12:00:00,12:14:56,459,F,0010,LFQ5


Jon G

[Firebird]

Good spot that, Jon.

[jgowing]

I found a couple more things, this time with ADE files for the French airfields in FS9. Some helicopter overlay parking spots sit over existing airfield spots, for example at Le Cannet LFMC/LFM1, hence there are aircraft from other FPs occupying the same places. It's all resolvable with some tweaking, of course.

There's one problem I can't find the answer to yet, though. Does anyone else have telegraph poles all over the airfield at Pau LFBP/LFB1? I have the new files right at the top of the scenery layers, so I thought they should be fine.

Jon G

[John Young]

Thanks Jon,

Attached are replacement traffic files with the flight number and altitude corrected in the second leg. Regrettably, I made the same format error in both the French and UK sets and these were carried over to FSX too.

If you discover parking conflicts between the main AFCADs and the overlays, just delete whatever spots are not required in one of the AFCADs. I couldn't do that for the FSX main AFCADs as they are not my files.

I have checked Pau/LFPB/LFB1 and I have no stray telegraph poles.

John

[Firebird]

Jon,
I have checked LFPB and found no telegraph poles so it seems to be something on your system.

The only advice that I can give is that I have had a similar thing once or twice. One time I had jetways stacked one inside another another on a scenery. When I tracked it down it was due to a duplicate guid. I was using the original version of a lib rather a v2. Getting the right version cured the issue.

It might be worth loading up the senery in ADE, and if you add all your scenery libs to the Library Objects Manager having a look to see what is at a spot that you found a pole or two. If it shows telegraph poles then that is the issue.
If there are no objects in the scenery at that location then it is something installed outside of that scenery, possibly and area scenery that adds the poles.

[jgowing]

Steve,

I haven't acted on your suggestion yet, but what I found odd was that the ADE already had a lot of small excludes, as if to solve a similar problem, but they didn't align with the poles I saw. Then, when I tried to add some excludes of my own, they had no effect. Furthermore, the Pau scenery is currently set as the highest layer.

Admittedly, I have Occitania southwest French scenery installed, but lower down.

Jon

[Firebird]

Jon,
The thing about FS9 higher or lower can mean different things according to what you are looking at.
In reality the best thing to do is avoid talking about visual lists and only talk about the layer number, which is found in the scenery.cfg.

Using layer numbers, the lower the number the earlier that they are loaded. This is why the default MS folders are the lowest - you have to load the default world to mod.

To give you an idea, by top scenery in FS9 is HMS Ark Royal, priority 1, when in fact it is layer 764. The last to be loaded.

If as I think you mean that Pau is at the top of the Scenery Library table in FS9, then it also has a priority of 1.
This is the complete opposite of what you think it is.
To MS to give something priority 1 means that above all else these supercedes all else - not loads first. That is the point, every else is loaded before the Pau scenery. It is the last to be loaded. This means that anything that affects that area is loaded first and the Pau scenery has to wipe everything else out, or you will get earlier scenery loading as well.

The simple way to check to see if Occitania is the cause of your issue then simply disable it and check. If it is the cause the poles will have gone, if not they will still be there.

[jgowing]

Thanks Steve, it's slowly dawning on me that I may have never understood that point properly..

Getting back on to topic, John's Gazelles all look great, and I've tweaked the parking so that there are no duplicate spots, so the Gazelles now peacefully co-exist with Pumas and, at Le Cannet, with my rather low quality Tiger beta.

Jon