HMS Ark Royal Task Force

[John Young]

I'm pleased to announce, on behalf of the development team of Mike McIntyre, John Burtenshaw, Kevin Reed and myself, the completion of our HMS Ark Royal Task Force for FS9.

The package depicts HMS Ark Royal, a light aircraft carrier and previous flag ship of the Royal Navy, escorted by two Duke Class Type 23 Frigates – HMS Lancaster and HMS Argyll. The ships are positioned in the English Channel, circa 2006, shortly before the retirement of the BAe Sea Harriers that operated from Ark Royal and before the retirement of the ship herself in 2011.

These are static ships serving as AI platforms for Sea Harriers and Merlin helicopters, but there are two additional AI Duke Class frigates that patrol the periphery of the task force, but as they are dynamic they have no associated AI helicopters:













The original Ark Royal model is by Mike JG, but with his permission, I've re-modelled and re-painted it significantly. It operates a number of my AI Sea Harriers. John Burtenshaw's AI Merlins operate from the two escorting frigates with some very cleaver animation and xml triggers from Kevin Reed. Hat's off especially though to Mike McIntyre who managed the package development and produced the ingenious AFCADs and traffic files that make the whole thing work. I've uploaded the package on his behalf because at the moment he is pre-occupied with family matters. We send all our good wishes Mike.

The package was uploaded to the Download Hangar just before this post with the file name "HMS Ark Royal Task Force.zip" It should be available shortly. It has not been tested in FSX.

Everything you need is in the package. Have fun with it.

John Y.

[campbeme]

Sounds great guys cant wait to have a look.

Published and ready in the Hangar now.

http://www.militaryaiworks.com/download ... task-force

Front page announcement.

http://www.militaryaiworks.com/briefing ... task-force

[clickclickdoh]

Oh my, you are full of all sorts of surprises. That's really cool. Can't wait to get this in the sim.

[RKE]

Very nice surprise

[david.harwood]

Just loaded it into FSX and looks ok! Ski ramp doesn't seem to be recognised off the bow and haven't waited for the AI flights but there's a nice hard deck to land on with plenty of eye candy all around with the support vessels. Many thanks and a nice little addition!

[John Young]

No indeed Dave, the ski jump on the bow was a bridge too far for AI and we opted for the vertical lift. You could swap out my FS9 Sea Harriers with FSX native ones for greater efficiency if you wanted to. They are at flightsim.com, but Ill put them in the Download Hangar with some more of my previous aircraft once I've finished clearing my decks.

John Y.

[david.harwood]

John, its not the AI that's the issue its for your own aircraft. Did a sneeky take-off in the Razbam GR-7 earlier, just because you have to, and unlike the Ark Royal from Flying Stations you just fly off the end of the bow rather than being launched skyward of the ski ramp.
Don't get me wrong this isn't a complaint and I need to practice the vertical take-off and landings but just thought I'd let you know. it could well be as its being dropped into FSX by a muppet like me!

[John Young]

Dave, I'm intrigued to know how the Flying Stations Ark Royal produces a runway that curves upwards that user aircraft can "stick" to as if it were a continuous hard surface from the run up. Is it not just a case of the user pulling the stick back just as the ramp approaches to simulate the ramp and if late, just going through it? Can you tell me a bit more about how that works please?

John Y.

[hawk_sh]

What an awesome package, thank you very much.

So many new stuff these days and so few time to test and enjoy.

John, regarding the ski jump:
The skijump ramp at Yeovilton that is availabe as freeware also has got a curved surface.
http://www.militaryaiworks.com/forums/1 ... =yeovilton
download link from flightsim.com:
http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php ... fid=117547
You might want to have a look at it.

User aircraft will get thrown into the air using the ramp, although it is a little bit rough.
It works like in real life and considerably shortens the take-off run. I tested this using the IRIS T-45 and also the VRS F/A-18E.

[david.harwood]

John, I'm unsure how it works as a piece of scenery development as I have very little understanding of how you do what you do so well but as far as what happens in the sim it is as it would be for real.
If you use any aircraft, Harrier, F-35 etc you accelerate from the stern and when you hit the ramp you go up the ramp as if its a curved hard deck just as you do in real life. Team SDB also has a ski jump ramp in there Novofyodorovka AB (Saky) scenery for FSX and I believe in FS9. I also think the freeware Kiev does the same which is also similar to the additional Kiev model you get with Bear Studios Naval Flanker. All work like a real ski lift.
Not sure if you can retro engineer how models are created and I made an error in the Flying Stations reference, its the freeware Illustrious I downloaded from the RFN website. There is also a Queen Elizabeth and Juan Carlos carrier available and all have the same facility. I'd be happy to send you anything that I have and the only payware product is the Team SDB stuff so everything else is available from Flightsim, RFN, and a nice website FS,Shipyards.org. Have a look and see!

[RKE]

I have a faint memory of the Aerosoft developer, who did their Lukla scenery, mentioning that using a building or structure could allow for a sloped runway that user aircrafts could land or take off from.

As for making the STOL Harrier take-off, you can sort-of achieve the visual effect by playing with AFCAD, so the takeoff point is close to the ski jump. I had the old Ark Royal package installed, and the default AFCAD was pretty close to optimal when using the ACG/JYAI STOL Harrier.

[Victory103]

Love logging in and seeing such a cool surprise, outstanding job! I guess I'm going retro after all, although I do have NBAI F-14s in my FSX set up. I needed a new boat also for my Raz AV-8B to fly to.

[hawk_sh]

Wow, I can only repeat myself, what an awesome package.
Just took the time to install it and watch the morning flight operations.
The only thing missing is the appropriate ambient sound: sound of the sea and jet noise....

Here are a few of my observations / questions:

1. the manual is in Word-Format, since I only have an old version of Word on my flightsim PC I opened it on a different computer and saved it as PDF

2. I experienced some severe stuttering when the textures of the frigates where loading.
The textures come in DXT1 format. I converted all the textures for the static and the AI frigates to DXT3 format.
For the AI frigates I also replaced the textures: ddg17_eot2.bmp, hcvc.bmp, hcvc_L.bmp, helm.bmp, pilotdeck.bmp, vc_panel1.bmp with a tiny 16x16 pixel texture that is only 1k byte to further reduce loading time.
From the file Earl Watkins' Installation.txt I assume that the AI frigates are a pilotable model and have a virtual cockpit that is not needed when used as AI model.

3. When viewing the Ark Royal from bow, starboard side there is a green patch visible at deck height below the skijump ramp.
I assume that is a part of the AFCAD file?

4. Can the Merlin folder and/or the Sea Harrier folder be merged with the previously installed Merlin / Sea Harrier or do the have special flight dynamics for this package?

[bismarck]

@David, are these sceneries for FSX or FS9? I'm particularly interested in the Kiev.
Excluding Shipyard, I don't know the other sites you mentioned, have you got a link?

About playing with the AFCAD, Mike "The Magic" did a fantastic job to help me, on the two Italian carriers in this pack:
http://library.avsim.net/download.php?DLID=186759

@Hartwig, about point 4: the Merlin can't be merged, I don't know for the Harrier

Thanks, Giorgio

[mikewmac]

Have any of you fellows ever seen an AI Harrier or any other AI aircraft take off following the curvature of a "ski jump" in FS9? If so, I would love to know the details.

To the best of my knowledge it is not possible in FS9 or at least I have never been able to achieve it. I have been able to simulate it somewhat by tweaking a ski jump AFCAD and an AI Harrier FDE, but since John had designed one of his JYAI Sea Harriers with a VTOL capability, I chose to use them in this package.

As a sanity check I just did a quick test with the aforementioned UK Mil "ski jump" at RAF Wittering and the AI Harrier just plowed right through the ski jump prior to rotating for its normal takeoff.

[hawk_sh]

The UKMIL ski jump only works for flyable aircraft.

[david.harwood]

Giorgio,

Here are the sites I have stored for carrier and naval bits and bobs. There's a combination of FSX and FS9 addons but the RNF site is the most useful for the RFN carrier gauge. A nice little addon for any naval enthusiast.

http://royalefrenchnavy.perso.sfr.fr/RFN-Navires.htm (Illustrious, Queen Elizabeth etc)

http://www.fsxcarrierops.com/boats.htm (Kiev & Kuznetzof carriers)

If you have the VRS F/A-18E and TacPac you can add all the carriers in as moveable in the same way you can with AI Carriers if you didn't already know!

Mike,

I'll check the Team SDB Novofyodorovka AB scenery for FSX but I don't recall seeing an AI Flanker use the ski jump whilst I've been there.

[VulcanDriver]

AFAIK you can't make an afcad runway to go up hill which is why AI aircraft can't use a ski slope.

[VulcanDriver]

Giorgio,

Here are the sites I have stored for carrier and naval bits and bobs. There's a combination of FSX and FS9 addons but the RNF site is the most useful for the RFN carrier gauge. A nice little addon for any naval enthusiast.

http://royalefrenchnavy.perso.sfr.fr/RFN-Navires.htm (Illustrious, Queen Elizabeth etc)

http://www.fsxcarrierops.com/boats.htm (Kiev & Kuznetzof carriers)

If you have the VRS F/A-18E and TacPac you can add all the carriers in as moveable in the same way you can with AI Carriers if you didn't already know!

Mike,

I'll check the Team SDB Novofyodorovka AB scenery for FSX but I don't recall seeing an AI Flanker use the ski jump whilst I've been there.

Great ships there. Does anyone know if its possible to convert FSX scenery to FS9 use?

[Flightlead13]

Brilliant, simply brilliant!! This package is another great example of how the MAIW community has pushed the boundaries of FS and accomplished much more than anyone thought possible. Thank you to the development team for all your efforts and congratulations on an amazing package!