************************************************************************* *** SWISSAIR MD-11, THE FULL PACKAGE *** VERSION 2.22 / November 2001 *** ************************************************************************* A JOINT VENTURE BETWEEN: Alain Capt / acapt@worldcom.ch / Switzerland URL: http://www.acsoft.ch ("Produits" chapter) Saul Loeb / saulloeb@earthlink.net / United States ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FORWORDS OF DOC AUTHOR (Alain Capt) ----------------------------------- To really get 100% of what this sophisticated package has to offer, please take time to read carefully this documentation. I know you may suffer, with my "Frenglish" and the abundance of informations, sorry about that! It take, to the french-speaking guy I am, a considerable time to build this documentation. But it contain ALL WHAT YOU NEED, to master this MD-11 like I master it myself. Therefore, be patient, come back to it often and you will soon be a great virtual MD-11 pilot !!! PRELIMINARY REMARKS ------------------- Versions 1.x were a joint venture work between Staffan Ahlberg and me. It is not anymore the case for versions 2.x. However, Staffan still share Copyrights with me, on remaining graphic materials he work on. (see chapter: AUTHOR'S). ATTENTION FOR FS98 !!! To work properly, this package need a FULL UPDATED Flight Simulator. This mean you must have installed the two Microsoft official updates: "FSCONV98" and "Patch Set No1". You can freely download these stuffs on Microsoft Internet site or several other sources. This package require you have installed the Global Positioning System ACS-GPS, version 1.70 or over for FS98 or FS2000 and version 1.9 or over for FS2002. You can freely download it from many FS sources or directly from my site http://www.acsoft.ch. ATTENTION !!! for FS2000 and FS2002 versions, FSUIPC module from Peter Dawson, version 2.77 or over is required. ATTENTION !!! On takeoff, be careful to respect joystick calibration, flaps and trim settings, recommended in this documentation, or you may even not be able to quit the ground, especially with maximum fuel load. Chapter "OPTIMUM FLIGHT SIMULATOR SETTINGS" and Tutorial should be very helpful on this matter. ATTENTION !!! The auto-landing feature is only certified with the dynamic flight model of this package and may not work as expected, with other aircrafts using other flight dynamic models. User's & Developer's will found interesting information's in "FINAL REMARKS, TECHNICAL ADVISES AND INFORMATIONS" chapter. DESCRIPTION & HISTORY --------------------- Aircrafts: I adopt two Swissair models. One representing the standard Swissair livery. The second one is the "Asia" livery used by Swissair in the far East. This version 2 include now a stunting model with full moving parts and night lights. This is a new version of the MD-11 previously published by "Freeware Works" group (http://www.freewareworks.com). This new version, on which we all work, is the purpose of the Joint Venture. Gary Carlson is the author of the excellent MD-11 visual model, plus all so accurate and detailed moving parts. Speaking of FS2000 version, I collaborate with Saul Loeb, painting author of first well known version of this MD-11. After Saul made a first set of painting textures enhancements, he continue to deal with SCASM to modify FS2000 MDL file, in order to allow amazing night lights effects. During this time, I have fine tuned day painting textures and created from them, night light textures set. Speaking of FS98 version, I had to plunge in Aircraft Factory 99 and Aircraft Animator, to build, from FS2000 version, an FS98 compatible version. Gary had unfortunately no more time to do it. Not an easy task for a first work on aircraft 3D model and moving parts animation !!! Specifically designed for FS2000, this model had ton's of bleedthrough problems in FS98. For now, if you avoid to look under the aircraft (line of sight always looking almost a bit from up to down) results are pretty good. I decided to not touch the landing gear structure, which would have required to also redesign moving parts. Too much work for a version destined to die soon. Therefore, don't look too much under the aircraft !!! The specific flight dynamic, derived from the famous BEST4002 model, I built for previous version, has been adapted to this new 3D model. Many peoples, including experimented real world pilots, spend hours in flying the model, to help to make it real in many aspect which are usually not respected with common FS aircraft dynamic models. Sounds: I have adopted Achim Buerger excellent package, based on real MD-11 noises and redo the sound mixing work, to fit my personal taste. This sound is only available for FS98 version. FS98 Version 2 add compressed air noise in engines startup sequence. Is also added, an engines stop noise. All engines start/stop noises are not anymore restricted to "one single play at the same time" like before. Each engine will produce their own independent sounds. FS98 version also add a nice ground rolling sound. New pushback and Crew functions sounds support multi-sounds package. For more details see chapter "ADDING SOUND SETS". Speaking of Pushback and Crew feature sounds, Saul played the role of voices producer, by collecting records he ask all around. He also record himself as the captain voice set. On my side, I do all the post-production work, mixing all these messages sound with several background noises. Panel: My director line for the panel concept was trying to obtain the better compromise between "pure & hard" realism and FS comfort of usage. This is why I choose sometimes to melt "classical" FS commands into visual MD-11 realism, instead of emulating real MD-11 functionality, which might have being familiar only for MD-11 real pilot, or would have request to furnish with the package, the real MD-11 Pilot's guide document! After all, FS is initially just a games, not a professional training system! Still in this meaning, I do not hesitate to "double" many mouse commands. One is located on the more suitable button for it, the other one, with a short cut philosophy (example: CRT toggle on upper left corner of CRT) or conform to FS usage (example: auto-pilot, some settings working from the real button, but also in FS style, on display digits). Version 2.x mainly introduce the concept of "Full Flight Simulation". Pilot will now have to start from a dead unpowered MD-11 machine. He will have to bring to life all systems before to be able to start engines. The Crew feature will simulate all passengers and cabin crew activities. With the help of the Pushback function, pilot will be able to quit the gate in a realistic way. Even the "asceptic music" passengers can hear during several flight phases is simulated !!! Gauges: My target was to have this panel built with almost 100% custom gauges, all made by me, specifically for this panel. This version is composed of 28 gauges in all (not counting ACS-GPS). 26 gauges are ACS MD-11 custom gauges! 2 foreign remaining gauges are the attitude Standby gauge (Eric Ernst and Peter Mess) and axis indicator (unmodified Microsoft Gauge BELL_206B.CONTROL_SURFACES.GAU). The most complex gauge I wrote for this panel is a fully featured PFD having, for example, real functional speed warning bands, working in two modes (standard flight & flying with extended flaps). Is also displayed, three markers for takeoff speeds V1, Vr, v2. All these speeds (flaps & takeoff) are calculated in function of aircraft weight, extrapolated from fuel load. You have also an accelerometer and color changes on digital display of speed, will indicate when it is allowed to deploy next notch of Slats/Flaps. Of course, a radio-altimeter is included with selectable DH. The RA ground level is also represented for real on the altimeter band (Color band turn to brown color at ground altitude). All this, without speaking of many other features, like FDI, ILS, ARC etc... and the must: a GPWS, fully compatible with sounds of GPWS98. In version 2.x, E-HSI gauge start also to be rather complex. A wind indicator has been added, conform to the real MD-11. Wind is divided in two vectors: "head-wind" & "lateral-wind". A OGS/TAS indicator is also added (On Ground Speed / True Air Speed). The two "Engines" & "Oil" CRT gauges have a dual screen technique which permit to avoid multiple window layers to simulate CRT screen changes, a solution which is painful for FS resources load. This feature let me display two more screens: "Fuel graphic" & "Configuration" showing the landing gear information screen. The auto-pilot still have the classical FS AP concept, plus a high precision auto-landing, able to "kiss land" the MD-11 from MLW (maximum landing weight) to empty tanks. The advantage to have the control of all gauges of a panel is evident. You can make them participating to a single general concept. For example, auto-landing is completed with auto-brake gauge, when auto-reverse, and auto-spoiler are featured by other gauges. Version 2.x introduce a Global Panel Logic Control, with inter-gauges communications. This allow, for example, to shut down all electrical systems, if power fail, or to not allow engines startup until all required conditions are meet. All together, these gauges produce an amazing fully enlighten night panel with sharp and clear lit labels & texts, created pixel to pixel. INSTALLATION ------------ I am sure that many users will be happy with the new installation system, introduced with version 2.2. I wrote a specific installation program which will do all the job for you. In this archive you found a big file: ACSMD11.EXE, an auto-decompactifiable archive which will prepare into a temporary directory all the material for the installation. Therefore, before to run ACSMD11.EXE, you may wish to first create a specific temporary directory. Now run ACSMD11.EXE. This will open a small window. In this small window, you found the field "Unzip to Folder", which is set to Windows default temporary directory (generally: c:\windows\temp). If you decided to use an other temporary directory, replace this default path by the path of the temporary directory you have decided to use. Press button "UnZip". This will decompact all material into the specified temporary directory. Now, with your files Explorer, go to this directory, open it and run the program called "Setup.exe". This program will automatically detect all FS versions you may have installed on your machine. Select one or more FS versions where you wish to install the MD11 and click the install button. Finally, you can remove, if you wish, all the temporary directory. VERY IMPORTANT: Do not forget ACS-GPS (for FS98 & FS2000, version 1.70 or over. For FS2002, version 1.90 or over) is NOT INCLUDED, but MUST BE installed, or the panel may not work properly. VERY IMPORTANT FOR FS200 AND FS2002 USERS: This product require FSUIPC module from Peter Dawson, version 2.77 or over. When installed, be sure that both "Technical" options: "Provide power with flat battery" + "and even if avionic are off" ARE SET. All other settings are to your taste. VERY IMPORTANT FOR FS98 USERS: This product require also a FULL UPDATED Flight Simulator 98. This mean you must have installed the two Microsoft official updates: "FSCONV98" and "Patch Set No1". OPTIMUM FLIGHT SIMULATOR SETTINGS --------------------------------- VERY IMPORTANT, the panel is designed with a "pixel to pixel" technic and require therefore a screen resolution of 1024 x 768 in full screen mode exclusively, to render 100 % accurately everything. In this mode, you will be able to read clearly and without problem, even the smallest text label. Using the panel with other resolution (even larger) or in windowed mode will lead to inferior results. Pay attention the outside view is sized correctly. This is important with this aircraft, if you want to have a correct outside view feeling. Most of the time, with FS98, when changing from one aircraft to an other, the outside view is NOT reset to new aircraft settings. Closing outside view window and re-open it will insure your outside view is correctly sized. Zoom factor is also very important for real outside look feeling. It must be set to about 1.29 for FS98, 0.55 for FS2000 and 0.70 for FS2002. The dynamic flight model expect your joystick is calibrated the following way: Control Surfaces gauge tips reach full scale almost exactly when your joystick also reach his own full scale. This is especially important for takeoff. The dynamic flight model is also optimized for the following FS flight realism settings. For FS98, I recommend to set "Flight realism" cursor in "Aicraft Settings" to full realism, even if this is not capital. Things are more critical with FS2000 and FS2002. You will only obtain OPTIMUM BEHAVIORS, if you put all cursors of "Flight model", into "Realism settings", to MEDIUM position. I recommend to use the following trick: use "Current realism settings" cursor to select "Medium" preset, then after, you can modify all other settings, in EXCEPTION of "flight model" cursors. Less real position of these cursors will not really affect flight model behavior, but settings over medium position, may introduce what I call "distortions". In other words, you will still be able to fly the model with no major problems, but to obtain same results, you will have to use different flight profiles (all speeds, flaps settings etc...). This may also lead to a sistematic premature stall warning on landing for FS2000 version. Finally, avoid to use option "Display true airspeed" and use instead the real world setting: "Display indicated airspeed". ADDING SOUNDS SETS ------------------ Pushback and Crew functions use two series of sounds, prefixed respectively "PB_" and "CD_". These sounds are organized, internally, in 6 different categories, representing: The captain voice: CD_CapClimb.wav <- REF Sound CD_CapDescent.wav CD_DoorsToAutomatic.wav CD_LandingIn2mn.wav CD_TakeoffIn2mn.wav PB_BrakeReleased.wav PB_CallGround.wav PB_ParkingBrakeSet.wav PB_Ready.wav The co-pilot voice: CD_Rotate.wav <- REF Sound CD_V1.wav CD_V2.wav The First Flight Attendent voice: CD_BoardingDone.wav <- REF Sound The Flight Attendent voice: CD_AfterLanding.wav <- REF Sound CD_BeforeLanding.wav CD_Boarding.wav CD_SafetyMessage.wav CD_Welcome.wav The Ground voice: PB_ByeBye.wav <- REF Sound PB_GroundAnswer.wav PB_PushingBack.wav PB_PushingBackPlusEngine.wav PB_ReleaseBrake.wav PB_SetParkingBrake.wav The music: CD_Music.wav <- REF Sound For each of these categories, you may add independently, up to 10 more file sets. Independently mean it is NOT required to add a complete serie of "CD_" & "PB_" sounds files, you can just add a file(s) set to one or more categories. Now, speaking of the category itself, here you MUST add ALL sound(s) of this category or you may have missing sounds during dialog simulation. Panel will determine automatically the presence of multiple category sets, by testing on the basis of the FIRST sound file name (marked: REF Sound, in all lists just written before). But panel will NOT verify the presence of other files of the category. Then, panel will choose randomly, for each category, an existing set. This mean you will obtain a random combination between all possible voices you may have implemented. This work is done once, during panel loading. To create a new category set file name, you simply add the postfix "_X", where X is a number from "0" to "9". For example: PB_ByeBye.wav will give: PB_ByeBye_0.wav, PB_ByeBye_1.wav, PB_ByeBye_2.wav, etc... I have published an alternative "Captain voice set", ACSMD11f.ZIP recorded by me, to demonstrate this feature. All files are post-fixed with "_0". Now to your recorder and mike !!! And please, don't forget to publish your work as a freeware, that all of us can benefit of your additional voices. A last word: For the music, you must prepare a sound file which can be looped perfectly, to give the illusion of a continuous music play. EXTENDED UPPER PANEL -------------------- On the extended overhead panel you will found following functions: PushBack function: Please read dedicated chapter to pushback function. Ignition group: Two buttons A & B, almost one of them must be active to be able to start engines. Power Group: Ext This button suppose you take power from ground. It is a fake function and will always turn to red (mean not available) when activated. Batt This button give initial electrical power required to bring to life the panel. Can be turned OFF when aircraft receive power from APU or Engines. APU This button will start/stop APU generator. When started, button first lit in yellow color and you will hear progressively the APU sound. When APU is operational button color will turn to green. With no engine started, APU is required to have air for the air conditioning system or for the Engines startup procedure. Air Cond group: Rot knob Just a fake button simulating the setting of air conditioned temperature. ON/OFF Start/stop air conditionned for the whole aircraft. If air is available, will turn to green, and you will hear the air cond sound. If not, button will lit in red color. ATTENTION, to be able to start first engine, you will have to turn air conditioned OFF in order to have enough pressurized air to launch turbine. Anti-ice group: This is just a fake function which will do nothing within FS simulator. But these button are coupled to the logic and not simply turn black to green when activated. They will need some time to be active (turn yellow first) and will refuse to activate (turn to red) if aircraft is only powered with Battery. The first group of three buttons concern engine 1 to 3, button "W" concern wings and finally, button "T" concern aicraft tail. This is exactly all the buttons existing in the real aircraft for this function. A panel window, when closed, has his gauges turned to an idle state. APU sound is produced by one of the upper panel gauge. Therefore, when turning OFF APU, please wait until the button turn from red to black, before closing the window. This will insure the APU sound is really stopped and unloaded. If you do not respect that, this has no consequences for the game, except gauge is still playing a sound for nothing. When you start APU, also wait until button turn to green, before closing the window, or you APU will finish to start the next time you open the window. PUSHBACK FUNCTION (EXTENDED UPPER PANEL) ---------------------------------------- RESET Button: Will initialize heading to current aircraft heading and reset pushback distance to default 20 meters. Abort immediately an eventual active pushback sequence. START button: Start a pushback sequence according to parameters set. Aircraft must be stopped for this cmd to be accepted. First 3 digits: Desired heading after pushback. Can be inc/dec with mouse like usually in FS, but only if a pushback sequence is not active. Will turn green when a pushback sequence is started. Arrow buttons: Will compute heading to be pushed back with a 90 degrees turn, in the arrow direction. Will work only when a pushback sequence is not active. Second 3 digits: Allow to set approximative distance in meter the aircraft will be pushed before turning start. Can be inc/dec with mouse like usually in FS, but only if a pushback sequence is not active. Will turn green when a pushback sequence is started. Pushback start & stop use acceleration/deceleration. Turn start and stop are progressive, like in the reality and not like a "robot". Timing between message who request the ground to work a bit before to call, are randomly set within a realistic timing range. The initial ground call might be repeated, if ground crew is sleeping too long. !!! IMPORTANT !!! Technical limitations: From a gauge, only the SLEW mode can be used to build a pushback. This mean all FS sounds are shut, but not my own sounds. Therefore this solution is really suitable for the MD-11 panel. SLEW also mean you must have your joystick well set to neutral and that you must avoid using it during all the SLEW pushback phase. A gauge is idle, when the window which carry it is not anymore active (shown). This mean you must avoid to look the pushback from outside, use lateral views, or even to close the extended upper panel window during pushback. Therefore, stay concentrated on your checklist !!! In fact, you can have a look outside when the aircraft has started to turn. But wait before doing that, the turn is well established (end of progressive phase). You can do that because turn rely on heading. But, be careful to return into cockpit before aircraft reach final heading, or you will make a full 360 ! Looking outside during straight pushback phase, imply you will add to initial distance setting, the distance aircraft roll during you are looking outside. CREW FUNCTION ------------- Two new mouse spots are used to manage this feature. They are located on the full right of panel auto-pilot console, where are located buttons to toggle Starter window or CRT screen's modes. Here, the last button down, with label "AR" and the "Arrow" button, immediately to the right of "AR" button will be used for Crew function. "AR" button: This button is used to start/stop Crew function. intitialy, label of this button is, as usualy, white colored. When Crew function is started color will turn to green. When stopped (understand paused) color will turn to yellow. This button might blink in green color to indicate Crew function is waiting Captain to click the button to run next action. "Arrow" button: Arrow color turning to green, mean that user can click this button to skip current active step. When Crew function is stopped ("AR" button in yellow), clicking on arrow button will reset Crew function. In this case, "AR" button will return to normal white color. In all other cases, clicking arrow button will have no effect. Crew function can be started at any time, on ground or in flight. By looking at the aircraft situation, Crew function will know what to do. Crew function use following FS variables to determine aircraft situation: Parking brake state. On Ground state. Airspeed. Altitude to ground. And Special custom internal variable OGS (On Ground Speed). Here follow the fully description of the logic for this feature: Suppose you are at parking and you start Crew function. Logic will, in this case, examine Parking brake state. If parking brake is set, Crew function will start normally with the boarding sequence. If parking brake is not set, logic will examine aircraft speed to determine probable situation. Under 50 knots logic will suppose you are taxiing or maybe just after engine startup, or just before take off. Logic will therefore jump to "Security message", the message said during taxiing, before the takeoff. In case your speed was over 10 knots, Crew function will start immediately the "Security message". Now, if you are under this speed (maybe stopped just before take off) and you don't want this message to be said as soon as you will go, you can use Arrow button to skip this step. When started normally, with parking brake set, logic will ramdomly choose a boarding time in the range of 3 to 9 mn and start immediately the "asceptic music". From time to time, you will hear Flight Attendent messages. Finally, the First Flight Attendent will announce to you that boarding is done. At this stage, "AR" button will start to blick. When you will click it, you will hear "Cabin crew, doors on automatic". You are ready to pushback now. Now you have started your engines and begin to join your runway. Like aleady said, as soon as your speed is over 10 knots, Crew function will start immediately the "Security message". "Aseptic" music will start again just after it, to keep cool your passengers. In the same time "AR" button will start to blink. When Captain click the "AR" button, he will say "Cabin crew, takeoff in two minutes". Music will stop soon after this action. For takeoff, as soon as speed is over 50 knots, logic will enter into takeoff phase where copilot will say the three message V1, Vr and V2. These speeds are calculated in function of the weight of aircaft (fuel weight is used here). In case V1 is higher than V2 (mean you can abort takeoff at any time before the aircraft weels quit the ground), copilot will ignore V1 announcement. If during this phase, takeoff is aborted (speed fall down under 50 knots) Crew function will terminate immediately. Now you are in the climb sequence. As soon as you pass over 12'000 feets, "AR" button start to blick for a maximum of three minutes. You will also hear a reminder bell sound. If the Captain click it, he will say to passenger his traditional welcome message with some info's about the flight. But this action is not mandatory. Logic will skeep automatically this step after the blinking period or if logic detect aircraft climb seem to be not anymore established. After this step and, of course, supposing aircraft has continued a normal climb, logic will simply always check altitude and memorize the highest altitude reached. This altitude is used during descent to compute an arbitrary altitute: 12'000+((AltMax-12'000)/2), where the "AR" button will start again to blink for three new minutes maximum. Here Captain will tell to passenger about the started descent. Blinking might stop before the three minutes, if 11'000 feets border is passed before. In case aircraft do not climb over 12'000 feets limits (which is really not probable for a MD-11), logic will consider it is a very short flight and both climb and descent Captain announcement are just skipped. During descent on destination airport, logic will open an "altitude window" where the pre-landing announce is allowed. But announce will not be produced until both No Smoking/Fasten seat belt are ON. If you forget to activate these buttons or do it too late, you will not hear this announce. If you activate them before the upper altitude (9'500 feets) of the "altitude window", announce will occur obviously as soon as 9'500 feets are reached. Before landing, "AR" button will start to blink again. If Captain click, then he will say "Cabin crew landing in two minutes". "After landing" message will occur when speed on ground fall under 30 knots. But if you miss you landing and abort it, if "After landing" message has not been already played, logic will wait on next landing to produce this message. If you accelerate over 50 knots after this message was played, logic will terminate Crew function ("AR" button turn to white). As soon as the "After landing" message has been played, the "asceptic music" will start to play again. When you reach your gate and stop, as soon as you will set No Smoking/Fasten seat belt to OFF, the "AR" button will start to blink. Until you do not click "AR" button, music will continue to play. When you click, music will be stopped immediately and the Crew function will be terminated ("AR" button turn to white). !!! IMPORTANT !!! Limits of the crew feature logic: If abnormal situation is detected (this can occur if you have paused a long time Crew function or if you use Slewing or replay etc...), logic will immediately terminate Crew function ("AR" button turn to white). It can also occur in these extreme situations, that the logic will be fooled. This will, for example, happen if you start a replay just after landing. Flight Attendent will start her "After landing" message !!! In this case, you always have the possibility to reset the Crew function. When you takeoff with strong wind having violent gust, copilot saying V1, Vr, V2 simulation may be fooled and will announce a speed, when in fact aircraft is just receiving a strong positive gust. A strong negative one may also result in an abort of crew feature, because logic will believe pilot is aborting takeoff. FDI: HOW IT WORK ---------------- HDG mode: As long as NAV1 is not tuned and receiving an ILS navaids, FDI is in HDG mode. In this mode FDI take auto-pilot altitude and heading settings as a reference. Suppose your aircraft is now following exactly the heading set on auto-pilot at the altitude also set on it. In this case, your FDI will be centered, no matter if your auto-pilot is active or not. Now, if you change assigned heading and altitude on auto-pilot, the two FDI needles will immediately show you the horizontal and vertical direction you must take. As soon as you will have the correct banking to reach the new direction and the correct vertical speed to reach new altitude, the two needles of the FDI will again be centered. When coming close from new heading and altitude, needles will start again to move. If you maneuver the aircraft in order to stop needle moving and maintain them centered, you will smoothly exit from your turn and descent/climb and be level at the new altitude with the new heading. The banking angle used by the FDI is the same used by the auto-pilot. Therefore, when using auto-pilot, the FDI will remain centered. The vertical speed used by FDI is the vertical speed you can set on auto-pilot. When closing new altitude, the vertical speed will be changed in the same way the auto-pilot will do. Therefore, in this case again, FDI will remain centered when aircraft is under auto-pilot control. You can decide which vertical speed has to be used, by just setting this parameter on auto-pilot. When using FDI in manual for this axis (auto-pilot not controlling altitude) You don't need to worry about sign. FDI will just consider the rate and apply it in the right direction (climb or descent). If auto-pilot vertical speed setting is to zero. FDI will use a default rate of 1800. The banking angle cannot be modified by the user. It is always the banking angle which would have been used by the auto-pilot. ILS mode: As soon as you NAV1 radio receive an ILS navaid, FDI will switch in ILS mode. FUNDAMENTAL: To work properly, this mode REQUIRE YOU SET NAV1 COURSE (CRS) TO THE HEADING OF RUNWAY AXIS (sorry but no way to get this from FS variables). As long as you have not intercepted the ILS in both axes, FDI will be in ILS interception mode. This mode is quite simplified and will not solve every possible cases. In other words, aircraft must be within a correct altitude range and a good minimum distance and correct position in regard of the runway, in order to obtain a good interception. The FDI will in fact simply calculate an interception angle of about 42 degrees. For the vertical axis, if you are over the glide slope FDI will order a descent rate of maximum 3000. If you are under glide slope, FDI will order a maximum climb rate of 1000. When closing the interception, FDI will react same as in HDG mode, leading you in the runway axis, on the good glide slope. From this point, FDI will be able to keep you very precisely on the right track. Moreover, it is designed to well anticipate drifts out of the track in both axis. Keeping the the cross centered will lead to follow the ILS track, sometimes better than the auto-pilot is able to do! Technical advises & informations about FDI: ILS interception can fail mostly because of heading and position of aircraft in front of the runway. Imagine, for example, you are at a good distance of the runway, but you are pointing right on the runway and your angles with runway axis is 42 degrees. This will mean FDI will say you are correct. But obviously, you are not, because you will intercept the runway axis only when you will reach the runway, which is too late !!! If you make a little drawing of this situation, you will see that similar situations exist where interception can even occur behind the runway! On the vertical axis, failure cases are more easy to understand. failure will occur obviously if both maximum climb and descent rates FDI is able to use, are not able to reach glide slope altitude before a reasonable distance of the runway. A FDI able to insure an optimum ILS interception in every possible configurations would require a much more complex logic control, based on trigonometric calculation and able to order patterns like going around, making a three-sixty to loose altitude etc... This is something I was not ready to program within the time I decide to devote for this enhancement. As already said, FDI in ILS mode require you set the NAV1 course (CRS) to the heading axis of the runway. Attention, true runway axis is not always the runway number x 10 ! Moreover, the FS true runway axis may differ from real world heading you can found in some documentation. If you don't know exactly which heading has the FS runway axis, set the NAV1 CRS to theoretical heading "runway number x 10". This will be enough to intercept. When you have intercepted, you can fine tune NAV1 CRS, by reading aircraft heading, when horizontal ILS indicator on PFD is centered. FDI needles may sometimes produce some "jump". This is not abnormal. This occur for example, when aircraft will "cross the line" of ILS glide or heading axis. This reverse immediatly the sense (sign) of control logic and the effect to the needle is an immediat change of sense for the correction (which is correct). Some other "jumps" are due to the fact the amplification factor, when you are close the perfect centered cross, is quite important, in order to well anticipate drift tendancy. OGS/TAS INDICATOR ON E-HSI CRT ------------------------------ When on ground, indicator show what I call OGS, "On Ground Speed". This indication IS FULLY INDEPENDANT of wind (this was the challenge, technically speaking for FS98 version !). Even with a strong gusty wind, it will indicate aircraft speed relative to ground. For FS98, displayed value is not 100% stable and quite slow in refresh, but accurate enough. Very useful for taxi under bad surface wind conditions. I have no idea if this speed is also indicated into real MD-11. When aircraft is not anymore on ground, this indicator will start to display TAS (True Air Speed). This speed is calculated from both Mach speed and external temperature FS variables, like done in ACS-GPS. ATTENTION for FS98, "On Ground Speed" will work properly ONLY if you DO NOT use time compression. As OGS is internally used with crew feature, using time compression with FS98, when rolling on ground, will not only lead to totally wrong OGS indication, but will, probably, provoke an abort of crew feature. This restriction DO NOT APPLY to TAS (True Air Speed). PFD / SPEED RELATED PARAMETERS ------------------------------ On the right of vertical speed band of PFD, you will remark red speed limit bands. In any circumstances (with or without slats/flaps deployed), they will indicate the available speed envelop. These speed limits take now in account the aircraft weight, extrapolated from fuel load. On the same place, originated in the middle of the speed band, on the actual speed indicator, you will see the accelerometer. When you have a positive acceleration, you will see a thin yellow band going upward. Length of this vector indicate acceleration value. In case of negative acceleration, this small band will go downward. On constant speed, you just don't see anymore this yellow vector. Version 2 of the PFD will also help you to avoid deploying slats/flaps at too high speed. This will be indicated by color changes of the central digital speed display. When you are over 290 kias, this indicator will be green like usually. Now, if your speed fall under this limit, you will enter into "Deploy slats/flaps warning mode". Speed display will turn to orange color. This mean you are NOT ALLOWED to deploy slats/flaps at this speed. When color change to green, then you can deploy first slats/flaps notch. When done, speed display color will immediately turn again to orange, until you will reach the next correct speed to deploy next notch. This process continue until you have fully deployed slats/flaps. During takeoff, you will see three small triangles, which will indicate respectively: V1 (yellow color), Vr (green color) and V2 (light blue color). These speeds are also calculated in function of the aircraft weight. Of course, V1 (must takeoff speed) is an approximation, based on a standard runway length. All these functionalities exist on the real MD-11 PFD. I tryed to represent them as much close as possible to the real gauges, but I had to make some concessions, in order to obtain good readability. The main one, is the usage of color change on digital speed display. FS2000 UNSOLVABLE PROBLEMS (DO NOT APPLY TO FS2002 VERSION) ----------------------------------------------------------- FS2000 do not recognize well FS98 jet engine model. Moreover engines start variables have serious problems and don't behave like before, with FS98. This is the reason you must avoid the following manipulations: - Never load MD-11 aircafts from a FS2000 aircraft WITH ENGINE OFF !!! This will lead to a situation where MD-11 have his internal engines variables unsychronized with those of FS2000 and it may be impossible to start engines. Now, if you have loaded your MD-11 with engines ON, you can shut down engines and save a flight situation in this state. You will be able to load this flight without any problems and will get a MD11 with engine OFF. I warmly recommend to exclusively use this method to load the MD-11. You can build as many flight situations as required for your needs. But attention !!! Loading an other MD-11 flight situation saved with engines ON, from a MD-11 flight having engines OFF will NOT WORK TOO. This is the only case I was not able to solve. "Engines ON" to "engines OFF" will work, like "engines ON" to "engines ON" or "engines OFF" to "engines OFF". - DO NOT USE the automatic engine startup feature of FS2000 (CTRL-E). This will not work as expected with an FS98 model (Microsoft boof). With the MD-11, this may lead to a wrong synchronization of variables used for engines start and MD-11 buttons used for this purpose. FS2000, before patch No 2 version, may oscillate on pitch axis during ILS approach. This is an "official" bug MS correct with Patch No 2. If you make an autolanding, don't worry! Normally as soon as my autolanding feature will take the control, oscillation will be stopped and aircraft should land perfectly. Just maybe the touchdown point will be influenced. SOME GENERAL TRICKS AND INFO'S ------------------------------ A mouse spot exist to call FS2000 GPS, direct from the MD-11 panel. It is located on the button labeled "PL", just under the toggle button "MP" used to change CRT No 2 between ACS-GPS and EHSI screen. To turn ON/OFF CRT's, use the small gray round button in the middle-down of CRT border. Turning OFF CRT #2 while GSP is displayed may be not clean (GPS remain), if your version of ACS-GPS is under 1.70. Left computer ON/OFF mouse toggle is on the left of his white button (cannot be on white button, because of mouse spot conflict with the airbrake). For right computer, use normally the white button. If you want to make an auto-landing controlling yourself the power, you just need to deactivate the auto-pilot speed control. Now your problem is to know the optimum time to cut the power. Just survey the auto throttle state on the auto-pilot or better on the PFD. On the precise time the auto-landing feature would have cut the power, state of auto- throttle will toggle. During the critical phase of auto-landing, just after auto-landing has cut the power and until aircraft touch the ground, if you want to abort landing, you don't need to worry about the state of auto-pilot (if active or not). Just put power again with throttle command and auto-landing will be immediately cut as well as auto-pilot, if it was still ON. Before this phase, you must cut auto-pilot to regain manual control. On the PFD gauge (CRT no 1) or the auto-pilot console, you can set the DH. This parameter is used by the radio-altimeter and the GPWS. It will determine the altitude where the radio-altimeter will change display color. Over DH (Decision Height) altitude, radio-altimeter have green color. It will turn to orange close to DH and then turn to red color at DH. GPWS will say "Approaching Minimum" when RA turn to orange and "Minimum" when it turn to red. You can refer to GPWS98 documentation for the GPWS featured by PFD gauge. All ground proximity warning system features of this nice and popular application are included with almost 100% the same behavior and logic. This panel feature a full auto-brake, including the RTO mode for take off. RTO don't need to be activated in some way, it will automatically start to brake aircraft if you cut power during takeoff. On landing, auto-bake is coupled with auto engines reverse. A yellow indication will lit on CRT No 3, when auto-brake is braking. Adding power again will immediately shut down auto-brake. For your information, real MD-11 don't have an auto engines reverse. Speaking of auto-brake. MD-11 has more an assisted brake system rather than the classical auto-brake implemented here. In fact, all auto breaking features on landing are quite cheat for FS98 and FS2000 version. They almost don't brake nothing at all !!! As you know, FS98 & FS2000 slow down too much easily heavy aircraft, even if you don't brake at all. This wax apparently corrected at last in FS2002. On upper panel, you will found, in addition of classical functions for this place, the Yaw Damper (also located on upper panel in real MD-11). Notice that the Pitot heat is both manual and automatic. It will be turned to ON when external temperature is closing zero degrees and turned to OFF when this temperature return to about over 5 degrees. But at any moment you can overrule this automatic setting with a mouse click on button. Don't miss the E-HSI/GPS CRT mouse toggle. It is located on left of the auto-pilot. it is the top left button of the group of four buttons forming a square. If you press on "Baro set" button (click on center of button), you will reset to standard baro pressure immediately. CRT no 3 and 4 dual screen can be toggle not only from most right buttons stack on auto-pilot console, but also in the up-left corner of each screen. You can not only toggle the FDI function of PFD gauge with a click on the appropiate button, but also directly on the PFD screen, on a spot located up-left the attitude indicator (see "See-me.gif"). FDI is automatically coupled to NAV1 when it receive an ILS localizer. Otherwise, it work the classical way, using AP parameters. You can set different throttle power for each engine with mouse drag command using in the same time the keyboard key "CTRL". On CRT No 2, most down left, you have the timer function. You have four timers available, each with a different color. A mouse click on the left part of timer string will reset it to zero. Click on right part will toggle between all four timers. When CRT No 2 display ACS-GPS, you found over the timer the FS98 time compression factor. Maybe some of you suffer, like me, of abrupt and spurious throttle cut with FS98, when in auto throttle mode. This problem is solved by the throttle gauge, thanks to a watchdog function I implement in it. Please don't forget to watch the picture "see-me.gif" where you will see precise location of all "special" mouse's spots I just describe. FINAL REMARKS, TECHNICAL ADVISES & INFORMATIONS ----------------------------------------------- The GPWS feature is fully located into gauge ACS.PFD-MD11.gau. It use the same filenames as the very famous GPWS98 and is therefore fully compatible with the whole warning sounds set of this application. The set of files included in this package are original GPWS98 sounds, just resampled to a lower level (-4 db) for a better all together sounds balance. Only one exception: "-apdisco.wav" is a different sound. Attention the auto-landing featured with this package is only certified with the dynamic flight model of this package and may not work as expected with other aircraft using other flight dynamic models. As this feature was designed for this specific package, I was able to take advantage of this fact to design a very precise auto-landing, remaining not too complex in coding. Moreover, I doubt that an "universal" very precise auto-landing can be programmed without the need to enter parameters, specific to the used aircraft. Try with other dynamic models at your own risk !!! Many custom scenery's have incorrect design of localizer. If you remark your MD-11 do not touch ground within the correct limits on the runway, this is not the fault of the auto-landing feature. This panel has been designed with a "pixel to pixel" technique. This mean all gauges have been designed in a way that all included graphic material will be sized 1:1 inside the panel. This mean FS stretching graphic routine DO NOT act on this graphic material, which is therefore represented "pixel to pixel". This technique allow high precision panel design and usage of very small texts and labels, remaining sharp and therefore fully readable. The cost of this technique is that the panel MUST BE used in the resolution it has being designed for (in this case 1024x768 full screen). Attention !!! Because of Global Logic Control introduced in version 2.x, almost every gauges will not be functional if used into an other panel. Gauges were written in Visual C++ 5.0 using the Microsoft panel SDK reference. Internal design was programmed to be as less as possible computing consuming and FS drawing refreshing. CREDITS ------- Tanks to Gary Carlson and Saul Loeb for the nice MD-11 3D model and both very accurate and beautiful liveries. It was really nice to work together on the new version of this MD-11 aircraft. I am especially grateful both of you have accepted we rework together some parts, to make the aircraft really looking like the Swissair model is. Tanks to Staffan Ahlberg for his nice work during the previous Join Venture version we have done together. Tanks to Andi Jaros for his A320 PFD gauge. This gauge was my first reference and inspiration when I started to build my own MD-11 PFD. Thanks to Eric Ernst and Peter Mess for the Standby attitude gauge I use with modified colors into this panel. Thanks to Wilco van Deijl for his GPWS98, which was used as a reference for this package. Tanks to Sean Trestrail & Juan Carbeza for the amazing BEST4002 flight model I have used as a basis to start building my own MD-11 flight model. Tanks to Achim Buerger for his sound pack I use as a basis to build the aircraft sounds included with this package for FS98 version. Thanks to Peter James for his engine start-up sound I rework to use as startup sound in this package. Tanks to Pascal Linder, to have published Tutorials of his great method allowing to modify FS2000 MDL files and get such amazing night effects. Tanks to Marco Rensen for SCASM consultation he gave to Saul Loeb. Tanks to Ron Beal, and the other sound artists who helped with the crew and ground man recordings. Many thanks to Laurent MASTEY (ex real life DC10 pilot), to take the time for testing the FDI feature and giving precious advises. AUTHOR'S -------- This "Swissair MD-11, The Full Package", version 2.x, is a Joint Venture between Alain Capt & Saul Loeb. Here follow the detailed author's list: PANEL CONCEPT & DESIGN: Alain Capt. BITMAPS PAINTING: Staffan Ahlberg & Alain Capt. GAUGES BITMAPS PAINTING: Alain Capt assisted by Staffan Ahlberg. PROGRAMMATION: Alain Capt. AIRCRAFTS FS2Kx 3D MODEL: Gary Carlson. 3D MODEL ADAPTATION TO FS98: Alain Capt TEXTURES: Saul Loeb & Alain Capt. FS2Kx MDL FILE REWORK FOR NIGHT: Saul Loeb, FLIGHT MODEL: Alain Capt. FS98 ENGINE SOUNDS: Achim Buerger re-mixed by Alain Capt. "PB" & "CD" SOUND MESSAGES PRODUCTOR: Saul Loeb (recording some, getting others) POST-PRODUCTION (MIXING) Alain Capt DOCUMENTATION: Alain Capt COPYRIGHTS ---------- THIS PACKAGE IS FREEWARE AND NO MONEY SHOULD EVER BE MADE WITH IT !!! WRITTEN PERMISSION OF AUTHOR'S IS NEEDED TO COPY THIS PACKAGE OR PART(S) OF IT, ON EVERY MEDIA LIKE CD-ROM, DISKETTE, BBS, INTERNET SITES ETC..., IN THE CASE USERS MUST PAY TO ACCESS THIS MEDIA OR HAVE TO BUY IT. NOBODY HAS THE RIGHT, WITHOUT PRIOR AUTHOR WRITTEN PERMISSION, TO USE ANY PART OF THIS PRODUCTION, IN ITS ORIGINAL STATE, OR MODIFIED WITH UTILITY SOFTWARES, INTO ANY OTHER APPLICATIONS INTENDED TO BE PUBLISHED, EVEN IF PUBLICATION WILL BE A FREEWARE. THIS DO NOT APPLY TO "ACS.CtrlSurfDisp-MD11.gau" GAUGE, WHICH IS A RENAMED BUT UNMODIFIED ORIGINAL MICROSOFT GAUGE. FOR SIMPLIFICATION PURPOSE, ANY REQUEST CAN BE ADRESSED TO ONE OF THE TWO FOLLOWING ADDRESS: Alain Capt 35 ch. des Passiaux CH-1008 PRILLY SWITZERLAND Tel + Fax: 41-21/ 648 38 37 E-Mail: acapt@worldcom.ch URL: http://www.acsoft.ch (look on "Produits" chapter to found FS pages) Saul Loeb USA E-Mail: saulloeb@earthlink.net Have nice flights with Swissair MD11, the full package !!!