Introduction The consistently increasing realism that is enjoyed in today’s flight simulation market got another shot in the arm with the recent release of Dauntless Software’s SimPlates 2004. Approach plates and airfield/navaid information is an area that has been vacant from electronic offerings for the average sim flyer for a very long time. Online databases have cropped up over the years, and real approach plate books could always be purchased, but cost, availability, and the real need of being able to meet the sim flyers need of being able to takeoff from Tokyo today or land in Washington D.C. tomorrow made it cost prohibitive to buy adequate coverage. Dauntless has meet this need of the simmer and provided about as much as one could ask for in a $34.99 bundle, finally opening up the world as a flying playground for the sim enthusiast. Documentation & Installation Well, we have to air the only bit of dirty laundry early. There is no documentation! There is no manual explaining the program and how to use it at all. I will say it is extremely easy to figure out how to use the software, maybe a 5-10 minute learning curve, so that is good, but it would have been just as easy for some minor documentation to have been included on the CDs to walk through all the options and what they provide. Installation was straight forward via a setup.exe and a newer main program can be downloaded from Dauntless website to overwrite and update to the latest version. The installation does not load any plates onto your hard drive, so it will access the CDs to pull your search results from. I just copied all the databases provided on the CDs (totaling 1.2 GB) into the SimPlates folder making searches quicker and void of any CD swapping. Main Menu Once you start SimPlates 2004 you are presented with a very simple choice of IFR Plates, Airport Info, Navaid Info, Help/About and Exit. The last two are self-explanatory.
IFR Plates is where you will find all the approaches, departures/arrivals, special minimums, and airport information for your desired location. There are many search filters to choose from as you can see on the left half of this screen. You are given three options to choose from to search for your desired airfield in the upper right corner. Country, State, or FAA or ICAO code. If you select country, you will be presented with the first 1000 matches of whatever you have selected in the search filters. Selecting a State is no different. If you type in an airfield identifier code (example: MCI or KMCI) then you will get only that airfield’s results. This is by far the best option. If you do not know the airfield code then use the State option to get a list of airports names and scroll down to the name you are looking for. As you can see on the IFR Plate screen there is every type of approach listed so you can filter out and see only the approaches you are interested in viewing.
Airport Info has some very detailed information about airfields not normally known by your average simmer. Again you are presented with the same three options to search out your desired airport. Once you have located the airport you want information on and have selected it in the Matching Airport/Facilities box, the gauges at the bottom become active. Depending on the airport you have selected and the information available for that airport will determine what gauges light up at the bottom. Generally you will get the FAA and NIMA Directory and IFR plates to light up. Only at the larger airports will the Preferred Route gauges light up. When you select one of the Airport Directory gauges you will be presented with a complete breakdown (in HTML format) of the airfield, runway information, frequency options, pattern directions and airfield lighting services available. Generally speaking the only major differences between the FAA and NIMA directories is how they are formatted. There are minor differences in type of information presented so look at them both and decide yourself what works for your needs. FAA Preferred Routes are very handy if you are a “heavy iron” flyer. These are the prearranged routes that are preferred by ATC that aircraft follow when flying from or to some of the more busy airports. The Preferred Routes provide routing, altitude and effective hours of operation. There seems to be more FAA Preferred Routes listed for a given airport than the NIMA listing.
The last primary option, Navaid Info, provides detailed information on all types of NAVAIDs. You have a USA dropdown and a Worldwide dropdown to search in. The same search options exist for both and when you find the NAVAID you desire to view, it will display a plethora of information for you. Other than frequency, most of this information may be overkill to the average simmer. But everything that is listed in the General Information section of NAVAID Info is explained at the bottom of the page to prevent confusion.
Summary Over all this a very useful tool for the sim enthusiast and for the simmer that is trying to improve their simulator flying skills. I have always been reminded that the best way to do a job is with the proper tools for that job. SimPlates 2004 is the proper tool for the simmer that wants the right products to execute the desired approach. Buying just the US approach plates and Airport Facility Directory from aviation shops would cost over $150, not including international plate books. Dauntless Software has said the core program is for the most part a completed product but that Plate Packs are continuously going to be made available as a free download to it’s customers. Also mentioned were future endeavors that will continue to bridge the gap between simulation and reality. Tremendous value, high quality, and instant availability make this a definite purchase option for the average simmer or above. * SimPlates 2004 can be ordered here |
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