There seem to be very few helicopters that are specifically designed as AI aircraft with multi-LOD etc. I use the Flight1 Heli Traffic program which is an awesome add-on for FS9 and adds a whole new dimension to the sim. But a lot of the choppers I use are not designed for AI and can cause some hefty FPS hits. Most of what I use are standard aircraft that I have tweaked for AI by converting textures to DXT3, getting rid of VC textures, panels, sounds etc and work okay but would love to have more that are specifically designed for AI.I have tried the library on AVSIM and also Hovercontrol and MAIW. I have found a few but not many. Any suggestions of what to look for and where?

There seem to be very few helicopters that are specifically designed as AI aircraft with multi-LOD etc. I use the Flight1 Heli Traffic program which is an awesome add-on for FS9 and adds a whole new dimension to the sim. But a lot of the choppers I use are not designed for AI and can cause some hefty FPS hits. Most of what I use are standard aircraft that I have tweaked for AI by converting textures to DXT3, getting rid of VC textures, panels, sounds etc and work okay but would love to have more that are specifically designed for AI.I have tried the library on AVSIM and also Hovercontrol and MAIW. I have found a few but not many. Any suggestions of what to look for and where?

I too use the Heli Traffic program - which provides some very interesting "eye candy" to airports. Frankly I have not noticed any significant FR impact.I doubt however that you will find much in the way of "AI specific" Choppers for one very simple reason:Other than the fairly recent military choppers (tweaked by Nick Black I believe) in some of the MRAI packages, choppers used as AI craft were treated by FS as just another airplane. They could not take off and land as a real life chopper does. The military ones I referred to do take off quite well but still land much like a STOL aircraft.So there was really no reason for anyone to create AI specific choppers as they just did not "fly" like the real ones.I do use the Hovercontrol Jayhawk and the S-76 by Elvis - along with a number of flyable choppers.Hope these thoughts are useful.

I too use the Heli Traffic program - which provides some very interesting "eye candy" to airports. Frankly I have not noticed any significant FR impact.I doubt however that you will find much in the way of "AI specific" Choppers for one very simple reason:Other than the fairly recent military choppers (tweaked by Nick Black I believe) in some of the MRAI packages, choppers used as AI craft were treated by FS as just another airplane. They could not take off and land as a real life chopper does. The military ones I referred to do take off quite well but still land much like a STOL aircraft.So there was really no reason for anyone to create AI specific choppers as they just did not "fly" like the real ones.I do use the Hovercontrol Jayhawk and the S-76 by Elvis - along with a number of flyable choppers.Hope these thoughts are useful.

Thanks Opa. As always, your input is much appreciated.Yes, I get the reason for the dearth of models. I have found a few here and there that purport to be AI though many of them appear to be regular models that have been tweaked a little. But since Heli Traffic has transformed the issue of AI helicopter behavior (very realistic) I thought maybe there might be a few more out there I was unaware of.As to the FPS hit of AI choppers, I totally agree that normally there doesn't seem to be any appreciable hit using Heli Traffic. I hope nobody reads my remark and decides not to purchase Heli Traffic because they misunderstood what I said. It's an awesome utility and I would urge everyone who wants to see FS9 running to its full potential to purchase it. For those who haven't tried it, let me tell you that it can take any FS aircraft that you designate and make it behave perfectly as a helicopter, hovering, landing, and taking off vertically. You can add totally realistic AI helicopter traffic very easily to any place you want it as well as generating random AI traffic between existing helicopter pads in all your sceneries.I think what I was experiencing was that some of the military sceneries I have created have probably gone a bit "over the top" in the number of choppers I have coming and going. I tend to get a bit carried away when I create custom scenery and want to put in every conceivable object I can and have maximum AI. I have been running a series of Vietnam-war era sceneries I created and was having some frame rate issues when I posted my request. I have since solved it by paring down some of the details and replacing a particular helicopter model that was not AI friendly with one I found on Hovercontrol that is less demanding.But still hoping I will hear of some models I haven't already found.. :(

I'm also a big fan of Flight1 Heli Traffic...Kiwi, I think as it becomes more widely used, there may be more AI-optimised models for FSX and FS9. (ain't we lucky these are generally made for both)As David points out (and he's put together his share of AI chopper packages) there hasn't been much more than Nick Black's stuff and the Elvis S-76.Of course in the short term, you could just upgrade your computer :( Slightly OT, I managed to distress my very competent rig the other day by running a large photoreal scenery with a detailed airport, commercial AI, a bit of custom AI, ground-based AI, some Recorder Module loops for more realism, and a fleet of military Heli Traffic!Who ever said enough is too much...

LOL! Awesome screenshots WingZ! Yes, definitely fits the definition of over the top! :( And boy, do I hear you on the PC upgrade thing. Mine is definitely getting old and has been upgraded and tweaked to its absolute limit. Just wish I could win the lottery!I don't know how well Heli Traffic has sold. It never got much publicity and I think most people just aren't aware of how good it really is and excellent value for what you pay for it... So I hope what you say is correct and there will be more AI specific choppers released but without some kind of push for it, I'm not too optimistic.