DX10 Nav Lights Experimental Fix

[SteveFx 258]

This is another experimental fix. This time the fix is to the non working aircraft nav lights.

 

There are two separate issues - the lights that aren't there but shine (e.g beacons, nav lights) and the lights that are there but point towards the coockpit (strobe, recog)

 

I going to deal with them in two posts as separate issues.

 

Don't try this if you have third party lights that already work with DX10 already or you mainly want to use DX9. The change could have some small impact on DX9 performance - I don't think its at all significant though.

 

The fix is very simple but you do have to make a small modification to each aircrafts configuration file.

 

1) rename the attachment ballast.txt to ballast.fx and place in the FSX\Effects directory

 

 

Then for each aircraft that you want to fix do the following

 

1) take backup copy of aircraft.cfg (or sim.cfg) for helicopters

 

2) edit the aircraft.cfg find the [lights] section and insert

 

light.0 = 1, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00, ballast

light.1 = 2, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00, ballast

light.2 = 3, 0.00, 0.00, 0.00, ballast

 

then renumber the lights that were previously there starting from 3

i.e the light that was originally light.0 becomes light.3 and so on.

 

The ballast must always be the first thing on each bus !!! yes i know its bizarre.

 

To help you out the second attachment is a modifie dlights sections for the default cessna

 

 

Thats it. You should then find I hope that the nav lights and beacons work.

 

 

NOTE: ORBX Streetlights.

 

In DX10 preview the ORBX streetlights appear (i.e are on) provided that a single external light on the aircraft is turned on. they go out when the lights are turned off! This change does not affect this behaviour - but you might want to confirm this before trying the change.

 

Thanks to Paul J for testing and pointing this out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[SteveFx 258]

The strobe fix

 

There are a number of lights which currently work but only point at the cockpit - i.e the spotter and tower views are broken in DX10.

 

The ones i know of are

 

fx_strobe.fx

fx_strobeh.fx

fx_recog.fx

 

fx_navwhi.fx

fx_navwhih.fx

 

 

These lights are defined in the effects configuration to not shine at the aircraft.

 

Whilst we cannot correct this behaviour, this bug does not seem to apply to lights that do shine at the aircraft. The previous fix makes the types of light work at last so we can now fix the strobes by adding a brief "shine" towards the aircraft. Note that this won't work if

you havent applied the first fix.

 

Each effect files mainly consists of a repeating set of 3 config groups called

 

[Emitter.0]

[Particle.0]

[ParticleAttributes.0]

[Emitter.1]

[Particle.1]

[ParticleAttributes.1]

etc

 

For each of the files above, take a backup copy. Then edit it and increase the number of each group by 1 so that they now go

 

[Emitter.1]

[Particle.1]

[ParticleAttributes.1]

[Emitter.2]

etc

 

Then insert the contents of the following file immediately before the entry now renamed to Emitter.1 (i.e the one which was originally called Emitter.0)

 

This defines a new Emitter.0 which adds the "shine" to the effect.

 

 

[SteveFx 258]

Note having done the ballast fix you only need to fix one effect fx_strobe.fx to see the default cessana working properly

Then you can decide whether to proceed or not!

[matgg 1]

Just wanted to say thanks a lot Steve for all your hard work!! Especially for people like me with pretty average systems, having dx10 preview mode working has made looking great and still getting frames into the 20s!! Thanks again, and I look forward to whatever you fix next!!

 

:drinks:

 

Mat

[hmar 0]

Tried this out on the Realair SF260. Strobes are working again but the navigation lights refuses now to shine; without the mods strobes and nav lights were only visible from behind. The nav lights have a separate effect defined. Maybe I should add "something" to the effect ?

 

In any case thank you for your efforts to make FSX better and enjoyable.

 

Hugo

[SteveFx 258]

Hi Hugo

 

Can you pm me the before and after section of the aircraft.cfg to look at? No guarantee of a solution, but it would be usefull to see

 

Steve

[hmar 0]

Hi Steve

 

Like I mentioned in the other DX10 Shader topic, this behaviour is common to all nav light effects were the "Light=1" missing in the "Emitter.0" section. After adding this row, these nav lights are working in DX10 but only after the modification of the lights section in the aircraft.cfg with "ballast". Many developers have now modelled the nav and strobe lights in the model to avoid the DX10 problems; the aircraft.cfg doesn't contain nav lights specifications then.

 

Hugo

[Ce_Zeta 13]

Thanks Steve for your superb work. And Thanks Hugo for your comment, is very useful!

[Carbone120 0]

hi, i have a problem with my aircraft´s when te the plane are in land the lights of wings there are in place! but when takeoff the lights disapere!!! Im using Dx10, but if i turn off dx10 all its ok but dx11 is not more stable than dx10 i got more fps with dx10

 

you can´t help me??

[jewel77 6]

Another DX10 issue fix from Steve The Great!

 

But I think I'll use it after your future fix for blue-grey runways and taxiways at dawn and dusk :biggrin:

[RNGR 0]

OK, a "small fix to this Steeve's fix" Just select strings from [Emitter.0] to the end of file from Steeve's ballast.fx file, and add it to the ends of fx_navred.fx, fx_navgre.fx, fx_navwhi.fx files and renumber this new [xxx.y] sections accordingly. Now you are don't need change aircraft.cfg at all. And file ballast.fx too, of course

 

Tried this out on the Realair SF260. Strobes are working again but the navigation lights refuses now to shine

You are need to add string "Light=1" to [Emitter.0] sections (in any place in the section) in RASSF260_navgre.fx and RASSF260_navred.fx file. After this see my post above

[Paul J 349]

Deleted - pj

 

Better solution coming via the "How-To" doc and pdf...

[barneycanoe 0]

By Golly! This works.

 

Here is what I did and what I think RNGR was trying to say.

 

1) Download ballast.txt file, rename to ballast.fx and place in FSX effects folder.

2) Make backups of fx_navred.fx, fx_navgre.fx, fx_navwhi.fx files from the same folder

3) Open ballast.fx, select everything from the [Emitter.0] to the last line, i.e. the entire rest of the file down to and including "Extrude Heading Max=0.00")

4) Open one of the three fx files and paste the copied text into the file at the END.

4) Starting with the beginning of your paste, rename your just-pasted [Emitter.0] to [Emitter.4], [Particle.0] to [Particle.4] and so on (if you are changing the fx_navred.fx for instance). The next three entries would be renamed to .5

5) Save, start up FSX and check for nav and strobe lights.

 

 

Works for me!

 

Dave

[Paul J 349]

HI Dave! D'you need some more snow? :lol:

 

Yeah, more or less... The whole thing is now in the "How-To" here, (pdf here), as one downloadable zip-file, and containing Steve's original modified files (the ballast.fx now being deleted), and with the addition of the two navred and green fx files.

 

I should caution - this fix only applies to stock aircraft, or addon aircraft which use these same .fx files.

 

All the Best,

 

pj

[barneycanoe 0]

Well, thanks Paul. I will have to remember to read the HOW TO more frequently