I will admit my wrong doing posting this question here. I simply don't know where to best post these questions as I'm not certian really what is involved.

 

I have this curiousity about doing these customizations to FSX. I'm hoping someone can point me in the direction of more specific help, perhaps some tutorials, or take some time to generalize the knowledge, steps, and tools to do them.

 

1) I'd like to add some static ships to some harbours,ports and naval shipyards that I fly over regularly. I have found several good sources of AI ships, and I'd like to use them in places I frequent often. (eye candy)

2) Many ships are pilotable. I've been launching some of the pilotable ships I've downloaded from water based aerodromes, but unfortunately, these aren't near where I'd like to sail. How might I go about launching from a dock in a harbour? I'm guessing that I would have to look at the port as being an airport, and design it as if I was designing an airport?

3) The easiet way to have ships sail between ports.

 

 

For static ships, use Instant Scenery 2 from Flight1. It can't be done any easier.

 

For AI Ships that move you're in for some complicated work. Visit FSDeveloper.com to get som guidance.

I realize you want to "roll your own," so this recommendation may be off target, but for what it's worth, I've heard very good things about Henrik Nielsen's freeware AI ship packages.  If you're interested, search the Avsim file library using his name as author.  There's a base pack and then regional packs for various regions that contain the routes.  I haven't experimented with them myself but I'm planning to at some point sooner rather than later.  Hope this is helpful.

head to the library and look for aicarriers2.zip by Lamont Clark. Allows you to place static or moving single ships or whole fleets anywhere in the world. brilliant program.

head to the library and look for aicarriers2.zip by Lamont Clark. Allows you to place static or moving single ships or whole fleets anywhere in the world. brilliant program.

 

This.

Thanks all for your insight.

Simmerhead ... yes ... I stumbled upon Scenery 2 in my quest. Looks like a brilliant application. Sounding cheap though, would there be anything similar in the freeware market? I also stumbled on applications TTools and Boat Traffic Compiler, but both look pretty daunting. Hence your comment " you're in for some complicated work".
 

And yes ... of course there is aicarriers2. I had that in previous FSX installations, but (and perhaps I wasn't using it to it's full potential), I found that I was limited to a specific selection of ships (naval vessels predominently), and placement options were limited. I understand you can select navigational fixes available in FSX to place them, but that prevents me from placing vessels precisely where I wish to place them. An "enhanced" aircarriers application could possibly allow one to build their fleets based on craft available in their library, and place them a points defined by co-ordinates? Perhaps a workaround could be to create a custom navigational fix to be selected from with aicarriers. Is this possible? 

Instant Scenery has just been released in version 3, and if you intend to make any scenery it is the easiest tool in the world to use. It is worth every penny IMHO and there is nothing close to it as freeware. The creator of that tool is a true genius!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22PxTylve5k