We all have had the problem of the perfect approach being maliciously faulted with the AI floating just ahead. You do not want to do a go around and start from scratch, so you ease back the power and try to keep some distance. I did this today with disastrous results (i.e., I had wake turbulence turned on with ASV). I know there are two programs out right now, Armando Di Francesco's FSAIS and SG-Flightware's AISmooth. I have been to the home discussion forums and seen mixed results. I need some feed back from those who do (or use to) use these programs. Is it worth installing?? Or should I just wait for Traffic 2005 which has AISmooth included? I like my traffic program I use now and would like to install one of two available now, but I have the dilemma. Also, if you like one more than the other, could you give some info on frame rate hits. With my traffic program now, along with complex airplanes and ASV my frames are on thin ice as is. Some info would be great. Thanks.P.S.Here are the links to the two programs to which I am referring.[link:Library.avsim.net/esearch.php?CatID=fs2004util&DLID=63288/]FSAIS

CameronI use AISeparation on every flight. It works quite well, especially if you want to do some 'plane spotting' at a favourite airport. It seems to have virtually no detectable FPS hit which is great for my ancient Athlon 1.6+GHz!However it still doesn't completely solve the go-around problem. What tends to happen is that go-arounds occur because the total time between a departing AI being given line-up & hold and/or take off clearance and the time that it is far enough away from an AI on short-final is just too long, so the go-around will occur. Obviously this is the FS engine itself so little can be done to rectify this other than (manually) adjusting your AI departure times (through TTools etc). But I've very very rarely encountered go-arounds due to a landed AI not being cleared from the runway soon enough to avoid the AI just about to land to have to go-around. In other words AIS does seem to effectively separate AI approaches through it's 'slewing backwards' method.Another thing I've noticed though is that on the odd occasion approaching AI just seems to disappear at an arbitrary stage of their approach. Whether this is due to it being 'slewed back out' of the 'approach zone' or not (given that it was too hot on the heels of the AI in front of it), I'm not sure, but the interesting thing is that I haven't noticed two 'conflicting' aircraft listed in the 'Conflicts' field within the program itself when this has occurred.I haven't tried AISmooth so shouldn't really comment but it's worth mentioning that according to its forum it seems to have some problems that weren't very thoroughly addressed - the current freeware version, that is, anyway.Cheers :)Josh

>I haven't tried AISmooth so shouldn't really comment but it's>worth mentioning that according to its forum it seems to have>some problems that weren't very thoroughly addressed - the>current freeware version, that is, anyway.Hopefully that is sorted as JustFlight sre using it in Traffic2005 due out next month.

I have recently tried both - results somewhat mixed although AI Smooth seems more realistic and has settled down well for the last few runs - I am running it on a separate system using WideFS. [Also, with FS AI Separation you can see the AI aircraft being slewed backwards!]The main problem remains that we are stuck with the high approach speeds that FS uses for AI Aircraft. They seems to stay near 250 kts until about 3 nm on the approach when they quickly slow down to a sensible speed - often if one starts an approach at a normal distance in trail it will catch up and overtake leading to ATC ordering a go around when you were originally cleared to land as No 1.

I am using AISmooth version 1.0 as available in the libraries. I run with Respond to My Aircraft disabled and set seperation to 90 seconds. I do use FS Configurator to slightly speed up the taxi rate to clear the runways of AI.This type of seperation has helped keep the take-off queues with AI at 80% pretty reasonable at dense airports. I find that insuring that FS need not be paused helps quite a bit.I am like many others anxiously awaiting the upgrade to Radar Contact V4 which has AI control capabilities to help with traffic seperation in the nearer approach range as well as the capbility to block AI from taxiuing onto the runway as you are on close final, all as stated by the developers. Until that version is out I am using AISmoothe along with RC 3.1.I am also using where applicable "cross-runway" AFCAD2s so at none parallel dense airports (like KLGA) cross runways can be active, weather permitting.

Like Ronzie, I'm using AIS V1.0 and have increased the AI taxi speed with FS Configurator and it works great for me. I believe that the faster taxi is more helpful than the AISmooth. R-

Thanks for the feedback. I think I might go w/Armando Di Francesco's traffic separator as it looks like there is no frame rate hit and with AISmooth I read at one of the forums that it does cause a noticeable hit. Also, thanks for the heads up on Ken Salter's FS9 Configurator. This looks like a gem. If it works well I shall have to leave a tip for Ken via paypal :-beerchug.

OK, I changed my mind. For one, I can not spell Separation, as you can see in the title. It is now obvious to me why my search on this topic produced little results. I see that this topic was discussed to some length only a few weeks ago. All my questions have been answered. Thanks for the input though.