[13MAY15] Intercontinental breakfast, anyone?

[rsrandazzo 6,353]

Captains,

 

We were sitting about tonight having a discussion on some of the interesting design decisions that went into the new 747-8 series aircraft, and as part of that conversation Jason gave us a bit of a tour of the exterior model and all of the fine detailing that has gone into the PMDG model thus far.

 

After looking over the images, I decided you would probably enjoy seeing them as well. 

 

I have mentioned a few times that we are developing the 747-400 and 747-8 airplanes more-or-less in parallel because it is far easier from a development standpoint to do so.  The two will cease developing in parallel about the time we hit beta testing on the 744, which hopefully won't be too much longer.

 

While the 747-400 is, by a long margin, my favorite airplane of the modern era, I am starting to grow increasingly fond of the new, bigger sister.  I anticipate that I will be adding the -8 to my rating a bit later this year, and then I am sure it will turn into a full-blown-love-affair...  (I have a four-engine-fetish...  the support groups just haven't helped, but thanks for asking.)

 

 

 

 

The amount of aerodynamic cleanup that Boeing has accomplished with the 747-8 has to be seen to be believed.  We are modeling all of it faithfully, and as usual Jason has poured a huge amount of effort into detail and authenticity.  From the landing gear to the wing/body fairing to the new flap systems to the engines...  It is all there in all of it's in-depth realism goodness. 

 

 

 

You will note how clean the airplane is.  We are going to give you painters some options on cleanliness and wear with the newest versions of the 747 series.  You will be able to choose varying degrees of wear for your liveries, and we are exploring some wear-capability for the VC as well.  (not a sure thing... we are exploring there...)

 

Take a good look at the main landing gear tires in the image above, and you will see the effect of weight on the tires and how they relate to the pavement underneath them.  It turns out that we have had this capability for some time, but we just weren't using the data produced by our tire pressure/structural integrity model to provide you with some visual goodness...  The 747s will bring you a whole new array of visual accuracy, no matter how badly you abuse your landing gear.

 

(And I have seen a few of you fly... So i KNOW there is some gear-abuse going on out there!)  :ph34r:

 

 

I think these three images give you a pretty good idea where we are with the 747-8 Intercontinental.  The cockpit for this airplane is well along also, but we aren't quite ready to show you either VC just yet.  We mentioned this during the 777 development as well, but we do a bunch of "non standard stuff" inside the VC during development in order to help us through the process of making certain that things align properly, display properly, etc... and if I showed you an image of the VC at this stage of "work in progress" we would inevitably have some folks skip through the text and not realize they were looking at work-in-progress....  So we are going to hold off showing you the insides just a bit longer.

 

Hopefully not TOO much longer...  I am eager for you to see what we have wrought.  B)

 

Lots and lots more goodies coming your way- stay tuned!

 

(Now where is my meeting schedule for Four Engine Fetish Anonymous?) 

 

 

[CaptKornDog 281]

Fantastic!!

[ddswh1pk0s 8]

Great screenshots

[19dcavscout 39]

Beautiful. Here comes another dent in my wallet!

[uhntissbaby111 58]

Gorgeous!!!! Thanks for the update and the pictures!

[max2770 74]

Wow, this is fantastic.

[voske 34]

Greet shots! Thanks for the update.

[pinlifter 502]

Big 8 baby!

[rondon9898 84]

Beautiful! I suspect this might be out around my birthday time which would be jolly nice can't wait to fly the 744 in particular but the tyre shape on the ground is fabulous

[SuperG 31]

It's always nice to receive news of a much anticipated release, thanks Rob. Will any of the 744/-8 innovations make it into future 777 updates?

[Datalink 26]

Loving the tires, hope to see this on the 777's one day! Hint hint lol she's looking spot on mighty fine now

 

I assume you'll have the 744 as the base pack, and the -8's as extensions? Not that I may spend too much time in them, I'm more of an RB211 guy :-p

[pedrotrindade 335]

_Stunning!!!

[fabristunt 25]

Beautiful! I'm looking forward to see some VC photos when it's ready

[aceridgey 330]

Great job Jason and team!! Looking really good!

 

Alex

[G MIDY 101]

Stunning! Looking forward to going back to something a little more analogue!