I'm exploring airports, masses of them, every flight is to a new airport I have not visited before.
At a later stage I intend to learn my away around the actual airport creation and modification tools so will likely learn the answers to some of these questions myself. For now I'm just curious if there are any typical causes for the 3 things I'm listing below or any simple fixes? These are problems I've hit more than once:

1. Why are taxiway signs sometimes all over the place? (Guessing it's an AFCAD thing?)
2. Why do some airports have sticky taxi or tarmac areas? For example, you need to apply a good deal of throttle to move. (Guessing maybe a texture property wrongly assigned?)
3. Why does the aircraft bounce on certain surfaces? (Have no idea on this one???)

 

Any help greatly appreciated!

I have suffered all three of these as well but despite trying to make modifications to the airports with ADE9X I haven't been able to overcome them.  If I have an overwhelming to desire to fly to those airports then I just put up with the problems.  Fortunately, I have only experienced these a couple of times so it's not a real issue for me.

 

Dijvid

Firstly, when you try making scenery you will find that flocks of haphazard taxiway signs are just the tip of the iceberg. FS9 was made by hordes of outsourced companies who got paid by the numbers they produced, not for the accuracy of what they made. Or even, you will find, didn't make it at all, "But where's the runway? There isn't a runway?"

 

Second, there is no "sticky" texture for taxiways or aprons, and no connection between the plane's "wheels" and the "ground". This is not real life, it is just malfunctioning software.

 

Third, while it is admittedly possible in real life to get a small plane to bounce along if you find the right speed on the right surface, FS9 is not real enough to get that right so once again........

 

While being critical, it is also a miracle that with so much being crammed into FS9 it manages to function as well as it (sometimes) does.

While being critical, it is also a miracle that with so much being crammed into FS9 it manages to function as well as it (sometimes) does.

 

Thanks for the replies, looks like it's just a matter of put up with some of the issues. I totally agree with the above quote, despite a few bugs, some quirks, it really is a great piece of software.

 

I have found some airport issues are easily resolved with simple changes but other airports do look to be a real challenge to rectify or not possible at all. Landed at another airport today, with another issue I've come across before. During taxi while turning and the screen pans I get a well defined stutter almost to the point you could start calling it a skip! It is airport specific and it's not because the airport has a great deal of system hogging features. Not sure why it happens? May be a FS quirk, may be a specific texture or object that triggers the stutter, may be a graphic card setting I could change somewhere to completely remove it. Lots of playing around to do in the future!

 

Overall, the work done by people in creating airports and scenery is unbelievably good at times and the issue airports are few and far between.  

There are a few things to learn about FS before enjoying smooth flights with no problems in FS. Firstly any addon that you add to your sim will most likely cause you problems.

 

Mainly because the developers do not know or take enough care as to what they are doing.

 

Let's take scenery a scenery addon.

First, you must check it for alpha channels (DXT3 and 32bit textures need these) otherwise you will get stutters in your sim. Second, I always add mipmaps (if they are not there) to scenery and AI (not flyable aircraft)

Third, if the developer does not separate the landclass files so that there is not texture folder you will get OOM's.

Fourth,  bumpy taxiways just need a flatten/polygon.

Fifth, sticky tarmac for me is always my brake calibration.... always dodgy and I just have to check my brake pedals are fully off.

Afcads. well when a (most) developer makes a scenery they invariably do not bother with the all important afcad. It is very easy to check for faults using ADE. As for approaches (so your AI will land and takeoff) most have never heard of them.

 

For me scenery now is just like VC's. People oo and aah about VC's with no gauges in them. Same with scenery ...ooo look I can see the dunny in the terminal. Yes but can I or my AI fly into the airport! 

OK, so let's face reality!

 

There are as many different computer systems "out there" as there are hairs on your head and yet we expect every developer to produce the perfect addon for all of us.  That's impossible!

 

We are not satisfied if there is the slightest stutter, even for a nano-second, in our beloved sim.

 

I get "sticky" taxiways on the odd occasion, and I have a "bumpy" ride on the odd occasion, and I have some misplaced signs on the odd occasion.  So what??!!  Nothing is perfect in this world.  Yet we have a great sim in FS2004 which performs miracles for us.

 

36 years ago I sat in front of a tiny home computer displaying a few dots on a tiny TV screen and having a ball with my first flight simulator.  I had not the slightest idea way back then what flight simming would develop into.  I'm very grateful to Microsoft and all the developers for what they have achieved in allowing me to enjoy my hobby in such a wonderful way today.

 

Dijvid

There are a few things to learn about FS before enjoying smooth flights with no problems in FS. Firstly any addon that you add to your sim will most likely cause you problems.

 

Mainly because the developers do not know or take enough care as to what they are doing.

 

Let's take scenery a scenery addon.

First, you must check it for alpha channels (DXT3 and 32bit textures need these) otherwise you will get stutters in your sim. Second, I always add mipmaps (if they are not there) to scenery and AI (not flyable aircraft)

Third, if the developer does not separate the landclass files so that there is not texture folder you will get OOM's.

Fourth,  bumpy taxiways just need a flatten/polygon.

Fifth, sticky tarmac for me is always my brake calibration.... always dodgy and I just have to check my brake pedals are fully off.

Afcads. well when a (most) developer makes a scenery they invariably do not bother with the all important afcad. It is very easy to check for faults using ADE. As for approaches (so your AI will land and takeoff) most have never heard of them.

 

For me scenery now is just like VC's. People oo and aah about VC's with no gauges in them. Same with scenery ...ooo look I can see the dunny in the terminal. Yes but can I or my AI fly into the airport! 

Thanks! That gives me loads to work and experiment with. All your points make sense except the sticky tarmac for me. I know the situations I have come across were not brake related. It's the same airports, same areas every time that stick.

I like to experiment with my FS9 installation and have recently made some rather drastic modifications.

 

I decided to remove ALL default airports and airport backgrounds, all those crappy looking shorelines and all roads.

A well made addon airport blends in the best like this, but sometimes you need to add some exclusion polys to get rid of trees and/or buildings, but that's pretty rare.

 

This has in some occasions got rid of the bouncing runway problem too. This often happens if you remove a photo background for an airport, which I usually do

to make the airport blend better with the surrounding ground textures.

 

I find the coastlines look much better without the beach textures everywhere and the roads that are part of the ground textures themselves I find enough, especially when flying at high altitudes.

 

Now this is probably not for everyone, but I like to tinker and I've found no issues with these mods.

 

Now when I go to choose an airport, I only get a list of my addon airports, which are the only ones I visit anyways.

remove ALL default airports

Now there's a thought!

I haven't flown to a stock airport in living memory.

 

What effects are there on AI?

What does the sim look like, outside the custom areas?

Screens please...

I haven't noticed any effect on the AI at the airports installed, they seem to come and go as usual, and the skies seem as busy as always.

How the sim handles it when the departure/destination airport is no longer there I don't know, but at least it doesn't seem to cause any memory leaks.

 

The textures and landclass I use are such a mishmash that I can't say they are this or that anymore. Too much tinkering has been going on

 

The sky is HDE v.1 and I'm using NextMAP Europe 19m mesh. Those are at least unmodified.

 

Here are a couple of screens:

 

 

Well it doesn't look as if the sky fell! Nice screens too!

I may well take this thought into the next sim that I build, thanks for the idea.

Now I think about it, AI simply spawns and vanishes on the surface of the 40km bubble surrounding your viewpoint.

If you happened to be near a removed airport, AI would try to land, then vanish. Not sure if it would spawn inside the bubble however.