FS9 AFCADS IN FSX?

[ABE 0]

Can FS9 AFCADS be used in FSX?Abe

[Mace 1,966]

The SEARCH function is your friend on this topic!In answer to your question, Yes BUT often they will have a number of issues:1) FS9 AFCADs will not have any of the FSX features such as ground vehicles2) FS9 AFCADs are designed around FS9 airport buildings; thus you may have aircraft parking in walls, etc.3) there may be bleed-through issues with some ground polys...and probably more issues I can't think of offhand.Also ABE this question was just asked a few days ago. I am sure the "search" function will give you even more info.There are a number of ways to convert FS9 AFCADs to FSX, most notably the converter in the file library...although it is imperfect. So far, there is no substitute for manually tweaking the xml code and recompiling, since not all decompilers are the same.But fear not, a number of AFCAD replacements are in the works, FSPlanner and ADE.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2310 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 2.5-3-3-8 (1T), WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian case

[Guest erbj]

Sorry Rhett but I have to correct you on one item:FSX ground vehicles actually work very well in an airport with a FS9 Afcad file. Pic below shows an AI AArdvark Boeing being pushed back by a standard FSX pushback vehicle at ESMS Sturup utilising an Afcad file I made long before I even had heard of FSX!All other ground vehicles are there too as are the new markings on the ground. Otherwise you are absolutely correct!Erik

[Guest erbj]

As an edit to my own reply above I must add that there of course might be things like air stairs, fuel trucks etc. that behave differently with FS9 Afcads than with those made with FSX methods. I

[jvile 1]

That picture is very misleading because it is someones 3rd party scenery and AFCAD normally has no effect on the visuals.The question is, "Can you place a FS9 AFCAD into FSX" and the answer is yes but many complications will occur based on how small or large the airport is and if it is a USA vs International type airport scenery.A Gate or CARGO parking spot made by AFCAD is what places the Pushback tug, Conveyor belt and baggage cart in front of the parked airplane. That is a function of parking spot radius and a 9.0 meter forward distance and not AFCAD. The living world animated vehicles that travel from parked plane to parking spots loose the vehicle tracks when a FS9 AFCAD is placed into FSX. This is because AFCAD does not know what VEHICLE means and now all Animated vehicles travel along taxiway and runway routes causing mass confusion with AI and User planes taxing to and from a runway. If Crash Detection is turn on your User plane will crash and reset FSX. Many AI Planes and animated ground vehicles will go head to head and grind the airport to a halt.The Fuel Truck that we call with a CTRL key command is also now missing from the FSX airport because it also is coded has VEHICLE.The following list are other parts of FSX that become distorted, go missing or just flat do not work correctly because AFCAD does not understand the visual or non-visual scenery when coping the FS9 AFCAD to FSX1. Control Tower is now gone if the airport has one. All animated Jetways will go missing in some cases or move in the wrong direction and not attach to the door of the correct User/AI Plane2. Any Red Blast fence that sits on the airport or is part of the parking ramp is gone. This also includes the airprot Boundary Fence3. Airport Buildings are in the wrong place based on the af2_xxxx.bgl that was made with FS9.4. Taxiway signs no longer align and some are sitting in the middle of the runway. Most windsocks are on the runway also.5. All the ILS GUIDS are no longer aligned with the threshold of the runways including the antenna buildings6. Many airport buildings are sitting on taxiways.7. Ground traffic tracks cause vehicles to drive right through buildings and on the grass textures8. Airplane parking stands misaligned9. Alternate Threshold to indicate international rather than US Threshold markings are missing 10. Alternate Touchdown to indicate international rather than US Touchdown markings are missing 11. Alternate Fixed Distance to indicate international rather than US Fixed Distance markings are missing12. Alternate Precision to indicate international rather than US Precision markings are missing13. Leading Zero Ident to indicate runway numbers have a leading zero (for runway numbers 0 to 9) are not understood14. No Threshold End Arrows to ignore Threshold End Arrows.15. Runway Designator If this value is set, the Secondary Designator (the runway in the opposite direction) is set automatically. 16. Primary Designator If this value is set, the Secondary Designator is not set, but should be specified next. Same values as designator. 17. Secondary Designatior Opposite designator to primary designator. 18. Primary Closed is closed with X' not understood by AFCAD19. Secondary Closed is closed with X' not understood by AFCAD20. Offset Threshold set as a single element not understood21. Blast Pad set as a single element not understood22. Overrun set as a single element which means all 3 (including the 2 above) can be set independent of each other (not understood by AFCAD) 23. Visual model to number of elements, including Ndb, ILS and VOR (previously in other scenery bgl's) not understood24. Both a Runway Start and a Start Location Element which differs from FS9 for arrival runway assignments will be misplaced which causes AI Planes to go around25. Airport Parking Spots have been limited to a maximum of 255 if coded with airline codes so AFCAD will drop out some parking spots26. TeeOffset1-4 Optional stopping points for aircraft, in meters from the center of the parking spot are no longer displaying with a FS9 AFCAD to FSX.This is the short list

[Guest erbj]

Jim,I

[jvile 1]

ErikI agree with you that the 3 pieces of animated pushback, baggeage and conveyer will show up and work because they are not controlled by AFCAD but Parking type such as GATE and CARGO. By the way those are the only 2 types that create the animated.The Living World vehicles that travel from parking spot to parking spot are generated again by GATE and CARGO only which is not a function of AFCAD. The amount of animated Living World vehicles are also a random percentage based on how many Gate and Cargo sopts are coded. The problem is, AFCAD destroys many visuals and non-visuals because its compiler cannot compile things it don't understand so it drops what it does not know.What I am pointing out is if a AFCAD from a default FS9 airport is copied into a Default FSX airport there will be many complications. This differs from using a 3rd party scenery because the visual scenery is controlled by 3rd party and not by FS scenery. AFCAD at that point is only used for AI ground traffic alignment to the 3rd party scenery so yes you are correct in that the pushback tug will work.I feel we are on the same page but Rhett could not think of all the corruption that can occur when coping a FS9 AFCAD to FSX. I added other areas that will go missing if the User is prepared to do without or accept that Living World vehicles are going to default to taxiway links and runways for travel purposes because AFCAD deletes the tracks along with many other visuals.

[Guest erbj]

Thanks Jim,your replies clarify a lot of things regarding how airports work in FSX. I guess the best thing to do right now (besides enjoying FSX!) is to sit back and wait for a user friendly replacement for good old Afcad!Best regards,Erik

[jvile 1]

ErikThe smaller and simpler the FSX airport the better a FS9 AFCAD will fit. You can take a small GA type FS9 AFCAD and place into FSX and not see much scenery corruption. As a airport becomes larger in size and uses more scenery resource data then AFCAD starts causing many more problems.One of the biggest unseen problems with all airports is when AFCAD modifies a FS9 airport and also copies the following sectionsRunwaysStart Locations Freq'sAll Taxiway dataAprons Apron LightingAFCAD then uses a delete statement to tell FS9 not to use any of the default data but use what AFCAD has at a higher priority.What happens now is when the FS9 AFCAD is copied into FSX it brings FS9 data with it which tells FSX to use the FS9 data in AFCAD and block (delete) the FSX airport scenery data.If the freq's have changed in FSX for Tower, Ground, Approach, ATIS, Localizers, ILS, etc. the FS9 AFCAD copied to FSX changed all the FSX current freq's back to old FS9 data. That destroys the FSX most current freq's and replaces with the old FS9 freq's. The same applies to all the other sections. FSX may have a new runway added that was not in FS9 at some airports (KDEN, LEBL, EHAM, etc.). When you copy the FS9 AFCAD to FSX guess what. The new runway that is in FSX is now gone because a FS9 AFCAD does not have it listed as a piece of scenery. I guess I could have listed the easy things in my list rather then the more complex areas that cause corruption.

[ABE 0]

Thanks guys. I should not have jumped the gun and asked a general question about a fairly complex problem. Essentially, I just wanted to see if my FS9 afcads of KLAX and KTOA would work in FSX. I created local traffics and wanted to see the basic parkings - specially TWA - implemented in FSX. That part works.....after I did a conversion of course. As for the bells and whistles and perfections, I'll just have to wait for somebody smarter than me to come up with the solutions.Thanks again guys. It's just wonderful to be a part of a group like you.Abe

[jvile 1]

AbeKLAX for FSX is on the list of airports to do.I am finishing a new very complex FSX KMIA like my FSX KATL and will have also have a LAX FSX coming out.Ray, Patrick and Mace are working on some other FSX airports also.My list right now is KMIA with a AI Plane STAR arrivals to RWY 9 (another AI first) and all runways openPHNL with curved approaches over Diamond Head landing west and all runways openLOWI with curved approaches to avoid high terrain both User and AI KPHX but Ray may get it done before meKMSP with the new runway and all ILS approaches in the GPS receiver including crosswind runway arrival/selectionKLAXetc.

[Mace 1,966]

>Sorry Rhett but I have to correct you on one item:>>FSX ground vehicles actually work very well in an airport with>a FS9 Afcad file. Pic below shows an AI AArdvark Boeing being>pushed back by a standard FSX pushback vehicle at ESMS Sturup>utilising an Afcad file I made long before I even had heard of>FSX!>What I *meant* to say, was that with many fs9 afcads, FSX ground vehicles will not be travelling in the correct places in FSX, due to the different positionings of buildings, taxiways, etc. in FS9 vs. FSX.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2310 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 2.5-3-3-8 (1T), WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian case

[Mace 1,966]

>>I feel we are on the same page but Rhett could not think of>all the corruption that can occur when coping a FS9 AFCAD to>FSX. I added other areas that will go missing if the User is>prepared to do without or accept that Living World vehicles>are going to default to taxiway links and runways for travel>purposes because AFCAD deletes the tracks along with many>other visuals. I could think of them, eventually...but it would really take me a long time to come up with a list anywhere near as comprehensive as yours. :)I have indeed encountered many many of the problems you mention in the past, when I was experimenting with FS9 AFCADs in FSX.That's exactly what I was getting at when I said, you'll have ground vehicles if you have to relevant parking spots (CARGO, GATE), but they probably will not track on the paths that you would like them to track on.I still need to work on ground vehicle paths on the airport I'm working on now.In a related vein, I will probably revisit KSTL soon as I have learned a lot about the way FSX handles things...particularly in the area of ground vehicles and vehicle parking...since I did versions 0.1 to 1.0 between October and January. Besides, Bob Familton wants me to add some more MIL parking there for Boeing.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2310 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 2.5-3-3-8 (1T), WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian case

[Mace 1,966]

>Abe>>KLAX for FSX is on the list of airports to do.>>I am finishing a new very complex FSX KMIA like my FSX KATL>and will have also have a LAX FSX coming out.>>Ray, Patrick and Mace are working on some other FSX airports>also.>>My list right now is >>KMIA with a AI Plane STAR arrivals to RWY 9 (another AI first)>and all runways open>PHNL with curved approaches over Diamond Head landing west and>all runways open>LOWI with curved approaches to avoid high terrain both User>and AI >KPHX but Ray may get it done before me>KMSP with the new runway and all ILS approaches in the GPS>receiver including crosswind runway arrival/selection>KLAX>etc. LOWI approaches -- great one to do. However, I am not sure if the AI can handle anything other than a straight-in approach. ??If they can do curved approaches, MHTG takes the cake on that, with circling approaches mandatory on both runway ends. At present AI aircraft fly through mountains on at least one of those approaches.I am presently working on MPTO -- with year 2006 parking improvementsI am also doing MNMG -- part of a larger project but I may put this out separately so that the community has some central american airport coverage in FSX.Ground vehicle paths is the one thing I have not yet added to these.This good thread is going to make me work on ground vehicles this weekend, thanks everyone's discussion.RhettAMD 3700+ (@2310 mhz), eVGA 7800GT 256 (Guru3D 93.71), ASUS A8N-E, PC Power 510 SLI, 2 GB Corsair XMS 2.5-3-3-8 (1T), WD 250 gig 7200 rpm SATA2, CoolerMaster Praetorian case

[jvile 1]

>>LOWI approaches -- great one to do. However, >I am not sure if the AI can handle anything >other than a straight-in approach. ??>Sure they canAI Planes will honor many different type approaches in clear weather such as Circle to Land, LDA Base Leg (curved), downwind with a 180 degree turn to final and even fly STAR arrivals which I will introduce with the release of KMIA.Many of my FS9 airports found here in the Library have these approaches to avoid high terrian such as LOWI, KLAS, PHNL, VHHX IGS checkerboard (KAI TAK) PAJN, PASI, etc. FlyTampa just released their St.Maartin scenery were I wrote the approaches to ST Barths for them. RWY 28 is a curved approach over the bay waters and RWY 10 is a hold em high on final so AI clear the hill. I have many other airports on my do list for high terrain aviodance such as GITMO (Cuba) and some in South America.Matthew Ministry wrote a short tutorial and added it to his readme for some of the curved approaches found here on AVSIM such as KDCA's river approach.