Arrows Across America: Flying the Air Mail

[robcap 80]

Not always easy, and this is something we didn't anticipate. (And why should we, it should work).

Even scenery in the marketplace seems to suffer from this bug.

[Fielder 3,681]

The Steward of Gondor, Denethor (1:20), is not happy about the beacons. But what of Théoden (3:10)?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDYQ3PJK

 

 

[Dominique_K 10,150]

These sites have been in my bookmarks for a long time 😀

https://sometimes-interesting.com/concrete-arrows-and-the-u-s-airmail-beacon-system/

http://mytechnologyworld9.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-forgotten-giant-arrows.html

I am glad that somebody made an addon with this.  Now to the .to.

[Dominique_K 10,150]

Dup’ sorry

Edited December 12, 2022 by Dominique_K

[robcap 80]

please delete

Edited December 13, 2022 by robcap

[robcap 80]

Dave converted hundreds of old strip maps from the Library of Congress website to PDF files. Most of them are for routes we don’t cover (yet) but I converted them all anyway because why not? I also made this very crude map with lines for each route and you can click on the line and get a link to a spreadsheet row where the PDFs are linked, also links to the actual Library of Congress map images if you fancy downloading some full sized .tiff files that’s a few hundred megs big. Some have multiple years.

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1dXJVufz9r0djYODJIzint15KxCC2F2s&usp=sharing 1

It’s a lot of stuff you won’t need though but I just fancied making it. Here’s some direct links to some actually relevant strip maps:

Route 5 Salt Lake City to Pasco (SL-P)
1936 strip map for Salt Lake City to Boise: 135 - Salt Lake City UT to Boise ID - 1936.pdf - Google Drive 1
1930 one for Boise to Pasco 136 - Boise ID to Pasco WA - 1930.pdf - Google Drive

Route 32 Portland to Spokane (via Pasco) (P-S)
1933 Portland to Spokane 137 - Portland OR to Spokane WA - 1933.02.pdf - Google Drive
1933 Columbia River Gorge 137A - The Columbia River Gorge - 1933.03.pdf - Google Drive

NOTE: there might be some differences between what we’ve modelled and what appears on maps as things changed a lot over the years like beacons being moved or new ones being installed and old ones closed, landing fields closing when planes could fly farther more safely etc, and the maps themselves are all over the place when it comes to years as you might’ve noticed.

There’s a couple of strip maps for Seattle down to Portland but for whatever reason they don’t actually show the beacons so sod 'em.

Anyway the maps are long strips, thus the name, and as such aren’t orientated north but orientated along the path of travel. There’s a lot of info on them but what you’re looking for are these bad boys:

That’s Antelope Island just to the north-west of Salt Lake City airport. The arrows are the directions to the previous and next beacons and the number is the beacon number (obviously). The morse code is what the real life beacons actually flashed for identification but we don’t model that so it can be safely ignored.

You’ll also see these beacon markers with circles around them which denote landing fields:

You’ll also see huge red lines radiating out of various spots as well on some of the maps which are actually radio range navigation beacons. There’s a mod for that on flightsim.to Radio Range Navigation » Microsoft Flight Simulator and it’s also included in the Boeing 247D payware plane as well. Not sure if they’ll all match up as things probably changed over the years but it’s another option for navigating.

And remember: the main air mail beacons flash yellow and then white. The ones at landing fields flash green and white like normal airfield beacons. So keep an eye out for the yellow and white flashing beacons. The exception is down the Columbia River Gorge where they used red flashing and green flashing beacons on either side of the gorge to help you not fly into the sides at night and in poor weather. They’re nicely illustrated on the Columbia River Gorge strip map I linked above.

 

[Waldo Pepper 1,953]

Great post!   I'm surprised at the detail of the maps,  considering it was the 30's.   That Columbia River Gorge section is beautiful.

[pbearsailor 7]

Thanks Rob!  This is very helpful.

steve

[flyblueskies 143]

On 12/10/2022 at 2:01 PM, Richard100 said:

Arrows Across America v2 update is now available

The update for our 1926 US Air Mail routes add-on is now out and includes:

• .pln files for use within MSFS and with Little Nav Map and other flight planning software

You can download the update from our flightsim.to page - https://flightsim.to/file/32132/1926-airway-route-cam5 

 

We look forward to hearing what you think.

 

I think the pln files are missing...

[robcap 80]

21 hours ago, flyblueskies said:

I think the pln files are missing...

Hm. That's a mistake in the write up. I will correct it.

It dhould say something like: There is a CSV file in the manual folder. You can load that into Little Nav Map, and it will present you all beacons and ILF's as user points.

From this you can make a flight, and fly it in MSFS.

Hope this helps.

Best, Rob

[robcap 80]

On 12/13/2022 at 8:00 PM, pbearsailor said:

Thanks Rob!  This is very helpful.

steve

It's Richard and Dave who do all the historical research. They have some brilliant finds.

We might put them together in a little stories file someday.

[flyblueskies 143]

3 hours ago, robcap said:

Hm. That's a mistake in the write up. I will correct it.

It dhould say something like: There is a CSV file in the manual folder. You can load that into Little Nav Map, and it will present you all beacons and ILF's as user points.

From this you can make a flight, and fly it in MSFS.

Hope this helps.

Best, Rob

Thanks! I did do that, but I cannot set a departure or destination airport from the CSV list (in Little Nav Map). I can create/export a .pln (in Little Nav Map), but when I load it into MSFS, it does not set me on the ground at the airports listed in the csv file. It sets me up in the air with the plane running...

Perhaps I simply do not know how to do this, but I have not found a way yet to start on the ground at one of the csv listed airports...

EDIT: I think I figured it out...after installing ArrowsAcrossAmerica in the Community folder, in LittleNavMap, I had to:

1. Go to Scenery Library (menu along the top).

2. Go to 'Load Scenery Library'.

3. Double check I had 'Flight Simulator Base Path' set correctly ("C:\MSFS" in my case).

4. Click the 'LOAD' button. It then took a few minutes to load in all airports, navaids, etc., including the new ArrowsAcrossAmerica user points and airports.

After this I was able to create/export and choose the flight plan successfully in MSFS 2020.

Edited December 14, 2022 by flyblueskies

[robcap 80]

Version 2.1 update:

It seems there is an issue with our services files. This is an Asobo MSFS issue.
It disables services on a global scale, including glider tows.

We looked into it, and compiled an update. Please download and install this latest version, 2.1 It completey replaces version 2.0.

Delete the 2.0 version from your Comunity folder, before installing this update.

Get it here: Arrows Across America: fly the US Air Mail routes 1926 » Microsoft Flight Simulator

Also, there is a nice trailer online, by Icarrus, and hopefully more video's of the route from Salt-Lake City to Seatle will follow.

MSFS 2020 Arrows Across America Series Trailer - YouTube

Edited December 23, 2022 by robcap

[robcap 80]

Small Dev update:

Dave just finished working on CAM8, Portland down to San Diego. Over 120 beacons placed in the past few days working pretty much non-stop, not to mention a bunch of terraforming and custom polygons to remove and/or add trees and bushes etc. From Roseburg, OR down to San Diego, CA. That completes the full CAM 8 route from Seattle down to San Diego, over 1200 miles.

Well I say complete but there’s still more work to be done to finish up and then we have to test these hundreds of miles because at the rate we were going there’s no doubt tons of errors. Then there’s a bunch of old Intermediate Landing Fields that need doing along the way.

Dave quickly drew this up in Google Earth showing what is currently in the dev builds:

That’s over 2,140 miles of airways

Also we are working on some more hangar models.

[DeepestRed 214]

Fantastic!   I somehow missed this up until now and it looks very much like my kind of thing.  Looking forward to flying these routes, and to the new stuff.   Thank you!