Incorrect parking at payware airports

[Deltaair1212 53]

So I thought I’d ask here since AIG never responds to my questions on their forums but I have AIG for my traffic so all of the airlines and GA are accurate. The only thing that bugs the heck out of me is incorrect parking. I have loads of payware airports from SXAD to orbx, and LatinVFR etc. at least 40 separate airports. AT LEAST. So I only fly in and out of payware airports. You would think that you get what you pay for, and some of these add-ons aren’t cheap. So I can’t for the life of my figure out what is the issue with incorrect parking. Is it the airport or the AI program? And it’s mainly my turboprop traffic. The Dash 8’s never park at the gates! They always find themselves parked next to me in the GA area. A couple of other aircraft types that should be at the gates are parked at the private FBO’s. Is anyone else having these issues? It can’t be just me. 

[psolk 3,040]

So first of all Kaii and team at AIG are usually very responsive.  Secondly, this is primarily an airport afcad issue.  VERY few add on scenery creators take the time to create an accurate AFCAD for their airport.  Why, I can't answer that it's one of most add-on scenery customer's biggest complaints so it's not just you.  

So within the AFCAD there are a number of variables that can be set such as airline code(s), max allowable wingspan, gate type, allowable aircraft type etc etc.  Then within the AI there are variables such as model, texture, and airline code etc.  

In order for things to work "perfectly" all of these things have to be manipulated manually to match unless you can find an updated afcad available for download for some of your add-ons...

So it's not just you and a lot of us have spent a lot of time manipulating all of this ourselves sadly.  Then V5.3 dramatically reduced the number of available parking slots on top of everything.  

I'm sure someone else can point you to a good tutorial on all of this.  

[Dave_YVR 972]

There's a forum at AIG that includes downloads for payware airport ADE's properly edited by users for AI traffic.

 Have a look here as well as the sub-forum for Forum Member afcads. It's a rabbit hole worth jumping in to.

https://www.alpha-india.net/forums/index.php?board=90.0

 

[Nemo 1,305]

I agree with you in every aspect but don't understand your last point. This is only for P3D default airports?

On 8/16/2022 at 3:23 AM, psolk said:

Then V5.3 dramatically reduced the number of available parking slots on top of everything. 

[Deltaair1212 53]

3 hours ago, Nemo said:

I agree with you in every aspect but don't understand your last point. This is only for P3D default airports?

Exactly. There’s no reason why a payware airport should be missing parking spots 

[psolk 3,040]

5 hours ago, Nemo said:

I agree with you in every aspect but don't understand your last point. This is only for P3D default airports?

Only because if the add-on developer doesn't include an updated ADE then the OP would still only see limited available parking spots.  For me it is a great indicator if the developer modified anything from the default ADE or just tried to work around it...

Also, if you overfly a default airport and wonder why with 100%AI you only see 10 AI aircraft at the gates it would make sense.

2 hours ago, Deltaair1212 said:

Exactly. There’s no reason why a payware airport should be missing parking spots 

There's also no reason the end user should have to go and complete the developers job but we do...  As you can see above, a payware airport if it doesn't have a modified Afcad or ADE whatever we call it these days would revert to the default P3D ADE and AI parking availability.  At KEWR with 100+gates default ADE shows like 1/5th of that.  

[dave2013 1,128]

I don't buy payware airports any more as I concluded that most of them just aren't worth the money.  Some of the ones I have bought had pitiful AFCAD files with either no assigned gates and ramps or the assignments never get updated so over time the parking accuracy declines.

The payware developers should be expected to routinely update the parking for at least 10 years IMO.  It isn't that hard.

Dave

Edited August 17, 2022 by dave2013

[pgde 571]

On 8/15/2022 at 10:32 PM, Dave_YVR said:

There's a forum at AIG that includes downloads for payware airport ADE's properly edited by users for AI traffic.

 Have a look here as well as the sub-forum for Forum Member afcads. It's a rabbit hole worth jumping in to.

https://www.alpha-india.net/forums/index.php?board=90.0

 

Would these AFCADs work if one is not using AIG?

[drobinho 27]

That ultimately depends your own AI setup, specifically two lines in each [fltsim.x] entry for every AI aircraft installed:

• atc_parking_types=
• atc_parking_codes=

AIG does an incredible job in making sure every entry installed includes these two lines and adheres to standards (GATE/CARGO/RAMP/etc., ICAO airline codes). The ADE files available in that forum are designed to match these lines in each [fltsim.x] entry that AIG installs. In my experience (with Ultimate Traffic), this data is not always as robust in large, all-encompassing packages compared to AIG.

If your own AI setup is missing these entries, or has any discrepancies in these lines (wrong gate type, wrong ICAO airline code), then your experience with the ADEs available in that forum may be a bit different. I encourage you to dive into the aircraft.cfg files for your AI installs, familiarize yourself with the data, and manage/edit it as you see fit.

 

The combination of Airport Design Editor + managing these lines in [fltsim.x] entries allows you to customize and adjust your airports accordingly.

For example, I've built some custom flightplans to populate airports with large maintenance operations so I can have busy maintenance ramps. By adding [fltsim.x] entries that are specific to my custom flightplans, and modifying the ADE file of these airports, I can guarantee that the AI planes from my custom flightplans park exactly where I want.

[Deltaair1212 53]

1 minute ago, drobinho said:

That ultimately depends your own AI setup, specifically two lines in each [fltsim.x] entry for every AI aircraft installed:

• atc_parking_types=
• atc_parking_codes=

AIG does an incredible job in making sure every entry installed includes these two lines and adheres to standards (GATE/CARGO/RAMP/etc., ICAO airline codes). The ADE files available in that forum are designed to match these lines in each [fltsim.x] entry that AIG installs. In my experience (with Ultimate Traffic), this data is not always as robust in large, all-encompassing packages compared to AIG.

If your own AI setup is missing these entries, or has any discrepancies in these lines (wrong gate type, wrong ICAO airline code), then your experience with the ADEs available in that forum may be a bit different. I encourage you to dive into the aircraft.cfg files for your AI installs, familiarize yourself with the data, and manage/edit it as you see fit.

 

The combination of Airport Design Editor + managing these lines in [fltsim.x] entries allows you to customize and adjust your airports accordingly.

For example, I've built some custom flightplans to populate airports with large maintenance operations so I can have busy maintenance ramps. By adding [fltsim.x] entries that are specific to my custom flightplans, and modifying the ADE file of these airports, I can guarantee that the AI planes from my custom flightplans park exactly where I want.

Where can I find these? I have AIG

[Dave_YVR 972]

1 hour ago, pgde said:

Would these AFCADs work if one is not using AIG?

The ade's will use real world airline codes except for most regionals that will use the airlines they are operating for similar to UALX, AALX etc. Either way, much much better then any of the default ade's which are normally a joke.

For what it's worth, the type of parking (Gate,Ramp, Cargo,GA etc) isn't as important as many think. As long as the radius is adequate for the aircraft type and the code is correct, they'll park in whatever type of spot it is.

[drobinho 27]

18 minutes ago, Dave_YVR said:

The ade's will use real world airline codes except for most regionals that will use the airlines they are operating for similar to UALX, AALX etc. Either way, much much better then any of the default ade's which are normally a joke.

For what it's worth, the type of parking (Gate,Ramp, Cargo,GA etc) isn't as important as many think. As long as the radius is adequate for the aircraft type and the code is correct, they'll park in whatever type of spot it is.

Yes, good point! There are some nuances with the parking conventions (___X = express / ___C = cargo). There might be some variation to those depending on real life ICAO codes, which is why I recommend taking some time to understand how it's all organized. For example, Lufthansa Cargo = GEC not DLHC.

 

37 minutes ago, Deltaair1212 said:

Where can I find these? I have AIG

You'll want the aircraft.cfg file, available in each airplane installed into your AIG AI Manager location. [AI Manager > AIGAIM - OCI > SimObjects]. Once you open the aircraft.cfg file, you can CTRL+F for "fltsim" and you'll find the list of each AI paint installed.

https://i.imgur.com/MsYbkVK.png

[Dave_YVR 972]

10 hours ago, drobinho said:

There are some nuances with the parking conventions (___X = express / ___C = cargo). There might be some variation to those depending on real life ICAO codes, which is why I recommend taking some time to understand how it's all organized. For example, Lufthansa Cargo = GEC not DLHC.

 Very good point as well!