Local AM radio to navigate?

[Guest Hugo]

ADF radios can normaly tune from about 200 KHz to 1700 KHz. Higher than 535 Khz is the Broadcast band for normal AM radio broadcast. In remote places like those for bush flying, navigational aids are also remote!! Using local radio stations is often the only alternative for radio navigating over these areas. Besides, it can also be a source of local weather information, musical entertainement, news, etc. These radio sources are not implemented in FS. Well, not as of now! Although, I have found that many of the towers we see in FS are the representation of the physical AM radio transmission towers (some of them probably are those of the FM transmitter), and that many, I'd say about 60 to 70%, are within yards/meters of their reported real world location. I also checked that few of the reported tower sites do not have their physical representation conterpart in FS or are way off. With Airport I can set an NDB site wherever I want but I found the higher frequency I could set was limited 999 Khz. Higher ones, like lets say 1340 KHz, although accepted by Airport, could not be tuned in with the aircraft ADF. I can't say if FSSC has the same limitation though.With Afcad2, what a fantastic FS addon!!, using its NDB adding facility, a frequency set above 1000 KHz will be tunable by the ADF. And it is relativaly easy to tie the NDB location within inches of the center of the FS tower representation if one wishes so!On this site http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/page?page=provs one can find informations primeraly for Canada/US am/fm radio stations, but also worldwide as I gathered, with specific infos on physical tower specs and location (the yellow I icon to the left of the station Id). For the moment I'm doing some work related to Quebec province. Here's a bit of what I found. There is 190 radio stations in Quebec, 84 of those are AM type, the ones I'm interrest in. For each one of them (AM), I got the ID, frequency of operation and location coordinates and into a small database in Word format. It's a bit time consuming to visit each and every AM site to pick up the informations but still managable for 84. Most probably such info, already bunched together, could be found in a text form on the net, ei through Shortwave and Medium Wave Listener sites. But I haven't looked for it yet.With Afcad I have created a fictive airport (St-Loin (St-Elsewhere)) with a single turf runway I located somewhere in Quebec but I could have set anywhere in the world, the North Pole if FS had it ;-), it does not matter. From there I inserted a separate NDB entry for each of the radio station tower location. Doing it this way, one only has to edit a single file instead of doing it for each and every nearby airport and it does not pertubate any existing or addon FS airport.Attached:Image#1 below shows in background a limited NDB list I've put up so far. In foreground, the type of entry I made.Image#2 shows the result in the map and GPS windowsImage#3, how things appear in FSNav, after updating the base!Naturaly this will appeal mainly those people who, like me, prefer the low and slow contry or bush flying. I am not a puter power user by any means. Hence the single entry method I used. Power user could do much better I'm shure and possibly could go even further. For example linking a given frequency with a local internet aired station eventhough it may not be the very same station selected. Imagine flying the northern region and hearing english or french or inuktituk news, music when nearing one of these stations. The same naturaly with Swalii or Zulu while over the african savana. Actualy the local language of any overflown contry. Just an idea.Hugo

[Guest EdrickV]

FYI, there is a scenery package available already that adds tunable AM radio stations in the Alaska area.It's in the library as am_radio.zip"This small addon sets up 37 Alaska, 2 Yukon and 84 Quebec AM Radio frequencies tunable with the ADF for additional navaids capacities."And if you're interested in unusual navigation aids, there is a Radio Range System package available for FS9 that simulates an old system used back in the 1940's."Let me help you out. You're cleared to taxi any way you can to any runway you see."

[mgh 89]

While in some areas of the world it may be necessary to use commercial stations for navigation, in general it's regarded as bad airmanship in the real world.The reason is that the transmissions may not be coming from the identified main transmitter but from an alternative or emergency transmitter located elsewhere or even a relay station miles from the main transmitter.

[Guest jimkeir]

Hi,Now if you could tie those up with a list of internet-broadcasting radio stations so you could actually tune the radios in FS and get a realtime radio feed, that would be nice.Jim

[Guest Hugo]

Hi all. Well an old thread revived!To EdrickV- It's been a long time since we came across. If I remember well, t'was in a dicussion on the BFU forum about float a/c ai we had you, Holger, few others and me on how to implement them in FS. From there Holger brought up further into a comprehensible way to acheive it and even applied it to moving vessel pathways. A very good job he did!Now the post you refer to here, has been set in april 04 and am_radio.zip was an offspring of this "work" I uploaded few days later in may :-)In your reply you write " And if you're interested in unusual navigation aids, there is a Radio Range System package available for FS9 that simulates an old system used back in the 1940's " Could you elaborate a bit on that. ThanksTo mgh- I agree with you that using am commercial station frequencies to navigate may not be the best way to go ;-). Especialy nowadays that cheap GPS systems are available to ga pilots. But you have to understand that when I worked this file I had in mind what was going on in yesteryears when there were no such system. Also it was made with the perspective of those people who were flying off the main centers in smalltown airports and/or bush where there generaly were no naviational aid whatsoever. Up until the late eighties almost every 5,000+ people town had their own broadcast station and many of then had some kind strips, grass, gravel, etc of their own. So using broadcast freq. made sense for, lets say, orientation rather than navigation per se. I know I used them in this fashion in the early '70 in southern Quebec. Altough I've never flown Alaska or N. Quebec or NWT, I assumed that those who did and probalably still do today, would have used them where available. But naturaly nowaday with pocket GPS, it's an 'art' that may very well be on its decline ;-) To Jim- As mentionned in the end of the post, being able to link a given frequency to some internet regional stations (even if they were fm) would be some nice enhancement into realism insertion. But, not being a power user myself, it is something beyond my capacity. Now, if anyone would like to give it a try though, well.... ;-)Offsprigns.After bringing this file to Avsim library, someone I don't know of (t'wasen't me!) brought it to Flightsim library. Thanks to him!! A french guy (a retired administrative from Air France), who got it there, contacted me over it, inquiring if I could do the same for european stations and/or other us/canada states. Altough it could have been, as I was working onto an other piece of scenery (St-Georges-de-Beauce) at the time with a deadline of june 24th for some reasons I won't bring up here, I had put this aside with the perspective I may take it back later, which I haven't as of yet! But, in any case, I couldn't find as a good database for european am stations, as what can be found on the radio-locator site, for North-America.In any case, this guy and I became good friends and kept contacting one or twice a week since. We did quite a bit of multiplayer online flying through FsHost linkage and in a pilot/copilot fashion through FSNet. Since then, we met a few times as he came to Montreal last year and again last month. He is still here at this time and will be leaving back this coming sunday. Now, next october I'm scheduled to come to Paris for a couple weeks and my friend insisted I'd stayed to his place for the time. Hard to refuse!! This means I can do more millage for the bucks!! So I'm also planning to go to Lyon for 2-3 days (an other friend of mine lives in the area and agrees to accommodate me as well for this stay :-) Actualy, I want to get to Lyon area in order to go and visit a small nearby village of ~1000, named Vaux-en-Beaujolais.Now, why in the world would I want to add ~800 km of travel distance to such a remote place? Well, it's a long story :-). Ok, I'll try to make it short, I'll give it my best shut. But you know me ;-)When I was about 15, that's 45+ years ago!, I found in my home library a book titled CLOCHEMERLE by Gabriel Chevalier. It's an ~400 pages novel first published in 1934, the action taking place in the early 20's (after WW1) in a wine grower village of Beaujolais named CLOCHEMERLE, hence the title. I've never been a big novel reader but in that case, I laughted my way across it over 2 consecutive days stopping only for a night of sleep. I learned later that this novel was classified as a masterpiece of french humoritistic writing, which I must say I have to agree with :-) There are two other novels the author published to follow suit, Clochemerle Babylone (1947), Clochemerle Les Bains (1964). I red them both years later and re-red them all there after!!Funny enough, it's the british that made a film of it, http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles...299000638.shtml, although the french may have done one too, Le ch

[Guest Hugo]

Oups! Sorry. The second attached file should have put as a jpg. Here goes

[Guest Hugo]

errata: I refered to Balzac's 'La condition humaine' above where I should have written Balzac's 'La com

[Guest EdrickV]

Wow, I didn't notice the dates. (No wonder the topic seemed familliar.) Someone bumped the AM Radio thread in the BFU forum and I followed the old link here while reading it. :)"Let me help you out. You're cleared to taxi any way you can to any runway you see."

[Guest Hugo]

Edrick I replied to the "Someone that bumped the AM Radio thread in the BFU forum" ;-)Oh! Anything more to add to "And if you're interested in unusual navigation aids, there is a Radio Range System package available for FS9 that simulates an old system used back in the 1940's." you brought up?Hugo

[Guest EdrickV]

Here's more info on the Radio Range System. I've never used it, but if you're interested in old navaids, then this sure qualifies.http://www.dc3airways.com/Radio_Range_Manual.htmlhttp://library.avsim.net/esearch.php?DLID=...Wood&CatID=rootIt even has it's own forum here:http://dcascreenshots.net/rr/index.php"Let me help you out. You're cleared to taxi any way you can to any runway you see."

[Guest Hugo]

Thanks for the links. Will give an eye to them.Hugo

[LuisFelizTirado 33]

A great story, Hugo, and it goes to show that even small things can lead to great friendships. Have a good time in the Beaujolais!Some of my best friends live in a small village just like that in the Dijonnais. Boulangerie right across the way, church steeple, cows going out to pasture through the streets. Quite charming. Except for the cow droppings!Amicalement.Luis

[Guest Hugo]

Hey Luis! Thanks to you for participating into my long awaited dream :-) Though I may also have some bucolic sights of the area from my youth and 40+ year old reading of a novel that even took place some 40 years earlier, I'm progressivaly adapting to to lessen the shock to the new realities :-) See image below."small village just like that in the Dijonnais. Boulangerie right across the way"In the small village where I now live, there is a boulangerie right across my place but it opens only during weekends :-)"Quite charming. Except for the cow droppings!" -- Though, not as bad as bomb droppings. Some other village realities no one should ever adapt to!!"Amicalement."Je te le retourne,Hugo