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KenWood

Fly2 and VFR Detroit, Michigan

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Hello everyone,I've heard a lot of really great things about Fly2 lately. So, it has sparked my interest in looking at Fly2 for VFR flying around the Detroit, Michigan area. Someone mentioned that there is terrascenery (?) for this region, but I don't quite know what that means. Anyway, could someone please comment on the Fly2 Sim for me. Do you think it would be good flying a Cessna 172 VFR around the Michigan area? Are there ways to customize the scenery, by adding your own buildings, static aircraft, etc.??? Thanks for answering the newbie questions, I'm really intrigued to learn more about this sim...!Kind regards,Steve

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G'day Steve,Welcome to the Fly! forum. You have found your way onto the best flightsim forum bar none. :-)>>I've heard a lot of really great things about Fly2 lately. >So, it has sparked my interest in looking at Fly2 for VFR>flying around the Detroit, Michigan area.Fly! II excels at VFR flying, especially when coupled with terrascenery.> Someone mentioned>that there is terrascenery (?) for this region, but I don't>quite know what that means.Terrascenery is scenery produced from land class files where textures are allocated to various land classes. ( eg. forests, farmlands, populated areas etc and combined with digital elevation maps produce a very realistic scenery. You can do all the above yourself - for free. OR download scenery from the Avsim Fly! II library if you prefer.>comment on the Fly2 Sim for me. Do you think it would be good>flying a Cessna 172 VFR around the Michigan area?I'm not American but the american terrascenery ( by Randall Roche )that I do use is very good.As real as it gets - :-)> Are there>ways to customize the scenery, by adding your own buildings,>static aircraft, etc.???Yes Yes Yes,1. fly has a built in scenery editor which allows this in seconds. -literally.2. If you want to delve a little deeper there is a program called Terramodels that allows even greater control over modeling the scenery.3. Once you are expert you can make exact scale models in a 3d modelling program and put them into Fly! II.> Thanks for answering the newbie>questions,You're welcome Steve, hope to see you around in the future.> I'm really intrigued to learn more about this>sim...! Now for the bad news, :-( don't dilly dally around. Fly! II is getting very difficult to find in the shops these days so if you are interested don't wait.Cheers,Roger @YSSY

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Hello Steve,If you can obtain Fly! II, all of the items (and more) that Roger mentioned will be available to you. Be sure to upgrade (install the final patches) as listed at the top of this forum - you will need to bring your version of Fly! II up to v240 to enjoy all of its capabilities.For TerraScene, you would need to download and install the TerraScene program and carefully follow the installation instructions in order to extract working textures from the Fly! II program. Once TerraScene is installed, you can experiment with making your own scenery for areas or you may render the scenery from data packs produced by others. I am the author of TerraScenery render packs for the Detroit area - by rendering two of my global tile packs (Toledo & Detroit), you can obtain most of the city. The Toledo tile includes the southern part of the city - the Detroit tile includes the center of the city and a good part of the north (extends up the river thru a portion of Belle Isle).Over Grosse Ile (KONZ) looking north:

The links below:1. Over Detroit City (KDET)2. Over Detroit Metro Wayne Co. (KDTW)All of these airports and taxiways are also available from several authors in the file library.


Randall Rocke

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WOWWW! Thanks everyone, for your kind and very informative responses. I guess my next task is...GET THIS SIM! The Detroit Stuff looks fantastic! I acutally fly out of a little airport in Canton, MI called Mettetal. I don't know Randall, if you're terrascenery extends this far - if it does, fantastic. If not, maybe I could try to improve this area someday. Well, I'm off to hunt Fly2 down, and give this all a try. Thanks again!

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Steve,The Detroit global tile TerraScenery does include the Plymouth/Canton area. However, this is one of those rare cases where Fly! II does not include a small airport - Mettetal (1D2) is not in the sim's database.However - don't despair. This is fairly easy to rectify. If you obtain the sim and would like the airport added, those of us that are familiar with database-editing would be able to do so in minutes. The resulting DEX file is so small it is easily e-mailed or uploaded to Avsim. You then use Frank Racis' DexImport program to import the DEX and Voila!...you have the airport.Now, at this point it would be the runway only, but you can then add taxiways with Taxiway program included in the latest Fly! II patches, add airport buildings and other scenery with the Fly! II built-in editor or with Allen Kriesman's great TerraModels program. (You could also ask the great TerraModels airport manufacturer, Wayne Roberts, if he might be willing to help.) :-)


Randall Rocke

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Randall,Thank you very much for your reply, I really appreciate it. Your work on the Detroit area looks great! I'd love to get my home airport included here, but let me see how Fly "flies" right out of the box first. My excitement grows - I just ordered the product online today, so I'll eagerly be expecting it's arrival soon.In the meantime, what should I start downloading? Obviously the software patches, but any other "killer, must have" add-ons that you might recommend? Thanks again, looking forward to being a new Fly!2 Pilot soon!

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Steve,I'm kind of on the run with some stuff here, so I will just "brush" on a few things:--TerraScene (obviously)--Texture Enhancer - From the author of TerraScene...it brings up all of the default Fly!II textures to a much richer color intensity (matches the color depth of TerraScenery better)--TerraModels (+TerraModels texture pack and Biberall textures)--Infometar - fantastic program for downloading metar weather and adjusting it for use in Fly! - you'll find it in the original Fly! area--C4TO v2 (Cleared 4 Takeoff) - The original add-on ATC that adds so much to IFR flight - does an outstanding job of making flight communications more realistic. There is a newer version out that works as a DLL and has new capabilities - still somewhat in the beta stage.--Flyscripts! - You'll need this to run the original C4TO, as it is a scripted program.--The wonderful modified clouds by Jure!--Numerous sky replacements that really improve on the default (skies.ini files)--VFR Ocean--Aircraft! Fantastic payware planes: Citabria from RealAir Simulations and the PMDG B757 and B777 airliners. Tremendous freeware planes from ROTW (Rest of the World): PA19, PA28, TBM700, P-51, Staggerwing!--Flight model updates from Rob Young for the 172 and Pilatus!--Tons of airport scenery (look in both the TerraModels and Scenery areas of the file library)--Taxiways and NAV updates


Randall Rocke

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Guest Eagle

Swambast, what is the name of your home airport?

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Hi Wayne!His airport is a small field: (K1D2) Mettetal (Canton/Plymouth, MI) and does not exist in the Fly! II database. I was telling Steve that I could make the airport for him and upload it as a DEX file to Avsim.I was recommending he contact you after the airport was installed. :-)(This is something I could easily make this weekend and mail to you)


Randall Rocke

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Guest Eagle

That would be good, Randall. I would then upload the entire package. Hope I can find information on the airport. Will look now.

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Wow - what a heck of a welcome here, thanks much everyone! Eagle, I greatly appreciate your offer to get Mettetal (1d2) added to the database. I would be more than happy to send you the info on it; I have a .pdf file I could email you if you would kindly provide your email address. Thanks again for your incredible welcome, and your efforts to include my home airport!Regards,Steve

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Steve,I'll add the airport (runway, lighting, beacon, etc.) to the database and send Wayne the update this weekend. Wayne has a great affinity for building airport scenery (buildings, static aircraft, taxiways, etc.) and will add those items to make it feel "more like home". Then he'll send up the whole package to Avsim.Both of us should have access to very good data for this - I've already located the geographic and technical data on the airport from Airnav. That's all I'll need to add it to the sim. Wayne will be accessing TerraServer thru the TerraModels program which will give him the layout of the airport - if for some reason the data isn't available (or for more detailed information), your material may be helpful.


Randall Rocke

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Steve & Wayne,I just took another look at the info at Airnav before leaving for work. There is some good information, but it's very sparse. The runway info is very complete as far as type, lighting, distance, width, surface, displaced threshold, etc. But, there is basically no exact geographic position data, either for the runway or the end points. There is no listing for the mag/true headings of the runway and the airport lat/lon is given as "estimated". The rest of the data is excellent.Steve, if there is any exact lat/lon info or runway bearing data in that PDF of yours it would be very helpful. Please send it to me at capvideo@columbus.rr.com . Otherwise, I'll extrapolate on the positions and bearing and then realign the airport with TerraServer before sending the file to Wayne.


Randall Rocke

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