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Post by alaskanflyboy on Oct 31, 2018 4:45:03 GMT -5
With my entire adult life working in various sectors of the US aviation industry, I'm constantly thinking of real-world operations and ways they might be implemented. Rather than tagging on to other threads, I've decided to create a single thread where I can post things as they strike me. I will be creating eat idea as a separate post, which I expect will make them easier to address individually with the quote function.
For a little background. I started simming when I was about 5 with the original Microsoft Flight Simulator on a 286MHz IBM-compatible computer. Ah, 1988. I played the hell out of it. I never successfully landed until I was about 12 and playing FS 95 on a much more powerful Pentium. Since skipping from the original MS FS to FS95; I've gone through FS98, Fly!, FlyII!, FS2004, and FSX (which I never got to run right and went back to FS2004). This love of flight sim actually spurred my knowledge with PCs and inspired me to join classes in high school based on computer hardware and programming.
My real-world experience started in the summer of 2000 when I started working on a private pilot certificate. It was summer vacation between my sophomore and junior year of high school. I managed 16 hours in Cessna 150/152s — confusingly N994JP and N994PJ, respectively — before 9/11 put a several-month-long hiatus on my efforts. By the end of it, I'd already decided on pursuing the college route for a commercial pilot certificate so I sat it out until I could get into classes in 2003 at the local community college that luckily was a satellite school for UND. In the next year and a half, I accumulated another 140 hours before running out of money — a sadly common story in this industry. From there, I worked 4 and a half years as a contract air cargo ramper for a well-known carrier that happens to be known for being brown. During that time I also occasionally threw bags for local sports charters (It was KGEG; so Spokane Shock, Gonzaga University, Whitworth University, Eastern Washington University, and any teams playing them). Toward the end, I also did a very short stint concurrently as a commercial fueler for the FBO worked for that held the UPS and sports charter gigs.
In 2012, I moved to Wisconsin with the wonderful woman who would become my wife. I ended up working line service for an FBO at KUES (Waukesha). It was a mix of aircraft fueling, aircraft towing, valet, concierge, shuttle driver, playing Tetris in the hangars, caterer, etc. I eventually left that "thrilling" life to pursue my A&P certificate, which I got my Airframe in February and my Powerplant in May of this year.
Out of all this history comes my grand ideas that keep popping up as I play with flight sims and FS captain.
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Post by peter on Oct 31, 2018 17:53:59 GMT -5
Hi Alaskanflyboy, I started simming at about the same time as you, except I was quite a bit past my pre-teen years when I began Sounds like you have all ingredients together for great enhancement ideas. Just fire away Cheers, Peter
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Post by alaskanflyboy on Nov 7, 2018 2:54:27 GMT -5
For lack of a better term, I'm going to call this one Advanced Hold-Over Times. In reality, there are different brands of de-ice and anti-ice fluids that have differing hold-over times. In modeling the current HOT.cfg, I imagine you likely saw the FAA guide listing them all. If not, the 2018-2019 publication is here. It would be interesting to allow for different airports — and perhaps eventually different servicers (FBOs, airline ramps, etc) — to use the different brands. I expect more hardcore users to enjoy this as it would require a closer review of HOT tables. I see this being implemented as a restructuring of the current HOT.cfg to accommodate multiple products and dilutions. Airport specific changes could be part of the deice.cfg and ramp-specific difference could be added through the DDF.cfg.
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Post by peter on Nov 7, 2018 5:22:25 GMT -5
Hi John,
Travis will correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that the current HOT is determined as the minimum of de-icing fluids that are applied. Would you like to model that one has to return to the stand to only get one fluid re-applied then? The idea of different FBO fluids is very interesting, in particular for economic aspects.
Cheers, Peter
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Post by alaskanflyboy on Nov 7, 2018 11:04:33 GMT -5
Hi John, Travis will correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that the current HOT is determined as the minimum of de-icing fluids that are applied. Would you like to model that one has to return to the stand to only get one fluid re-applied then? The idea of different FBO fluids is very interesting, in particular for economic aspects. Cheers, Peter Unless just Type I was applied, it's usual to reapply both after the HOT expires. Type I is considered a de-icer and applied hot (most have it heated around 180°F) while the others are considered anti-ice. Type I followed by Type IV is common in the US for aircraft that exceed 100 knots on take-off roll. Smaller aircraft typically just get Type I which has a very limited HOT. Type III is available for most small aircraft to use, but its availability is rare in the US since most small aircraft lack FIKI (Flight Into Known Icing certification). Also, the service costs more than most small aircraft owners and operators like to spend, and the fluids have shelf-lives around 3 years. It's usually better to just hangar small aircraft for that reason. We charged around $15 per gallon for Type I and $25 per gallon for Type IV when I was working line. 15-20 gallons is typical for most aircraft the size of a citation. A Baron or Bonanza might have de-icer boots or hot wings, but they don't like spending several hundred dollars to get sprayed off. HOT times are typically the maximum time allowed between the start of the last application and the take-off. So if the typical routine of Type I and Type IV is applied, the HOT starts the second they begin spraying the Type IV. Once that happens, the HOT for Type I is no longer considered as it's considered washed by the Type IV. This is where different brands come in to play. If I'm being sprayed with Kilfrost ABC-S Plus and it's lightly snowing at 26°F, I have a HOT of 3:00. If instead Inland Technologies Eco-Shield was applied in the same conditions, I have a HOT of 2:05 - 2:30. Both are Type IV fluids.
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Post by Travis on Nov 13, 2018 13:44:25 GMT -5
Hi John, Thank you so much for your effort! We would welcome any and all ideas that we could turn into "simple behavior models" to be coded! I have only a short time left to write now - the lunch bell just rang out - but I will respond in full later. The original HOT table came from the 2013-2014 FAA tables (and possibly cross-checked with data from Transport Canada). They included "Brands" but they also included "Generic (SAE)" values which we took for our ACME Brand Fluids. The HOT table itself could not support multiple brands, but I've had a set of ideas on notepaper which I could check with when I return home (before Thanksgiving). Regards,
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Post by alaskanflyboy on Nov 29, 2018 2:30:57 GMT -5
A thought struck me while reading in another thread about airline timetables. Currently, it appears that FSC just allows for one airline schedule per airline. Some airlines have differing timetables based on seasons, often just a Winter and a Summer schedule. I can see this being done with a slight modification to either the <airline>.cfg as a set of parameters (e.g. SCHEDULE1= <file>,<start date>,<end date>); or <airline>_schedule.txt as a header with a date range. With a header in the <airline>_schedule.txt, I suspect you would have to have the program scan the headers of all the airline files then read the one that applied to the current date of flight.
A feature like this would be useful to Captains flying either real-world airlines with such schedules, or VA's that have such schedules. It would allow for schedules to be published in advance that can automatically go into effect at their proper times.
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Post by Travis on Dec 1, 2018 18:14:51 GMT -5
What if we required a "default schedule" to be required for each airline (such as ACME_schedule.txt)... but allowed for separate schedules that operate on either a Day-Of-Year (DOY-DOY) or a Month-To-Month (MON-MON) basis?
So an ACME_schedule.txt file would be in operation year round. However an ACME_schedule_6_8.txt file might represent ACME in June-to-August timeframe... or an ACME_schedule_152_243.txt file might represent ACME from June 1 to August 31 (on a non-leap year).
We could just as easily allow for filenames such as ACME_schedule_244_151.txt which would start on Day of Year 244 (Sept 1), and last until Day of [Next] Year 151 (May 31) for an inverse schedule....
A DOY schedule would also easily allow for "holiday schedules" or "sporting-event schedules" around certain fixed days....
Best,
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Post by alaskanflyboy on Jun 5, 2021 11:19:05 GMT -5
What if we required a "default schedule" to be required for each airline (such as ACME_schedule.txt)... but allowed for separate schedules that operate on either a Day-Of-Year (DOY-DOY) or a Month-To-Month (MON-MON) basis? So an ACME_schedule.txt file would be in operation year round. However an ACME_schedule_6_8.txt file might represent ACME in June-to-August timeframe... or an ACME_schedule_152_243.txt file might represent ACME from June 1 to August 31 (on a non-leap year). We could just as easily allow for filenames such as ACME_schedule_244_151.txt which would start on Day of Year 244 (Sept 1), and last until Day of [Next] Year 151 (May 31) for an inverse schedule.... A DOY schedule would also easily allow for "holiday schedules" or "sporting-event schedules" around certain fixed days.... Best, I don't know why I never got back to this one. To avoid errors, I believe a default schedule would be a given. And the more I think about this, I believe having the different schedules called in the airline.cfg (such as SCHEDULE1= <file>,<start date>,<end date>) would keep the data the cleanest and provide the most flexibility since the schedule could be named <airline>_schedule_<description>.cfg and be retrieved. Then it wouldn't matter much what the schedules were named. A VA could distribute "2021" as easily as "Summer" or "Winter 2021/2022", or even "Ski Season" if they desired. The schedule editor within the admin window would then just need a name, start date, and end date field. Programming wise, I'm not sure how easy the date portion would be since it would have to handle a range of date types I imagine (either a recurring schedule based just on month and day; or a hard stop with a month, day, and year.)
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Post by Travis on Jun 6, 2021 14:03:46 GMT -5
John,
I know what you're saying there and that works for me.
I do need to revisit this musty thread after Beta 1 so I can get a handle on everything.
I would admit that it would be better if AI traffic could be modified in certain measures like this.
My ideal change would be that FSCaptain flights - as well as AI traffic - to the KLAX area increased the week before and after the Oscars. Or to the KDAB area the week before and after the Daytona 500. Etc.
Best,
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Post by alaskanflyboy on Jun 26, 2021 11:56:36 GMT -5
After doing a multi-sector day this past Sunday, I found myself wishing FSCaptain were capable of multiple commitments to the same airport for pre-planning purposes. I was able to pre-plan all the flights days ahead except one that used the same airport. Would it be possible in a future release to have multiple releases for the same airport so long as their flight blocks did not overlap? In this instance I had the following flights set up in PFPX using FS Captain passenger and cargo numbers: PAIRING DEP/ARR EQP SKDBLK TTLBLK 1721 ABQPHX 1300/1415 738 01:15 01:15 1730 PHXDEN 1500/1700 738 02:00 03:15 1731 DENPHX 1745/1945 738 02:00 05:15 1834 PHXONT 2100/2215 738 01:15 06:30 1835 ONTPHX 2300/0015 738 01:15 07:45 TTLBLK 07:45As you can guess. The only one I couldn't pre-plan until shortly before the flight was PHX-ONT since I already had the PHX-DEN flight committed. Given that FS Captain recognizes the sim time and won't let you load a given flight until you're within the specified window, I believe it could be worked to have two or more flights departing the same airport to occur and FSCaptain will recognize the next flight with the scheduled departure time closest to current sim time. This could allow even for multi-day pre-planning — not that I imagine myself doing one in the near future as it was hard enough to get the dear wife to ok me simulating an airline pilot's entire day! To recap, I found myself wishing I could pre-plan both the PHX-DEN and PHX-ONT flights days ahead so that each leg was mostly plug-and-play the day of flight. Since their departure times are 6 hours apart, it shouldn't be confusing to the system to identify which is the active plan at login. Otherwise I had a great, but fatiguing, time last weekend with only a minor flameout in moderate turbulence coming into Phoenix over the mountains. I was impressed to not have any software glitches in P3D, Activesky, GSX, SimACARS, FSCaptain, vPilot, the PMDG NGX (which two flights before this event CTD on me when I attempted to enter a revised route ), UGCX, or the REX Skyforce and Environment Force programs.
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Post by Travis on Jun 27, 2021 18:21:46 GMT -5
Hi John,
I'll give this a whirl and see what happens. As you've figured out, you can't have more than one departure from an airport with a similar class of aircraft. That's the holdup here.
However I've forced the Admin to allow me to do just that, and after dinner tonight I will spawn 35 minutes before my "first flight" and see what happens. I'll then time-shift to midway between the two departure times to see what happens.
I suspect both attempts will choose the "first flight", only the second attempt would have me as very late.
Best,
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Post by Travis on Jun 27, 2021 18:39:42 GMT -5
Otherwise I had a great, but fatiguing, time last weekend with only a minor flameout in moderate turbulence coming into Phoenix over the mountains. I was impressed to not have any software glitches in P3D, Activesky, GSX, SimACARS, FSCaptain, vPilot, the PMDG NGX (which two flights before this event CTD on me when I attempted to enter a revised route ), UGCX, or the REX Skyforce and Environment Force programs. That is an impressive orchestral coming together of various add-ons! (Hat tip to your wife for graciously permitting you the time.) I'm most curious on how you use ActiveSky and the REX "Forces" together. I have ActiveSky as my WX program, but I use REX Texture Direct, Soft Clouds, and Airport Textures. So for me they work together.... REX draws/paints what ActiveSky says should be there.I don't fly multi-leg enough (although I'd like to) but when I do, the only problems I sometimes have is with my ISG gauges and my Multi Crew Experience. From time to time, one or the other want to be cranky in trying to properly reinitialize and switch to a second flight, but I've paused my simulator and been patient long enough to clear things out and restart things so everything works most of the time. (Just not all of the time though, dadgummit.) Best,
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Post by Travis on Jun 27, 2021 22:49:30 GMT -5
However I've forced the Admin to allow me to do just that, and after dinner tonight I will spawn 35 minutes before my "first flight" and see what happens. I'll then time-shift to midway between the two departure times to see what happens. Eeek... I was just informed by Home Control that other actions must take precedence. Testing will occur on my morrow.... Best,
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Post by Travis on Jun 29, 2021 0:03:51 GMT -5
Last night had no cool-down, so work today was on a limited schedule. I really don't fare well following hot nights.
Initial testing looked good, enough so that I expanded work and the Admin portion appears to be nearly done. (Famous Last Words....)
More limited testing tomorrow... hopefully in the FCDU!
Best,
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