FSX/FSX-SE Aircraft and Panel Design Forum - How To

I've been playing around with the FSX SDK plugins for 3DS MAX in hopes of creating my own FSX aircraft. I'm at a point with my project where I'd like to have the control surfaces animate. One of the MAX plugins is called FSX Animation Tool & seems to be the tool to use. Unfortunately the supplied documentation is quite lacking to say the least (don't get me started on what's completely misleading about it also).Anyway I was hoping someone might offer some tips on how to use the FSX Animation Tool. For now I'd be happy knowing what to do to setup the basics like ailerons, rudder, elevator & maybe gear animation? My aircraft model has separate parts for each of thes…

I have created a dll app in C# and wanted to import it into C++ to create a gauge with FSX.Can or has this be done? I am newbee when it comes to C++ and creating gauges.Reed

New to this stuff so please bare with my ignorance...I'm working on a test FSX aircraft as a learning experience. Having no clue how to start an aircraft project from scratch, I copied the FSX Cessna's folder, renamed it & have been modifying things here & there.I replaced the Cessna's MDL file with one I created in 3DS MAX. Everything was going fine until I came to animating the gear. As the Cessna has fixed gear, my new animated gear will not retract. I know I have the MDL set up more or less correct. My MDL's gear retracts fine when I use it with a default FSX aircraft that has retractable gear. But pressing "G" does nothing when I run it with the Cessna's file…

Hello All, I have the F16 by Kirk Olsson that has the Radar Gauge in the panel by Eric Marciano and it works fine tracking the Ai in FS2004, i have the Harrier package by Iris/DSB and would like to have the gauge working in this aircraft. I have installed the gauge and switches into the Harrier panel ok but i can't get the Ai to show on it, i think i'm right that it works using the FSUIPC and that you don't need a registered copy and one thats 2.8 or above, i have the latest one but i still get a error message telling me i'm using a program that is not accredited for access to an unregistered copy of FSUIPC, Any help would be appreciated , …

Hi all,I did post this a couple of days ago, but it didn't show up anywhere so I give it another try:I'm working on a panel for an Avro York and for the autopilot heading setting I need to use a left-mid-right switch, insted of the rotating headingknob.I'm modifying the default DC3 Autopilot xml-coding and thought that I can just use a simple L: or G:variable statement to achive this.But my logic derailed somewhere, obviously, as it does not work, the Headingbug is moving OK, and the switchlever is visible in its mid-state but refuses to move.Where do I go wrong?And now I'm desperat for some advice,my coding is like this:(L:DEC,bool)(L:INC,bool)(>K:HEADING_BUG_DEC) (L:…

I had a thought while I was at work... perhaps we can create a resource for all of us and do it the easy way. There are many constructs that a lot of us struggle with and by that I mean that we can't get things put together solidly enough to even start to play with them and experiment. I hope that this thread will eventually become a sticky and be a resource for the syntax of various constructs, in each different kind of situation.One rule: To ask for something, you have to offer something... a tip, an example syntax, an explanation of why something works the way it does... anything. Offer something you know and then ask for something you'd like someone else to explain. I…

HelloTo check the status we look at the A:Var, to set it we use a K:VarK:AP_MASTER and A:AUTOPILOT MASTER for instance.What are the A:Vars for the following two?K:AUTOPILOT_OFFK:AUTOPILOT_ONThanksRoelof

Could I request an addon for and aircraft that I own in real life? I would be very greatful if you could copy the exact things on my aircraft, that would be super fun to fly my plane in the simulator.I want it made in Flight Simulator X please.The aircraft is a Stinson Voyager, tail number is N6725M. It has TUNDRA tires on it as well. I have a bunch of pictures so you can copy the paint and cockpit, oh yeah, did I mention the cockpit? Hehe, also could you create a cockpit? All the Stinson Voyagers I've seen out there have VERY low quality cockpits and that upsets me, and they are all for FS2004. Thats my minimum requirements, plane with tailnumber and paint and tundra tir…

Just found this Aircraft panel over 2 monitors.http://download.down-under.ws/FS9_Fs2004_E...wo_Monitors.zipTas

Test Post - Please disregard.Moderator, please delete this post.

Hi all,When I started testing my gauges in FSX a few weeks ago, I quickly ran into all kinds of strange problems after resizing the FSX window, or hiding and resizing panels. The most troubeling problem I ran into was that my exported variables where destroyed when I resized the window! It became apparent quite quickly that the sequence of events that take place whilst running FSX is different from the sequence in FS2004. This lead to my gauges destroying variables at resize in stead of while unloading the gauges. I decided to map all the FSX events as they occur in sequence, and this are the results of this mapping exercise. I hope this will help other panel developers.T…

Has anyone found the XML A:Var for the fuel dump in FSX?ThanksMitch

Ok, I searched everywhere and tried everythig I could think of - I refuse to believe that there is no variable (parameter) that would give me current Helicopter collective value - a percent of it, or the lever position, or anything!The funny thing is - it is possible to SET the collective (in the default R22, you can set it through PROP_PITCH_SET, by calling PROP_PITCH_INCR/DECR event, but there is no value that gives the current position of the collective. I tried:(A:PROP(1) BETA,degree)(A:GENERAL ENG(1) PROPELLER LEVER POSITION,percent)but none of these yield anything. Any ideas, anyone?(I tried hovercontrol already... the XML discussion is not as "lively" as here...)

Hi all d 9 != * 1 + (>L:EICAS pages, number) scrolls pages to 9 then back to 1. How do you reverse it, so start at 9 or below and scroll through to 1 then back to 9.

Hi all,there is one thing I don't quite understand with FSX's new default XML gauges... First of all, I am no XML gauge designer, but I am still curious about this for a certain reason (see below).Opening up any of these CABs you will find a bunch of bitmaps inside, and many of them with a _night.bmp suffix. But inside the actual XML files I was not able to find any kind of reference to these bitmaps, but they do still work once you activate panel lighting.Basically, the only reason why this bothers me is that I was trying to rewrite certain gauges (in C++) but I just have no clue how to find out if the night bitmaps are loaded or not (that is if panel lights are active o…

We are a new VA just in the early steps of opening on vatsim we have the website done FSACARS and somemore but we are strantded with no fleet this is as we are a VA that is not existant in the real world so we are look for someone who is able to repaint have and have a try at it for us This is greatly appricated Thanks Chris Evans The Website is http://powerjet.co.nr and the image is on the top left corner of the site, if you are able to do this then please add me on msn [email protected] reply to this thread or email me at the same adress

Can some expert in gauge programming modify the XML radar gauge in FSX so that the radar screen will show the taxiways as well as the runways? I love to use the Control Tower but miss the taxiway display so you could watch the radar and see the aircraft on the taxiways too. Thanks, best regards, Bob.

This is probably not even worth posting, but is it possible that default aircraft could have bugs? {insert sarcasm here} I noticed that the Default Robinson R22 Helicopter has a "Strobe" switch which does not do anything. The aircraft does have a beacon, but no switch for it. The only way to activate the beacon is to use "L" keystroke that turns all the lights on. The MS designer probably misnamed the switch and forgot to put the right variable in. This is easily fixed by modifying either the XML code of the switch (that turns it into a beacon) or the aircraft.cfg file, which would set it to strobe.Sorry if this is old news :)

Are there any FSX type panel toggle button gauges that when pushed will select Panels 1 through 6. I have some toggles that will select panels by ident, like 10001, but that requires renaming the panel idents, which I don't want to do. Thanks, regards, Bob.

Hi,I'm using an old hack from the fs9 aircraft.cfg for the FSX Baron58 (Analog) to turbocharge the engine and to rotate the left (#1) prop CCW. All the edits seem to have carried over well except one of the added lines in the propeller section (rotation = -1,1) no longer works. When active in FSX, this line cause the the left prop to spin very very slowly, as viewed from outside the aircraft, regardless of throttle or prop-pitch settings. I thoroughly checked the "Propeller" section of the FSX SDK and there's no mention of the "rotation" variable at all. It makes me wonder if this was a sanctioned variable to begin-with in FS9. Do you think Aces took it out to accomi…

I really wanted to think of a really sarcastic title for this message but ah well......So Microsoft give us the ADF2 we've wanted for so long and then prevent us from using it by forgetting to supply us with the gauge token to read the value. The workround is to set ADF2 to a fixed value every time the aircraft starts up because then you have a known value to track.I've also only just noticed that all of the XML gauge tokens are missing from the gauges.h file too. I can't find them anywhere else in the SDK - and I've only just had an eyetest so I don't think I need glasses - but maybe, just maybe, I've overlooked them. Can anyone point me in the right direction or do I …

I'm just at the tidying-up stage of a new sound gauge for FS9/FSX when I realise that what's good for me isn't good for the rest of you... i.e I've been playing sound files by referring to them as a number read from a list and not as a string. Looking down through the fsxgauges.h files, I seeregister_variable_by_name(PCSTRINGZ)which looks like it sorts the problem. Well, that problem anyway. Maybe. :). The follow-up problem is that if I register a string variable to carry the soundfile name, how do I read it at the other end?get_variable_by_nameby any chance? Anyone got any ideas....? samples....?-Dai

I notice that the B744 of Ifly has lack of engine power when using real living perfomance tabels in Project Magenta from FL250 on.Where can I find the parameters to increase the power of the engines. I suppose I have to do it in the ircraft.cfg, but I don't know which item ? Many thanks Michel

I've just uploaded a new gauges.h file for FSX (fsxgauges.h - filename fsxgauges.zip - ach! I've just realised what a stupid name that is!). It contains the usual bucketload of corrections and backwards-compatibility code. There's a whole load of new stuff in it compared to fs9gauges.h and I'm not even going to attempt to list it. I've marked all my additions as//***************************//Dragonflight Design change//***************************and//***************************//End change//***************************but I confess I didn't mark all of the aliases added into the gauges token list.Any problems please let me know; I've just compiled my current project with …

Hi all,Have you noticed that changeable tail numbers (NNUMBERS) are not visible in planes imported from FS9?Neither in models made with FSDS3 are, using decal_nnumber.bmp for textures etc...(I don't know if the same happens using Gmax).Anyone know how to fix it?Thanks