After Hours – Australian Scenery for MFS4

The discs arrived a few days later, along with some photographs of the various locations. Installation instructions are scant, and it pays to print out the “RHOV2. DOC” file which has comprehensive instructions and suggestions. You can type this file from DOS, or send it to the screen with a “TYPE README. DOC IMORE” command, but I used the lazy way by reading it into WordPerfect, then printing it out from there. Sean and Paul say the size of their market does not allow them to run to fancy brochures, so you get minimal but adequate documentation.

Before you can use this scenery, you must have a copy of Microsoft Aircraft and Scenery Designer (ASD). This product retails for about $60, and allows you to design some fancy aircraft” and scenery. In the USA, Microsoft Flight Simulator has a large following, and there are many such “add in” products to enhance the core capabilities of the simulator. The Aircraft and Scenery Designer is simple. From the disc prompt containing the ASD floppy, execute the command: “INSTALL C:\FLTSIM4” where the “C:\FLTSIM4” argument is the disc and directory where you have installed the MFS4 simulator.

Loading the scenery is almost as simple. Using the floppy disc supplied by RHOV2, you execute: “GOC C:\FLTSIM4”, where the “C” in “GOC” is the letter of the hard disc drive and the remainder of the argument the full path of the location of the simulator as before. Seancautions thatyou shouldremove all files in the simulator directory with an “SCI” extension before installing RHOV2 scenery, or you may experience unpredictable results with scenery mixing from different areas. You can leave the “SEATTLE. SC1” file that comes with ASD as this scenery is compatible with the Australian scenery. This scenery mixing will only be a problem if you have previously installed other scenery products.

In an earlier version, you had to set up the memory parameters for scenery from inside the MFS4 programme. Now the installation programme does it for you, although its was not a complicated procedure.

To get the headings accurate, MFS4 needs to start at Seattle. Sean says that the MFS4 world is flat, and needs to have a Northern Hemisphere starting point. YOu ;,dect “Boeing Field Runway 13R” as the airfield to depart from, and use the MFS4 menus to save this as the start-up mode. After the programme loads forthefirsttime,youselectanothermode, sayBankstown, and the aircraft you wish to fly if it is different from the Cessna 182 that comes with theBankstown location. The MFS4 documentation covers this process in full detail, but you need to know that it is a requirement to start at Seattle.

All this sounds a bit techo, but it takes only 10 minutes or so of careful work, and I had no glitches. I was keen to see if it has all worked and was somewhat apprehensive as I selected a Cessna 182 from Bankstown for the trial flight. However, the sight fromthe threshold ofrunway llC atBankstownwasvery pleasing.

Takeoff was normal and I decided to fly over to Sydney KSA and try an approach on runway 16 (one six). To orient myself, I turned on the map and scaled it to get a view ofBotanyBay. My’486 is fairly swift, but it choked a little with the map turned on. There is so much detail in the scenery that it takes a lot of CPU cycles to draw the map as well as the cockpit view. My advice is to fly with the map off and just peek occasionally. In this configuration, the programme has a useable screen refresh rate, even if a little slow in comparison with some of the newersimulations. A 33MHz’386istheslowestrecommended computer for this product and a ‘486 is much better.

Although it is over 20 years ago since I last flew into runway 16 at Sydney, looking out of the front of an aircraft, the view was immediately familiar. All the navigation aids worked, including the marker beacon. I liked the use ofstrobes to guide you to the centreline which is a development at Sydney in recent years, accurately represented by the scenery.

After a touch and go, I turned left for a cruise up the harbour, grateful for not having to pay the $250 landing fee. Most of Sydney’s icons are present, including the tower, the Opera House and the bridge. Temptation – can you fly under the bridge and get away with it? Diving down to 50 feet, I easily made it then turned across Sydney and back toBankstown for a few more circuits. The only thing I missed was the usual swarm of traffic on finals.

Being resident in Canberra, I thought I would try a night flight starting from runway 35. I selected an F-20fighter, which is a re-engined version of the popular F-5 “Freedom Fighter”. Takeoff was followed by a low altitude slow roll, then a turn downwind over Canberra’s northern suburbs. The night lights are quite spectacular. Flying south to left base, the sun “rose” at 0530, as summer had been set as the season. This sunrise instantly changed the colouring of the scenery, with fields and suburbs being shown quite clearly and accurately. The F-20 Tigershark flew very responsively and I managed a smooth touchdown at 130 knots.

Aftertaxying around to look at the detailed ground scenery, I rolled back to runway 35 and took off again. This time I took the sceniccityflight, looking closely atthecitycentre, Telecom Tower and Parliament House. Is that a flag I see? Is it waving? I flew close to the Parliament House flagpole and to my considerable surprise, found thatthere is indeed a waving flag, complete with Union Jack and Stars. Sean has sworn me to silence on his first design for the flag!

The F-20 was successfully landed, and for a complete contrast, I swapped the fighter for a 7 47-400. I must confess having always been keen to see what it would be like to fly a 250 tonne aircraft. While I have flown most things from parachutes to fighters, I have often wondered about the effects of inertia in these large aircraft. Seantellsme that his acceleration, roll and pitch rates are realistic, and much closer than the 7 4 7 supplied with the ASD which he says is “unflyable”.

Starting again at runway 35, the first impression was of a considerably greater cockpit height off the ground. A full power takeoff was a bit of a guess, but I rotated without incident at 130 ! mots with 2000 feet to run. The 7 4 7 has a “glass” cockpit which is most impressive, containing a comprehensive flight director and a moving ground map. The map slowed the frame rate down considerably, so I switched it off with a SHIFr+SPACEBAR combination. This leavesa radio magnetic indicator which is quite adequate for orientation after you get used to it. Taking care of my passengers, I moved the controls languidly a bit ahead of where I wanted the aircraft to be to keep the flight smooth and controlled. Overall, I found the beast easy to fly.

After taking the Boeing 747 a bit further downwind than usual, I turned base and intercepted the ILS. I remembered to round out slightly higher than normal and with 130 !mots over the fence, stopped on the runway with about 1000 feet to go. So why do they pay Qantas captains so much, if it is this simple? (Only joking!)

The detail in the scenery is impressive, so I rang Sean up to ask him how he assembles it. I had purchased my own copy of ASD to test the scenery, but I was interested to see if he had any additional tricks. He was a bit cagey about someof the “clever” tools he uses as he has an internationally competitive product and wants to keep it that way. He was however expansive on the general method. After selecting a reference point, he forms a grid from the locations of key navigation aids, usually VOR stations. He then slews the flight simulator to a ! mown point referencedfrom these grid points, then “drops in” the appropriate scenery object.

Some aspects of scenery require special tricks for them to display correctly. MFS4 decides when it will render an object on the screen, and this can cause problems. For example, taking off towards the coast from Tullamarine and Essendon, the water of Port Phillip Bay did not display at the correct time, giving the impression you are flying over land. Sean uses proprietary techniques to force the scenery to come up to display it so that it looks correct from the cockpit.

Night scenes are very impressive. I particularly liked the rendering of airfield lighting. Again, Sean and Paul have gone back to the source, and use a CAA document “Rules and Practices Aerodromes”, that defines the lighting standards. They use these standards to set up a night airfield so that it looks just right. Night VFR will never be the same.

Sean and Paul have spent literally thousands of hours creating this product. Since they are both pilots, they have included objects and presentations that look convincing from the air. I especially liked the aircraft they had created with ASD, as each bird flew very accurately, representing its type well. All sorts of source documents are used, including WACs, ONCs, TPCs, road maps, VTCs, airfield charts – in fact anything that is an authoritative reference.

Overall, this is a quality product, and full marks must go to Sean and Paul for creating it. Having such an excellent product assembled in Australia is a credit to these pilots, who have completed the work in their spare time. At $99 for the Sydney to Melbourne scenery, it is clear that it is a labour of love – if they recovered their costs and a fair profit, this scenery would cost hundreds of dollars per copy.

There are more products in the wind. They are currently working on the Sydney to Brisbane scenery, and then Melbourne to Adelaide. After that, they hope to complete outback NSW. There are also add-ins to TRACON II which is an air traffic control simulation. If you are keen enough, one person can fly the aircraft and another control it, with communications via a modem. Other products provide support for a Soundblaster card. A human voice reads the ATIS to provide the set or default wind when COM! is set to the correct frequency. This product also gives the runway directions, NAV and COM frequency for a selected airfield on the press of a combination of keys.

As you can tell, I was very impressed with the quality of this all Australian product. The designers can never hope to recover their costs in such a small market as Australia, so if you are attracted to making your flying realistic and in Australia, I recommend you support them and purchase this scenery from: RHOV2 PO Box 7, Emu Plains 2750. They can also be contacted by telephone: Sean Trestrail (047) 398 689 Paul Thurston (02) 624 1259. Tell them you read about it in AA.