The original textures are nice, but probably should be updated at some point.
When we do update them though, we should shoot for generic/variety in order
to give different parts of the flightgear world different looks (as best as
we can with our course land cover/land use data set.)
Here's a quick update to the yf23 fdm and auto-pilot settings. It flies and
takes-off reasonably well - still haven't tried landing it yet;) It can
still be a bit wobbly at times though and It's not very good at terrain
following either.
Taking off on auto-pilot is quite fun. Set full flaps and CTRL-a (assuming
you're near sea level), hit F6 to make it go straight and apply power - about
50% until it rotates then apply full power. Retract the gear as soon as it
gets off the ground and by the time you#ve done that, retract the flaps.
Quite entertaining from a tower view:)
It's not really an ideal a/c to model but apart from the aesthetics, which
appeal to me, I was curious about not having a rudder.
There's a new texture sheet too but it only makes the a/c a paler shade of
grey.
I've attached an update for the yf23 and I think I've included all the right
files - the model is unchanged (I think I'll eventually paint it in an
imaginary NASA scheme, perhaps a bit like the HIDEC F-15, until I can get
some newer pictures and see what they've done with it) so I've not included
it again.
The fdm still needs quite a bit of work - it can be a bit twitchy and wobbly
at times, and the auto-pilot roll-out and smooth need tightening up, but it's
flyable. Haven't tried landing it yet though;)
- HSI GS needles shouldn't disappear when they hit their limits, only when
there is no GS signal.
- Make vac/amp gauge driven by new minimalistic amp model.
- Update digital clock face color to look more "LCD-ish" based on a real
C172-S cockpit photo.
- Add an OAT gauge to the old C172 2d panel.
currently exist carried over. (Sorry for the previous screw up David, I
found a logic error in my script that prevented the carry over from not
working correctly.)
here's an update to the b52 - it's just some relatively minor changes to the
fdm and panels.
I've been trying to improve the take-off and landing characteristics, or at
least get them to fit the pictures and film I've seen.
The best way to take off is by using the autopilot - at sea level just extend
the flaps, punch in the altitude hold on the autopilot (and heading if you're
lazy), and apply full power. It'll also take of with the default the default
elevator trim of -0.07 but it 'staircases' a little bit - the auto pilot
smooths that out.
I've included some notes and observations about taking-off and landing in the
readme.
While I wouldn't claim any sort of accuracy for it, I hope it manages to get
some of the characteristics right.
much what i've seen p-51d's do. Be careful of spins.
Added vstab incidence (real ones have it) thus improving takeoff behavior.
Reduced turbo-mul to what it probably should be.
Returned wing camber to Andy's estimate.
Increased flap drag. And tried making adjustments to get the thing to not
glide so impossibly far.
Corrected empty + pilot aircraft mass to 7190.
Upped "cruise speed" to maximum operational speed of 380 knots.
Reduced prop pitch at cruise to 0.8 (3000 rpm is only for takeoff).
Changed camber to 0.01 (found reference that said 1%)
Decreased tail surface effectiveness slightly just to get better numbers.
Changed turbo-mult to 2.5 and wastegate-mp to 30
Changes:
Fit the solver to the known stall speed instead of an abstract
approach configuration. That is, specify stall AoA and speed as
"approach" values. At approach weight (20% fuel) I can now just
barely hold the aircraft in the air without losing it at 87 kias.
Note that the IAS guage seems to have a slight calibration error, it
was reading something that looked more like 95 knots; I got the real
value out of the property browser.
Change the sign of the incidence value for the wing. It specifies a
rotation about the axis pointing out the left wing, so positive values
are "nose down".
Increase the "effectiveness" of the tail surfaces quite a bit.
Smaller surfaces do actually need higher values. YASim scales surface
force coefficients with their areas, which is correct within a single
wing. But between wing-like devides, generated forces kinda/sorta
scale linearly with their spans. This is particularly important for
tail draggers, since YASim's lack of prop wash modelling needs to be
offset by extra elevator authority.
Add a camber value to the wing. Most wing airfoils are asymmetric,
and produce non-zero lift at zero AoA. I picked 0.1 (10% of stall
lift at zero alpha) as a reasonable guess. If someone has airfoil
data for the Mustang we could look this up exactly. This was the
biggest change, which allows the cruise AoA to be much lower than
approach or stall.
Reduced the compression value for the tail wheel to 20cm. These
things are very stiff; they "compress" only as much as the tires do.
Even 0.2 is too much motion, but the numerics tend to go wacky when
you give them very high spring coefficients. This helped the ground
handling a little bit.
Removed the extra damping from the main gear. My impression of tail
draggers is that they tend to have "squishy" main gear. Again, this
(subjectively) seemed to improve ground handling to me. I also tried
reducing the spring constants to 0.5, but that ended up being too
squishy -- you could see the ship (stopped on the ground) bank to the
left by 2-3° when you pushed the throttle forward.
Ground handling is still pretty difficult; I get the best results by
holding the tail down until 90 knots or so and then very gently
lowering the stick. The aircraft bobs once or twice and then lifts
off. I don't think this is proper procedure, though.
Andy
