New .air file sections

[Big_Stick]

Anyone notice the new .air file sections? Any ideas on what they do? F/A-18 has a couple.

[sparks]

No, I hadn't noticed those two. Thanks.

Section 1549 is a new table format that's hard to interpret with AirEd. It contains one 32-bit floating point number, followed by a 3 column by 4 row table of 64-bit floating point numbers. Here's the actual data:

0.300000
columns: 3 rows: 4
0.000000 0.800000 1.050000
40.000000 0.550000 0.800000
65.000000 0.620000 0.850000
96.000000 0.700000 0.900000

I don't know what this table does yet.

Section 154A is a table of 17 pairs of 64-bit floating point numbers. This is the exact same format as section 401, CL vs mach. I've dumped and plotted the data in section 154A, and judging by the shape of the curve and the fact that 430 is all zero's, my guess is it's CD vs mach. Should be very easy to test this one.

[sparks]

Here's the best I can do for AirEd.ini updates:

1549=Unknown,record
154a=Mach Drag?,tbldb

[1549]
1=00,int32,float0
2=04,int32,rows
3=08,int32,columns
4=0c,double,d0
5=14,double,d1
6=1c,double,d2
7=24,double,d3
8=2c,double,d4
9=34,double,d5
10=3c,double,d6
11=44,double,d7
12=4c,double,d8
13=54,double,d9
14=5c,double,d10
15=64,double,d11

A new version of AirUpdate that will be able to handle these new sections should be availabe 'soon'. (At least the dump feature is working.)

[Shane Olguin]

It would be very nice if M$ came up with a CD vs. Mach table where the mach number is scaleable as in table 401. Is that a possibility with the new table?

[Big_Stick]

It would be very nice if M$ came up with a CD vs. Mach table where the mach number is scaleable as in table 401. Is that a possibility with the new table?

If that isn't a Mach drag curve I don't know what is. The smoking gun is the absence of Table 430 from the F/A-18, and the presence of this new Table 154a. Finally they give us what we wanted, and separate superchargers and turbochargers with water injection, too. Well, finally we have some new stuff to figure out. Anyone played around with the relationship between the turbocharger and supercharger, and the water injection, yet? Quite a few parameters in there to toy with. Is each ADI section for all engines, or does each engine require a separate ADI section, I wonder?

Yes, the new table is fully scalable in both axes.

[sparks]

Anyone played around with the relationship between the turbocharger and supercharger, and the water injection, yet?

Yes, and the next version of AirWrench will support these new systems.

Each engine requires a separate ADI section, and the same goes for the Nitrous section. Besides preventing or decreasing 'damage' at high manifold pressure, the water tanks in ADI sections also affect the balance.

There are some new gauge tokens in the FSX panels SDK to go with 'detonation' and 'engine health', but in testing they all seem to report failures after the fact when the power has already been lost rather than while power is being lost.

To the first order, there isn't a whole lot of difference between the new supercharger option and a turbocharger with the critical altitude set to zero. The nitrous system is a lot like the old WEP system, where you push a button, and the manifold pressure increases by a factor determined by mp_boost.

I haven't had this much to figure out since CFS1. :d

[Henry]

Well it certainly looks like a step in the right direction:applause:
im glad you fellas know what you are doing:ernae:
H

[sparks]

AirUpdate and my version of aired.ini have been updated for the new air file sections (1549 & 154A). Both updates are in the AirUpdate download at the mudpond:

http://www.mudpond.org/AirDat.ZIP

[Big_Stick]

Yes, and the next version of AirWrench will support these new systems.

Each engine requires a separate ADI section, and the same goes for the Nitrous section. Besides preventing or decreasing 'damage' at high manifold pressure, the water tanks in ADI sections also affect the balance.

There are some new gauge tokens in the FSX panels SDK to go with 'detonation' and 'engine health', but in testing they all seem to report failures after the fact when the power has already been lost rather than while power is being lost.

To the first order, there isn't a whole lot of difference between the new supercharger option and a turbocharger with the critical altitude set to zero. The nitrous system is a lot like the old WEP system, where you push a button, and the manifold pressure increases by a factor determined by mp_boost.

I haven't had this much to figure out since CFS1. :d

We are in Hog Heaven here...I was bleary-eyed like I haven't been in a long time last night. Thanks for your work on these.

[Henry]

Hog heaven ya got ketchup:costumes:
Thanks
H

[thudpilot]

Very impressive Sparks, very impressive.
We could not have done it without ya.

Oh, and Henry this is for you:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uq5XgLiz6F8


:costumes:

[Big_Stick]

The critical altitude for the turbo works as expected, and the supercharger increases boost only at lower altitudes, running out of steam well before the critical altitude, as it should. Only real problem is that the turbocharger does not work like a real one; the turbo should in fact be able to overboost the engine dramatically on the ground and at lower altitudes, but the FS turbocharger has an "automatic" wastegate that cannot be adjusted. Real aircraft of the '40s and '50s had manually adjustable turbosupercharger boost controls that were scalable, could create an overboost situation, and could cause turbine wheel overspeed. We still don't get that with FS but at least we've got something new to play with.

The ADI works as expected but is the consumption of water scaled to the amount of manifold pressure above the setting in the engine section? I'm looking into this now.

[sparks]

The critical altitude for the turbo works as expected, and the supercharger increases boost only at lower altitudes, running out of steam well before the critical altitude, as it should. Only real problem is that the turbocharger does not work like a real one; the turbo should in fact be able to overboost the engine dramatically on the ground and at lower altitudes, but the FS turbocharger has an "automatic" wastegate that cannot be adjusted. Real aircraft of the '40s and '50s had manually adjustable turbosupercharger boost controls that were scalable, could create an overboost situation, and could cause turbine wheel overspeed. We still don't get that with FS but at least we've got something new to play with.

The ADI works as expected but is the consumption of water scaled to the amount of manifold pressure above the setting in the engine section? I'm looking into this now.

ADI water consumption rate is contant and does not vary with manifold pressure.

There are also new gauge tokens for ADI water quantity and NOX quantity, which make it fairly easy to monitor consumption rates. I simply set the ADI rate to 40 gals/min and observed no difference in consumption between idle and full throttle.

[sparks]

Supercharger performance vs altitude:

MP_____HP__Alt
180.1 5298 479
168.0 4945 2392
150.8 4439 5308
138.6 4109 7532
121.7 3648 10942
080.4 2469 21129
053.3 1677 30517

[fliger747]

This will all be very interesting to work with. Perhaps I might start with some of the planes that I have done in the past and have experience and data for.

As always there will be over simplifications. For the R2800, which I am familiar, the ADI system did vary the injection rate with throttle setting once it was opened past a defined point. The "Water regulator" controlled the water injection rate and the carburator mixture was simultaneously adjusted away from full rich to a value closer to best power. The system could be and usually was turned on before the takeoff run was started. The 30 gallon tank in the F4U was good for about fifteen minutes total useage under typical conditions. As it was located in the left wing root, there was little CG change. In the DC6 type aircraft, the tanks were usually located aft in the nacelle, quite close to the center of lift.

[sparks]

Air file section 1549 provides the parameters for animating the exhaust nozzle vanes, but doesn't appear to have any effect on engine performance.

[Shane Olguin]

Would anyone be able to set up a config file so that AAM 1.0 could analyze and display the new Acceleration tables?