FSX Ants Aussie Airports Vol. 4

Ants Aussie Airports Vol. 4: Darwin International, Australia. Contains scenery that includes Darwin International as well as Royal Darwin Hospital helipad and the military helipads at Robertson Barracks. This scenery contains photoreal backgrounds that are designed to blend in with the payware FTX textures By Anthony Lynch.

This is a text version of a PDF document which you can find in Ants Aussie Airports/Documentation.

ANTS AUSSIE AIRPORTS VOL 4 : DARWIN INTL scenery for Microsoft's Flight Simulator X

INTRODUCTION

This download contains scenery for FSX and includes Darwin International as well as Royal Darwin Hospital helipad and the military helipads at Robertson Barracks. This scenery contains photoreal backgrounds and these are designed to blend in with the payware FTX textures. It is therefore recommended that you have the FTX textures installed if you wish to see these airfields at their best.

I try to make these airfields as accurate possible. This means that almost all of the models are custom made with the use of library objects kept to the minimum.

Note: Many of these airports are available for FS9 as part of the VistaOZ freeware package.

Note: Each airport pack I make is a standalone pack. You do not need to have Ants Aussie Airports Vol 1, 2 or 3 installed to use Vol 4. You can download and install any other volume later if you want.

REQUIREMENTS
- Microsoft's FSX is essential (this scenery is not compatible with FS9)
- ORBX's payware FTX textures are highly recommended.
- OZx freeware airports are recommended though not essential.

INSTALLATION

Note: If you have already installed any Ants Aussie Airports packs then Vol 4 will install into the same folder as these. This is to prevent your scenery library from filling up with individual entries for each Volume. You do not need to have any of my other volumes installed to use Volume 4 and you can install other volumes at a later date if you wish.

1. Unzip the download into a temporary folder.

2. Using Windows Explorer navigate to your FSX install ("Your Hard Drive:Program Files\Microsoft Games\Microsoft Flight Simulator X")

3. From the temporary folder drag and drop the "Ants Aussie Airports" folder into the "Addon scenery" folder in your FSX install. If you have installed any of my previous packs then you will get a warning about overwriting existing files. Just click OK (I have made a few object libraries, eg cars, cones, gables etc and I include a copy in each pack).

4. From the temporary folder drag and drop the "effects" folder into a blank space in your FSX install. Make sure you don't drop it inside another folder. You should get another warning message so click OK to proceed.

5. Start FSX and select "SETTINGS". In the "Other settings" section on the right of the screen select "Scenery Library". If you have installed any "Ants Aussie Airports" pack before then you will have already added it to the scenery library and you should skip to step 7.

6. Select "Add Area" and navigate to the "Addon Scenery\Ants Aussie Airports" folder and select "OK".

7. Ensure the Scenery area "Ants Aussie Airports" is above the FTX entries and click "OK" (see below for a screenshot). Please note, if you have installed any of the ORBX products to check your scenery library. I've found that sometimes the ORBX installer will mess with the order of your scenery library and will place the FTX files at the top of the list.

You are now ready to fly so select one of the airfields listed on the following pages.

Do you have FSX ADF AI installed?

If you have the FSX ADF AI package installed then there are a couple of things I would like to point out.
Firstly, to avoid any potential conflicts you will need to delete (or disable by changing the file name extension from .bgl to .off) three airport data files in the ADF AI scenery folder. These are: YPD1_ADFAI_ADE_RJN.BGL, YPDN_ADFAI_ADE_RJN.BGL and YRBK_ADFAI_ADE_RJN.BGL.
I have included a modified copy of the YPD1 file in my scenery. This file provides support for the AI helicopters at YPDN. Many thanks go to Rob Nieuwenhoven for permission to modify his original files for YPD1 and YRBK (Robertson Barracks).

Do you have FTX Traffic installed?

AI will affect always affect framerate performance. However, there is one aircraft included in the FTX Traffic which really kills framerates. This is the Embraer 120. There can be three of these at Darwin in Airnorth colours and I find these 3 aircraft can knock as much as 20% off my framerates which is a bit excessive in my opinion.
You can disable this aircraft by opening the following file "FSX\ORBX\FTX_AU\FTXAI_AIRCRAFT\FTX 1.0 EMB_120\Aircraft.cfg" with a simple text editor. Change the second line from "title=EMB120 AirNorth" to "title=EMB120 AirNorth off".
Note: this tip is for experienced users only. If you are not familiar with editing .cfg files or messing about with your FSX installation then do not try this.

AIRPORTS INCLUDED

Darwin International, Darwin NT, YPDN

Darwin airport is three airports for the price of one. First off it is a military base (RAAF Darwin). The military area is confined to the south of the main runway except for the control tower which is staffed by military personnel. Secondly, there are international and domestic services. Many operators use Darwin airport with regular services by Jetstar and Qantas. There are also quite a few smaller operators servicing the area and these include Hardy Aviation, Pearl Aviation, Airnorth and Vincent Aviation to name a few. Thirdly there is a large general aviation area at the northern most area of the airport. The Northern Territory is a big place and sometimes the best way to get around is via light aircraft.

Royal Darwin Hospital, Darwin NT, YXDH

On the northern edge of Darwin is Royal Darwin Hospital and a helipad to handle medivacs.

Robertson Barracks, Darwin NT, YRBK

A new army helicopter base east of Darwin and home base to the 1st Aviation Regiment which comprises the 161 and 162 reconnaissance squadrons. The aircraft fleet is currently being upgraded from OH-58 Kiowas to Eurocopter EC665 Tiger Armed Recon Helicopters. The hangars are based purely on speculation and are therefore not an accurate representation of the real world airfield. For some strange reason it is hard to get pictures of military airfields.

FAQ

Will this scenery work in FS9?

No. However, these airfields have been converted from FS9 airfields which are available as part of the vistaoz package. The photoreal doesn't blend with the default textures. It is highly recommended that you have the FTX textures installed. These not only provide better ground and tree textures for Australia but also provide better coastlines, landclass and roadways as well as improving a few of the major cities. Plus they also have plenty of free airports which you can download. I consider FTX an essential purchase for anyone flying in Australia so the airfields are designed to blend with these textures. Please do not ask me to modify this scenery to work with the default textures. It would just mean a lot of time and effort from me with no benefit to myself.

Why are the windsocks so ugly?

It is difficult to create windsock models that work well in FSX. The FSX SDK doesn't allow access to the necessary parameters so developers must use windsocks developed using the FS9 SDK. Unfortunately FS9 windsock models don't work all that well either and will more often than not display the incorrect weather conditions. This is not a fault of scenery developers but is a fault with MS FS9 and FSX. For FS9 I used to make windsock poles and added the FS9 default windsock to the top. It wasn't perfect but it looked better than the default and at least showed which way the wind was blowing. In FSX I can't do this as FSX (for some unknown reason) will move the windsock away from the pole. So, rather than use unreliable windsock models I decided to use the ugly default windsocks which at least show the correct wind conditions which is more important than looking pretty.

Where has the water tower on the RAAF apron gone?

There used to be a very distinctive water tower in the centre of the RAAF apron. Unfortunately this landmark was pulled down earlier this year. It was a silly place for a water tower though.

Will there be more Ants Aussie Airports?

Yes. The following is a list of the planned volumes (note that the order given here is not necessarily the order they will be released). Earlier volumes may be downloaded from avsim (you may also find a few at flightsim ). You can either use the search function (try "Ants Aussie Airports") or visit my blog (anthony31fs.wordpress ) for direct links.
AAA VOL 1 : Snowy Mountains (released and available now)
Cooma, Tumut, Polo Flat, Khancoban, Geehi, Adaminaby
AAA VOL 2 : NSW (released and available now)
Gundaroo, Wedderburn, Wilton, Evans Head, Casino, Sth Grafton, Warnervale
AAA VOL 3 : Melbourne Helipads (released and available now)
A couple of helipads on the Yarra River in Melbourne
AAA VOL 4 : Darwin International (this scenery)
Darwin International, Darwin Hospital, Robertson Barracks
AAA VOL 5 : Northern Territory (this will be released next and is a good companion for the Darwin Intl scenery)
RAAF Tindal, Emkaytee, Batchelor, Delissaville, Dum in Mirrie, Albany Park, Dundee Beach
AAA VOL ? : Southern QLD
Brisbane Intl (maybe), Lady Elliot Island, Bundaberg, Hervey Bay (maybe), Gympie (maybe)
AAA VOL ? : Northern QLD
Longreach, Barcaldine, Aramac, Hamilton Island, Rockhampton (maybe)

Any other problems

Before emailing me asking for support consider the following. This scenery is designed to work with FSX SP2. Please also consider that this scenery works great on my system and that's all that really matters to me. If it doesn't work on your system then I may be able to give a few tips and pointers but please don't expect me to spend too much of my valuable time trying to solve problems as my advice would probably be to read the section below.

UNINSTALLING

Start FSX and remove "Ants Aussie Airports" from the "Scenery Library"
Delete "Ants Aussie Airports" from the "Addon Scenery" folder
Delete any effects file (.fx) starting with "AntsAussieAirports_" from the "Microsoft Flight Simulator X\Effects" folder

PARTIAL UNINSTALL

You may wish to remove some airports but not all. Each airport will have a number of files associated with it so to uninstall a particular airport you will need to remove each of these files. For example: To remove Darwin Hospital you will need to remove the following files:
aaa4_DarwinHospital_Photo.bgl (The photoreal background)
aaa4_DarwinHospital_Scenery.bgl (Placement of the 3D models)
aaa4_DarwinHospital_Windsock.bgl (Windsock model, unfortunately uses the default windsock)
AFX_aaa4_YXDH Darwin Hospital.bgl (runways, taxiways and aprons as well as excludes)
It is not recommended that you remove aaa4_DarwinHospital_ModelLib.bgl as this contains the 3D model library which may include models used at other airfields.
Note that the AFX files include excludes. If you edit this file with an airport editor that is not AFX then this data may be stripped from the file.

This software is not public domain. You may redistribute this software only if you do so for free AND you keep all the files intact. You cannot redistribute this software if you charge users for access. You cannot redistribute parts of this software. It must remain as a complete package. You may not sell this software or make a profit from this software. You may not reuse this scenery or parts of it in your own scenery.

THANK YOUS

Many thanks to Rob Nieuwenhoven for letting me modify his airport files for AI traffic.
Thanks to Toucanair for providing some pics of Darwin hangars.
Thanks to the people at VistaOZ.org and Aussiex.org and FSDeveloper for answering my silly questions.
Special thanks to all those who provide free FS addons.
Thank you for taking the time to read this manual and I hope you enjoy the scenery.

Anthony Lynch

⇲ Download Now 47.5 MB

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