Virtual Tower View - Viewpoint?

[Andreas Stangenes]

Hi, Ive been searching high and low for this information. I have no problems connecting FSX via fsinn when using euroscope, however I am in a ultralite, and I'd like to actually be like 200ft above ground in the actual tower. There is nothing about how to do this in the wiki as far as I can tell (did I miss it?). By googling Ive found a very few posts scattered around the net mentioning something about a "mobile tower bus" gotten from Avsim, however im having troubles locating the file. How do YOU do it?

 

Help appreciated! Thank you!

[Rauno Maisa 1018208]

For tower view, I reckon you have to slew yourself to the correct position. MSFS has it's own learning center info on slewing.

[Andreas Stangenes]

Thanks Rauno!

Isnt there a way to edit the airplane to make it automatically give you a viewpoint 200ft above the ground? What file is it, and how do I edit it? Thanks!

[Ross Carlson]

In my experience, if you use slew mode, the aircraft movement becomes very stuttery.

 

FSInn may have some tricks for this that I'm not aware of, but the way I do it with the tower view in VRC is to edit the "eyepoint" definition in the aircraft.cfg. I use the default C182. I also had to edit the contact points so that the landing gear are all the same height, otherwise the plane sits slightly nose-up, which causes the tower view to not be flat (parallel to the horizon.)

 

I'll see if I can dig up my edited aircraft.cfg file and post the changes here.

[Ross Carlson]

Here's the line to edit to change the eyepoint. Change the third value to the tower height in feet:

 

eyepoint = -12.5, -1.2, 2.19

 

Here's the section to adjust the contact points so that the plane sits level:

 

[contact_points]
point.0 = 1,  -4.70,  0.00, -5.40, 1500, 0, 0.5, 22.0, 0.3, 2.5, 0.7, 0.0, 0.0, 0
point.1 = 1, -18.00, -6.00, -5.40, 2500, 1, 0.5,  0.0, 0.3, 2.5, 0.7, 0.0, 0.0, 2
point.2 = 1, -18.00,  6.00, -5.40, 2500, 2, 0.5,  0.0, 0.3, 2.5, 0.7, 0.0, 0.0, 3
point.3 = 2, -15.90, -26.0,  3.00, 1800, 0, 0.0,  0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 5
point.4 = 2, -15.90   26.0,  3.00, 1800, 0, 0.0,  0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 6
point.5=  2, -39.23,   0.0,  0.00, 1800, 0, 0.0,  0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 9
point.6=  2,  -2.50,   0.0, -2.17, 1800, 0, 0.0,  0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 4
point.7=  2, -42.00,   0.0, 10.00, 1800, 0, 0.0,  0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 7

 

You'll have to experiment with these values to find out which is which, but I believe the first three lines are usually the landing gear. I believe the third value on each line is the distance from the reference point (usually somewhere in the "middle" of the plane). Since they are all three -5.4 in this example, this plane probably already sits level. This is the default C208 from FSX. Some planes will have a larger negative number for the nose or tail gear, which will make the plane sit with a nose-high attitude, and mess up your tower view. Adjust the value so that it matches the main gear, and you should be set.

 

Obviously, you have to reload the aircraft for the change to take effect.

[Andreas Stangenes]

Thanks alot for all your replies! Now I just need to understand it hehe

 

What I found also is that I can start a multiplayer session, save the game in tower view at the airport I want, and then load that save file when in free flight. That works very good as well! I just shift-enter to go above the ceiling so I dont get walls and polygons in my view that dont naturally belong there (I get that sometimes in tower view in fsx).

[Ross Carlson]

I usually just adjust the eyepoint so that I'm sitting directly above the tower, then I don't get any view obstructions at all.

[Jake Saw]

Using FSX you can start your own LAN multiplayer session inside FSX and switch your "role" to Air Traffic Controller. Then you can select the airport you wish to control and load up inside the FSX tower cab "virtual cockpit". Then simply use FSInn to join the ES session.

[Jonas Eberle]

There are also special "airplanes" available that can be used as towers.

 

For example here (Mobile Tower): http://www.simviation.com/fs2004utilities6.htm