FS2004 Scenery - Hawthorne-Feather Airpark (8B1) Hillsboro, NH
version 0.1b alpha - June 6, 2005
By Thomas Perry
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050606 - Change: K8b1b.zip contains the AFCAD missing from the original release K8B1.zip
Follow normal installation routine listed below. You do not need AF2_8b1.zip.
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050604 - Change: AF2_8B1.zip contains the AFCAD missing from the original release K8B1.zip
Installation: Copy the AF2_8B1.bgl file to EITHER (NOT BOTH) ...\Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\Scenery directory or your ...\Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery\K8B1\Scenery directory. The runway should then appear (It's supposed to be paved, not grass. :-) Sorry for the exclusion.)
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Hawthorne-Feather Airpark is located in Hillsboro, NH. It was once associated with the now defunct aviation school Nathaniel Hawthorne College. Nathaniel Hawthorne College closed in 1989, was repurchased by somebody in the '90's but never reopened, and is now for sale. The airport, however, is alive and well, at least as far as I know, and supposedly is the base for 9 aircraft. NHC once operated 3 DC-3's out of this airport, but they were sold back in the 80's, one of them crashing on its final flight from the airport (with no significant injuries thankfully). You can read more about the airport at
http://creports.capnhq.gov/airfield/ViewAirport.asp?view=Thumb&state=NH&code=8B1&filetype=_ and
http://nhcweb.tripod.com/
I became interested in redoing this airport because I've flown by it in real life many times, and I happened to land there in FS and noticed that it was dug deep inside a hill. Thinking it was at the wrong altitude, I found that it was actually at the wrong location. It turns out that the coordinates listed in AirNav are quite incorrect after reviewing the airport in NASA's wonderful WorldWind program and cross referencing that to the roads of USA Roads, which I have found to be very accurate.
To develop this airport, I used AFCAD 2.21, SceneGenX Build 34, and Airport for Windows v 3.0 build 192. I started with AFCAD for the runways, moved to SceneGenX for the buildings, and then went to AFW to put in Gerrish's trees and redo and airport background. I also had lots of help from Scott Gridley to help me understand flattens and LWM/VTP polys. Thank you Scott, your help was tremendous.
What's next? Well, eventually I'm going to take the time I need to learn to model hangars more accurately. I'm not proud of the hangar in this file, but it's the right size. I may also add some of the streams on the airport.
I have installed on my system, and developed these files to fit, USA Roads (www.flight1.com), FSGenesis Freeware Terrain and payware Landclass (www.SurClaro.com and portal.fsgenesis.net), Jim Keir's Maine coastline scenery (Maine.zip, available at www.jimkeir.co.uk/FlightSim/scenery.html ), and FreeFlow NE by Scott Gridley, which contains much improved water (lakes, rivers and streams) for this area. Finally I use AD Roads and streams for their streams, rail, and utilities. I definately suggest you install each of these items as they really improve the realism.
Let me know if you have any questions or if you have any suggestions or would like to help me improve this airfield.
- Copy the "K8B1" directory to your "Flight Simulator 9\Addon Scenery" directory.
- Install Gerrish's trees if you have not already done so. Follow the directions in the readme file in trees_v3.zip. (Basically, copy the "trees_v3.zip/scenery.zip/trees_0.bgl" file to your "Flight simulator 9/scenery" directory.)
- Start Flight Simulator, and activate the scenery by selecting "Settings / Scenery Library / Add area" and select the Addon Scenery/K8B1 directory
- Quit from Flight simulator and restart it. The new airport should be there.
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Further Installation instructions
As noted, the default version of the airport is quite incorrectly placed. It was in a hill and therefore a deep ditch was dug into the hill to place the airport. The problem is there is no way to exclude this ditch without modifying a default file, which is needed for many, many other airports. Microsoft's EULA technically does not allow me to distribute a modified version of this file. Also, other users may have modified this file themselves, and by replacing their file with this one, that could cause problems with other scenery you have.
If you would like to remove this ditch, however, you can use the following instructions:
You will need two tools -
LWMViewer v. 1.3 by Jim Keir (1.4 apparently has some bugs in it). (Available at SurClaro.com
BGLC from the Flight Simulator 2002 Microsoft SDK(?)
To remove the offending flatten from the default file, load ...\Flight Simulator 9\Scenery\Name\Scenery\FL928160.bgl into Jim Kier's LWMViewer and export the source. Search for and remove the following lines:
Then use BGLC to recompile the source file and replace the original FL928160.bgl file with the new file compiled by BGLC.
COPYRIGHT
=========
The Scenery files in this archive are released as FREEWARE.
Copyright (C) 2004 Thomas Perry. All Rights Reserved
You are permitted to use the scenery in any way you like and to modify it as you see fit.
You may also redistribute the package free of any charge or gain as a single
unaltered archive accompanied by an acknowledgement of the author's copyright
(a copy of this file will suffice), for use with Freeware or Public Domain
scenery or for the creation thereof.
You may NOT use, distribute, or otherwise reproduce this package, or any part
thereof for commercial gain or profit unless expressly licensed by the author to
do so.
Commercial or shareware scenery authors are hereby EXPRESSLY FORBIDDEN from
using or distributing these files without first obtaining a
LICENCE for such use or distribution from the author. Any enquiries should be
sent by e-mail in the first instance to the author as below. A reasonable offer
of payment, proportional to the financial gain to be made from such use or
distribution, will normally be expected.
