This scenery object features a hardened deck for take-off and landings for airplanes equipped with the rcbco-20 catapult and arrestor gear gauges. It has a nice wake effect. ( Many thanks to Bruce Barker of the Virtual Navy group for letting me include their carrier wake effect.) My goal with this project was to create a landable carrier with wake effect that could be moved to another location with only one set of coordinates and heading to enter. This project does do that; (you do have to enter the coordinates and heading in 3 spots in the XML file)
I started with my earlier FSDS Lexington and converted it to a .dfx file so it could be read by Gmax. I added the hard deck with the attach tool script so it would be part of the vessel and move with it. I then compiled it into the FS9 .MDL - XML scenry object format. I identified the wake effect as another scenery object in the XML file so it could be moved. At first, the ship showed up right in the middle of the wake. I wanted to use the same coodinates for both so I went back to Gmax and moved the vessel in relation to its origin. The vessel origin is now very close to the stern. Now, the wake starts very close to the bow, as it should.
I thought I was done because I could move the package and land on it. However, if I wanted to create a flight the airplane would start underneath the carrier, jump up to the deck and crash.. FS9 needs a runway definition for a starting point so I created one with AFCAD and added the definition to the XML file. It also uses the exact same coordinates and heading.
I originally had the Lex parked in Long Beach Ca harbor, so I moved everything down to San Diego just in front of the Naval Station. Everything worked. The ship currently shows up in the airport list as PLEX and is at the bottom of the San Diego fields list.
NOTE: When you create a flight the airplane will be sitting on the stern just about to fall in the drink. That is because I had to offset the vessel in relation to the wake as described above. Just taxi forward to about the front elevator and then save the flight. The Lexington does not have an ILS. I created it for use with my vintage planes; F4B-4, SBC-4, SBU-1, etc., these all flew VFR. If you must have an ILS you can add one after you move the vessel with AFCAD. Also, to move the ship you need BGLcomp installed and know how to use it.
INSTALLATION: Unzip Prelex2.zip into a temporary folder. Copy the folder called Prelex into the Add On scenery folder in FS2004. Activate the scenry through the scenery library and you are good to go.
MOVING INSTRUCTIONS: Open the folder called "Moving Stuff" and copy the 2 files directly into your BGLComp folder. Now slew an airplane to the new desired location. Jot down the 2 coordinates and heading from the top of FS2004. Right click on the Prelex XML file and open with Notepad. Use Notepad and nothing else or the syntax will get corrupted. You will see 3 places where the coordinates and heading are entered. Replace the existing enteries with the new ones and close the XML file. Note, if you want PLEX to show up somewhere other than San Diego Ca in the airport list you need to change the entries for city and state etc in the XML file. Now run BGLcomp. If you are running XP you just have to drag the XML file on top of bglcomp.exe. You will see a short flash of a black screen and in a few seconds a new prelex .bgl file will appear. If it says it is about 82 kb in size you had a successful compile. If it is small like 1 kb you made a mistake in entering the coordinates.
Copy the new Prelex.bgl file into the add-on scenery> Prelex>scenery folder. If you have been good, the carrier will show up at the new location.
I have created the necessary files to move the carrier with BGLComp, so please don't ask me to move it for you as I just don't have the time.
LEGAL: This project is released as freeware. You may modify it, repaint it, etc., upload to another website as long as it is not for profit. You need my written permission to use any of these files for commercial purposes; otherwise just give me credit for the original design. This airplane should not hurt your computer but I am not responsible if it causes problems.
