FS2004 Douglas A2D-1 "Sky Shark"
The Sky Shark is another example of what "could have been". It was developed as a logical replacement for the AD-1. Unfortunately, constant problems with the engine gear box kept this program from going anywhere. The 5100 horsepower between the twin Allison engines was just too much for the gear box technology of the day. When it did work it was fast and could carry one heck of a load. Only about a dozen of the Sky Sharks were produced because the Navy had decided to concentrate on pure jets by the time the gear box problems could be resolved. The first plane was painted Navy blue; all the rest were silver. I found 3 views for the A2D-1 on a Russian website. There are also many photo's available on the internet. Whenever there was a decrepancy between the drawings and photo's; the photo's won out. This FSDSv2.24 project has the usual animations plus folding wings, sliding canopy, nav and landing lights and a dynamic shine. I have added the XML gauges to the panel so the airplane can do catapult launches and arrestor gear landings on an appropriate carrier. See Carrier Ops, below. I included a operational tailhook and folding wings which both need a keyboard assignment before they will operate. I chose shift+T for the tailhook and shift+F for the folding wings.
INSTALLATION: Unzip Shark.zip into a temporary folder. Copy the file Sky Shark into the Aircraft folder of FS2004. Open the gauges folder and copy the contents into the Gauges folder of FS2004. Close everything and fire up FS2004. This airplane will show as the A2D-1 under Douglas in the aircraft selection list.
PANEL: I have included Dana McGee's Sky Shark panel from a few years back. Even though it is a FS98 panel it works very well in FS2004. I have added the Tail Hook and Catapult Launch gauges along the bottom edge of the panel. I have also made the neccesary entries to the panel .cfg file so the Meatball will show if the carrier has an ILS. (See Carrier Ops below)
SOUND: I have aliased the Cessna Caravan sounds but it rally needs something more robust like a C-130.
CARRIER OPS: You need 2 things to fly the Sky Shark on and off a carrier in FS2004. First you need a Carrier with a hardened deck and an operating ILS if you want to use the "Meatball". I recommend the "Waikato1" available at the major sites for starters. It has a nice big deck, plenty of eye candy (steam spewing from the catapults,etc) and has a hardened deck and an ILS. Install this item strictly according to the author's instructions. I did and it works as advertised. The second thing you need is Rob Barendregt and Doug Dawson 's rcbco-11.zip available at www.SurClaro and www.SurClaro.com for the gauges. These XML gauges can be added to the panel of any aircraft and give you arrestor gear type landings and catapult type takeoffs. These gauges are easy to install and the authors have provided excellent documentation. I suggest you print out the installation instructions and follow them to a "T". The panel already has these gauges placed so you don't have to do anything to the panel .cfg file. One last thing; if you want to use the "Meatball" you must set the radio NAV1 to the Waikato ILS frequency which is 112.1. Then save the flight so you don't have to do it everytime.
I had problems determining which radio was NAV 1 because the panel is so crowded; I just set all 3 to 112.1 and the Meatball works just fine
If you have problems with the carrier or gauges please contact the respective authors directly; I do not know the design details.
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.
