This is the original text file from François Ouellette's
Supercharger file (superchg.zip).It is included here for operating
reference purposes.
All the files needed for the Winnie Mae version are already in the
GAUGES.ZIP file for the Winnie Mae panel.
J.L.Stubbs
1:35 PM 03/08/2000
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/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\+/+\
====== Welcome to the world of SUPERCHARGED engines! ======
Notes on installing and using the FS Supercharger Gauge,
Version 3.3.x for Microsoft (tm) Flight Simulator 98.
Idea and programming: François Ouellette
Copyright (c) 1999 - François Ouellette - All rights reserved.
Gauges' bitmaps are derived from Tom Gibson's engine starter switch
as found in his DC-6 panel.
Please visit http://members.aol.com/TGFltsim
>////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
> THIS SOFTWARE IS FREEWARE - SEE NOTICE AT THE END OF THIS FILE.
>
> PLEASE GIVE CREDIT TO THE AUTHOR WHEN USING AND DISTRIBUTING!
>////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
This version built 1999/11/19.
This is a better version of the gauge!
It seems to work well on FS98 with many airplanes and I was told it works
fine on FS2000 too. On FS98 it is recommended to apply Patch 1.
*************************** IMPORTANT ***********************************
This version has pressure calculations reworked from previous releases
to offer more realism. Tom Gibson has provided loads of information
on real flight data to make this possible.
If you have an earlier version of the SuperCharger the configuration file
has to be changed! See below for the new format.
**************************************************************************
The gauges now computes a reference manifold pressure from the ambient
barometric pressure and the engines' RPM, then apply the extra pressure
produced by the 'low' or 'high' pressure supercharger.
Be prepared for an exciting adventure high in the sky!
Take your baby to 20,000 feet and keep the manifold pressure in the
high 30's! Forget about checking the EGT gauge and adjusting the fuel
mixture!
The supercharger gauge is available for either 2 or 4-engine aircrafts,
so you can give your trustworthy DC-3 or glorious L1049 and DC-6B a new
life right through the next millenium with minimal modifications.
Please read the whole document if you want to enjoy this new gauge.
First: A bit of history...
Supercharger - What is it for?
==============================
The power of an engine is directly linked to the mass-flow rate
of gaseous mixture and therefore the pressure in the cylinders.
By supercharging the cylinders - that is, feeding them with a
pressure greater than that of the atmosphere - the mass of air-fuel mixture
will be greater than in normal operation; this is monitored using the
the manifold pressure gauge.
The density of air drops by 25% at 10,000ft, 50% at 20,000 and 67%
at 30,000ft. Barometric pressure drops 3mm for every 100ft altitude.
For a piston engine, the mass of air-fuel mixture decreases
in the cylinders as the altitude increases, and when an aircraft
reaches an altitude at which the power available no longer allows it to climb,
it is said to have reached its ceiling. The only way to raise the ceiling
level is to increase the mass of air-fuel mixture. In other words, blow more
air and fuel into the intake manifold that the engine would normally aspire.
Several systems were used from as early a 1911, when the Swiss engineer
Alfred Buechi developed the first exhaust gas energy recovery turbine.
A supercharged engine has one (or more) compressor(s) driven by the engine.
Typical engines used 2, a 'high' and a 'low' compressor. Gearboxes, and turbo
systems driven by exhaust gas were developed to recover energy and return it
to the engine, thus pushing ahead its possibilities. Pressure was normally
regulated with governors and other devices.
Popular engines such as the Pratt and Whitney Wasp and Hornet series,
the Wright R-1820 series (which equipped the B17 and the DC-3 DST),
Cyclone R-2600, R-2800 and R-3350 used on so many aircraft all had superchargers.
Later development of the 18-cylinder Wright R-3350 Cyclone, known as the
Turbo Compound, was a turbo-boosted engine in which the exhaust gases drove
3 turbines which returned the energy directly to the engine shaft. Each of
the 3 turbines provided an additional 300hp to the engine without any big
increase in fuel consumption, and the original power level of 2,700hp was
boosted to 3250hp, then 3,700hp. The Turbo Compound was typically used on
the Douglas DC-7C and Lockheed L-1649A Starliner, and the engine made it
possible to cross the Atlantic non-stop. The Turbo Compound was the ultimate
large piston engine.
This Supercharger simulation: What is it?
=========================================
Normally, FS gauges are instruments showing something about
the aircraft and the flight dynamics (altitude, heading, fuel level,
engine rpm...). A gauge simply reflects the value of the instrument
with a numeric or analog scale, sometimes using a formula to turn
a value into a usable one (e.g. percentage, feet, degrees...). Some
'gauges' can provide input to the FS, such as the throttle lever, via
calls to pre-defined functions.
My supercharger plugs itself to the engines' data structures,
which is not what a normal FS gauge does. Instead of just showing
something that's happening, it's making something happening, in this
case changing the engines' manifold pressure values.
A side effect of this is that the MAP gauge's needle will
jump up and down as the pressure is fed into the engine and consumed
by it. The standard FS MAP gauge and its clones that most people use
are fairly sensitive to minute changes, and since the MAP values
are being changed from the outside, they tend to get nervous.
To overcome this problem a 'lazy' gauge can be used, which will
react more slowly. I have classic-looking MAP gauges to match.
Available on request! You can even extract your gauges'
bitmaps (thanks to Chuck Dome's GAUBMP program) and send them to me
for re-programming).
The stuff has been created with Microsoft's Visual C++ 4.0
development tools on Win 98, so it should be portable without
the need for new releases of anything. Please let me know of any
problem you may encounter.
Features
========
The gauge is programmable. You can put your own set of altitude and
required MAP values in a text file. Up to 10 engines can be configured,
each of which can have up to 10 ranges of altitudes.
The settings can be changed dynamically with the use of the mouse even while
the aircraft is flying!
In this version an output file will be produced to show which values are
being used. See below.
NOTE: there is currently no way of automatically associating a particular
aircraft with specific engine settings. Each time you select your plane you
will need to set the desired configuration if you don´t like the one loaded
by default.
How to install and use it
=========================
If you're reading this you must have opened the ZIP archive already!
Use WinZIP (or a similar product that supports long file names) and
extract the files as follows:
1. Put the *.gau files and 'supercharger.cfg' in the Flight Simulator's
'gauges' folder. There is a 2-engine and a 4-engine gauge available,
called respectively fo_sc.2.gau and fo_sc.4.gau with identical features.
NOTE: if you have a previous version of the SuperCharger and added entries
to the supercharger.cfg file you will need to change them to adapt the values
to the new formulas. See below.
2. Put the gauge in your plane's panel by editing the corresponding
'panel.cfg' file located in the aircraft's panel folder. Find a place
where the gauge's plate will fit. The 4-engine one measures 268x95 pixels,
the 2-engine 140x95. Try a size of 100 and see how it looks compared to
the other gauges.
IMPORTANT:
the 'gaugeNN' entries MUST be in ascending sequence by 1; adding a gauge
in between two existing ones requires renumbering the following gauge entries.
Experiment and re-size until it fits neatly in your panel.
That's it!
3. When selecting the airplane, the gauge reads the configuration data
found in the [maptable0] entry in the file. If the file cannot be read or
if this entry is missing, the gauge is pre-programmed with data matching the
Wright Turbo Compound engine. You will see a little light glowing below the
upper left-hand side screw on the gauge's faceplate:
- green means the file was read and entry 0 has been loaded.
- yellow means the entry (or the file) was not found, and the default settings
are used.
To clear the light just click on it with the mouse.
4. To select the 'low' or 'high' positions simply click on the toggle switches
with the mouse.
How to edit configuration file
==============================
You can edit the 'supercharger.cfg' file to add your own engine configuration
data.
Use the Notepad (or the Wordpad, but make sure you save the file WITHOUT
formatting characters) to edit the file. Up to 10 configurations of 10 items
each can be put in the file. The format resembles the panel.cfg file and is
fairly simple. Each engine has an entry called [maptableN] where 'N' is a number
from 0 to 9. By default [maptable0] is loaded by the gauge when selecting an
airplane.
Create your own engines by adding new sections, with the following data:
altN = altitude, low, high
where 'N' is a number from 0 to 9.
The altitude is in feet, and the low and high values are in inches Hg,
and can be fractional. The low value is the ADDED pressure produced by the 'low'
blower, the high by the 'high'. Some engines had settings with overlapping
low and high settings. You do not have to specify 10 lines of data, but make
sure the altitudes are entered in ascending order. Comment lines start with
two slashes, blank lines are permitted. A 0 pressure value means the blower does
not do anything. Therefore an entry such as alt0=500,0,0 means you won't
use any supercharger pressure up to 500ft altitude.
OK, you need to know how to put these numbers in! And do a bit of mathematics.
As a guide, use the following:
1. At full throttle, at sea level the manifold pressure is about equal to the
normal 29.92 inches Hg.
2. At 3/4 throttle, about 27" (-2.9").
3. At 1/2 throttle, about 22" (-7.9").
4. At 1/4 throttle, about 18" (-11.9").
5. At idle, about 12"
Roughly 2" are taken off from full to 3/4, another 5" to 1/2.
Then, with altitude the pressure decreases 3mm per 100ft:
0 = 29.92"
You see that there isn't much left at 20,000ft at half-throttle... without
the supercharger, of course.
Now, back to our SuperBuzz engine example:
In this table we will add 15.1" extra pressure at take-off, so
around 45 total pressure at full throttle (45 - 29.9 + 0); the 'low' supercharger
will maintain this pressure up to 3000ft. Then around 40 (40 - 29.9 + 3.5)
up to 5000, but this will depend on the throttle position. This is the figure
for full throttle.
So on so forth. Past 15,000ft you will have to engage the 'high' blower by flipping
the switch (with a mouse click) to the 'high' position to get the high blower
supply the extra 23" pressure to push it to around 30". When overlapping values
are found the high blower value prevails when set to 'high'.
How to load configuration data
==============================
Once you have created your own engine configuration data you will want to use it.
The gauge has a hidden clickable command area on the lower left-hand side screw.
Click on it with the mouse and you will see a little red number appear between
toggle switches 1 and 2. The number is the corresponding [maptableN] entry
currently in use. Numbers run from 0 to 9, 0 being the default. Click on the
number to cycle through the various entries, and then click on the screw again
to load the corresponding configuration. There is no check by the gauge to verify
that the entry you are selecting actually exists, until the gauge tries to load it.
For example,
your supercharger.cfg file has 4 entries, called [maptable0] through [maptable3],
you want to load the data in [maptable3]; click the number box until you see
number 3, then click on the screw. If the data has been successfully loaded, a
little green light will show just below the upper screw.
If the entry has not been found, or if the file is missing, a red light will show.
You can click on the screw again to bring the number box and select another entry.
To clear the pilot light just click on it.
Voilà!
You are ready to experience the joy of supercharged flights.
In this version the values being used are written to an output file called
'supercharger.dat' in the FS 'gauges' directory. You can view the file by opening
it with the Notepad or Wordpad.
The data on MP values and altitudes as found in the supplied supercharger.cfg
file has been provided by Tom Gibson. Thanks Tom, once again!
One last word of advice about switching blowers from LOW to HIGH, taken
from Tom's (real) DC-6B flight manual:
1. You must decrease the throttle to 20" MAP before the switch.
2. You must only change 1 or 2 engines at a time (if two, no. 1 & 3 or no. 2 & 4).
3. You must not change an engine's supercharger setting more often than once
every 5 minutes (i.e. if you throw the switch, you have to wait at least 5
minutes to throw it the other way).
4. You do not need to reduce throttle when switching from HIGH to LOW blower.
Have fun and please forward your comments and suggestions to:
François Ouellette
=================================================================
COPYRIGHT (c) 1999 BY FRANCOIS OUELLETTE, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
ENJOY, AND FEEL FREE TO CONTACT ME WITH SUGGESTIONS FOR
IMPROVEMENTS.
THIS SOFTWARE IS THE PROPERTY OF THE AUTHOR, AND CANNOT BE
RE-SOLD OR PACKAGED WITH ANY PRODUCT FOR SALE, WITHOUT THE
EXPRESS WRITTEN PERMISSION OF THE AUTHOR. THIS IS FREEWARE!!
YOU MAY UPLOAD THIS GAUGE TO ANY OTHER SERVER THAT HAS A FREE
DISTRIBUTION POLICY. IF THIS GAUGE IS UPLOADED TO RESTRICTED
SERVERS (I.E. COMPUSERVE)(NOT THE AUTHOR'S INTENTION),
IT MAY BE DOWNLOADED AND UPLOADED TO OTHER SERVERS. THIS
NOTICE CONSTITUTES THE AUTHOR'S PERMISSION TO DO THIS.
THIS SOFTWARE KIT MAY NOT BE UPLOADED TO SERVERS THAT HAVE A CHARGE
FOR THEIR USE; IF A VIABLE FREE OPTION IS PROVIDED THIS FILE MAY BE
UPLOADED THERE. "VIABLE" MEANS THAT IT IS NOT SIGNIFICANTLY MORE
DIFFICULT TO ACCESS THE SERVER USING THE FREE METHOD VERSUS THE PAY
METHOD ("NOT SIGNIFICANT" MEANS THAT, FOR EXAMPLE, THE DIFFERENCE IN
ACCESS TO THE SITE BETWEEN FREE AND PAY METHODS MAY ONLY BE FOUR
ATTEMPTS OR LESS).
THIS ENTIRE TEXT FILE MUST BE INCLUDED IN ANY DISTRIBUTION.
THE AUTHOR IS NOT LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGE THAT YOU MIGHT
INCUR AS A RESULT OF USING THESE PRODUCTS. YOU ASSUME THE RISK
OF USE.
THANKS TO MY AMD K6-2 PROCESSOR THAT SPITS FRAMES WITHOUT COMPLAINING,
ALSO TO MICROSOFT FOR THE FLIGHT SIMULATOR WITHOUT WHICH WE WOULDN'T HAVE
SO MUCH FUN.
