• Which the release of FS2020 we see an explosition of activity on the forun and of course we are very happy to see this. But having all questions about FS2020 in one forum becomes a bit messy. So therefore we would like to ask you all to use the following guidelines when posting your questions:

    • Tag FS2020 specific questions with the MSFS2020 tag.
    • Questions about making 3D assets can be posted in the 3D asset design forum. Either post them in the subforum of the modelling tool you use or in the general forum if they are general.
    • Questions about aircraft design can be posted in the Aircraft design forum
    • Questions about airport design can be posted in the FS2020 airport design forum. Once airport development tools have been updated for FS2020 you can post tool speciifc questions in the subforums of those tools as well of course.
    • Questions about terrain design can be posted in the FS2020 terrain design forum.
    • Questions about SimConnect can be posted in the SimConnect forum.

    Any other question that is not specific to an aspect of development or tool can be posted in the General chat forum.

    By following these guidelines we make sure that the forums remain easy to read for everybody and also that the right people can find your post to answer it.

P3D v5 ARGH!!! - SOLVED!!!

n4gix

Resource contributor
Messages
11,674
Country
unitedstates
ARGHHH! This Avanti is driving me nuts! The prop arrays are tagged correctly for visibility and animation, but slow and blurred cones will not display in the sim --- whenever I compile the entire exterior.

When I compile only the fuselage and the prop array, they work perfectly!

In the screen shot below, the Prop_Disk will display but its Parent chromed cone will not show up at all... :banghead:

I thought possibly that the bazillion switches, knobs and levers from the VC was "overloading" the model, but removing them when compiling the exterior model did not solve the problem. BTW, this version of the Avanti has six scimitar prop blades, the four bladed "disk" is a place holder and not the final bitmap.

Anyone have any inspiration?

GQWEy.png
 
Last edited:
I don't think your problem is in the prop animations.

Most likely there is another animation that is broken and the prop is after that so it gets broken as a result. Do you have access to the xanim file? Check that to make sure there is anything wrong with any GUIDs being zeroed or blank. Check that all your animations start on zero and end on the same keyframe if you have multiple parts using the same animation name.
 
Since I'm doing the original modeling/animating, yes I have access to the modeldef.xml scripts. ;)

It's definitely not an animation issue. This strictly a <Visibility> problem. With the current modeldef.xml at 12,681 lines, finding any previous object's <Visibility> or <Animation> being defective will be hard to find. Any missing or defective GUID would generate an error when exporting from Max, so I can rule that out.

What is strange though is that the slow and blurred disks are children of the parent chrome spinners and use the same <Visibility> condition. However when the entire model is exported, the slow or blurred disks appear, but the parented chrome spinners do not appear! :banghead:

Code:
  <PartInfo>
    <Name>Avanti_Prop0_blurred</Name>
    <Visibility>
      <Parameter>
        <Code>
          (L:Prop0_blurred_vis,enum)
        </Code>
      </Parameter>
    </Visibility>
    <AnimLength>100</AnimLength>
    <Animation>
      <Parameter>
        <Code>
          (L:Prop0_blurred,enum)
        </Code>
      </Parameter>
    </Animation>
  </PartInfo>
 
Does the spinner have a visibility condition? Can you have visibility conditions be children of parts with visibility conditions? I've always tried to avoid having visibility conditions children to other visibility conditions as they've been unreliable in the past for me. It's years ago since I've last done it so I don't know the exact issues I had, I just don't do it anymore. In a situation like this I would have the spinner and the prop be children of a prop axle, something that doesn't need to have a visibility condition.
 
Yes, if the Slow Spinner is the parent it would suffice if you attached the vis to the spinner only and remove it from the disk. Same for the Blurred and Still assemblies.

Things may also depend on where and how you set the Prop0_blurred_vis,enum variable. Have you monitored its values?

All of this you know already, of course. Just some random thoughts.
 
SOLVED!!!

After a few fruitless days, I thought of a possible solution just before falling asleep last night. :idea:

This morning, I re-worked the prop arrays by creating six dummy nodes and applying the <Visibility> conditions to them. I then Linked the chrome spinners to their respective dummy nodes, leaving the blades and disks as children of their respective chrome cones. It works! :cool:

Thanks for the suggestions. At least they gave me some clues to chase! :wave:

GRXdS.png
 
In a situation like this I would have the spinner and the prop be children of a prop axle, something that doesn't need to have a visibility
This "Prop Array" is using custom logic to drive both the animations and the visibility conditions.

The "still" prop is animated 10 revolutions from frame 0 to frame 1000. This allows for the logic to drive the rotation from where one can actually count the blades slow, to gradually increasing speed such that it seamlessly switches to the propX_slow condition, followed by the running speed of the propX_blurred condition.

This system also allows one to "motor" the turboprop engine as long as needed to purge fuel and avoid a 'hot start'.
CNgO7HMa3W.gif
 
Nice on Bill ... looking forward to getting the 1st MilViz MSFS plane ...:)

Adds a lot to the enjoyment of owning a plane from any Sim type, , to know a little history of its design and design issues ... Thanks for sharing.
 
Back
Top