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FSX Piper Comanche

What I do is create a Spline 'template'. I then go to Left side, with the template in the right area, and then use 'Cut' (Alt-C) and start cutting away on the fuselage. When done, I then extrude that cutout outwards to form the wing. I adjust the sections of the extrusions of the wing with FFD boxes till its right. Then clone the side of the fuselage with Mirror to the other side.

In your case, you have already made the wing. If its separate from the fuselage, then use that as your template, cut the fuse with Cut tool, then weld the Vertices.

If you have Polygons in the wing opening, then it will not weld. You have to delete the Polygons inside the wing root first. Opening to Opening.
 
Thanks! I tried that before, but somehow vertex weren't welding. So this is pretty much the final result.



But of course I got a couple of cuestions. For example, the tail section does something weir there, anyways that's going to be the elevator, so it should be detached from the body. There's a shot of the smoothed version and the "raw" version of it, I don't know why edges get crazy over there.





And, once again, the wing root. When I add some extra edges to have a smooth transition I end up with a f****d up wing root. Actually it looks better with no extra edges.



Talking a bout wings, I also need to conserve that edge, sharp. I tried adding extra edges along but with no result.



PS: I know there are some overlapped polys in the tail, but this was just a test to see how it would look complete
 
There's nothing wrong with using Boolean ops; there's also nothing wrong with using Cut: use whichever method suits your task as you tackle it. A Boolean gives a result quickly, then you spend some time tidying up. A Cut operation spends some time setting up the cut to get the result required and then it's done.

I'm not sure what your problem here is, but is it perhaps that you have used the wing to cut the fuselage but then found you can't now use the fuselage to cut the wing? That's what happens in a Boolean op, so clone your wing and fuselage first to make wing01 and fuselage01. Then cut the (original) wing with fuselage01 and cut the (original) fuselage with wing01. If that looks okay you can then either hide or delete the clones.

You're using Max 2012, so I'd also say you ought to try the ProBoolean: it's a more capable tool than Boolean most of the time.
 
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Thanks Tom, I finally used the cut tool to get the result. I like how it ended up so it'll stay that way, I guess
 
Nice wingtips.

When I first started out, I would just move the wings up to the edge of the fuselage and push them through just a bit. I never welded them. I usually had to (and still have to) break them from the fuselage to map them (if they have their own mapping sheet) so I never got into attaching them. I do now these days, but still sometimes have to break them apart. With smooth fillets in the wing roots, you have to make them as one part, but then later can cut them free to map them if needed.
 
Wait I haven't understood. So I should detach them of the fuselage? And then what? I'm going to have a rough transition in the root or not?
 
Well, its how you map it. If you can map all the fuselage and wings on one texture sheet, then leave them all connected. If you are going to put the wings on their own texture sheet, then you can either break them off the fuselage (Detach) and apply the Wings texture to them and map them, or you can do a 'multi-material' where you select the wings polygons and apply the Wings Material and then you have a fuselage material and a wings material to the same object, which can be bad on frame rates if you have a large amount of parts (Polygons) and large textures (high rez, like 2048 or 4096 pixels big). If you are doing just 1024 sized textures, then you should be fine with a multi material. I tend to steer clear of multi materials. Thats why I would detach the wings if using a texture sheet for the wings only.

So... If you are doing all the outside textures on one sheet, you 'do not' have to detach the wings. And you do not have to detach the wings if you do a multi-material.


Bill
 
By the way, I saw I missed one of your questions above. Your tail didnt match up right with Symmetry on. This is because the entire inner edge of your one side of the fuselage has to be perfectly aligned to one axis or this happens. Just turn on the Grid and move the cross sections over till they all line up.

What you can do when you need a quick adjustment of these edges is to use Border mode (keyboard 3) and select the inner Edge seam. Then switch to Edges mode (keyboard 2) and deselect anything that isnt on that 'seam'. Now on the right, go to the Make Plannar and press the X, Y, or Z button that will instantly align all of the seam perfectly to the same surface. Only one will work, so click one, see if that is it, if not, control-Z and select the next. This perfectly makes your seam flat. Then align the Gizmo to that edge (seam) and 'then' add your Symmetry and set weld to 0.01 and it should be proper.

Thats the right way to setup your plane for a mirrored Symmetry side.
 
Okay, I see... Guessed it was because of a "misalignment" of the edges. My main problem is that I'm still getting that "fence" on the wing root and it's driving me crazy because I want to solve this problem before moving forward.

You see...



And no matter how many polys I add, I keep getting that weird root...

 
Good news! I finally did it... I had some edges missing where the wing and the fuselage joined so I added them and now I have a nice and smoot transition. My question, now is. How do I avoid what happens on the circled area when smoothed?



I now have to work on the tail section and do some tide up of the border section to mirror it.
 
So... I'd say it's pretty much finished. Now... I don't know why I'm getting those weird spikes on the tail...





And this is the tail problem.



and how it looks un-smoothed

 
I finally figured it out. Some more edges were needed on the vertical stabilizer. Now I moved towards the landing gear and this is how it looks.

 
Thanks! It's finally shaping up quite nicely. I now have to sort out the wheels well, and adding detail like the exhaust and antennas. Btw, what's the best way of doing the wheels wells? Have in mind that I'll have to do an animation of the landing gear going up (but that's another story). And the same question... Should my last task be cut the windows? (When the final smoothing is done) I'm asking because when I use the cut tool to do the windows and then I smooth everything the borders go crazy. But I should do a low poly interior too, so I don't know how to proceed.
I've also tried to do a first FSX import with no success. I can't figure out how to use the XtoMDL program. I tried with a batch file, a CMD shortcut and using command lines, but all tutorials seem to be a bit incomplete on how to use it. Is there any good tutorial on how to do it?

Thanks!
 
I would just cut them out with Cut tool, then extrude them in and flatten the surface that faces downwards. Thats how I make mine.
 
I finally cut one side and then cut over those on the side. I now have this problem. One of the characteristics of the Comanche is its sharp window edges and I want them to keep it that way like you can see on the "Unsmoothed" model. But when I press TS or MS everything gets round and messy.





I changed the crease on the edges to 0, added extra edges with chamfer, extruded those polys inwards and nothing gets me the result I need.
 
I finally solved it, it I had to change the crease of the adjacent polys as well. Here's the result so far.







To do list includes: Wheel wells, cockpit, command surfaces, window frames and prop.
 
Mau, what I would do is cut the windows out 'after' you lock in the plane's mesh. When you are done working the base mesh, collapse the stack 'smoothed' and then cut the windows. Thats how I do it.

Note that you 'can' attach a Edit Poly to the stack (before collapsing) and then cut the windows. It will treat it like you have already collapsed the stack. You can then still have the base mesh to change around. I have done this before (via Arimmus 3D's teachings on this) and my Max had weird effects happen, like missing Vertices and things, on the base mesh, but with yours, it might work fine. This is an option (if it works) for not wanting to collapse the stack early to cut the windows.

Nice landing gear. Its really coming along nicely.
 
Your work so far looks good. One thing I would strongly recommend you do would be to get it exported into the sim. The sooner the better. You need to be able to see the final product to spot certain things that you won't see in Max, and as the model grows in complexity the odds of errors when compiling increase. The troubleshooting process (which at some point you will likely have to go though) is much easier to do when you export/compile frequently.
 
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