Rabbit Lights

[Peter Hornfeck]

Sorry, but I don't understand the manual.

What I want to do:

Want to make a bgl light or effect light, which is running down 21 light poles, 3°
I need no light poles, they are ready and placed in FS9 and FSX. Also all other approach lights are made as bgl files and placed.

I made an Gmax animation for the Rabbit Lights and it works in FSX/FS9. But the light is not bright enough. If I use an effect or bgl light I can not control the direction from which the light is visible. And it should only visible from approach side. With an attached effect in FSX I used a polygone face to hide the effect from the opposite side. But it hides sometimes a part of the lightpoles too and didn't look good.

Now I tried ALT, but ...

With make library all FSX models are shown, but when creating library for all files I get the message "not accessible".

When I tried to use to "Make Array", I entered this in the line:
29.826788131 | 121.461946533 | 0.000 | 123.371214
Strobe-T | 0 | -2400F | 2F | 1/8
....

TAG column is not explained and I do not know what I had to enter there.

The result:
Parsing document: E:\FSX_FS9_Tools\AFLT2002\Library\Arrays\MALSR.xml

ERROR C2034: XML Parse Fatal Error (line, column, error)

ERROR: 6, 7, Quote expected.

ERROR C2470: Unrecoverable error parsing XML!
ERROR C2006: Parse failed (0x80004005)
ERROR C2003: Failed to process file: E:\FSX_FS9_Tools\AFLT2002\Library\Arrays\MALSR.xml

and only want to use my own effect files.

And I do not understand the Strobes:
For every light I need to make a new one with new name?
For example Strobe1, Strobe2, Strobe3, Strobe4 ...
with new GUIDs?
Sequence I entered 1, but I need 21 strobes. When I checked the 24, in the dropdown I can only choose up to 16? So why there can only be possible 16 of 24?
Should I create now 16 ini files (sequence 1 to 16?) and the last 5?
If I make a ASM file, I know how to add Pilot Control, but I do not understand why I had to do this here for every light? Or not?

And I do not understand the def files.
Approach-5x5F | -28F | -1000F | 2F | White-Med
Approach-5x2p5F | 0 | -1000F | 2F | White-Med
Approach-5x5F | 28F | -1000F | 2F | White-Med

First is the model-name?
Second is position left from centerline in ft?
Third is Distance in feet from Threshold?
Fourth position right from Cenerline?
Fifth entry comes from which value?

Is there no entry to change the altitude between the lights?
For example I did my approach lights with asm tweaking like this:
And the distances all in meters, not in feet.

SEPARATION_PLANE WrongSide2, 20174, 30, -25822, 32768
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 0.200, 0.400, 30.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 6
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, -2.300, 0.400, 30.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 7
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, -1.050, 0.400, 30.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 8
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 1.450, 0.400, 30.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 9
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 2.700, 0.400, 30.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 10
WrongSide2 label BGLCODE

SEPARATION_PLANE WrongSide3, 20174, 60, -25822, 32768
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 0.200, 0.400, 60.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 11
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, -2.300, 0.400, 60.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 12
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, -1.050, 0.400, 60.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 13
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 1.450, 0.400, 60.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 14
BGL_LIGHT LIGHT_NAV, 2.700, 0.400, 60.000, 20, 0.60, 0.40, 0FFFFFFFFh, 0.000000, 0.000000, 1.000000 ; source poly num = 15
WrongSide3 label BGLCODE

I'm sure the Toolbox is an interesting tool and helpful. Maybe someone can explain how to use it.

 

[gadgets]

Re AFLT:
I am travelling at the moment and dont have access to my development system. Following are my "off-the-cuff" answers:

With make library all FSX models are shown, but when creating library for all files I get the message "not accessible".

This suggests inadequate/inappropriate Windowes permissions. You may have to run as Administrator.

TAG column is not explained and I do not know what I had to enter there.

As expleined in the appendix to the user manual, the Tag column is an optional, arbitrary text field used to allow multiple arrays in a single file. If you only have one array (e.g., the string of strobes), the Tag field can be left blank.
Re the array creation error, did you surround the array definition wityj "<" and "/>"?

And I do not understand the Strobes:

-each strobe must be uniquely defined, else hopw could you spe ify the sequence number.
-16/24 selects the maximum number of strobes. For 21 strobes, select 24. The inability to select sequence numbers above 16 may be a program issue - but no one else has reported it. If you are only going to have one sequence of strobes, it's far easier to define everythng in the array - in which case this issue won't matter.
- As noted in the manual, PCL is done on a system basis. Why are you making .asm files? The system does this for you.
-The .def file structure is fully defined in the appendix to the User Manual.
-Light/model altitude is specified in the model placement - either in the placemeng code or in the .def file.
If you are coding you lights using .ASM tweaks, you have no need for AFLT.
As for how to use AFLT, I've included an 18 page user manual. I don't know how to explain things any better than that.
Don

 

[Peter Hornfeck]

Thanks for explanation. Yes, running as admin and this can not be the reason. But thank you for your help.

The reason to use asm tweaking is, because I think FAA and my airport are not the same. For example, pictures disagree with the rules of markings I found in the FAA documents. I made my objects like I saw them in reality and than the lights must fit to this.