MU-2 progress towards update

[Cameron]

Now the MU looks even scarier, nice procedural detail Tom. Good to hear your voice/accent finally!

So is that done with Gizmo?

No Gizmo on this one. Tom has a hefty C framework he's been building up for a long time.

[Simmo W]

Thanks Cam, so even scarier! So it sounds like the SAAB will be the first payware user of Gizmo? I think so.

[Cameron]

Thanks Cam, so even scarier! So it sounds like the SAAB will be the first payware user of Gizmo? I think so.

Sounds about right!

[Dozer]

Thanks Tom! It's looking great!

[tkyler]

Good to hear your voice/accent finally!

Accent?  What accent?  :-P

I started work on the C framework before Gizmo was as complete and robust as it is today so I've stuck with it as it's very flexible and I'm comfortable with it.  I do plan to integrate Gizmo on the MU2 later, not as a replacement, but as a compliment as it's possible to integrate the two techs.  Ben has put some really neat stuff in Gizmo and made it quite painless to get quick results and when the time is right...meaning pretty soon as I'm getting happy with the systems on the Moo.... I plan on putting it to good use.

[tkyler]

Added flags to the altimeter and ADI.  These flags are animated as opposed to "instant snap" and work off the left radio bus.  Protocol calls for starting the right engine, then left, THEN flipping the radio master switches.  If you watch the video above of the real MU2 that details the engine start, you'll see that the engines are both running before the flags on the altimeter and ADI disappear when the pilot flips the radio master switches.

[steven winslow]

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[Neurus]

I have flown the MU-2 on a friend's system and I loved it (he has Saitek Panels whereas I only have Saitek Yoke+Rudders and 2 Throttle quadrants) and I loved the plane. Sadly with a X-Plane 9.67 (latest at the time we tried), we had problems with the lights (they won't illuminate the cockpit) so we had to make an emergency landing almost in complete darkness.

My friend is not very good with computers so I don't know if he has the latest version or not but when I got home I decided to check for an updated version before buying mine… and I found this thread.

It looks awesome and I can't wait to buy the new version when it comes out! I will wait for this version because having seen the videos, the difference is abysmal!

Great work and thanks for improving the x-plane experience so much. (which, to be honest, is desperately looking for a UI update)

[Cameron]

It looks awesome and I can't wait to buy the new version when it comes out! I will wait for this version because having seen the videos, the difference is abysmal!

Purchasing today gets you this update for free in case you weren't aware.

[Dozer]

It looks awesome and I can't wait to buy the new version when it comes out! I will wait for this version because having seen the videos, the difference is abysmal!

Purchasing today gets you this update for free in case you weren't aware.

Although with the amount of work that's gone into 1.5 I am a bit surprised you haven't made it a paid update! I think you'd be justified doing so - but I also think that my values on spending money on artistry are not 'normal' in the pure statistical sense of the word.

I love those flags - details like that are what bring a model to life. (Why does the altimeter depend on avionics power though? I thought it was purely mechanical, driven by air pressure and springs, and only needing electricity for transponder Mode C altitude reporting, lighting, and possibly to drive an agitator to keep the mechanism moving.)

[tkyler]

The altimeter is part of the "flight director system" and therefore provides electrical signals to the flight director for barometric altitude info.  The flag, like the others on the ADI and HSI, represents an "unreliable signal"  in that some signal conditioning and cross-comparisons (from other sources) are done by the computer before "officially" being used to control the plane through the autopilot.  Of course lack of power cause the flags to display also.

The "system" is collectively referred to as the "Sperry SPZ-500 Automatic Flight Control System" and consists of the autopilot controller, mode selector, pilot's altimeter, radio altimeter, altitude alert controller, ADI and HSI.

As to it's dependency on "avionics power".....it's more accurate to say that these components are powered from the left hand radio bus (I think?).  (it's powered off the AC busses, which xp does not explicitly simulate)....and in the absence of real AC busses in x-plane, it's the best I can do.  I had requested some features for x-plane 10 regarding electrical bus simulations but Austin has said he will not put the feature in for now.  I am going to investigate my own multi - bus simulation...which means a refresher on simultaneous equations and gauss-seidel numerical techniques (my way of saying it ain't a quick solution)....and I'm REAL REAL rusty on that stuff, so no telling when I'll have it, but I'll keep plugging away.

Until I get the busses modeled accurately, I'm going to make some "convenience" concessions".  The right switch will control the avionics and nav2 stuff and the left will control the nav1 stuff and flags.  This is just procedural and wont' affect anything because in reality, the electronics are MUCH more sophisticated...so it'll mostly be for "immersion" in normal operations.

[steven winslow]

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[MaidenFan]

The MU-2 was the aircraft that really got me into other X-Aviation products. I never thought the MU-2 would get better, but looking at the progress, it has gotten SO much better!!!! :P The new textures and details in the cockpit make it look like a real airplane. ;D

[kgenus]

Tom,

For the past few years I've been interested in a used Mitsubishi MU-2B as potential owner.  A few months back a friend mentioned X-Plane and eventually, I found this forum and your plane.  I'm typically not one to spend on addons but after reading your posts and seeing the professional manner in which you conduct yourself, I chose to support your endeavors. 

Thanks for all you've done.

Kevin

[tkyler]

Thank you Kevin, that is very much appreciated.  Are you still looking to get one?  I quite miss flying in them, they are quite something to me.  I am anxious to get the next update out, it will be quite a step up from the current offering....and for those who are wondering WHEN that it....well there's a few little niggling things left that I need to hunt down.  I'm working quite furiously on V10 still and only get in the occasional weekend work on it....but I'm telling ya, it's real close!

[mezopeter]

This is really the best X-PLANE aircraft ever. After this update with ADF and the new enterior lightning and looking it will be the best-best! You can feel the plane. Thank you!

[andyw248]

Just to add to this sentiment --- I also moved to x-plane 9 after having used all the other sims, was bitterly disappointed by the planes, and then discovered your MU-2 which blew everything away, including all the high priced planes that are available for the other sims. I'm really looking forward the the updated version and I really appreciate your effort of keeping it at the leading edge. Thanks for the sneak previews!

BTW you may have heard of it but there is a product out there called TrackIR that allows you to lean forward a little bit so you don't have to hide the yoke... just in case

[Lukasz]

Not everyone has TrackIR and it's really nice, that some developers remember about such pilots and provide additional features for them, in order to make their flying more comfortable and enjoyable. Even having TrackIR, I use such features from time to time, because after 2 hours of flight my back starts to ache, from constant moving, stretching and peaking around things. Unfortunately my "cockpit layout", while fairly ergonomic, falls short of a real plane.

[Dozer]

I have TrackIR (the first version that's 2DoF only - it lets you turn your head but not move it) but it's a royal pain in the neck trying to click on a switch on an instrument panel while your head is moving the camera at the same time. In real life, I can move my hands completely independently of my head, but desktop gaming technology hasn't really caught up with that yet! so I use a combination of hat switches and PilotView-plugin preset camera positions to navigate the panels. So being able to remove the yokes is a mandatory feature for aircraft like this if I am to use them, rather than panning the camera forwards to peek over the yoke.

TrackIR is fantastic in combat sims, especially where there's no need to use the mouse in 3d space because all the commands are mapped to the keyboard. Couldn't do without it in Il-2 Sturmovik!

[Kesomir]

I have TrackIR (the first version that's 2DoF only - it lets you turn your head but not move it) but it's a royal pain in the neck trying to click on a switch on an instrument panel while your head is moving the camera at the same time.

There's a hotkey to enable/disable the camera. On windows it's F9. Look where you need, hit F9, operate switch, Hit F9 again.

[Dozer]

There's a hotkey to enable/disable the camera. On windows it's F9. Look where you need, hit F9, operate switch, Hit F9 again.

Yes, I knew about that, I didn't get far with learning that technique (ie making it as fluid and unthinking as just using the hat switch) partly because, on my system and with a first-gen TrackIR, it was a significant amount of hassle to get the TrackIR running each time and the benefits over just using the hat switch, for X-Plane IFR-type flight, just wasn't worth it.

Also I had to tie an infra-red LED to my forehead with a lanyard, with a wire running down to a battery pack somewhere nearby - a homemade system to replace the ineffective retroreflective dot. It was cumbersome and confused the heck out of my housemates :-)

[tkyler]

Not everyone has TrackIR and it's really nice, that some developers remember about such pilots and provide additional features for them, in order to make their flying more comfortable and enjoyable

The current MU2 plugin wasn't designed well to handle multiple types of "preferences".  Because I primarily use a trackball and keyboard, you'll note that it's very "mouse manipulator intensive" as opposed to being hardware friendly.  This was a big issue for me and was a heavy factor in the plugin redesign.  My goal is to allow any preference to be utilized whether keyboard input, mouse input or hardware input and still have consistency in the animations and functionality.  That may sound trivial but I think a lot of people would be surprised just what a pain it is to make everything work...and when it all "just works", then nobody will notice because it just works as you'd expect. 

As it turns out, the throttles are the biggest pain to make work with custom plugin and animation.  Austin's hardware setup is tied into his throttle dataref pretty tight..so you have to intercept the joystick input value to make the animations work with customization...and it just goes on and on and on.  That last 5% takes a long time!

[tkyler]

Thought I might have had it tonight.  6 straight hours....about 50+ "relaunches" of x-plane (spare me gizmo pitches...I know I know) but still there's some bugs yet to be squashed in my code.  I have each function with regards to the engine working perfectly, but I can't get all the functions to work at the right time.  It's like pushing one side of a see-saw down...then going to the other side and pushing it down.  What you want is both sides down but you never seem to get it.  I'm so close I can taste it.  Once I squash these last two bugs,   I just need to wire up some light switches and animations and be done with it.

I have the prop locks working proper on start up.   If you don't take the props off the locks properly, you won't be going anywhere.  Simulating those prop locks also means simulating an over speed governor too....so there's yet another procedure to follow during startup.  Now that I think about it, I have quite a bit to add to the manual.

[Lukasz]

One of the things, that caught my eye and bumped up my interest in Mu, apart from that I really like it's overall and original shape, are unique engines. For someone accustomed to King Air, this was a surprise at first, but after I did my homework and get used to them, I felt in total love. And now you're going to add even more unique and seldom modelled features to the engines That's awesome.

[Dozer]

Very exciting Tom!