EGCC Manchester Int

[Femke]

AS I live about 20 miles from Manchester airport I decided to download a free version of the scenery someone had made. Looked great but even with 16 gig memory  my aircraft were crawling down the runway trying to get speed up to take off.

Now I have made a couple of attempts in 10.1 to make my own version of the airport one in wed and another in Marginals overlay editor to sort of teach myself the tools.

In 10.1 if I started a new file in wed and renamed it to EGCC I had 2 choices. I could import the global apt.dat file part that gave me runways and aprons which I did sucessfully or I could start from scratch and build my own runways and taxiways then populate the airport buildings.

This time I decided to start from scratch. So I created a new airport in wed 1.2, called it EGCC, created the airport, placed the runways and made half of the taxiway.

Just to check all was running ok, I then opened 10.20 64 bit  with my VW car on the runway, there were my runways and the first of my taxiways and spread around the gras was a blooming airport.

Nothing shows in Wed. Nothing shows in Overlay Editor. But I definitely have some rather bland looking airport buildings.

This is what has me scratching my head in puzzlement where did they come from and why.

Any help would be wonderful as this is driving me batty.

[Tonka]

The EGCC airport layout in the default apt.dat is very accurate. I would recommend using that instead of trying to make another one.

 

Bear in mind that the runway and taxiway data is stored in an apt.dat, and the building and object data is stored in a dsf file. So, if you want to remake/alter the buildings, you only need to alter the information in the dsf file.

 

Airport buildings generally come from a Custom Scenery package, so have a look in your Custom Scenery folder for a scenery with Manchester Intl in it. If you remove the sceneries for Manchester from your X-Plane folder, you should be able to load X-Plane again and find nothing but runways and taxiways there. These will be from the default apt.dat.

 

Its possible that you might have some X-Plane style building derived from OSM data being placed there if you load the sim without any Custom Scenery. Without screenshots its hard to know what you are seeing. If after removing all custom scenery for Manchester from your X-Plane folder you still have buildings there, try making an exclusion zone in WED or Overlay editor to exclude objects from that area. There are lots of useful posts about the use of exclusion zones floating around online, but let us know if you need some more help, and try to post a few screenshots to show us what you are seeing.

[Femke]

The EGCC airport layout in the default apt.dat is very accurate. I would recommend using that instead of trying to make another one.

 

Bear in mind that the runway and taxiway data is stored in an apt.dat, and the building and object data is stored in a dsf file. So, if you want to remake/alter the buildings, you only need to alter the information in the dsf file.

 

Airport buildings generally come from a Custom Scenery package, so have a look in your Custom Scenery folder for a scenery with Manchester Intl in it. If you remove the sceneries for Manchester from your X-Plane folder, you should be able to load X-Plane again and find nothing but runways and taxiways there. These will be from the default apt.dat.

 

Its possible that you might have some X-Plane style building derived from OSM data being placed there if you load the sim without any Custom Scenery. Without screenshots its hard to know what you are seeing. If after removing all custom scenery for Manchester from your X-Plane folder you still have buildings there, try making an exclusion zone in WED or Overlay editor to exclude objects from that area. There are lots of useful posts about the use of exclusion zones floating around online, but let us know if you need some more help, and try to post a few screenshots to show us what you are seeing.

Thanks for taking the time to answer. I understand the taxiways and runways are in the global apt.dat as I have already successfully imported the airport from the global apt.dat in the past, to 10.1 but there seemed to be bits of taxiways missing and an area where the cargo apron should have been that wouldn't show. So to avoid a repeat of that situation I decided to go from scratch this time and make my own runways and taxiways.  The only custom scenery folder with the EGCC data is the one I am creating, but just in case something is sitting in one of the folders of other imported UK airports I have downloaded I shall rename mine to go to the top of the custom scenery folder as a trial.

 

The airport buildings that are loading are extremely bland and although there are slight similarities to some of the Manchester layout the actual buildings are nothing like the true airport.

 

The OSM data you mentioned I suppose is a possibility but I wonder if that is a recent development for 10.20 as it wasn't there the last time I started making the airport when I was using 10.1

 

I  tried to paste a clipboard piccy of the airport here but after a few minutes it self deleted with a message saying the post was too short and the jpeg was wiped so I had to use the auto saved reply. Perhaps copy and paste is not allowed in posts, I am not sure and am loath to go upsetting anyone here and getting banned as I was at .org

[Tonka]

Upload the pic here, or to one of those online image hosting places and post a link. To upload here use the 'More Reply Options' button, then 'Attach Files' verify the image is within any image size policies on this site before uploading. I'm not sure what they are off hand.

 

Bear in mind that there is a scenery_packs.ini in the Custom Scenery folder that can be used to specify a load order too. you might have to edit that to make sure your scenery is shown on top.

 

 

[Femke]

Its cool thanks Tonka, and the exclusion zone worked a treat and took out all the brown and cream shaded airport buildings. I think you were right that x-plane may have inserted some OSM data, as I recall doing a scenery save in the middle of creating runways and aprons. With no buildings the program may have tried to be helpful and insert some.

Thanks for your help.

[Tonka]

No probs, glad you got it sorted!