This is unfortunately taking longer than I thought, because of a slight lack of motivation, and other projects. But I haven’t cancelled the project, because I want to get this done, and I’m too far through this anyway. You may have noticed that I have changed the name, confirming this is a new aircraft, albeit a quite heavy rework.
If you can't see the pictures below, try here (Google Drive Folder).
Other projects
One of the main reasons for delays, these projects include the Ariel Atom 4, Atom 4R, and the America’s Cup Yacht.
Newly-Completed Components
Nose Landing Gear
I have completed the basic mechanical system for the nose gear, where I used the A320 nose gear for reference.
Strength tests
The nose gear can support the weight of the aircraft at the moment, but when I did touchdown tests, it bent back into the fuselage. I discovered that using a floppy rotator for the main leg caused this issue, so I made it the controlling rotator for landing gear extension/retraction. But this caused another problem: It caused the front Strut to sometimes fold forward and down, rather than backward and up — gravity was the culprit. This broke the landing gear, but I didn’t want to get rid of the strut. The solution was to adapt the strut so that it folded forward and down instead, because gravity is immutable.
Main Landing Gear
Wing cutout mistake
Even before I began on the main gear, I knew I had made a mistake in not creating a cutout in the wing for it. When I got to the stage of making it, I believed that all the measurements were correct and on proportion, but it didn’t fit probably, because I thought they were correct, but I didn’t know if they actually were. I had another look, and realised one of the widths was wrong, and when I fixed it, everything fitted in place much better.
Strength tests
Because the main landing gear folds sideways, rather than lengthways, they performed better in touchdown tests than the original nose gear. However, I did have to fix some shaking wheels.
Engines
I have completely redone the engines, starting from scratch, and using joystick bases for the fan rotation. I also made those swirls/spirals on the spinners! By using curved reducer blocks for the fan blades instead of propeller engines, it looks far more realistic, and the blades don’t disappear when a certain RPM is reached. Also, instead of using one engine hidden in the fuselage for the thrust, I’ve used two engines — One in each side — and I’ll be creating a startup procedure too.
Slats and Mounting the Engines
Another blunder: I didn’t make a gap in between the slats for mounting the engine. I didn’t want to ruin the slats by creating the gap, but then it hit me: Make another gap at the wing root. This meant I could change the ship of the slat without changing the position. It also meant I could put lights in the other gap.
Paused development areas
Cockpit
This is what really slowed me down last time. So it will probably be the last thing I will do.
Layout
The problems with the previous cockpits were the layouts. There were too many FT labels, which aren’t good for performance cost. Also, they didn’t really look similar to any other cockpit. This time, however, I have used real cockpits from the A320, B737 etc, as reference for the new one. I’ve already sketched it out.
Still to do
Passenger Cabin
The floor, walls, and ceiling of the cabin will be designed so that it’s possible for objects to travel through it, without falling out. I will also add functioning doors and wing exits. Seat pitch will be 75-80 cm, all Economy Class, with these seats.
Funky Trees
I said in the previous report that much of the FT code for the LXR2-200 will be carried over. However, because of the amount of things being reworked and replaced, I’m now starting to think that not much actually will be carried over.
Building
Using GalacticaAsia’s advice (see the previous report), I have replaced most small and hinge rotators with regular rotators, and can I just say, rotating some of them correctly was a nightmare. But every little bit helps. As for drag, I reduced it from about 17,000 points to under 400, but I will increase it when I start making the speeds realistic. This forum is quite useful.
T
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@TheNewSPplayer ok, cool!
@RobertsAeronautics i downloaded the LXR2 to see the code and some other things, i might use them on my future builds
@TheNewSPplayer
I think it's the same code as in my LXR2-200.
It uses a
condition ? value_if_true : value_if_falseoperator.Bro, what codes do you use for making the Landing Gear doors open and close whem activated o deactivated?
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