To infinity and beyond - with AI

[speedbird591]

I'm still adding some Classic British AI to my Kai Tak traffic and learning stuff all the way. I'm sending it out fairly evenly spaced to Taipei, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur and Brunei, but I need to do some more work on timings as they all come back in a bunch in the middle of the night. :roll: So until I replan the timings, I thought I'd be clever and do a few touch and go flight plans. The first one to go on test was a BA VC10 and I decided to chase it with a Hunter to see where it went. This is the route shown on the map for the chase a/c - you can see from the wiggly bit at the beginning that the AI a/c didn't exactly follow my expected route! I assume from this that a touch and go flightplan tells the a/c to fly the back course parallel to the runway heading and then turn in to pick up the IGS after a certain distance. But with the Kai Tak Rwy 13 IGS offset by so much it couldn't find it.

This was the flightplan : AC#3,GARVM,5%,1HR,VFR,00:05:00,TNG00:25:00,010,F,0999,VHHX,00:30:18,TNG00:55:08,010,F,0998,VHHX

And this is what actually happened:



Your starter for 10 is: How far would it fly if you left it to its own devices? It wouldn't run out of fuel so I suppose it would just grind on round the world indefinitely at about 200 knots and 2,000 feet! If I didn't cancel the flight plan would a VC10 leave Hong Kong every half hour and fly for ever at a heading of 316 degrees? How long would it take before an indeterminate number of VC10s were flying round the world nose to tail? I didn't have the patience to follow it any longer, so I shall leave you all to think of the answers for me I think I'll have to scrap that plan and fly hops to Macau and back instead



Ian

[DaveB]

Hi Ian..

A word of caution when following AI aircraft. If you get too close, you can 'interfere' with it.. so much so it will fly on.. and on until it eventually disappears. The odd 'close formation' is ok ;-)

ATB

DaveB :tab:

[speedbird591]

If you get too close, you can 'interfere' with it.. so much so it will fly on.. and on until it eventually disappears.

Oooer! I wouldn't want to interfere with it

Do you think if I just wait on the ground it might come back of it's own accord?

[Techy111]

Maybe they are all in the back drinking the duty free......

When the bar is dry it will land..... :roll:

Tony

[DaveB]

Do you think if I just wait on the ground it might come back of it's own accord?

Err.. no.. well actually, yes. It won't come back as such.. just reappear where it should be on it's next cycle I did the same years ago when PeterM first released McLeland Field. Thought I'd sit with 'Echo' which I managed to do for some time. However.. got a bit close when it was in one particular phase of it's plan and off we went.. out to sea with only one of us returning

ATB

DaveB :tab:

[petermcleland]

In particular you should avoid formating on the downwind leg...He will NOT turn base while he can see you there. He will just extend his downwind leg to let you go first. If you turn in and leave him, if you have not forced him too far, he will turn in and space behind you...You can then half loop and fly inverted to above him and then pull down and formate again on finals. He won't object to that and if you are good, you can do a formation landing.

How far will he go away?...Remember that AI only exists in a rectangle about 70 miles around your user aeroplane...If he gets to the edge of that he will vanish and cease to exist. If you are in Traffic Tools > Explorer Spot View on him when this happens...CLUNK!!! You will suddenly be back in Spot View on your user aeroplane.

To force an AI aircraft to fly its entire route, you must fly to keep him within that limiting rectangle.

One further point on AI T&Gs...They are risky to program unless you know how to avoid a particular bug...They will work fine in good weather, but if the weather deteriorates then he will call up to file an IFR plan...IFR T&Gs do not touchdown...They just continue to do Radar vectored ILS approaches to OVERSHOOTS. This will continue forever as they will never cancel their IFR plan once filed, even if the weather goes gin clear. There is a programming FlightPlan method to break this cycle and you can see this in the section of Echo's FlightPlan that has him doing T&Gs first at McLeland Field and then at Yakutat before returning to base...He will make a final Full Stop landing at McLeland Field whatever the weather does. Without that FlightPlanning method he would never again land if the weather went IFR. If you need clarification of this then let me know

[speedbird591]

Thank you very much for all the info, Dave and Peter. I understand it a lot better now. I'll try to avoid crowding him on the downwind leg as per Peter's suggestion and see what he does. I'm still not convinced that he will find the IGS for Rwy 13 from the flight path he has taken. I'll have to leave that for a day or two as I'm off to work soon.

Meanwhile I've acquired another AI "classic" aircraft from my past life and have programmed it to do a short hop to Macau and back. This time, my chase a/c kept well back and landed at Macau first to wait for him and he landed on schedule. I've yet to see if he makes it back in time for Happy Hour :drinkers:



I've bookmarked the post to save Peter's advice which I'll come back to when I'm ready to experiment further Thanks again for the advice.

Ian