heater controller link?

I completely understand, ElfBoss. I appreciate your informative response. I also must say, the power behind your engines is overwhelming in a very positive way. In addition, they do not have the exhaust cloud trail which is such an eye pleasing plus. Such a great build overall. This creation of yours is very inspiring.

Hi West, thanks for you comment. Much appreciated. :) The continual climb was something I've been trying to tweak for a bit and there is a some trim work being done in the background that tries to dampen it (pitch reduction). I've somewhat concede that "it is what it is" because the HERMES is built for STOL. The wings cause an amount of drag but impart a ton of lift. However a revisit is certainly not out of the question.

Typically when I get to a comfortable altitude after takeoff I'll hit altitude hold and then use INCREASE and DECREASE for long flights. On landings I find it easier to use AP and plot a WP just past the end of the runway (with WP ALT of 0). I can use Roll and Yaw while AP is active to "push" finese the approach. I will then start to reduce the throttle slowly so that the plane is actually coming in under the approach and does a touch down before the WP. Hit the brakes, throttle all the way back and she can stop in under 20m.

This is a real gem of an aircraft, ElfBoss. I really appreciate you sharing this with the community. I was hoping that I could also ask you a question regarding the take off speed? Is there a way to adjust how quick the aircraft goes up when taking off and continually climbs at a high rate? For instance, once the craft has reached an appropriate altitude, is there a way to not allow the aircraft to continually climb without engaging the altitude hold? Thank you so much for your time and wonderful creation.

Almost all are in m/s except for boats where I've typically denoted knots.

I was wondering are all of your creations speed indicated in the same units?

Sure, Darkstar. Go ahead.

So i thought i would ask for your permission to use your MK III and MK IV and make a sort of MK V. I am going to take and make the engines removable. then modify the engines to work both ways with jets or props. as well as making a STOL system. Just thought it be best to ask your permission before i post it since the base design will not change much.

I added the following in the latest updated...
- Added a button to the front left of the pilot that allows them to toggle the AP Roll Turn Assist ON/OFF. In heavy winds it is expected that the HERMES will need to apply much more yaw to accommodate for the wind push the closer it gets to the WP. Turning off Roll Assist will prevent the plane from banking over too far and loosing control.

Unfortunately the AP System is not bugged but can't compensate for the excessive winds that have come up in v1.0. The APs goal is to point the aircraft at the WP, nothing more. If the winds are too strong (I experienced blasts on a trip to the Arctic) planes get easily throw off course and the corrections become more exaggerated the closer you get to the WP. The only solution right now is that if you are experiencing heavy winds you need to turn off AP and go manual. I may look at a configuration setting shortly where you can turn off roll turn assist in AP. This could help with the heavy banking.

The new winds are a real menace right now. It's actually pretty cool. :) On a trip to the Arctic I had to fight to stick a landing with 30 m/s crosswinds. When I landed even with parking brakes on it was getting pushed about. Took forever to try to get her in to the hangar. Wind and weather will now be something you need to consider in your choice of vessel.

her AP system is bugged, i flew into some wind and she kept overcorrecting and eventually spun out and flew into the water i was in the cargo are and jumped into the seat back there to see why were tilting hard

Technically there is no auto-landing system on the plane. However you can use the AP Route system to generate an approach, transition and touch down spot but you may need to provide subtle "push" assistance during the route. With the AP the manual controls are still active allowing you to make small corrections (pushes). Speed control though is completely in the hands of the pilot and not the AP system.

can you autoland with this?

When I think about this there is already a button on the flight deck for group locking. Just set that to default to on.

The door controllers all have two lock options: Lock and Group Lock. I built it that way so that you could control doors either individually or in a group for closing. What you could do is set up a toggle button that defaults to on and have it accessible from only the inside. Take the output of that block and send it to the Lock item that is not occupied on the door controller or if both are just add an OR gate to have two inputs going in to one. The result is that so long as that toggle button is on the only way to enter is to put in the code. By default the code expires after 5 seconds and the door will lock agsin. If you want to unlock all the doors again just turn off the toggle block.

How do you Do the Locks for all the external Doors before flight??

I see, many thanks mate

Hi Tin, In the case of a lightning strike the main breakers all get tripped (as per game designed) and they need to be turned back on. At this time they are located in the midsection of the plane as I couldn't find a location space in the cockpit. However, there is one stop gap method in the cockpit. There is a breaker next to the copilot seat (EMERGENCY) that when flipped back on will send power to the BASIC and DRIVE Systems. This should give just enough power to restart some engines and put the plane in to HOLD ALT so you can get to the main panel and flip the breakers back on.

It seems that the electric power system is unable to restart after being knocked out by lighting during bad weather, causing the whole plane to lose control and dive to the sea

bruh ur dedicated

Added new Beacon Locator and Emergency Beacon blocks. The Beacon Locator block is now in the place the Test Alarms blocks was previously. The Test Alarms has been moved to the ceiling. The Beacon Locator has an ON/OFF Switch, an Audible Alerts Turn off Button and a 8 segment bar indicator which identifies the signal strength based on blips per second. From practice it appears that an "over the target" beep count equates to 8-9 blips per second

Hi, Dinobino. Thanks for the comments. There are actually 4 external connections already for Ground Power. Under each engine pod is an electrical connector. Each funnels in to the Engine Batteries Breaker which feeds to the Main Grid. Therefore if you connect electricity to any of them it will funnel through to the whole plane. Additionally there is a separate electrical connector in the cargo bay if you wanted to bring in a generator which is connected to the Main Grid. In the next release I'm going to add disconnect buttons to each of the four engine pods so that it may make it more apparent.

In regards to rescue beacon... looking at it. :)

This plane is awesome! I have 2 ideas you should implement:
- Ground power port
- The new rescue beacon locator for finding crashed planes and a beacon for crashing of course.

In regard to the formula...

Considering I can only consider positive values for the Engine Throttle the formula for the value remap for any range of mins and max would be:

x.out=(x.val - x.zero)/(x.max-x.zero)

where...
x.val= value from throttle x-axis
x.zero= value on x-axis considered to be zero
x.max= value on x-axis considered to be 1

For example... considering full range of x.val=-1 to x.val=1...
x.zero=-1
x.max=1

The output should have x.out=0 all the way back and x.out=1 all the way forward.

All the way back...
x.val=-1, output should be 0...
x.out=(-1 - -1)/1- -1)=0/2 = 0

All the way forward...
x.val=1, output should be 1...
x.out=(1- -1)/(1- -1)=(2/2) = 1

In the middle...
x.val=0, output should be 0.5
x.out=(0--(1))/(1- -1) = 1/2 = 0.5

The formula works for any range allowing you to account for those deadzones that may occur our throttle quadrant at full back or full forward. The only thing to add would be a clamp on the x.out between 0 and 1.

I didn't build it with HOTAS in mind. That extra bit I just added is a bolt-on after the fact. Sorry.

Hi Neottious. Because the Turbo Fans can never go in reverse the -1 on a HOTAS won't mean anything for throttle control to the engines. At this point I can only go as far as to be able to provide throttle control to a HOTAS for the engines going forward with a positive value.

The wings may not promote fuel economy but they are ideal for short take off and landing as well as slow approaches. The HERMES was originally built for that. The Jet Turbo Fans are just to add a bit more "umphh".

Doesn't compensate for the fact that 0 on HOTAS is -1 in-game, the function for that would be x/2+0.5 though.

That wing design kills your fuel economy.

I added some screenshots that show the composite controller block for the HOTAS Priority Switch. There is one screen shot that shows the location for the HOTAS microcontroller on the HERMES. On that microcontroller there are two adjustable properties that you may want to consider depending upon how your stick works:
MAX VALUE LOCATION FOR STICK, ZERO VALUE LOCATION FOR STICK.

Those properties can be set to reflect the respective "end zones" for your HOTAS UP/DOWN Axis. If you find that pushing the stick all the way forward only gets you to 95% or all the way back gets you 5% then you can set those properties to reflect your mins and maxs to ensure all the way forward is MAX and all the way back is IDL. For example, setting MAX to 95 and MIN to 5 will represent that your 100% range is actually in between those posts and it will adjust the throttle value out accordingly.

Hi Gordon Ramsey, I've adjusted the sensitivity for the REVERSE THRUSTER so that it will move faster. I've still left it at a max value of -0.25 as the REVERSE can't be used as a retro thruster. The power of the TurboFans (forward only) always trump the power from the Ducted Fans (can be forward or reverse, the Reverse Thruster Electric Motor is attached to shaft going to the ducted fan). The REVERSE THRUSTER is designed to allow for the HERMES to maneuver on the ground without the help of a pushback tug... particularly for backing out of a hangar.

Hi Neottious... I've now added support for HOTAS. To the right of the Central Throttle Quadrant you will find a yellow Combination Panel with the following...

1. FLIP SWITCH - When Gamepad/Joystick mode is active and the Switch is ON the throttle value sent to the Engines is now the actual value of the UP/DOWN Axis from the stick expressed in percentage. NOTE: If Gamepad mode is active and the FLIP Switch is OFF the UP/DOWN Axis will work as UP DOWN commands only sent to the Cenrtral Quadrant

2. HOTAS SIDES SWITCH PUSH BUTTON - When the FLIP Switch is ON hitting the button will cycle between 1 and 2: 1=HOTAS Signal is coming from Pilot's Seat, 2=HOTAS Signal is coming from Co-Pilot's Seat

3. SEVEN SEGMENT DISPLAY -> "C"=Central Quadrant provides value for Throttle, "1"=Pilot HOTAS provides value for Throttle, "2"=CoPilot HOTAS provides value for Throttle

4. INDICATOR - When Lit HOTAS Priority Mode is active (ie Throttle values are values coming from Gamepad/Joystick UP/DOWN Axis)

The reverse thrust lever is so slow and takes forever to start and stop can you fix this?

Hi Neottious. Let me see what I can do. The centre throttle quadrant feeds directly in to the Engine Controllers so they taking it's value from there. That quadrant is tied to the seats 1 and 2 buttons for up and down. I can see about putting in a bypass for the HOTAS throttle axis from the seat (UP/DOWN I assume) and see how I can factor that in with the current control scheme. I'm thinking a button to switch to HOTAS which will be confined strictly then to the pilot and then some sort of synch with the existing throttle quadrant. May take a bit of time and troubleshooting to get it just right.

One major issue, it completely screws over people who play on HOTAS due to the throttle thing. Are there any remedies for this?

Thanks, Killer Bunny. Not sure how that got cut off in the description. I could have sworn it was there. :) The default codes I put in are typically the numbers on the vehicle if anyone ever needs to find it.

Hi , the code is 0397 for me , but very good plane i use it with my friends

Thanks, Alec. I was originally considering implementing an auto landing system but couldn't get the level of precision for WP following I was hoping for. I've tweaked it a bit now so it may be possible. Just need to find the time. :)

Great aircraft here, one-button engine startup and pretty straightforward to learn the autopilot system and everything else. Love that it can almost auto-land for you if you step down the altitude on final approach in the waypoints.

Hi swerve and MrPanther. Thanks for the comments.

For the Beacon Search there is a Sensor located on the same gimbal assembly as the camera. It is tuned to the frequency identified by the number on screen when detection is turned on. You can change that up or down by using the arrow keys. If someone is painting a spot with a laser that is in view of the gimbal camera and you are tuned to the same frequency it will pick it up and populate data relating to that detected spot. In the case of my gimbal camera I have both a Painter (Laser Distancer) and a Sensor. So if you set them both to the same frequency when they are both turned on you will pick up on the laser you are pointing.

nice