News on the Starship
-
I am super excited about the Starship. I feel it will be one of my favourite MSFS aircraft.
Please Nick, can you advise if wing flex will be implemented? I watched many videos on the aircraft lately and it would appear its wings flex spectacularly. I am hoping it will be reflected in the simulation.
Release day purchase here.
-
Absolutely! I've paid particular attention to how the wings flex while the aircraft is taxiing, and have written my own code to emulate different surface dynamics for the best look and feel. You can see how dynamic the airframe feels in the very first shot from my first promo video. If you look very closely, you can see that the slightest bumps in the air cause the displacement to propagate down the wing. So glad you're looking forward to it!
-
Awesome to see the recent update about a planned release before FSExpo! My partner and I flew across the country recently just to see N74TD at the Evergreen Museum in Oregon, which has had me even more excited for the upcoming release; looking forward to the next progress update!
-
Any news on the starship, about the manual, would appreciate it! @Black-Square
-
@Black-Square I remain very excited to learn how to fly this aircraft. One question, as it was designed for VOR flights and ILS landings, at least I think that's right?, and with GPS replacing most older forms of air navigation, what type of navigation and landings can this aircraft do?
-
I thought I covered this in one of my update articles, but it appears not! Here is a relevant section from the manual, and also a section from one of those update articles.
"Users may choose whether to fly with modern GPS capabilities that have been added to the original AMS-850, with autopilot coupling to a GNS430 for modern approach, departure, and arrival capabilities, or with only the navigational functionality of the original Starship, including VLF and Omega radionavigation."
"The Starship's avionics suite pioneered many of today's commonplace features, with some in more recognizable form than others. While it seems difficult to believe in hindsight, the Starship left the factory with no GPS receiver, as the prototype flew in the same year GPS was first made publicly available to civilian users. Instead, the Starship's avionics automatically tuned to nearby navigation aids to generate a positional estimate, the accuracy of which could be enhanced by user input. The Starship also carried receivers for Very Low Frequency (VLF) radio stations, such as Omega, which consisted of nine transmitters located around the globe. As a personal passion project, this pre-GPS navigation system will be available in the Black Square Starship for MSFS. Since its first sale in 1986, the Starship has also received many software and hardware updates to provide modern navigation capabilities, which will also be represented in MSFS."
In summary, the Starship can navigate with VOR, basic enroute GPS, VLF/OMEGA (you can turn them on or off as you choose), and can land with the LOC/GS, and the LNAV only GPS in the real aircraft. I have also added the option to couple the avionics to a GNS 430 for WAAS enabled approaches, though there is currently no Starship configured this way in the real world. The expert on Starship equipment/avionics has told me that this is possible, and he has thought about doing it, but has yet to devote the resources to it.
-
@Black-Square Will VOR/DME based RNAV also be present along with VLF/Omega? It would be nice to see that for those who want no GPS at all, and it enables some RNAV approaches(if necessary navaids are present) without needing GPS.
-
Absolutely. On the sensor control screen of the CDU, you will be able to enable or disable VOR/DME, VLF/OMEGA, and GNSS. Each source of navigation is dependent on its respective systems, so VLF positional accuracy depends on your selection of stations, the time of day, the aircraft's position, and more. VOR/DME positional accuracy depends on how many stations are tuned in your proximity (which the aircraft is always doing in the background) and their signal strength. You can also relinquish your NAV1 and NAV2 VOR receivers when they are not in use for improved accuracy.
-
@Black-Square Will it also have legitimately simulated DME triangulation? I remember seeing in the manual that it can bounce between 3 DMEs on each receiver(a method developed in the 1980s iirc, tuning multiple DMEs in quick succession and repetition when available to gather a fairly accurate fix based on the distance from the 3) so that should be available on the VOR/DME status page and be taken into account for RNAV position determination afaik.
EDIT: Rockwell specifically had a patent related to such a system that came into effect in 1983, so it would be reasonable to expect a Rockwell/Collins system like the AMS-850 to have such functionality https://patents.google.com/patent/US4583177A/en
-
@Black-Square Great reply, just what I was hoping to learn. Can't wait for the release! Thank you
-
@Noob21 While I can't find any evidence in the 600 page avionics manual that this is the exact technique used in the Starship, the end result should be the same. The two DME-442 "three channel transceivers" (in addition to the two other NAV receivers) are constantly tuning and receiving DME stations. I thought you might enjoy the detail presented by the Starship's avionics manual, despite not containing the answer we were looking for:
"The digital synthesizer originates the CW frequency
used to drive the power amplifier. The processor programs
the synthesizer with the tune frequency using
data, clock, and enable lines decoded from the data
buffer bus. This dc level tunes the veo to apply
the proper CW interrogation frequency to the power
amplifier. The vco also supplies VAR FREQ feedback
to the synthesizer, which is compared with a fixed
REF frequency to provide error correction."I have emulated all of these navigation sources to the best of my ability, within reason and performance limitations, using the resources at my disposal within MSFS. When you select which navigation sources to use, the aircraft's positional estimate will improve or degrade depending on how well these sources are being received. Although I have not come up with a convenient way for this to influence the autopilot, and thus the course flown (I am still thinking of ways to do this), you will be able to monitor the status of the FMS position, and the operation of all these receivers, and receive notifications and flags when the FMS loses confidence in its position, just as in the real aircraft.
