I created a cargo 747 in the spirit of "Operation Apollo
Storm", a phrase coined by Staffan Ahlberg.
|
ith
so many great freeware airplanes available, why spend money on a
commercial product such as Instant Airplane Maker? The
short answer to this is you are not going to find many airplanes with
such attention to detail as the ones contained in this package out
on the net. And if you do, chances are you won't be able to
customize them in just seconds either! Sounds good, doesn't it?
This product should really be thought of as an airplane customiser.
You can't create your own aircraft from the ground up, such as with
Flight Shop. You can, however, choose from a large list of custom
paint jobs for the included aircraft: A319/A320/A321 from Airbus, the
DC-9-30 from Douglas, and my personal favorite, the Boeing B747-400.
Also included are various airlines that use the aircraft, such as
Northwest, Air Canada, Lufthansa, United, among others. Panels for
the aircraft are also part of the package; more about those later.
Textured and 3D engine pylons, round wheels and engines too!
|
Visually speaking, these aircraft are incredible! There are no
hexagonal shapes anywhere. If you look closely, you can even see the
turbine blades INSIDE the engines. The engine pylons are also 3-D,
something I have never seen in freeware aircraft. For moving parts
fans, you can watch the gear retract and extend. Words simply don't
do these jets justice. Take a look at the screen shots to see what I
mean. Amazing!
Installation
Installation couldn't be simpler. The small (I mean small!) manual
contains all the information needed. For those who have installed
Windows programs before, there are no surprises. One should note
that the program must be installed in the Flight Simulator
subdirectory. A window will prompt you to provide the path to your
FS98 installation. The extra airplanes (the ones with the airline
liveries) are not installed with the program and must be installed
afterwards.
The B747-400 panel designed by Tony D'Ambrosio.
This is one of three panels included but is the only one worth using.
|
Customizing
Now it's time to start customizing the aircraft. It's a simple
four-step process. First, you select the aircraft you want. You
have a choice of either a passenger of cargo version. Next, choose
the paint job. There are two menus here, one for the tail logo and
one for the fuselage. Both menus have a preview window that allows
you to see what you're choosing. In the third step you choose the name
of your "airline". From this menu, you type the name and select from
the rather limited number of fonts and colors. The fourth and last
From the first menu, you can choose the passenger or
cargo version of the included aircraft.
|
step is where you actually produce your aircraft. Just choose a name
for the airplane and click save. IAM creates a design file (*.iam)
containing all the information about the airplane (type, paint
options, and name) and then produces the airplane. Once it's done,
IAM displays a "Production Report" window that reminds you where to
look for your new airplane in the FS98 Aircraft menu.
Type in your "airline" name, choose the font style, and
type the designer information.
|
Flying
No aircraft is good unless it flies well. These aircraft don't.
They fly outstandingly! The flight model for the 747 was tested by
an experienced Boeing 747 pilot. I found the 747 and the others to be
very stable in all aspects of flight and I was able to hand fly an
approach without the aircraft jumping around. Those of you with a
Wingman Digital Extreme know that without an absolutely perfect and
frequent joystick calibration, hand flying is out of the question,
unless you are flying an IAM aircraft!
The two step painting process.
|
Panels
While the aircraft are amazing, most of the panels leave something to
be desired. The only one worth mentioning is the 747 panel. It's
designed by Tony D'Ambrosio and includes his Real CRT gauges. There
is a glaring omission of installation instructions for the panels. I
had to look around in the program's directory and found the
panels.exe file which when double clicked installed the panels. To
use them, I had to edit each aircraft's panel.cfg file. For the
price of this program, the installation and the quality of the panels
should have been better.
The Pros & Cons
he DC-9's have exhaust stains just like their real world
counterparts!
|
The pros are obvious. The aircraft look amazing and fly that way
too, even with inferior joysticks! That alone is worth the price.
Add to that the ability to customize your own B747-400 and you have a
program that will have a permanent place on your hard drive. IAM
also allows you to share your designs with the whole world. This is
done by uploading the design files (*.iam).
Even with such a great program, there are bound to be cons. Instant
Airplane Maker is no exception. Your choice of custom liveries is
limited to the menu choices. If you have any artistic talent, you
can "hack" the textures and apply the designs from your own mind.
The next "problem" I found was that it seemed the Airbuses and the
DC-9 had way too much fuel in the tanks. This made take-off a little
difficult. I solved the "problem" by using ADE98 to reduce the
amount of fuel. The handling and range of the aircraft were not
affected by the change except take-off was now a piece of cake.
You can rid of any of the IAM planes through a simple menu.
|
While a real pilot tested the B747-400, I don't think the other
aircraft were similarly tested. The designers, for unknown reasons,
left out one of the most essential items needed for flying, a pilots
operating handbook for each aircraft. I was left with no option but
to use handbooks developed for WestWind Airlines aircraft. They were
adequate when used as general guide for the aircraft.
Conclusion
Moving landing gear is a feature found on all IAM
aircraft. Note the visible fan blades.
|
Even with its few problems, Instant Airplane Maker is worth your
money. Where else are you going to get visually stunning aircraft
that fly just as stunningly? The quality even beats what the VIP
Group has to offer. (To be fair, they do have a wider range of
aircraft and panels.) You simply haven't flown until you fly one of
the aircraft from the Virtual Skunk team!
Phillip M. Overgaard
overgard@7cities.net
