AFCAD 2.21 vs ADE (1.50) ?

[Boosty]

AFCAD 2.21 vs ADE (1.50) ?

Greetings!
A basic tool question from the learning curve...
I want to design/edit airports and the surrounding terrain, in FS9.

Airport Design Editor describes itself as...
"a graphical design tool to create and enhance airports for Microsoft Flight Simulators 9 and X. It takes it's inspiration from the excellent AFCAD2 developed for FS9 by Lee Swordy. ADE does for FS9 and FSX what AFCAD does for FS9. It adds support for new FSX features such as fences, jetways and terrain."

I am not running FSX at all (yet), only FS9. Given this, which one should a "newbie" attempt to work with, first?
ADE was the first tool recommended to me (thanks, NikeHerk67), then I ran across AFCAD afterward and got curious.

Thanks in advance.
GaryG (Boosty)

note: for those who replied to my first post: "A Vintage AI "Airshow"- Is it possible?", please see my response, and thank you guys so much

[Jim Robinson]

ADE is the clear winner, Afcad was great for it's time but is long outdated now. It's problematic in the way it deals with some parts of the airport code and it can only do about half what ADE can do. With Afcad you'll need to use another program to place objects, yet another for terrain modifications - with ADE your only required to learn one program. ADE can also edit approaches, the only app I know of that's capable of that.

Jim

[NikeHerk67]

ADE is the clear winner, Afcad was great for it's time but is long outdated now. It's problematic in the way it deals with some parts of the airport code and it can only do about half what ADE can do. With Afcad you'll need to use another program to place objects, yet another for terrain modifications - with ADE your only required to learn one program. ADE can also edit approaches, the only app I know of that's capable of that.

Jim

There ya go Boosty! You heard it from an expert and a person who inspired me to get into airport design and modifications.

Hey Jim,

I have a stupid question ......Is it possible to create a very short RW, attach it to a Heliport and create an AI helecopter flight plan, even perhaps just a TNG for starters?

I realize the limitations in FS9 in that ATC requires taxi to RW to TO just like a winged aircraft! I'm trying to create this scenero which I plan to add onto an aircraft carrier if I can get it to work.

Check out my futal attempt so far. The only fault I have left is that I get an orphan parking error.
In the conglomeration below, I have an added RW16/34, 2 RW starts, 2 Hold shorts, a heliport, and a parking space pretty much stacked to top of one other....:eek


The result so far in FS9...

I'm not attempting to steal your thread as this may be of interest to you as well Boosty. By the way this is ADE!

[Jim Robinson]

Hi Herk, I know very little about AI, I did some GA flightplans for my home airport in notepad with TTools years ago, but that's about it. It's times like this that we really feel the loss of our old friend Opa, but I think he did a "tips & tricks" edition on heli AI IIRC so it might be worth some searching to see if you could find anything like that.

I downloaded a KAST Atsoria, Oregon scenery once that had some AI coast guard helicopters, but I think they just used the regular runways/taxiways like all the other AI did. That's the extent of my heli AI experience though. I can't really see what would be wrong with your approach of piling parking, taxiways, and runways into a very small area like that, the only thing is it seems you might have "active runway" issues, I see no way to make the heli use the short runway and all the other AI use the normal runway for example unless you separate the heliport into a completely new fictitious airport with it's own ICAO, and then write your AI flightplan accordingly.

What happens in the sim, anything at all? I used to use orphaned parking spots as a means of displaying static aircraft in airport sceneries, you had to assign a bogus airline code to the parking spot (like "CUB") and then declare atc_airline=CUB in the acft.cfg. The J3 would then show up there in a hangar or something but would never fly anywhere.

Hope you get it sorted,
Jim

[tgibson_new]

The tiny runway will be counted as a regular runway, and other traffic may try to use it. Also, if the wind does not favor that runway, the helis will use the regular runways instead. The only way I've gotten this to work reliably is to build the heliport as an overly airport with a different ICAO code. But then the airports need to be separated by a bit, since if too close the heli may try to "switch airports" upon departure, which causes an instant FS9 crash. Only trial and error will work that one out in my experience...

Hope this helps,

[Boosty]

Thank you gentlemen. I really appreciate your help, and feel like I'm in good hands here. Mr. Robinson, it's a pleasure, and thanks. Herk, once again, thank you.
So, ADE it shall be!
Pardon me, Herk, for inquiring about a possible alternative to your recommendation-I'm just ignorant about so much of this stuff. Oh and no problem on the thread-I'm in "sponge mode" and appreciate ANY relative information. Um, I hope you don't mind if I call you "Herk"-it just sounds cool to me.
GaryG (Boosty)

quote-
“Folks, we have reached our cruising altitude now, so I am going to switch the seat belt sign off. Feel free to move about as you wish, but please stay inside the plane till we land... it's a bit cold outside, and if you walk on the wings it affects the flight pattern.”-unknown pilot

[scott967]

The only advantage I see to AFCAD is the "show lights" feature to see what lighting you have assigned. Otherwise ADE is better in all respects. You could install both and create the airport in ADE, then load from bgl in AFCAD to check out lighting, or just slew around in the sim at dawn which is what I do. It's probably best to slew around anyway, just to make sure lighting looks right (also the lines).

scott s.
.

[Boosty]

Thanks, Scott. I'll keep AFCAD's "show lights" feature in mind, too. That will probably be important to me at some point. I suspect good lighting effects could really add polish to your work. I can't wait to get to that point!

[NikeHerk67]

Thanks Jim and Tom for the great advice on using a separate ICAO.
I’ll continue giving that some trials and errors time.

It sounds like you’ve been successful with this Tom…..

Scott, Slewing works and also, for great bird’s eye views, I really like Flight 1’s free F1View Utility for FS2004 found here….. http://www.flight1.com/view.asp?page=library

Boosty, Keep up the good faith. The learning curve for airport and scenery design is never ending, for me at least….

[tgibson_new]

Yes I have: