Specifying AI landing direction

FS2004

I am trying to get an AI aircraft to land on the 27 end of runway only. I have designated in AFCAD to not let aircraft land on the 09 end and not take off on the 27 end. There is a mountain close to the 09 end. But Nooooooooo they want to land through the mountain on to the 09 end. Is there a way to specify AI aircraft to land on one end of the runway only, 27?

 

Thanks

Jay

Which was have you got the wind blowing?

Thanks for the idea to try; I was hopeful to try this. I tried it both ways. But the AI still prefer flying through the mountain to RW 09. I also check AFCAD fault finder and everything looks good. After flying through the mountain the AI lands ok.

I noted that this split in EFCAD does not usually work for AI. You can close one end of the runway (both take-offs and landings); And AI will avoid it. If you want aircraft land on 27 close 9 completely. Regretfully the take-offs from 27 will probably hit the mountain. I did not find a solution for this except to create an ILS landings avoiding the mountain. This is a different chapter though.

 

Good luck.

Also if the ai fly through mountains is your flightplan set as IFR or VFR, I seem to remember if it's VFR the AI doesn't take much notice of ATC but IFR then ATC should guide it over or round, I may be wrong as it was a long time ago I did this.

Hi,

 

I did lot of AI planning and IFR plan might vector AI over the mountain but then aircraft goes around (since flying too high) and does not land.

The only way is to create ILS turn approach (ILS is primary for AI) and structure it in such a way that the mountain is avoided. But this is only if the mountain is not too close to the runway. I did a tutorial few years ago showing how to do these turn approaches using ADE. Have used Tivat LYTV runway 14 approach as an example.

Send me private message with your email and I can zip you the tutorial c/w the ADE AFCAD.

 

Cheers,

Peter

One thing you can try is to delete the Start Location for the runway end you don't want the AI aircraft to use.

In my many years of experience the saved and therefore active wind direction at any airport, remains the defining factor for influencing the approach directions for all AI (and user) aircraft. However, beware because you cannot just change the wind direction somewhere and then expect all AI approaches/landings to comply immediately. In such cases the active wind direction will keep coming from the system's memory.

 

The best thing to do is to set up a user flight at that airport, to then change the wind direction and lastly to save the flight you have just set up. Your new wind direction will now also be saved and only after you have then re-opened your newly set up flight, will all AI (and user) aircarft comply to the new wind direction at the airport where you have saved your flight.

 

But, but, but.

 

When you want to fly to this airport yourself from any other airport, you can only save the wind direction at one of them and not at both. In your case you therefore need to change the wind direction at your destination airport and to then save the flight at your departure airport. Only after you have re-opened your saved flight at your departure airport, will all AI aircraft be approaching, landing and taking off correctly at your destination airport by the time you arrive there yourself.

 

Good luck and I hope this helps.

 

Hans

Hi Hans,

interesting to read your experience. I must say that I never had a situation when the winds would have a different direction than the one I have planned in the default "Customized" weather for all the weather stations. If a flight is saved with this option, the wind blows in the same direction everywhere. Also one saved flight should not influence another save flight.

Cheers (Proost)

Peter

Peter, bedankt voor je proost !!

 

It remains possible that when you change the wind direction at your destination airport, as I have described above, the wind direction actually becomes the same everywhere but I have in fact never checked this. Moreover, this is not really important but what is important is that all AI aircraft at your planned destination airport are actually behaving correctly by the time that you arrive there yourself.

 

However, when you open any other non related flight, all wind directions will revert back to whatever is or was specified for that particular flight. It remains a pity that wind directions cannot be set and saved per airport.

 

Groeten.

 

Hans

A Follow up, so far:

 

I understand that this type of configuration for AI aircraft is not normal for FS2004. Trying to push the limits, I am amazed that FS2004 can do what it dose.

 

First: it is the case (to my continued testing) that the wind direction is the main criteria that tells the AI which runway end to use for landing and takeoff, as originally posted by ColR1948. I thought I had tested it and it didn’t seem to make a difference. But I had missed a deeper setting; though I had set the wind direction in “Customized Weather” I did not go to the next “Advanced” settings. I did not have the “surface winds” altitude high enough for my 3,800 foot runway. So, the wind direction does sets AI landing and takeoff directions.

 

This finding (if have not missed something else) sets an important limit to what I was trying to do; trying to get two AI aircraft to follow two different wind directions, one for takeoff the other for landing, on the same runway.

 

Simple work around for now: This is a small country airfield, I will display the landings and takeoffs in separate saved flights; each with its own wind direction.

 

All the suggestion that were made, I worked with and were very helpful for further understand AI behavior.

 

I may later try Beroun ILS tutorial, thanks for sending, nice tut. I suspect this is the only full solution.

 

Hjwalter - Thanks for remind me of the importance of restarting flights for a change to take effect. Also, to reboot FS9 often and to try a “create a flight” to get some things to take effect.

 

Tgibsion_new - Though the moving and deleting “Start Location” point did not seem to affect the problem, I did learn a lot tinkering with it and seeing other cool things you can do with it, thanks.

 

This is not the end.

Thanks to all.

Jay

Hi Jay,

there is another cheating solution. I did this for AI with Lukla Nepal airport VNLK where you can only land uphill towards the mountain and take off downhill from the mountain:

 

In original VNLK airport (have odd-on) close uphill runway for takeoffs and landings. Then create a copy the same airport in ADE or AFCAD, name it differently (VNL1 in my case) and close the downhill runway for takeoffs and landings. Then use TTools to schedule arriving aircraft during the day to VNL1 (will arrive uphill). Also schedule departing aircraft from VNLK during the day (will depart downhill). The reason why I mentioned "during the day" is because it TTolls scheduling all aircraft will be returning to the same airport through the mountains, schedule these at night when you do not see them. Bit of a cheating but works OK.

 

Peter

Another tip for programming AI aircraft near mountains.

If you set the flight plan as VFR, the ai aircraft will more than likely fly in to the mountains.

If you set it to IFR then ATC will tell it to climb to hopefully clear them, this works even if for example you set the altitude low, ATC will still tell it to climb, after clearing then it will descend back down to what you set it to.

 

Col.