Fighter Squadron: Flight Model Update by David Zurawski
	In case you are new to Fighter Squadron, all of the sims aircraft are made up of multiple objects. Each of these objects independently has lift, drag, moment, and damage values. It's the combination of these objects that make the aircraft and its flight model as a whole. In laymans terms … each individual object (pieces of the wing, fuselage, propeller) have specific flight data that contribute to the entire flight model of the aircraft. So when you shoot a portion of a wing off an aircraft, the flight-model is affected in a real and dynamic way. Let's go back to Michael Harrison: "All the known texture mapping problems have been fixed and I've been systematically going through all the airfoil files and fixing the curve data for lift, drag and moment so that they are as correct as they can be. Without a Cray, they won't be "perfect" but they will be quite a lot better than "good enough" for a PC simulation. "I'm currently going through all the aircraft and adjusting the weight distribution so that it's all as correct as can be. (Which can be difficult at times. Just how much * does* the outer wing section weigh?) This particular modification is a tedious process that we didn't go through for the initial release version of Fighter Squadron, due mostly to time constraints and the fact that the aircraft flew fairly close to "correct" as they were. When facing a deadline, it's very difficult to get some people to understand that they may not be correct, just "good enough. Cool … So how will the changes affect FS? One of the obvious answers is that people will have to get used to planes stalling under certain conditions. No longer will the aircraft allow people to simply "yank and bank" without any real repercussions. Veterans should have little problem understanding and adapting to the changes. However, "newbies" will have the difficult tasks of learning how to keep the planes in the air. A flyable B-17. The "global" weight (the default weight) for an aircraft will remain the same. But when one of the accrued objects that make up the aircraft is removed (blown / broken off) … the new weight and inertia settings will more realistically affect the performance. Click to continue		The instruments are legible even out here. What and when? The important thing to keep in mind is that Michael Harrison has undertaken this project on his own, to be completed largely on his own time. To compound the difficulty in this undertaking, he is also in the process of moving himself and his family to a new home. As of our last discussion, the flight models were coming along nicely. He has been prepping the P-51 and the Fw-190 and should have those out shortly. Once those have had some limited testing, the rest should follow shortly afterward. Suffice it to say that because Michael is doing this on his own time, "real life" has precedence. Michael's best guess for an ETA on the whole plane set is, "when they are done". It is my personal opinion that thanks to Michael Harrison's personal sacrifice and Parsoft's understanding Fighter Squadron will rise out of the ashes of condemned simulations like a newborn Phoenix. I expect it will easily meet the hyped expectations that had been initially set out. Unofficial FM Patch Don't want to wait? Download Etienne Labuschagne's Flight Model patch right now. This patch can be used with or without the 1.5 patch since it only affects the aircraft models themselves. Changes/Fixes: 1) All the aircrafts' wing loadings have been increased to be historically correct (as historically correct as my sources are!). Those who's wing loadings I could not get, was changed via and educated guess and some thumb sucking. 2) The Lanc, B17 and Me262 should not lose their engines anymore due to damage. Download the official 1.5 patch: Fighter Squadron 1.5 660k. Join a discussion forum on this article by clicking   HERE.
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