FREEWARE

FREEWARE
Who says nothing in this world is free!

It has a beautifully detailed cockpit, down to the sticky tape

on the pipe work

f youre a subscriber or regular reader

of PC Pilot, youll already know that
we diligently scour the flight sim
community for interesting freeware to
add to our CD every issue. These files
are generously provided by their authors
for your enjoyment, who only ask that
you perhaps drop them a line to say
how much you appreciate their work. Of
course, any constructive critique is also
welcome, although you know what some
of these creative types are like so be
polite!
Its simply amazing how the freeware
community has grown over the last few
years, generally keeping pace with the
growth and advancement of flight simulators
themselves. This is particularly true of
Microsofts Flight Simulator, which, because
of its open architecture, has become the
ideal vehicle for users to get more involved

in their hobby, perhaps by creating their own

aircraft and scenery. Yet in the beginning this
was a fairly specialised subject that required
knowledge of the inner workings of FS
combined with some equally specialised
software. However, these days as soon as
Microsoft releases a new version of Flight
Simulator, the freeware designers jump on it
like a pack of hungry wolves. The software
used to create aircraft or scenery objects,
although still quite sophisticated, is now a
little more user-friendly than it used to be.
In fact, there are two primary products
used to create add-on aircraft and scenery,
FSDS (The Flight Simulator Design Studio), a
superb product authored by Louis Sinclair
which is distributed by Abacus Publishing,
and GMAX formerly from Autodesk and
now supported by its own website Turbo
Squid.
These products are worlds apart in terms
of the development teams behind them, but
both use the traditional 3D-design four-view

interface; and in the hands of an

accomplished designer are both capable of
producing quite remarkable aircraft and
scenery objects.
Naturally, there are other products
available on the market. Airport for
Windows, from Tom Hiscox, is an alternative
freeware product that comes to mind, which
once again has been used to good effect in
many projects; although it is an FS2002/4
product and not suitable for FSX. Yet in an effort
to keep pace with FS development Tom has
recently released SceneGenX, a similar styled
product to Airport but developed for FSX. On
balance, however, I think most people would
still agree that the first two products I mentioned
have the largest user base.

Freeware
But what is freeware anyway? Well it can be
anything from a useful little utility, an aircraft,
a special effect, or even a depiction of your
local airfield. The main criterion is that its
free that is, you dont have to pay for it.
However, that doesnt mean its free to do
with as you please, because most authors

GMAX
Gmax is a derivative of 3D Studio MAX, Autodesks premier 3D design program - a product that costs thousands of pounds! It was originally conceived to provide
amateur designers with the tools to create 3D models for all kinds of games and although its a cut-down version, its more than adequate for that purpose. One
of the major advantages of using GMAX is the price - its FREE and they dont come much cheaper than that! You have to negotiate a fairly steep learning curve
in order to use it but if you are prepared to invest the time, there are countless books and tutorials available a Google search would undoubtedly be the place
to start. And of course, some of the 3D MAX tutorials can also be used with GMAX.

50

PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

firstly include a copyright notice to

stop unscrupulous people stealing
their designs and either selling
them, or simply calling them their
own. Secondly, they normally
include a disclaimer to protect them
against any virus or system crashes
that may occur after installing their
file, (which in my experience is
highly unlikely).
More disturbing for freeware
authors are the websites that charge
for downloading files that authors
intended to be free to all, effectively
selling freeware files that they have
no rights to. I should add that my
last comment does not include
websites such as flightsim.com or
avsim.com who simply charge for a
premium downloading service,
because they still offer free
downloads as well its just on a
reduced bandwidth. If you want a
high speed download service (which
is costly to run), they are quite
entitled to charge for it. Naturally,
there are many other reputable
websites which offer free downloads
as well, and I have listed some of
these at the end of this article.

A Freeware Community
Freeware can also form a showcase
or stepping stone for designers who

want to move in to the commercial

world, in fact I think its true to say
that most designers started out this
way. If you would like to have a go
yourself youll find that the design
community is only too willing to
help. A query left on a design forum
will produce dozens of responses in
a matter of hours. Youll also find
that many authors will allow you to
borrow certain design elements to
use in your own projects. So if you
manage to produce a brilliant
aircraft, for example, but cant quite
grasp the complexities of gauge or
panel design, theres usually
someone who will step in to fill the
gap. In fact, many freeware products
these days are produced by teams of
designers living in different
countries, who collaborate to
produce files that rival and
sometimes exceed the quality of
commercial products.
When teams form in this way
they would traditionally have team
members who specialise in a
particular area. So, for example, one
will create the 3D model, another
the documentation and perhaps
another would work on the textures
etc; which is exactly how the
professional designers work. There
are a few notable exceptions, but not

many individuals have the skill or

knowledge to cover all these
complex areas.
However, I think I should
mention that if you intend to use or
rework someone elses design, you
should first read any documentation
that came with it to see if the author
has included permission to do so. If
not you should write to them to ask
for it. As it happens there are very
few cases brought to court for such
innocent copyright infringements,
but its better to ask than be the
exception to the rule.

Types of Freeware
If you browse the freeware websites
youll find a huge range of files
available, usually listed by type and
possibly by date of submission,
because this is mainly how freeware
authors distribute their work. They
upload them in ZIP, RAR or some
other form of compressed archive to
the popular FS-related websites,
which gives them global exposure,
and end-users soon get to know the
names of authors who produce
consistently outstanding work.
Two of the most popular FS sites
are Avsim.com and Flightsim.com,
both with an extensive library
containing thousands of freeware
files. If you visit Avsim.com youll
find that it has a configurable
interface, where you can search
through their extensive database
listing the files by type. There are
(naturally) aircraft and these are
usually divided into FS version and

Lots of rivets and

stitching on the
fuselage, and
just look at those
bracing wires!

If you
can use
Windows
Explorer
and
navigate
your way
around your
PC, you
should have
no trouble
installing
freeware
files

FSDS
The FS Design Studio was released before GMAX and was quite an innovation at the time. It heralded a new concept for FS
designers and was used to produce literally thousands of aircraft and scenery objects. The introduction of GMAX was quite a blow to
FSDS as Autodesk decided to give it away free. Yet this was not quite as benevolent as it seemed, because the company was really
investing in its future. Where do most designers start? As amateurs of course, so if youre an amateur already versed in the nuances
of 3D design and then decide to turn professional, which program do you think youd use? 3D MAX perhaps.
Anyway since the release of FSDS 2 and more recently FSDS 3, many designers have returned to the Abacus product because its
far easier to use than GMAX and the latest version has a whole swathe of new and improved features. In addition, there are probably
more tutorials and help available on the net for FSDS, simply because it has been around for longer.

PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

51

FREEWARE

This is the Zip file were going to use

The contents of the Zip file shown before

extraction
This panel is based on actual
photographic data

whether they are original, repaints,

or AI aircraft. The same applies to
scenery and AFCAD files which are
also categorised.
Remember I mentioned earlier
about authors giving permission for
other people to use and borrow
elements from their work? Well,
repaints and updates appear
regularly on the internet, and this is
usually because a different author is
perhaps more skilled in developing
the flight dynamics, or might simply
offer a new livery for a popular
aircraft.
Flightsim.com has a slightly
different interface for freeware,
where you can search for a
particular file using keywords or
filenames, or simply browse through
the latest 300 uploads. Incidentally,
this is just a small part of what these
sites have to offer. They also provide
help and tutorial files and an
extensive library of FAQs.

Recommended Freeware
Below I have listed a few freeware
files that can be found on one of the
freeware websites. These are
products that weve featured on our

CD, or that I have found to be of

particularly high quality and in some
cases they are files that we were
unable to feature because of
copyright issues. Thats not to say
that the authors have refused
permission, its normally because the
file includes some portion of
another authors work. In this case it
becomes almost impossible to
contact all the people who
contributed to the project and so we
have to pass it by. We are always
most careful that we do not infringe
the copyright of the individuals
responsible for the work we feature.

These are the alternate panel.cfg files

Choosing a temporary directory to extract to

Norwegian F-16 for FS2004

Ill start this mini round-up with an
aircraft thats a little long in the tooth
now but has long been my favourite
when I simply want to fly around
exploring the FS landscape. Its a
Lockheed Martin F-16 jet fighter
designed by Kirk Olsson and in my
opinion one of the best examples to
date of this fabulous aircraft. The
design is highly detailed and
captures the sharp lines of the F-16
perfectly. It has operating speed
brakes, a realistic afterburner effect
and if you operate the wing-fold
command while on the ground the
pilot disappears and the aircraft is
shown with chocks and all safety
pins in position. In addition, the
spoiler key operates the drag chute
when you touch down.
The external textures are superbly
drawn and have that slight sheen
which is almost matt, so typical of
military aircraft.
This is just one of many aircraft
designed by Kirk that we have
featured over the years on our cover
CDs and in some ways highlights my
point about authors borrowing
various bits from each other. The file
featured here depicts a Norwegian
aircraft and uses Eric Marcianos
freeware F-16 panel. It also includes
F-16 sounds created by Christoffer
Petersen.

For those who wish to repaint his aircraft,

Kirk has already added his permission in the
readme file; the only stipulation being that
you acknowledge him as the original
designer.
I have detailed the filenames for this
aircraft below, but if youve already upgraded
to FSX, youll find literally dozens of repaints
and FSX conversions on the FS websites; just
type Kirk Olsson in the search dialogue.
Filename: vipernor.zip (aircraft)
Filename: fullf16pnl.zip (panel)
Filename: f-16-pw200-the_real_deal.zi
(sounds)
Location: www.flightsim.com

Bristol Fighter F.2B Mk.1

for FSX
This aircraft was designed by Robert Bruce
for FSX. Its a model that was originally
conceived in 1916 by Captain Barnwell, of
the British and Colonial Aircraft Company,
based in Bristol. It was nicknamed Brisfit by
its crews and was mostly powered by the
275-hp Rolls Royce Falcon III engine.
Robert has faithfully recreated the aircraft
with an amazing attention to detail that
extends to the leatherwork and beautifully
crafted woodwork inside the cockpit.
Externally, the airframe is complete down to
the last wire stringer and spar, with a pilot
and gunner dressed in flying gear of the
period.
As a taildragger they were not really at
home on the ground, but once in the air the

open cockpit offers spectacular views and a

freedom you cant experience in an enclosed
airframe. Although, in real life, much better
enjoyed on warm sunny days than across the
bleak trenches of Northern France in winter.
It certainly looks superb, is a joy to fly and
surpasses some of the commercial offerings
in terms of overall quality.
Filename: f2bx1pt1.zip
Location: http://www.simviation.com/
fsxvintage5.htm

Soccata TBM 700

The TBM 700 is a single-engine aircraft that
carries four passengers, or up to 885kg of
cargo with a range of 1500 nautical miles. It
has a service ceiling of 30,000 feet, is fully
pressurised and because it has a single
engine it can be flown under a standard PPL.
This aircraft was featured in issue 43 of PC
Pilot and was created by the TBM 700 team,
(led by Michel Migaud and Cyril Breton) and
is certainly a testament to the quality
amateur designers can achieve. It contains
every conceivable enhancement, including
animated control surfaces, suspension and
passenger and cargo doors. Theyve even
added protective engine covers, wheelblocks and pitot protection flags once the
engine shuts down. The textures are highly
detailed and reflective, with transparent
windows and NAV light lenses. Inside the
cabin the plush leather upholstery is fully
modelled it also has a fully operational 3D
cockpit. If you prefer the 2D cockpit youll

Eric Marcianos 2D panel is possibly the best

freeware fighter jet panel available

Look a little closer, the detail is absolutely stunning

Its nice to see that the Spirit of BOAC

lives on within Flight Simulator

A nice close up of the engine detail and

the realistic aluminium fuselage

52

You have to admit the Connie

was a class act!
PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

Its an FS2004 design but it has

not been bettered
PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

The speed brake control pops the drogue chute

on landing the F-16

53

FREEWARE

Change the appropriate file to

suit your version of FS

see that this is designed around very high

resolution bitmaps and is available in VFR or
IFR modes. It also comes with one of the
most professional looking manuals Ive yet
seen.
Filename: tbm700_a.zip
Location: www.flightsim.com

Lockheed L049A
Constellation v1.1. for FSX
The Lockheed L-049 Constellation was one
of the most graceful airliners in service
between the end of World War Two in 1945
and the advent of the commercial jet age in
the mid-1950s. With its long, sinuous
fuselage and gently tapered, upswept wings,
Another FS2004 model but everything
is there and it all works!

Move the p51d.gau file into

the gauges directory

the sleek Constellation was reminiscent of a

seagull in flight. Another distinctive feature
of the Constellation was its triple rudder
assembly.
This package includes the complete
aircraft with everything you need to start
flying. It comes with a 2D panel (no
additional cockpit views) and sounds are
included. Unfortunately, there is no VC
(virtual cockpit) but it does have a
comprehensive set of liveries including Air
France, BOAC, Braniff, Capitol, Delta Airlines
and KLM.
The package was designed by Wayne
Tudor, Dale DeLuca, Sofia Campos, Juan
Velilla Morton, Joao Paz, John Howard
White, Paul Strogen and Brian C. Selb.
It is an update to their original aircraft, with
all reported problems now fixed and
modified to give it full FSX compatibility.
Filename: confsx11.zip
Location: www.flightsim.com

Vista Australis for FS2004 from the

VOZ team
Vista Australis is a collaborative project from
a group called the VOZ team, founded
originally by John koorby Venema. It is

basically a team of Australian designers who

decided to highlight the distinct difference
between the FS depiction and the Australia they
call home. The textures in Microsofts flight
simulator are fairly limited and for the most part
depict any greenery as it might appear in North
America, which for Australia would be totally
wrong.
Due to a quirk in Flight Simulator you can
only have a certain number of textures loaded
at once, so the authors of VOZ have split the
continent into four sectors. This means you have
to use a separate installer to load the
appropriate texture set before you take-off,
otherwise youll miss all the great work that
went into the designs.
The pre-defined flights included with VOZ
are simply breathtaking. From the beautiful
coastlines of the north that extend into the
Torres Strait Islands just below Papua New
Guinea, you can travel through the arid
wastelands in the central region to Alice Springs
and on to Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne in
the south. The authors have even created their
own weather theme to make sure you see the
landscape as they intended.
If you didnt get it on our original CD its
quite a hefty download, but well worth the
trouble.
Filename: VOZ150COMPLETE.zip
Location: www.vistaoz.org

Installing Aircraft

The TBM only carries a single

engine, but its a big one!

Because Freeware is mainly created by

amateur designers who dont have any kind
of schedule to keep and who are motivated
by the pleasure it gives them the files are
generally provided as is, and often dont
come with any kind of automated
installation routine. Most, though, will have
fairly detailed instructions on how they

should be manually installed in the

form of a text readme file.
They may also be packaged
differently (maybe in a ZIP file or
some other archive format) and
will certainly need to be installed
in a different way. The method you
adopt will also depend on the
version of flight simulator youre
using. For example FS2002 and 2004
have different file structures to FSX,
where for reasons only known to
the inner circle at Microsoft, the
developers decided to change
where the files reside. The
implication being that if the file
was developed for FS2004 and
particularly if it includes a self
installer it will not work in FSX.
Having said that, as long as the
files themselves are compatible,
you may be able to install them
manually. This doesnt always work
because in some aircraft the
gauges from FS2004 simply dont
work in FSX. Im afraid I cant tell
you the reason for this, because it
has more to do with the
programming of the gauges which
is beyond the scope of this article
(and my knowledge). If youre
faced with such a scenario you can
still get your aircraft flying, by
utilising the panel from a similar
aircraft: I know this may not be a
satisfactory solution but it works and
will normally get you by until a
The VOZ team have massively improved on the
default rendition of Australia

Copy the effects into the FS effects directory

proper conversion becomes
available.

A Case Study

Freeware
files often
dont come
with any
kind of
automated
installation
routine

To demonstrate the method of

manually installing into FSX, Ive
chosen one of the files from a recent
PC Pilot CD. This is a Cavalier
Mustang aircraft from AF Scrubs
who designed the aircraft to work in
FS2004 or FSX. It was designed using
GMAX and the author has kindly
included the source files for anyone
who would like to modify or repaint
his aircraft. As I explained earlier,
many authors offer this facility but
still retain the copyright for the
contents of the original file.
In this case the aircraft is supplied
in a ZIP archive and requires winzip.
exe or winrar.exe to extract it. Inside
the archive, the author has already
created the folder structures for you,
so if you use the Use Folder Names
option within winzip.exe the
appropriate folders will automatically
be created when you unzip the file.
Initially, it is suggested that you
unzip the file into a temporary
directory, and then you will end up
with a new P51 Cavalier Mustang
folder. Inside this folder are seven
other folders and nine files,

including a ReadMe.txt file written

by the author that explains all
these instructions.
The next stage is to decide
which FS version of the program
you are going to install, because
the contents of the panel.cfg files
are different. So youll need to
open the Panel folder and in there
youll find three panel.cfg files, one
called panel.cfg, one called
FSXpanel.cfg and another called
FS9panel.cfg. In order to use the
correct file you need to delete the
panel.cfg file first and then rename
either the FSXpanel.cfg or FS9panel.
cfg to panel.cfg - naturally using the
clue in the filename to select the
appropriate one for your version of
FS. Incidentally, if you try to rename

Im not sure where that

is but dont those lights
look awesome!

Because they are a team of

independent designers, certain areas
contain more detailing than others

Clean lines and detailed textures

54

PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special

55

Copy the 20can.wav files into the

FS Sound directory
the file without deleting the original
panel.cfg file Windows will simply
refuse to do it. Im sure this sounds
complicated but believe me its
perfectly straightforward.
Inside the same panel folder
youll find a file called p51d.gau,
which is a gauge file and needs to
be moved to the Gauge folder in
the root directory of your FS
installation. For example, if you
used the default install that would
be C:\Program Files\Microsoft
Games\Flight Simulator 9\Gauges. If
you didnt use the default location
you simply substitute this for your
own installation folder.
Next you have to move the
contents of the Effects folder (found
inside the Special Effects folder)
into the folder with the same name
in the root directory of your FS
installation, and finally move the
20can.wav file youll find in the
same Effects folder, into the FS
Sound folder. The last thing to do is

to move the remaining P51 Cavalier

Mustang folder and contents into
the FS Aircraft folder.
The process is exactly the same
for FSX, except that the Aircraft
folder resides inside the SimObjects
folder rather than the root folder of
FSX, and you would use the
alternate panel.cfg as I explained
earlier.
However, a more important
point to remember is that some
gauges are programmed in such a
way that FSX doesnt recognise; so it
will pop up a dialogue box and ask 
if the file is from a trustworthy
source and if you really want to use
it. If FSX crashes after this message
you can be sure that the file is
incompatible with FSX.
Finally, I think its worth
mentioning that the process I
described above is quite specific to
the file I used, and if youre
installing a different file its almost
certainly going to be different.

Then copy the

entire P51 Cavalier
Mustang directory
in to the FS Aircraft
directory

Freeware authors are generally

knowledgeable individuals who
assume that we are too, so they
dont stick to one particular format
when packaging their wares. Having
said that, youll generally find that
the file will include specific
instructions on how to install it, you
just need to know the layout of the
flight simulator directory structure.
As a general rule, if you can use
Windows Explorer and navigate
your way around your PC, you
should have no trouble installing

freeware files.
Joe Lavery

Useful Websites
Freeware Websites
www.flightsim.com
www.avsim.com
www.simviation.com
www.wspilots.com
www.fs-freeware.net
Design and Designers websites
http://www.flightsimnetwork.com/airportsupport/download.htm
http://emarciano.free.fr
http://www.mirage4fs.com
http://www.freeflightdesign.com
http://www.projectopensky.com
http://pages.infinit.net/camsim/
http://www.flightsimnetwork.com/premaircraft/home.htm
http://www.gjsmith.net/Textures/catalog.htm
http://www.calclassic.com/
http://fokker.avsim.net/
http://www.fsglider.de/frset_e.htm

This shows where the

aircraft directory is within
an FSX installation

56

http://www.simshed.co.uk/
http://www.meljet.com/

PC Pilot Issue 50 Winter Special