A group of flight simulation streamers and community members have last week taken to their social network accounts to tease the community about a new study-level airliner they are alpha testing for the Microsoft Flight Simulator.
After discussions and rumors in the community, it became clear today that the aircraft all the hype was created around for is going to be Fenix Simulation’s Airbus A320 CEO rendition for the Microsoft Flight Simulator.
As stated in the press release sent out by Fenix Simulation’s director, Aamir Thacker, the company has assembled some of the most experienced and talented developers in the community with a goal to prove, that a high-fidelity simulation of a modern airliner in Microsoft Flight Simulator can be achieved without compromises.
We believe this to be the most comprehensive and complete A320 simulator available to desktop consumers. Not just for MSFS, but across any platform. We have all the usual suspects you’d find in a full-fidelity simulation.
Aamir – Fenix Sim
Moving on to the features, it has been stressed, that all things that were mentioned in the press release are already in the simulator and are complete. None of them are planned or in development.
The developers at Fenix Sim have 3D scanned five different A320-family airframes for the utmost accuracy. While it is clear the developers aim for the best visual accuracy possible with simulating pixels on the displays in the cockpit, or by featuring detailed wear and tear textures on certain cockpit parts, the systems were not forgotten and are going to be very in-depth as well.
A core focus of ours was to not only ensure that our systems logic and behaviour was true to the real aircraft, but that you feel like you are operating an incredibly complex machine, quirks and all.
Aamir – Fenix Sim
The aircraft is expected to feature everything one would expect from a full-fidelity simulation, this includes, for example, custom ground-up code, a full physical simulation of fluids and pneumatics, and a completely custom navigation environment that promises to deliver reliable operation for the auto flight system. Even some circuit breakers will be operatable in the aircraft.
Quickly covering the autoflight – we’ve put significant effort in ensuring LNAV and VNAV are fully and faithfully represented, and that the airplane behaves exactly as you’d expect:
Aamir – Fenix Sim
reliably.
Additionally, the developers have created an entire air-mass simulation. Air mass will be reacting to user input and other variables, and move through the airplane. Every single valve, compressor, decompressor, pre-cooler, and cooler is modelled. Everything from heat output from the passengers to metal in the seats will be simulated.
What is as well an interesting feature is the GPS-aided inertial navigation system:
GPS being satellite based, when coverage is low or non-existent, degraded navigational accuracy is to be expected. This has never been represented in a consumer simulator due to the immense amount of work required for such a small part of the aircraft. However, we have introduced and implemented NORAD algorithms for determining satellite location and velocity in Earth orbit by downloading GPS ephemeris data on startup, so if you fly in an area with degraded coverage in real life, our airplane knows this and will degrade your navigational performance accordingly in sim.
Aamir – Fenix Simulations
In regards to the failure system, as of right now there are 383 different triggerable faults, issues, and emergencies included in the aircraft.
There were no mentions of the expected release date and pricing model in the press release or any other public channels.
We will be following the development of the aircraft closely, and look forward to seeing Fenix Sim succeed with the project.
