Reality Expansion Pack v3.5

No tricks nor treats! A major update of REP has just been released. The update introduces new features and some minor fixes.

This update is published both through a complete package on the store and automatic updates. To install it just download the entire package again from the store or enable automatic updates as described in the user manual.

Edit: some hotfixes (up to v3.5.3 + v3.5.4 for some airplanes) have been published and are available only through the automatic updates.

Load a worn out airplane

It’s now possible to load an already worn out airplane. Just go to the plugins “SimCoders.com – REP” entry, select “Wear out to >” and choose one of the items listed below.

Brand New: this is the status of an aircraft that just left the production line. Its engine is brand new and all the onboard systems work as expected.
Privately Owned (new): this is an almost new aircraft. Its private owner handled it with care. The engine as well as the other systems will have some hours logged but no issues are in place.
Privately Owned (old): this aircraft was privately owned for years. The engine as well as the other systems will have much hours logged but no issues are in place as the private owner kept the plane with good care.
Flying Club: this plane has been in the hands of many pilots, some of them careless. The systems worn out quite much and some gauges are not working as good as you would like them to.

Instruments wear out as well

Now the instruments wear out just like any other component of your aircraft. After hours of usage, some of the instruments will not be precise anymore and engine vibrations affect their indications.

You can fix/calibrate the instruments using the Maintenance Report.

Below you find a comparison of a brand new RPM indicator and an old one, weathered by more than a thousand of hours of usage.

Brand new RPM ndicator

The same indicator after 1232 hours of usage

The incoming SIAI-Marchetti SF-260 will even let you tap over the instruments (and their light bulbs) in attempt to temporarily reduce the error 😉

Hobbs Time vs Tach Time

Until now, 99% of X-Plane airplanes just recorder Hobbs time and reported it in the small Tachmeter window. In every aircraft (default C172SP included) the Tachmeter and the Hobbs counter reported the very same value. This is not happening in real life. Let’s see what REP does now and why.

In the Maintenance Report you now find the airframe total time (Hobbs Time) and the engine’s total time (Tach Time). The two value may slightly differ after loading a brand new airplane and then flying it for a while. This is because there’s an important difference in how the two times are calculated.

Hobbs Time

In most planes, the Hobbs starts and stops based on an oil pressure switch. It starts when the engine starts, and stops when the engine is shut-down. While it’s running, it just ticks off a tenth of an hour every 6 minutes, based on “regular wall clock time”. So a tenth of idling on the ramp is the same as a tenth at cruise.

Tach Time

The tach clock isn’t really a clock at all, it doesn’t actually measure time, it really measures engine revolutions. But it’s calibrated such that a tenth of an hour of tach time is clicked off when the engine is at cruise RPM for 6 minutes. In other words, if the plane is at cruise RPM, the tach clock will be clicking off tenths of an hour at the same rate as the Hobbs clock. But if the engine is idling at an RPM speed that’s half of what cruise RPM is, then the tach clock will be running at half the speed of the Hobbs clock.

Move the point of view when in Walkaround and Towing modes

This feature has been requested a ton of times. Now you can move your head in walkaround using the default commands from X-Plane. To pan the view using the mouse you should map a key over the simcoders/rep/view/pan_with_mouse because, at this time, we didn’t find a way to detect the default mouse right-button click.

This will not work in VR. Sorry guys. Still the SDK is missing the basic tools to allow us to make this simple thing work in VR. It sucks…

The static elements are managed during the replay

The system now restores/removes the static elements, such the chocks and the tie-downs, during the replay, accordingly to your actions during the flight.

This is brought to all the planes except the Piper Super Cub, where the static elments are managed by ASDG’s SASL code.

Bonus: upgraded documentation

Some time ago we introduced a lot of automation in our way to produce our documentation (aka User Manual). Therefore, our writing process is now very quick and simple. The User Manual is growing with tons of new information about REP and its systems. Make sure you read it!

Changelog

This is the list of other features/fixes brought to you by this update

C172 Fix: Corrected a typo in the checklists
C172 Fix: the radios did not correctly save the stored frequencies
Carenado B58 Fix: better C.G. behavior
Under certain conditions, the fuel pump sounds where not stopped with the pump itself
A bug prevented the cylinders to fail properly and to report their compressions in the Maintenance Report
The hypoxia was shown even when hypoxia was disabled in REP’s settings
The oil filter doesn’t clog as soon as it goes past TBO
A change to the weight and balance during autostart broke the autostart algorithm
F33 and C210 XP11 Fix: By default the Carenado Panel is not used to control the static elements anymore. A specific setting is now available to activate it in the Settings window.