NAVSIM 2- the Windows Navigation Calculator for Flight Simulator pilots. ---------------------------------------------------------- This is the unregistered shareware version of Navsim2. The airspeed and fuel consumption rates have been limited. Registered users receive the full version with limits removed and with provision for position entry by latitude and longitude. Send 15 pounds sterling to: John Crabb Pax Bishopswood Chard Somerset TA20 3SD UK e-mail J.A.Crabb@exeter.ac.uk ------------------------------------------------------------- OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS NAVSIM OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS Description NAVSIM is a program written to allow flight simulator pilots to conduct pre-flight dead-reckoning navigation calculations and to produce a flight log form on which to chart the progress of the flight. This enables you to fly compass headings in any wind conditions in the same way as the majority of private pilots would do. Even if you habitually use radio navigation aids, NAVSIM will enable you to calculate headings to counteract wind drift. Add realism to your simulator flights! THIS CALCULATOR REALLY WORKS, YOU WILL GET ENORMOUS SATISFACTION FROM USING IT TO PERFORM ALL THE USUAL DEAD RECKONING CALCULATIONS, SETTING OFF IN ANY WINDS AND ULTIMATELY SEEING YOUR DESTINATION APPEAR IN THE WINDSHIELD AT THE RIGHT TIME! NAVSIM is suitable for simulators using the original SubLogic/ Microsoft system of North and East coordinates. NAVSIM is a flight simulation version of a program used by pilots of real aircraft in flight planning. It runs under Microsoft Windows version 3.0 or later, and utilizes a wide range of convenient Windows features. It is almost entirely mouse driven - the only typing required is when entering descriptive details for printing on the hard copy flight log form. NAVSIM offers the following facilities:- * convenient mouse driven entry of windspeed, wind direction, true airspeed, fuel consumption rate and magnetic variation * convenient mouse driven entry of turning point coordinates for up to twenty individual flight legs * immediate, simultaneous calculation of distance, track, magnetic heading, ground speed, time and fuel consumption for each leg * automatic on-screen graphical plot of track lines; watch your route build as you enter details * compilation of complete on-screen summary of your route, including total time, distance and fuel * file-save facility to allow previous trips to be recalled and updated for new in-flight conditions * hard-copy printed output of completed flight log form for use in the cockpit * weight, volume, speed, temperature and distance conversions * calculation of true altitude, density altitude and true airspeed Program layout NAVSIM presents four different work screens to the user. In addition there is an introductory screen from which the initial selection of a work screen is made. The screens are:- * introductory screen and initial function selection * route planning screen * route summary screen * conversions work screen * altitude and speed correction work screen The user may easily move from one screen to another, without altering their content, by selecting the appropriate item from a menu bar. Using NAVSIM - an overview The normal sequence of events in planning for a forthcoming flight would be as follows:- 1. Decide the route you will be taking on your simulated flight and note down the North and East coordinates of your departure and destination airfields, as well as those of any intermediate turning points. Set the "simulator grid offset" - see explanation later. * If you are flying between airfields or navaids in the Microsoft default environment you can short cut this stage by selecting locations from the drop down AIRFIELDS and VOR menus. * 2. Set the wind conditions in which you wish to fly. 3. Load NAVSIM on to your PC and run by double-clicking the icon. Full details for installing and running NAVSIM are given at the end of the manual. 4. Select the "NAVIGATION" function by clicking on the appropriate button in the INTRODUCTORY screen. The ROUTE ENTRY screen will appear. This screen will allow you, simply and easily, to enter the coordinates of your departure, turning and destination points. (Remember the AIRFIELD and VOR menus for use in the default environment). You will also be able to set the wind speed and direction (make sure you set TRUE direction wind in your simulator as ground level winds are often specified in MAGNETIC), true airspeed, fuel consumption rate and magnetic variation for each leg. The necessary magnetic heading to achieve your desired track will be automatically calculated. NAVSIM also automatically calculates ground speed, time and fuel consumption for each leg. As you enter the North and East coordinates, you will see your routing vectors plotted on a graphical work pad. Hopefully, on a round trip, you will have the satisfaction of seeing that your final leg actually returns you to your point of departure! 5. From the navigation screen you may, if you wish, switch to the SUMMARY screen to see a tabulated summary of the details for each leg. Total trip distance, time and fuel consumption are also reported on this screen. If you wish to alter any of the in-flight conditions, wind speed, true air speed etc. this may be done and the details for all legs will be automatically adjusted to reflect the new conditions. You may exclude any number of legs from this updating if you wish to allow for the possibility that conditions may differ from leg to leg. 6. When your route details have all been entered you would normally select the PRINT function. You will be invited to add descriptive details for each leg which will be reproduced on the printed flight log form. This is the only typing involved in NAVSIM. When satisfied, select PRINT and a hard copy of your flight log sheet will be printed on your printer. This log is the same as that used by pilots to monitor progress of the flight. It enables ETAs to be calculated. 7. Before quitting NAVSIM, select the FILE function and save the details of your route to disk. If planning to repeat the trip at a future date, saving the file will allow you to recall the details and re-calculate headings etc. for changed flight and meteorological conditions. You may not, however, alter the distances or track bearings of any leg of a recalled file. 8. If, at any point, you wish to check on weight, distance, speed or temperature equivalences; to calculate true airspeed from indicated air speed or to determine true or density altitude, simply select the appropriate work screen. NAVSIM screen by screen The following detailed instructions will guide you through NAVSIM screen by screen. In case you are not totally familiar with the operation of Windows, we define here two terms used throughout the following sections: "clicking" means moving the mouse to place the on-screen cursor over the desired object and then pressing and releasing the left mouse button. "double-clicking" is the same except that the button is pressed and released twice in moderately rapid succession. INTRODUCTORY SCREEN This is the self-explanatory menu screen which presents on first activating NAVSIM. The user is presented with the choice of three options:- 1. NAVIGATION. Clicking once with the cursor arrow on this button will cause the ROUTE ENTRY screen to be loaded. This would be the normal entry to NAVSIM. Using this screen you can enter the route of your proposed trip. You can also access the ROUTE SUMMARY screen from the ROUTE ENTRY screen. 2. CONVERSIONS Clicking the mouse once with the cursor arrow on this button will load the CONVERSIONS work screen. This screen allows you to perform a number of volume, weight, distance, speed and temperature conversions. 3. ALTITUDES/ SPEEDS Clicking on this button loads the ALTITUDES/ SPEEDS work screen. This enables you to perform some of the less common correction calculations such as calculating True Air Speed from Indicated Air Speed (rectified). ROUTE ENTRY SCREEN The ROUTE ENTRY SCREEN may be immediately recognized by the bright green graphical work pad occupying most of the left hand side of the screen. On the green pad are two vertical sliders to allow entry of coordinates. The coordinates required are those listed in the flight simulator documentation to define airfield position. In a block to the right of the graphical pad are the in-flight condition selectors. At the bottom of the screen, the selected North and East coordinate values and the resulting track and distance values for the currently active leg are presented, as are the results of the navigation calculations. As you enter details of your route, bright red track vectors will automatically be drawn on the graphical pad so that you may see the pattern of your trip building up. The green pad is approximately 160 miles wide and 130 miles deep. The first action you must take is to select a starting point for this representation of your trip, bearing in mind the predominant direction in which your route lies. Although it does not matter if the red route vectors leave the confines of the green pad, it is more satisfying if they do not! Therefore, if your trip will carry you in a predominantly easterly direction, choose a starting point towards the left hand side of the green pad, and so on. Place the cursor arrow at this point and click the left mouse button once. A small red circle will be drawn at this point, it represents your airfield of departure. If you do not click somewhere on the green pad and cause a small red circle to appear before setting coordinates, a message will pop up to remind you. There is no typing involved in entering values on this screen. All details are entered using Windows "sliders". You may not have come across these before but their operation is completely straightforward. Each slider control has a small square sliding knob or button. To obtain a particular value of windspeed, for example, place the cursor arrow over the sliding knob, click the left mouse button and hold it down, move the cursor and the knob will slide with it. At the same time the changing numerical value of, in this instance, windspeed will be shown in the adjacent box. When you have achieved approximately the value required release the mouse button. Small adjustments to the value may be made by repeatedly clicking on the small arrows which are located at the ends of each slider control. If you hold down these arrow buttons, the values will change continuously. So, after placing your starting circle on the green pad, the next most sensible thing to do is select the appropriate flight conditions. Using the sliders in the manner just described, display the values of wind speed, wind direction, ------------------------------------------------------------------ (NB! remember that Navsim deals in TRUE wind directions, make sure this is what you set in your simulator environment options) ------------------------------------------------------------------ true airspeed, fuel consumption rate and magnetic variation appropriate to the first leg of your trip. Normally, these values will apply to the whole trip. If you wish to change them for a particular leg, however, you may do so, but you should not do so before you have read the description of how this is achieved in the next section. If you have entered details for a number of legs and then wish to alter flight conditions, you may do so, but you will find the operation of the sliders noticeably more sluggish as the computer struggles to perform a large number of calculations. Do not worry, everything happens eventually. Next, return to the green pad and enter the listed North and East coordinates of your departure airfield. Minor adjustments may be made using the slider control arrows as described previously. When these coordinates are displayed correctly in the two white boxes below the green pad, click on the "next leg" button. ------------------------------------------------------------------ IMPORTANT NOTE: The North/East grid used by the simulator is, in general NOT aligned with true North. The angle by which the grid has been rotated is stated on the navigation chart or airfield coordinate list provided with your simulator or scenery disc. It is VITAL that you enter this value using the SIMULATOR GRID OFFSET slider. Otherwise the calculated magnetic headings will be out by the same amount! Sometimes the grid is aligned and the offset is then 0. (The AIRFIELDS and VOR menus take care of this for you in the default environment.) You will also have to discover the value of MAGNETIC VARIATION assumed. In the later charts this is also usually marked. Otherwise it should be available from an atlas, local map or some other such source. Magnetic variation is the angular difference between true and magnetic North. It varies from place to place and gradually with time. The authors of your flight simulator will have used a typical value which, obviously will not change with time. You just need to know what it is or your headings will be wrong by the same angle.(The AIRFIELDS and VOR menus take care of this for you in the default environment.) ------------------------------------------------------------------- Then set the coordinates for your first turning point. As you do you will see a red track vector swing round to reflect the changes you are making. As you effect changes in either direction or track, the values of magnetic heading, ground speed, time and fuel consumption will be automatically calculated by the program and displayed in the four light blue boxes at the very bottom of the screen. Distance and track are reported in the small green boxes. When you are satisfied that you have entered the details of the first turning point, again move the cursor over the NEXT LEG button, located at the bottom of the green pad, and click once with the left mouse button. A further small red circle will be drawn to terminate this leg. The next coordinate values which you scroll in will determine details of the second leg of the trip, and so on. In this way you will enter details of the whole trip, clicking on the NEXT LEG button between legs. Remember to terminate the final leg by pressing the NEXT LEG button for one last time. A maximum of twenty individual legs is allowed. Note that you may either regard a "leg" as being the portion of the trip between turning points or, the portion between waypoints on the same track. The calculated values displayed in the boxes at the bottom of the screen refer only to the latest leg being processed. The values calculated for the previous legs are being stored by the program and may be reviewed by displaying the SUMMARY screen as described in the next section. ROUTE SUMMARY SCREEN The route summary screen is entered by placing the cursor arrow on the word SUMMARY in the white menu bar, visible along the top edge of the screen, and clicking once on the left mouse button. The green graphical pad is replaced by a tabulated summary of the route details so far entered. All the other controls and data boxes that you used on the ROUTE ENTRY screen remain visible. This screen may be entered at any time. The table is largely self explanatory. The details of the last eight legs of your trip only will be displayed on first switching to this screen. The details of earlier legs (if any) will have been displaced leftwards off the screen. To view these legs, click on the small control marked with a double arrow at the bottom right hand corner of the summary table. Earlier legs will shuffle into view as you repeatedly click on this button. Likewise, if you wish to see the details of legs which may lie to the right of the screen, click on the control marked with left-pointing arrows. Below each column of data boxes is a small square box with a cross. The presence of the cross indicates that the calculated heading and ground speed values etc. for that leg will be updated to reflect any changes you may make to the flight conditions with the scroll bars to the right of the screen. If, for any reason, you wish to exclude a leg from being adjusted in this way you may do so by:- 1. Using the left and right arrows to ensure the leg in question is displayed. 2. Click the cursor on the small box with the cross beneath that leg. The cross will disappear indicating that this leg will be excluded from updating. Clicking again on the box causes the cross to re-appear and will allow updating to any future changes. This mechanism is useful if you wish to enter different flight conditions for separate legs. In this case, extinguish the crosses for all legs except the one (or ones) you wish to change, then move the control sliders to the appropriate conditions. If you wish to return to the previous screen to add further legs, click the cursor on the word ROUTE in the white menu bar at the top of the screen. Printing the flight log When you are satisfied that your trip details are complete, you may choose to produce a printed flight log form. You must obviously have a printer attached to your computer, and Windows must have been set up to deal correctly with this printer. Assuming that this has all been taken care of, simply click the cursor on the word PRINT in the white menu bar at the top of the screen. You will be offered two further options in a drop- down menu box. Normally you will click on ADD DETAILS to enable you to type in descriptions of your starting and finishing points for each leg, and the MSA and altitude at which you intend to fly. If you have recalled a file for alterations to flight conditions, this step will not be necessary, nor possible. Clicking on the ADD DETAILS option causes a further form to be displayed . When first displayed, the cursor will be flashing in the box marked PILOT, simply type the name of the pilot in this box and press the "enter" button on your keyboard. The cursor will move to the DATE box, and so on. In the OBSERVATIONS box you may type anything in the form of notes, reminders or trip details which you would wish to see appear at the top of the flight log form. The FILE box allows you the opportunity of noting the file name under which you may wish to store your trip details. These first four boxes are the only ones which may be amended if you are dealing with a recalled file. Once you have entered the file name, the cursor will move to the FROM box. You will want to enter the name of your airfield of departure, followed as always by pressing the "enter" key. In the TO box, enter the name of the turning point at the end of the first leg, or the name of the first waypoint depending on how you have divided up your log. Then proceed to enter the MSA and planned altitudes for that leg. The cursor will then return to the FROM box for you to enter the name of the start of the second leg; as this will normally be the same as the name you entered as the end of the first leg this is displayed for you and you need only press the "enter" key if this is correct. You may change the name in this box by deleting the displayed text with the "delete" key and enter the desired name. The program will automatically prompt you for similar entries for all the legs of your trip. You will automatically be returned to the main screen once this process is complete. Should you tire of it at any point, simply click on the return button at the bottom right of the screen. Assuming that you now wish to print your completed flight log, select PRINT again from the menu bar and this time click on PRINT when the drop-down menu is displayed. First make sure that your printer is switched on, selected on-line and loaded with paper. Printing should start almost immediately. If a problem occurs at this stage, it is almost certainly because the Windows operating system has not been correctly set up for your printer. If the Windows Print Manager icon is visible on the screen, double-click on this and sort the problem out before continuing. If you cannot see the Print Manager icon, save the route you have been working on and quit NAVSIM. If your computer successfully prints from other Windows applications programs you should have no trouble with NAVSIM. Saving your route To save your route, click on the word FILE in the white menu bar, and then click on the word SAVE in the drop-down menu which will appear. A file dialogue box will be displayed. At this point you will need to enter the name of the file under which you wish to save your trip details. Type the name, in the upper text box. The file name you choose must not be greater than eight characters long and may not start with a numeral. It must end with the extension .pln. Examples of valid file names would be:- CARDIFF.PLN, ROUNDTRP.PLN, TRIP2.PLN etc. When satisfied with the name, press the "ENTER" key on the keyboard. The route details will be saved under the chosen file name in the same directory in which NAVSIM resides. Normally you need not bother about this, although you may select a different drive or directory to store your files by using the drive and directory lists on the right hand side of the dialogue box. Alternatively, if you wish to re-save a previously recalled file under its original name you may double-click on this file name which should be displayed in the list of files in the larger of the two left hand boxes. File handling in NAVSIM is identical to that used in other Windows applications. Recalling saved files To recall a previously saved file, select FILE from the menu . This time when the drop-down menu appears, click on the word OPEN. Find the file name of the appropriate file in the list and double click on it. The previous route details will be loaded into NAVSIM. Note that only files with the extension .PLN will be displayed, this is why it is so important always to add this extension to the names of files which you save. If you don't, you may not be able to find them again. Modifying recalled files There is only one thing which you can legitimately do with recalled files, and that is to enter new values of windspeed, wind direction, true airspeed, fuel consumption rate or magnetic variation. This would be useful, for example, if you wished to re-fly a previous trip on a different day. It may also be convenient to prepare the flight plan for the next day's trip the previous evening, even though wind conditions may not be known. This may then be saved and recalled the next morning to allow the latest winds to be entered before printing the flight log. To enter the new in-flight conditions, simply adjust the appropriate slider on the right hand side of the SUMMARY SCREEN. You will see the tabulated values of heading, ground speed etc. change in sympathy. By default, all legs will be recalculated but, as stated before, any particular leg of the trip may be excluded from this updating by clicking to extinguish the cross in the small box below the leg details. If the leg is not visible, use the "shuffle right" or "shuffle left" buttons to bring it into view. As noted, the sliders may seem a little sluggish if your trip has many legs. Other items in the menu bar Most of these have already been mentioned. In addition, "SELECT" returns you to the initial INTRODUCTORY menu screen and "QUIT" terminates the program without saving files. Note that you may return to the INTRODUCTORY screen, and from there to any of the other work screens with impunity at any time. CONVERSIONS WORKSCREEN In complete harmony with its name, this is the screen which enables you to perform standard weight, volume, etc. conversions. Operation is simplicity itself. Simply adjust the slider in the chosen section until the number against the quantity you wish to convert is correct, the other boxes in the section give the equivalent quantity in other units. So, for example, to convert 3240 feet to metres, move the slider until the number 3240 appears in the "feet" box. You may then read off 987.8 in the metres box and, should you want it, 1080 in the yards box. There is only one exception to this mode of operation and it involves the control marked "AVGAS". If you wish to calculate the weight of a given volume of avgas (SG=0.72), adjust the volume slider to give the required volume figure, e.g. 40 US gallons, then click the "AVGAS" button. The numbers which then appear in the adjacent weight boxes are the equivalent weight of that volume of avgas. ALTITUDES/SPEEDS WORKSCREEN This is perhaps the screen you will use the least. Many of the functions included here, whilst they are found on standard manual flight computers, are not usually of great significance to most VFR pilots flying at modest speeds and altitudes. They are, however, included to complete the emulation of the standard flight computer. The upper group of controls allows you to set, PRESSURE ALTITUDE, INDICATED ALTITUDE, QNH or QFE and TEMPERATURE. With these quantities correctly set, the two lower left hand boxes will report values of TRUE ALTITUDE and DENSITY ALTITUDE. The lower right hand control allows you to set INDICATED AIRSPEED and to obtain TRUE AIRSPEED in the box below. The controls work like this. In order to calculate density altitude, true altitude and true airspeed, the computer must be given information on PRESSURE ALTITUDE and TEMPERATURE. Temperature is easiest, just move the slider to give the appropriate temperature at the pressure altitude you are about to enter. To enter PRESSURE ALTITUDE, you would normally simply use the slider provided - this is the way to do it if you know the pressure altitude. Alternatively you may enter INDICATED ALTITUDE and QNH or QFE, whichever datum is in use. The equivalent value of PRESSURE ALTITUDE will be calculated and displayed. The practical use of this procedure is to determine pressure altitude when it is not known directly. For example, if you wish to determine DENSITY ALTITUDE to help assess take-off run, you could enter the known elevation of your airfield in the INDICATED ALTITUDE box and the known QNH in the QNH box; pressure altitude will be calculated for you. Set the air temperature and the equivalent value of DENSITY ALTITUDE will be displayed. Alternatively, set the INDICATED ALTITUDE to 0, which would be the indicated altitude if your aircraft were on the runway with QFE set, and enter the value of QFE in the QNH/QFE box and you will get the same value of pressure altitude.All pressures are in millibars. It is obvious from the foregoing that the controls in the upper panel are linked. The rules for their operation are: 1. Set pressure altitude directly if you know it. 2. If pressure altitude is not known, set indicated altitude and qnh or qfe as just described. Once set: 3. Changing qnh alone will cause a new pressure altitude to be calculated, consistent with the value of indicated altitude which remains unchanged. 4 Changing indicated altitude alone will cause a new pressure altitude consistent with the value of qnh, which remains unchanged. 5 Changing pressure altitude will cause qnh to change consistent with the value of indicated altitude which remains unchanged. At all times NAVSIM displays consistent values of PRESSURE ALTITUDE, INDICATED ALTITUDE and QNH/QFE. Note that altitudes may vary by up to ten feet. INSTALLING NAVSIM --------------------------------------------------------------- To run NAVSIM you must have an IBM or compatible personal computer with at least one megabyte of memory and a 286 processor (or better). Microsoft Windows version 3.0 or later must be installed and running. You will not be able to control NAVSIM without a mouse. Navsim should be installed on your hard disk. 1. Place the NAVSIM floppy disk in drive A. 2. Locate and activate the Windows "MAIN" control window by double-clicking on its icon on the screen. This step will not be necessary if the MAIN control window is already open. 3. Double-click on the "FILE MANAGER" icon (a small filing cabinet) in the MAIN control window. 4. When the FILE MANAGER is active, you will see a symbol in the upper control bar for each of the disk drives installed on your machine. Click on the drive symbol for drive A. A list of the contents of the distribution disk in drive A will be presented down the right hand side of the screen. 5. Double click on the list entry SETUP.EXE (nb NOT SETUP1.EXE). This will load and run the installation program which will keep you informed of its own progress. When complete, a small aircraft icon with the label NAVSIM will be visible on your screen. To run NAVSIM, double-click on this icon. 6. On subsequent occasions when you switch on your computer, the NAVIGATION COMPUTER icon will be visible and, as with any other Windows application, you only need to double click on the icon to run the program. ------------------------------------------------------------ Whilst every care has been taken in writing and checking the functioning of NAVSIM, the author accepts no responsibility for any consequences arising from its use. No warranty, specific or implied, is given. ------------------------------------------------------------