[Release] Flying PAR/GCA approaches in BMS with vPAR/FSUIPCEmulator
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Hello all,
As discussed in the general forum several of us were missing the opportunity to have realistic PAR/GCA approaches in BMS multiplayer flights. Some of us were using F4AWACS with overlays, but as it lacks a glideslope view for the controller, it resembled more of a SRA approach. I remembered that many years ago I tried a program for MSFS that allowed precisely to fly/control PAR approaches over multiplayer, and I realized I could make it work with BMS with a few tricks. So, here we are…
Documentation on procedures is available on AFMAN11-217V1 and basic phraseology is described on vPAR’s website.
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What are PAR approaches?
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PAR approaches are a type of GCA (Ground Controlled Approach) in which the controller talks the airplane down to the decision height. Other kinds of GCA include SRA (Surveillance Radar Approach) and CCA (Carrier Controlled Approach) Mode III. In PAR approaches the controller provides both azimuth and glidepath information, and thus they are qualified as precision approaches. The attractive of bringing them to BMS is that we get to experience a different type of approach performed in RL, and we put another human into the loop to bring our viper home in IMC. -
Required software to fly them in BMS
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Installation
- Extract the vPAR programs (vPAR Transponder only required for pilots / vPAR Quad/Analog Radar required for controller) and FSUIPCEmulator to your directory of choice
- Extract approach definitions to the same folder as vPAR Quad/Analog Radar (either overwrite the existing Approaches.ini file or append new content)
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Instructions to set-up a PAR session in BMS
For PAR controller:- Launch vPAR Analog or Quad radar as desired (make sure port 4242 TCP is forwarded, as required)
For pilots: - Launch FSUIPCEmulator
- Launch BMS
- Launch vPAR Transponder and connect to controller (do not try to connect to vPAR controller before launching BMS)
The vPAR scope is by default divided into the PAR scope on the right hand side, and a more general approach control scope and ground movement radar on the left top and bottom sides respectively. Further information on the many available settings and functionalities of the vPAR program suite are available from its website
I have included definitions for the following approaches:
- Real-plate based Kunsan runways 36 and 18 (RW36 DA(H) 229(200), RVR 2400ft or viz 1/2sm 3.00º GP, RW18 (UNVBL UFN) DA(H) 218(200) RVR 2400ft or viz 1/2sm, 3.00º GP)
- Approaches to Pohang runways 08 and 26 (08 is based on the published minima for RW10)
- Approaches to Choongwon. RW34L set to a steeper glidepath of 4 degrees due to terrain
- ASDE/Traffic sector files for Kunsan intial approach control (KUNSAN_APP.sct) and basic tower (KUNSAN_TWR.sct) (read note in known issues section below)
Additional approaches to other airports can easily be defined using vPAR Transponder’s built-in approach editor (takes less than 5 minutes).
- Launch vPAR Analog or Quad radar as desired (make sure port 4242 TCP is forwarded, as required)
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Known issues
- Best testing experience was found when using vPAR in conjuntion with F4AWACS, as this allows IVC integration without focus on the BMS window, and a more versatile GCI/ATC experience, using vPAR only for final GCA control.
- TX timer in vPAR does not reset when using IVC PTT keys (F1/F2).
- VPAR_Q ASDE/Traffic sector symbology is not displayed correctly when using ‘,’ as decimal symbol in the Windows Control Panel regional settings (either change it to ‘.’ or you have another good reason to use F4AWACS for initial vectoring)
- As of FSUIPCEmulator version 1.0, lat/lon coordinates extracted by FSUIPCEmulator are only correct in KTO, as there is no direct way to extract them from the shared memory. I may work around this in a future update. In the meantime, approaches for other theaters can still be created and flown seamlessly using the vPAR Transponder approach editor (but be aware that the displayed coordinates and scale wont match your DED or charts)
That’s all. All credits go to Michael Oxner for creating vPAR, I just tricked it to work with BMS, and I hope that Monster can update F4AWACS in the future to provide built-in support for PAR so that we get rid of the need of running multiple programs
Regarding FSUIPCEmulator, as of this version it only propagates the offsets required to run vPAR. However, it does have the potential to make other MSFS tools compatible with BMS. If you have any request I can take a look at it. However, bear in mind that data publicly exported by BMS shared memory is limited in comparison with FSUIPC exported data, and I am not willing to go the undocumented way, especially with the new “licensing status”.
Safe PARs everyone.
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Congratulations Ahmed, excellent work
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Incredible work! I’m sure this so going to make a lot of people very happy
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Could be used as a basis to grade Carrier Approaches?
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Great work dear friend, Bravo!
Nikos. -
Really cool Ahmed! Great work I look forward to flying a PAR for the first time, you’re the man!
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Could be used as a basis to grade Carrier Approaches?
I don’t really think so. The carrier in multiplayer does not move so technically you could create an approach. However, grading for a carrier trap is basically done in the last 3/4 of a mile. You don’t really have the resolution in the PAR scope to assess that. That’s why in real life LSOs mostly base the grading on observations made by their own eyes and ears, assisted by the PLAT cam.
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That’s AWESOME !!!
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Hey AHMED,
that’s really COOL STUFF
tried it out immediately after release. Thanks - works great as an overlay picture while I’m flying…
Well - here is my question:
We (1stGW VFW) got the privilege to operate permanently with a “human ATC” while we’re flying online with our squadron. The lady does a hell of a job with F4Awacs from the OSC tool, while her husband is flying with us.
Problem is: Both are connected using the same router. This is just possible because the so called SQServer from OSC is running permanently on the game-server of our squadron and one can connect the Validator (as a player) as well as the F4Awacs (as a controller) to your personal computer using the IP address of the squadron server.Now, as I understood, vPAR Quad/Analog radar should be installed on the computer (as a controller) and vPAR X(Transponder) and FSUIPCEmulator should be running on the player side.
We - of course - now could connect to the IP address of the computer of that lady but how could her husband connect his sim-computer to her (being on the same router but on different computer) ??
Can you connect vPAR_T within the same home network (connected to the same router) to vPAR_Q ?
127.0.0.1 did work out only if vPAR_X and vPAR_Q are on the very same computer, then it works fine…
I’ve tried to connect 2 of my computer, checking out the individual IP address of my second computer and connecting vPAR_T from my “BMS-computer” to my “ATC-computer” with this IP address … but that didn’t work out ??? PORT ???
Any help ???
best regards
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Wow! Thank you, Ahmed.
For celebration of releasing a great app, I would like to share this F-15 PAR radio communication video in JASDF Komatsu Air Base. -
Hey AHMED,
Now, as I understood, vPAR Quad/Analog radar should be installed on the computer (as a controller) and vPAR X(Transponder) and FSUIPCEmulator should be running on the player side.Correct, the Quad/Analog radar is the server as well.
We - of course - now could connect to the IP address of the computer of that lady but how could her husband connect his sim-computer to her (being on the same router but on different computer) ??
Can you connect vPAR_T within the same home network (connected to the same router) to vPAR_Q ?
I haven’t tested but I can’t see why it wouldn’t work. Just use the private address within you subnet and make sure you have no firewall issues that are rejecting the connection.
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Hey Ahmed, another cool app you made here to go with your grb2fmap. Question on the transponder though, is it possible to allow the transponder to continually try and connect once told to connect to an IP address that does not have vPAR_Q or vPAR_A running? Currently it looks like it just times out and does not try and connect again until requested. If it were to continually try and connect then the person acting as the ground controller does not have to be present at the start of a mission but can start up the vPAR_Q or vPAR_A as the mission is coming to an end and the clients will automatically connect without any intervention? Just a thought to help in coordinating have ground controllers be more flexible since they may not actually be taking part in the entire flight.
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awesome work. interesting to test in the near future
cheers
scub -
Hey Ahmed, another cool app you made here to go with your grb2fmap. Question on the transponder though, is it possible to allow the transponder to continually try and connect once told to connect to an IP address that does not have vPAR_Q or vPAR_A running? Currently it looks like it just times out and does not try and connect again until requested. If it were to continually try and connect then the person acting as the ground controller does not have to be present at the start of a mission but can start up the vPAR_Q or vPAR_A as the mission is coming to an end and the clients will automatically connect without any intervention? Just a thought to help in coordinating have ground controllers be more flexible since they may not actually be taking part in the entire flight.
The vPAR Transponder is part of the original program suite, so there is not much I can do to change that. A quick&dirty workaround for your problem could be to launch the transponder when your controller guy is up using RDP from your tablet/smartphone or a quick alt+tab.
On a side note, I have updated the Approaches to Rev3 on the first post. The Kunsan APP sector now includes a MRVA plot as well as a better coastline, and the minimums on the preset approaches are now set to DA (based on BMS elevations) as vPAR is not interpreting the DH as such.
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Gents, here’s a PAR tutorial I put together to help understand the world of PAR’s.
http://www.slideshare.net/MooseMoose2/par-gca-operations-for-falcon-bms-61140914
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Dear Moose,
useful that, almost needless to say.
And thanks a lot for having made and shared it, most of all.With best regards,
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Fsb27, does it work now?
Edit 25/04/2016:
I just try Kusan 36 approach, vPAR Quadradar and vPAR transponder running on the same computer.
WOUAHHHH , What a great tool Ahmed. You can follow your approach on Quad radar … and it is really awesome in BMS world.:D
Thanks a lotWindblow
Envoyé à l’aide de Tapatalk -
two issues…
1. The vPar download link does not work.
2. FSUIPC…if one has a registered FSUIPC is it needed or does it interfere with its installation of installed side by side.Thanks.
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1. The vPar download link does not work.
The site seems to be down and I am afraid I just clean formatted and don’t have a copy in my hard drive. If the website is down for good maybe somebody can upload it somewhere)
EDIT: Thank dropbox for keeping the deleted files. Here is my old copy until the vPAR website comes back up https://www.dropbox.com/s/hcrctmlu62cbebd/vPAR.rar?dl=0
2. FSUIPC…if one has a registered FSUIPC is it needed or does it interfere with its installation of installed side by side.
You don’t need the real FSUIPC for this to work, and it won’t interfere if you have it in any case. Just don’t run MSFS and FSUIPCEmulator at the same time (you wont be anyway – will get an error message advising you)
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Thanks Ahmed !