Jetex Jim said:
I may be wrong but I don't think any of Lightning sim's had visuals, but I think it was a Vulcan sim I saw (about this time) with an early form of camera/model visual. The model (which was just of an airfield and its immediate suround) was constructed on a continues canvas belt. The motion of the belt produced the main motion down the runway but the camera was arranged on a track and could move from side to side. And there was an optical system to adjust the field of view for pitch and roll. The belt just went around and around to permit endless straight ahead touch and goes, if you like.
The rig was arranged with the camera at the bottom and the belt vertical and little monopoly board style buildings were stuck to the belt and these would periodically come unstuck and bounce down the belt towards the camera, a phenomena only rarely seen outside the sim environment 
Well, the F3 sim at Coltishall certainly did have one of the rubber roller visuals - if common erks chatted up the sim techs we could do a few run in and break arrivals when they were getting it to work after one of the numerous failures. Livened up a dull evening shift. Towards the end of December each year unauthorised additions were invariably stuck on.