Military Flight Simulators (Full Size Kit !) : Early Analog Scenery
Non-type experienced, serving sim instructors have had a bit of a renaissance recently; there has been a well-trodden path via the Typhoon sim console for guys (and gals) crossing over to the Typhoon from other FJ fleets.
The "first generation" of Herc sims at Lyneham each had a "model room" which was unusual - at the time - as they were bigger than most and horizontal not vertical, Gan , Masirah (?) and Hong Kong if memory serves.
Each lit by gi-huge banks of halogen floodlights, augmented by equally gi-huge banks of fans down the sides to cool the models down and stop them - literally - melting !!!
In the Guard Room, and controlled/monitored by the Ord Sgt, was an electrical "load meter" for the entire station usage, if it reached a certain pre-set figure then an alarm went off and said OS had to phone the sims and order them to turn off the Visuals !!! It was NOT, as rumour said, down to cost of electricity .. it was due to the fact that the wiring would not handle that load for any length of time !!!
Xmas visits by local school kids were always popular .. as the tiny model of santa + sleigh was placed on the threshold to force an "unexpected" overshoot ....
Far more fun were the visits by the wives clubs ... when a dead spider placed in a similar position would have a somewhat startling effect .. probably as said spider now appeared to be larger than the runway !!!!
Each lit by gi-huge banks of halogen floodlights, augmented by equally gi-huge banks of fans down the sides to cool the models down and stop them - literally - melting !!!
In the Guard Room, and controlled/monitored by the Ord Sgt, was an electrical "load meter" for the entire station usage, if it reached a certain pre-set figure then an alarm went off and said OS had to phone the sims and order them to turn off the Visuals !!! It was NOT, as rumour said, down to cost of electricity .. it was due to the fact that the wiring would not handle that load for any length of time !!!
Xmas visits by local school kids were always popular .. as the tiny model of santa + sleigh was placed on the threshold to force an "unexpected" overshoot ....
Far more fun were the visits by the wives clubs ... when a dead spider placed in a similar position would have a somewhat startling effect .. probably as said spider now appeared to be larger than the runway !!!!
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: Lincoln
Age: 49
Posts: 17
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I think the Buccaneer model was shipped to Lossie as I remeber seeing it when my dad was CFI on 237 and we had a sim tour, would have been about 86 I reckon.
Pretty sure it wasn't when we were at Laarbruch as I was only 5 when we were out there in the early 80's!!
Pretty sure it wasn't when we were at Laarbruch as I was only 5 when we were out there in the early 80's!!
Last edited by Sanf; 31st Oct 2012 at 23:34.
I think the Buccaneer model was shipped to Lossie as I remeber [sic] seeing it when my dad was CFI on 237 and we had a sim tour, would have been about 86 I reckon.
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Valley of the Sun, Az USA
Age: 71
Posts: 9
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Lightning Sim Visual system
I was a Lightning Sim Tech at Binbrook 73 to 77. I remember working on the visual system for about a year before it was mothballed. This was at the time the UK was having the power strikes. Facts about power consumption is correct.
Its design was a vertical rolling map - map speed was related to sim speed. Camera mounted at the bottom looking up the map. Map was solely for take off, approach and landing.
The picture from the camera was routed through to 3 projectors (Red, Green and Blue) fixed to the back of cockpit. The projectors ran at 50Kv. We had to use big earthing sticks before working on their set up..
The visual system was maintenance /set up intensive, to achieve 2/3 sorties before it needed recalibrating.
All in all, given its design and technology age (analogue computing using valve Operational Amplifers and servoes), it was a reasonable system
We did manage to simulate a bird strike using a pea shooter and a chicken from a childerns farm set - although its wing span came out at 45ft
Got my memory cells running now, gee it was nearly 40yrs ago - anybody on the forum who used the Binbrook box whilst I was there ?
Its design was a vertical rolling map - map speed was related to sim speed. Camera mounted at the bottom looking up the map. Map was solely for take off, approach and landing.
The picture from the camera was routed through to 3 projectors (Red, Green and Blue) fixed to the back of cockpit. The projectors ran at 50Kv. We had to use big earthing sticks before working on their set up..
The visual system was maintenance /set up intensive, to achieve 2/3 sorties before it needed recalibrating.
All in all, given its design and technology age (analogue computing using valve Operational Amplifers and servoes), it was a reasonable system
We did manage to simulate a bird strike using a pea shooter and a chicken from a childerns farm set - although its wing span came out at 45ft
Got my memory cells running now, gee it was nearly 40yrs ago - anybody on the forum who used the Binbrook box whilst I was there ?
If it helps, the 'leap' to CGI wasn't great. The Lynx sim at Detmold was truely awful - night only, glass-spikes aplenty, and vomit-inducing lag between contol input, sim movement, then the display would lurch around.
ISTR seeing the entire set-up on ebay not long ago. I wonder if it ever reached its reserve...
ISTR seeing the entire set-up on ebay not long ago. I wonder if it ever reached its reserve...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: East Sussex UK
Age: 66
Posts: 6,995
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like
on
1 Post
Thanks oldsimman ...
32/24k ... 
Mrs C's washing machine has more computing power (yes I know a sexist comment !)
ZFT ...
Great pic ... thanks for sharing ... size was clearly important in those days !
The ingenuity shown since the 60's in providing cockpit visual systems is simply outstanding ... just shows you how far we have come !
Coff.
two Honeywell computers running DAP2 a language similar to Fortran. The memory was ferrite bead core 32k on one m/c and 24k on the other,[yes k].Each Bite was 24 bits. Programming was punched tape or C60 cassette
Mrs C's washing machine has more computing power (yes I know a sexist comment !)ZFT ...
Great pic ... thanks for sharing ... size was clearly important in those days !
The ingenuity shown since the 60's in providing cockpit visual systems is simply outstanding ... just shows you how far we have come !
Coff.
I certainly remember going to St Mawgan as an ATC Cadet on camp (probably mid 80's), it was definatley a huge vertical model model with a camera.
IIRC the cockpit was motion fitted with a static rear crew area.
I never got a look inside as there was a 'mission' on and they didn't want to disturb the crews by opening a door at xx000 feet and have a load of Cadets walking in!
I also seem to remember a large 'cotton wool' area for above cloud flying...or did I imagine that?
IIRC the cockpit was motion fitted with a static rear crew area.
I never got a look inside as there was a 'mission' on and they didn't want to disturb the crews by opening a door at xx000 feet and have a load of Cadets walking in!
I also seem to remember a large 'cotton wool' area for above cloud flying...or did I imagine that?
Join Date: Nov 2005
Location: london
Posts: 379
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
(I was involved with sims procurement, 1966-70. This is from memory).
3 firms shared the workload arising from Healey's Defence recast:
- at Aylesbury, GPS (1967: Redifon Air Trainers Ltd). They had Bucc S.2(RN), which was the first UK digital/motion/visual. A US GPS mainframe.
- at Crawley, Redifon. They had F-4K/M, with Honeywell, and another (forget) with Redifon 2000 mainframe.
- at Lancing (Churchill Industrial Estate), Miles (yes, the same F.G.; soon Link-MIles, soon Singer-Link). They had F-111K, but chopped, which I think was to have been the first with 6-axis motion + colour visual.
The work of art in this generation was not the model - always done by dextrous females. It was the computer room, a work of exquisite civil engineering. The Bucc's at LM was sited at a distance from the runway that had been assessed as far enough to reduce vibration to match the floor's dampening (springing), but early sim useage was affected during runway activity. The room was clean - as in gyro manufacture - noddy suits, and very hot. For 30k.
Wedgwood-Benn at this time was Minister of Technology, responsible for the nascent UK computer industry. This raft of sim business caused him to obtain Cabinet Approval that all UK public procurement of mainframes should carry a Buy British weighting of 25%: so a Honeywell bid of £100 would lose to a Redifon £125. We only had ICL and they soon became Fujitsu.
3 firms shared the workload arising from Healey's Defence recast:
- at Aylesbury, GPS (1967: Redifon Air Trainers Ltd). They had Bucc S.2(RN), which was the first UK digital/motion/visual. A US GPS mainframe.
- at Crawley, Redifon. They had F-4K/M, with Honeywell, and another (forget) with Redifon 2000 mainframe.
- at Lancing (Churchill Industrial Estate), Miles (yes, the same F.G.; soon Link-MIles, soon Singer-Link). They had F-111K, but chopped, which I think was to have been the first with 6-axis motion + colour visual.
The work of art in this generation was not the model - always done by dextrous females. It was the computer room, a work of exquisite civil engineering. The Bucc's at LM was sited at a distance from the runway that had been assessed as far enough to reduce vibration to match the floor's dampening (springing), but early sim useage was affected during runway activity. The room was clean - as in gyro manufacture - noddy suits, and very hot. For 30k.
Wedgwood-Benn at this time was Minister of Technology, responsible for the nascent UK computer industry. This raft of sim business caused him to obtain Cabinet Approval that all UK public procurement of mainframes should carry a Buy British weighting of 25%: so a Honeywell bid of £100 would lose to a Redifon £125. We only had ICL and they soon became Fujitsu.
Last edited by tornadoken; 1st Nov 2012 at 11:05.
Join Date: Jul 2012
Location: Lincoln
Age: 49
Posts: 17
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
BSC, if I recall.
"Mildly" Eccentric Stardriver
The C-130 sims at Lyneham and Thorney Island were certainly in use up to 1975. The power drain was huge, and a bank of finned radiators were outside to cool everything down, although I think a lot of the power was drawn by the computers and tape drives. I believe that the lighting system was controlled such that only the section of scenery being overflown was lit; again to keep power usage to the minimum.
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: Why oh why would I wanna be anywhere else?
Posts: 1,305
Likes: 0
Received 1 Like
on
1 Post
The original Harrier sim at Wittering comprised 3 horizontal scenes with a 3 axis cockpit in a separate room. The particular board in use was lit with hundreds of flourescent tubes to give the right sort of lighting for the moveable cameras. The resultant heat required a rather large air conditioning room which, of course, was also needed for cooling the room (a large room) which contained all the reel-to-reel computer cabinets.
The result of all this was quite a large building.
In my war role my senior flt sgt was also the i/c flt sim in his day job. One Christmas I managed to win an Atari 64K computer thingy in the Christmas draw. The flt sgt told me that the computing power in that thing outstripped the computer power in his entire flt sim!
The result of all this was quite a large building.
In my war role my senior flt sgt was also the i/c flt sim in his day job. One Christmas I managed to win an Atari 64K computer thingy in the Christmas draw. The flt sgt told me that the computing power in that thing outstripped the computer power in his entire flt sim!
622m
Indeed we had the MCT with limited motion (Full crew training system with a synthetic input of flight deck data from a small cabin on the front), and the Dynamic sim which was a full motion sim with visuals. The huge vertical models were (i) the local area like Kinloss or St Mawgan (ii) Cloud scape which was a large bowl wih blue surround and cotton wool for clouds below and (iii) the sea scape with a couple of model warships
and maybe a periscope or two
Each model could be orientated in any direction so the runway or the direction of the ships really became a generic for anywhere.
Under the MCT at Kinloss were large cupboards - a place people used to brew wine etc.
The Dynamic sim could be connected to the MCT but very seldon was. Typical MCT 'Trips' were about 6 hours including briefing 9and rations!)where as Dynamic was about 3 hours. The mirror on the camera for the Dynamic always caused excitement -paticularly when the ROD was high and the trip switch didn't quite operate as it was supposed to. The mirror would end up on the floor amongst the train track system and sometimes got crunched. I believe a new mirror system might have been in the order of several hundred pounds so they were often glued back together until Thursday morning when the Staish (if he was a pilot) had his session (usually before morning prayers). High crosswinds and low vis were usually the order of the day and often he crunched it in breaking the already glued back on mirror.
Oh dear, never mind. Take up the hold or go for a coffee while it gets sorted.
Quite a nice rest tour really.
Indeed we had the MCT with limited motion (Full crew training system with a synthetic input of flight deck data from a small cabin on the front), and the Dynamic sim which was a full motion sim with visuals. The huge vertical models were (i) the local area like Kinloss or St Mawgan (ii) Cloud scape which was a large bowl wih blue surround and cotton wool for clouds below and (iii) the sea scape with a couple of model warships
and maybe a periscope or two
Each model could be orientated in any direction so the runway or the direction of the ships really became a generic for anywhere.
Under the MCT at Kinloss were large cupboards - a place people used to brew wine etc.
The Dynamic sim could be connected to the MCT but very seldon was. Typical MCT 'Trips' were about 6 hours including briefing 9and rations!)where as Dynamic was about 3 hours. The mirror on the camera for the Dynamic always caused excitement -paticularly when the ROD was high and the trip switch didn't quite operate as it was supposed to. The mirror would end up on the floor amongst the train track system and sometimes got crunched. I believe a new mirror system might have been in the order of several hundred pounds so they were often glued back together until Thursday morning when the Staish (if he was a pilot) had his session (usually before morning prayers). High crosswinds and low vis were usually the order of the day and often he crunched it in breaking the already glued back on mirror.
Oh dear, never mind. Take up the hold or go for a coffee while it gets sorted.
Quite a nice rest tour really.
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: Scotland
Posts: 96
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I remember visiting the Bucc simulator at Laarbruch. What sticks in my mind was that parts would occasionally detach themselves from the model and fall onto the floor. The poor pilot, however, saw this as a building hurling past from L-R or R-L !!! Quite a distraction.
I worked on the Tornado GR1 flight simulator and, as it was conceived to be an “all weather aircraft” it had no visual system at all – just a hood over the canopy filled with fluorescent tubes whose brightness could be changed to simulate various types of weather.
Later I worked on the Nimrod simulator (back end) and regularly visited Kinloss and St Morgan to see the “front end”. I can’t remember what was used for a visual system for low level but “in the cruise” the cameras switched to show, essentially, a rotating plate with “cotton wool” stuck to it to represent clouds. All very amateurish but it seemed to work.
In the early days of connecting the Nimrod back end to the front end, we didn’t get the clock synchronisation quite right and after a short simulated flight the TACNAV and RADAR reported a new target straight ahead, same level and moving slowly away from us. Turned out to be the front end which was flying slightly faster than the back end was
I worked on the Tornado GR1 flight simulator and, as it was conceived to be an “all weather aircraft” it had no visual system at all – just a hood over the canopy filled with fluorescent tubes whose brightness could be changed to simulate various types of weather.
Later I worked on the Nimrod simulator (back end) and regularly visited Kinloss and St Morgan to see the “front end”. I can’t remember what was used for a visual system for low level but “in the cruise” the cameras switched to show, essentially, a rotating plate with “cotton wool” stuck to it to represent clouds. All very amateurish but it seemed to work.
In the early days of connecting the Nimrod back end to the front end, we didn’t get the clock synchronisation quite right and after a short simulated flight the TACNAV and RADAR reported a new target straight ahead, same level and moving slowly away from us. Turned out to be the front end which was flying slightly faster than the back end was
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: Lincolnshire
Posts: 543
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
The F4 sim at Coningsby had the flat earth model when I first went through. It had been set up for the GA days and was largely redundant for the medium level AD stuff we did in the early days.
I remember it was set up with a model of a Hastings on a pole so we could run VIDs against the model. No idea how they worked the overtake problem! One wag tied a fly to the Hastings and asked a crew to close for a VID. Carnage in the cockpit apparently!
I remember it was set up with a model of a Hastings on a pole so we could run VIDs against the model. No idea how they worked the overtake problem! One wag tied a fly to the Hastings and asked a crew to close for a VID. Carnage in the cockpit apparently!
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Swindon, UK
Age: 55
Posts: 12
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Jag sim Coltishall.
When I was a young sim mech, at Coltishall, we used approx 10 % of the station power. If there was an "exercise minimise" going on, we would get a phone call from the guard room telling us to turn of the simulator. 
Which usually meant an early stack! On the airfield and weapon models alone, there where something like 250 400w lamps, so it was quite expensive to run! The models themselves where nearly 60ft long by 30 wide. Even today the sims I work on account for 8% of station power, mainly because of the motion pumps!
Which usually meant an early stack! On the airfield and weapon models alone, there where something like 250 400w lamps, so it was quite expensive to run! The models themselves where nearly 60ft long by 30 wide. Even today the sims I work on account for 8% of station power, mainly because of the motion pumps!