How does the fligth model work?

User Support Hub SDK
1

Hello guys!

I’ve spent some time looking into the SDK and learning about the flight model. Unfortunately I don’t have the time to get into this in detail. It would be nice if someone with experience could answer me following questions:

I learned that the flight model takes geometrical data from the GEOMETRY section and uses this to perform aerdodynamic calculations. Those seem complemented with certain coefficients and other values not covered by the geometric approach.

The wings seem pretty decent, but when viewing it in the aircraft editor, contact points of forces don’t always match the actual surface. On top, the fuselage seems to be a block. :smiley:

So how detailed is the geometric calculation and how does it interact with the coefficients? How would you rate the general quality of this approach?

Thanks in advance, eager to hear about your thoughts!

2

MSFS is having this block, approximating wing, fuselage and empennage, to create a veeery veeery rudimentary “CFD”. In addition, you also have all the speeds entered and some information about lift and drag. MSFS will then calculate a function, which approximates the behaviour in between the speeds, based on the “forces” acting on the aircraft.

This is how they are able to calculate corner cases like stalls, spins, etc. while having a somehow accurate approximation of the flight envelope.