Eurocopter EC130 B4/history
This is the history of Eurocopter EC130 B4.
Updates as of FG 3.0 Version
The Eurocopter EC130 B4 helicopter has recieved a major upgrade with FG 3.0 release. The existing model, which already had been of very high quality, has been refined in various aspects with lots of effort by mhab. The outside model has been enriched to a degree which should justify a 5* rating and the overall status of the aircraft improves to "production".
The Rotorhead has been brought to a new level of detail, a full detailed Fenestron was added and animations were introduced to all moving parts.
Cockpit was enriched for Pilot/Copilot controls, seats are textured now and a variable cabin configuration allows to set up 5 or 6 seats or an Emergency Medical Services (EMS) variant with 4 seats and a stretcher.
New Liveries
- N155GC of Grand Canyon Helicopters, colorful painting in red/gold, 6 seats
- N11QC of Blue Hawaiian Helicopters, 6 seats
- N130NE of MedFlight based in Ohio, EMS rescue configuration, 4 seats
- VH-OSA of MAC rescue based in South Australia, EMS configuration, 4 seats
- F-GOLH a beautiful new livery of a private french model for those who want to travel in style
- ZS-HOY of Starlite Helicopters based in South Africa, variation of F-GOLH, 6 seats
- D-HSTS privately owned Heli Gourmet in reference to famous cook Johann Lafer. The livery was done by Sanni, contributed through FG Livery database and was adapted to FG 3.0 version.
A lot of equipment (most of which was there already but hidden) can now be used, including a full blown SX16-Nightsun searchlight.
All of this has been brought together in a fully integrated configuration dialog which allows to set-up livery, fuel, extra views, weights, cabin setup and equipment.
Extra gimmics include a fully animated pilot, glass reflection on windows and front shield and variable rotor wakes depending on the strength of the downwash.
A closeup of the full detailed fenestron
EC130 fitted with snowshoes and hook
EC130 pilot controls
EC130 cabin configuration (EMS) with stretcher
EC130 luggage door
Even the pilot window can be opened now
EC130B4 at Samedan/ Switzerland
EC130B4 flying in the mountains
F-GOLH landing in Lake Geneva with floats inflated
Blue Hawaiian Helicopter near Kalaupapa
Some of the most interesting changes
- Flight Model tremendously improved (CoG and agility much more realistic) (fix by HHS)
- Mainrotor fully animated and adapted to original
- Fenestron fully designed and animated, incl. control rod
- Cockpit Controls added: Stick, Collective, Pedals, Co-Pilot Controls (optional)
- Compass (magn.) added (HHS)
- Doors movable
- Searchlight
- Snowshoes
- Hoist/Hook
- Checklists implemented with conditional display
- Pilot: fully animated
- Autostart/Autoshutdown enabled after 15 flights
- Rotor-Wakes off-low-medium-high cyclable
- Sound improved (doors moving, low/high rotor rpm, overspeed warning, and noise inside depends on open doors/window)
Configuration Dialogs and Help Screens
EC130 fully integrated configuration dialog
EC130 Help screen with all shortcuts and additional info
EC130 Config Help with explanation of dependencies
EC130 Simulation Options
Updates as of FG 3.5 version
FG 3.5 version of EC130 B4 is the first update after FG 3.0 version and the first one made available in FGAddon - ec130 at the new Sourceforge FGAddon SVN repository.
New Liveries
- N812MH Maverick Helicopters (Grand Canyon)
- N156BC Sheriff Broward County Florida
- PR-BOP Parana Police Policia Militar, Curitiba (Brazil)
EC130-B4 of Broward County Sheriff (Florida)
EC130-B4 of Maverick Helicopters (Grand Canyon) at LOWI airport
EC130-B4 PR-BOP of Parana Policia Militar (Brazil)
Enhancements of Model / Equipment
- NEW Searchlight Trakkabeam A800 (as seen with MAC rescue) fully functional with stow/deploy, color-filters (white,amber,red,IR),...
- NEW Stabilization for Trakkabeam A800, i.e. lightbeam direction remains stable in the air despite helicopter motion
- NEW Searchlight Watch View, allows to watch searchlight in action, automatically adjusted to selected searchlight
- NEW Searchlight Follow View, synced to searchlight direction, automatically adjusted to selected searchlight
- NEW Strobe Light at the rear gear mount (as seen with Maverick, MedFlight,Blue Hawaiian)
- NEW additional landing lights (as seen with MedFlight)
- NEW wide luggage boxes (as seen with Starlite)
- Searchlights optimized for Rembrandt
- Light-Cone Visibility adjustable (off,low,medium,high)
- Searchlight Portability: completely separated from other model parts, easy reuse with other models
- NEW additional antennas of different kinds (as seen with Broward County Sheriff, Parana Police)
- Fixes: handling of startselector guard fixed, rembrandt related fixes, ...
EC130-B4 of MAC rescue with new Trakkabeam A800 searchlight
EC130-B4 Trakkabeam A800 searchlight in stowed position
EC130-B4 additonal landing lights and strobe
Trakkabeam A800 Searchlight deployed and active
Attention: never look directly into a searchlight, this may cause severe injuries to the unprotected eye ...
EC130-B4 of Blue Hawaiian Heli using the A800 Trakkabeam searchlight (with red color filter)
EC130-B4 wide luggage box on right side
EC130-B4 wide luggage box on left side
EC130-B4 wide luggage box open with animated gas strut
Enhancements of Instruments
- NEW Horizon Offset Adjustment (AI)
- NEW Altimeter Pressure adjustable
- Lighting: improved INST.1 dimming
- Rotor Break Lock operable
- Cutoff Lever Guard operable
Updates of User Interface
- Configuration Dialog extended/updated new model/operator info, new equipment, antenna setup
- Simulation Options Dialog extended/updated light-cone visibility
- NEW Operator/Model Info Dialog with background info about the operator of the selected livery
- NEW Antenna Setup Dialog for configuration of all possible antenna
- Help Dialog updated
- NEW Multi-Key Shortcuts for Buttons on System Control Unit (SCU), Twist Grip, Start Selector, etc.
- NEW Tooltips for pick animations
- Pick Animations for knobs unified (all knobs use half-cylinders left/right)
- Shortcuts modified and some new added
- Alt-o ... Config Dialog (was AltGr-o) - AltGr-o ... Simulation Options (was Alt-o) - Alt-a ... Antenna Setup Dialog (new) - Alt-i ... Operator/Model Info Dialog (new) - Alt-L ... cycle Light-Cone Visibility (new) - AltGr-L ... cycle Slew Rate (new) - Alt-s ... toggle Stabilization (A800)(new) - Shift-S ... toggle/cycle Searchlight Filter (was Alt-s) - Ctrl-s ... reset Searchlight (was Ctrl-k) - Ctrl-p ... pause Searchlight (was Shift-S) - Alt-w ... W/LT TST (Warning Test) (new) - Alt-r ... toggle Rotor Break Lock (new) - AltGr-c ... toggle Cutoff Lever Guard (new) - :A* ... Multi Key Shortcuts (new)
New and improved Dialogs
EC130-B4 extended configuration dialog
New info dialog about the Operator of the selected livery
New Antenna Setup Dialog
updated Simulation Options Dialog
EC130-B4 updated Help Dialog
NEW Multi-Key commands (general)
NEW Multi-Key commands (doors)
Updates as of FG 2016.1 version
In FG 2016.1 release the following improvements are done. If you are interested in the newest features see Gitlab development repository
New Liveries
- N836GC Grand Canyon Gold 50 years anniversary special Golden Copter painting
Formation Flight
- NEW: Formation/Wingman Support: A fully animated wingman model and several formation scenarios are available. For details look for the Readme_Formations.txt file in AI sub-directory of ec130 aircraft ... and at Howto:Add wingmen
General Updates
- Non-Rembrandt aircraft-shadow improved and ALS compatible
- Nasal Errors handle nil values whereever necessary, hopefully fixes some really irritating bugs ...
- Tooltips improved/fixed
- Knob Animations: many pick animations replaced by knob animations
- MGPU (external power unit) can be removed by mouse click now
- Panel/Instruments Lighting Controls fully functional with day/night selector and dimming
- Multi Key Shortcuts added for panel/instrument lighting controls
- CWS Warning/Cautions next to CWS added, LITE+LIMIT+GYRO+GOV (amber+red) is operational
- Beep Sound whenever a red warning lights up on CWS
- Taxi Light independent of Nav lights
- Light/Searchlight Shortcuts adapted for Taxi Light
- L ... toggle Taxi Light - Shift-L ... toggle Landing Light (was L) - AltGr-L ... toggle Searchlight (was Shift-L) - Ctrl-L ... cycle Slew Rate (was AltGr-L)
- Stretcher Backrest adjustable (EMS variants only)
- EBCAU TEST implemented, EBCAU = Emergency Backup Control Ancillary Unit
- EBCAU Check Tutorial implemented
- ELT Emergency Locator Transmitter operational
- Rotor RPM improved variable rotor speed management
- Floats VNE Warning if airspeed exceeds max. speed with inflated floats
- Crash Fire if enough fuel is available at crash time
Enhancements of Instruments
- W/LT TST shows ALL warning lights
- Rotor Break disables starter
- Rotor RPM Indicator improved, dim knob added
- fix cockpit clock so it displays sim time
- VEMD Flight Report shows helicopter and turbine hobbs time
- Instrument Lights dimming in NIGHT1/NIGHT2 position
- EMER SW new emergency switch for emergency shutdown
EC130 Warning Panel with all on
EC130 improved RPM indicator, RPM dim knob and NEW Emergency Switch
RPM indicator during shutdown
Engine panel with EBCAU TEST button and guard open
Stretcher backrest is adjustable now (EMS variant only)
If you crash while enough fuel is on board a fire starts ...
... which burnes and rumbles until the fuel is gone
NEW Multi-Key commands added (general)
updated Help Dialog
Updates as of FG 2017.2 version
General Updates
- H130 (EC130 T2) variant added
- engine params
- 3D Model
- new/changed doors on right side
- new bumpmap
- liveries split up EC130 B4 and H130
- menu/dialogs adjusted
- panel instruments modified
- Turn indicator removed
- CWS redesigned
- Horizon (AI) redesigned
- ELT switch moved to panel
- KA51b moved to panel
- Emergency switch removed
- New panel of H130
- Autostart enabled after 5 flights (previous 15)
- Full autostart including external power fetch/remove and Twist-Grip run-up
- Co-Pilot, Passenger and Patient models added
- Co-Pilot animated model (like pilot)
- Patient follows backrest adjustment
- internal views adjusted and limited to human view behaviour
- Pilots/Passengers can be seated/removed by click animations
- Co-Pilot can fly without Pilot
- Luggage added
- visible luggage is added according to weight,
- special stretcher roller added for EMS configuration
- can be added/removed by click animation
- Tooltips
- Fuel tooltip shows percentage of tank fill
- Weight related tooltips (passengers,luggage) show percentage of used MTOW
- Limit Warnings
- VNE warning considers altitude, pwr on/off and checks for open doors
- New temperature warning if air temperature is outside of range -20°C <-> +50°C
- improved limit warnings with more details and two warnings simultaneously possible
- Multi Player
- MP behaviour extended and compatibility improved
- FDM improvements
- more stable hover behaviour
- simulate main rotor downwash on horizontal stabilizers
- Use of new fresnel effect in reflection shader
New Liveries
- HB-ZAZ Air Zermatt (H130)
- N836GC Grand Canyon Gold, converted to H130
- N832GC Grand Canyon Helicopters, adapted from EC130-B4 model N155GC
- N11EQ Blue Hawaiian Helicopters, adapted from EC130-B4 model N11QC
- N872MH Maverick Helicopters, adapted from EC130-B4 model N812MH
H130 new air intake and passengers
View from inside with passengers
People seated, click to place/remove them
Stretcher empty
H130 with one piece of luggage loaded
EC130 with wide luggage box and fully packed
H130 remove luggage tooltip
Left basket with skis
Left basket full and closed
special stretcher roller as luggage in EMS configuration
EMS equipment with patient
"Fuel" animation: refuel the heli by click or mouse-wheel animation
Updates in Development Repository (after FG 2017.2)
After FG 2017.2 release the following improvements were done. If you are interested in the newest features see Gitlab development repository
General
- more stable flight behavior, especially in hover situations
- VEMD looks better (implementation now uses canvas), Thanks to @deltaecho for this
- New instrument KX165 (replaces KX155A thanks to @deltaecho)
New Liveries
- N127LG Flight For Life Colorado (H130), operational since May 1st, 2017.
The helicopter started operation on May 1st, 2017 and provides transportation to pediatric patients within a 120-mile service area, including Colorado, southwestern Nebraska and southern Wyoming.
NEW Heli stationed at Centennial Airport Denver (KAPA)
H130 of Flight For Life Colorado on Heliport of Innsbruck Hospital
