AirBC Dash 8-102 (pro)
----------------------

AirBC Dash 8-102 C-FADK Fin#812 "Nanaimo" - Air Canada Connector for 
Microsoft Flight Simulator 2000 Professional Edition (see note below 
for the Standard Edition).  

This aircraft is a de Havilland model DHC-8-102, serial number 324, 
built in 1992 and in service with AirBC from May of that year.

AirBC is a regional connector for Air Canada serving the Western 
Provinces of Canada.  There are nine Dash 8-100's operated by AirBC 
plus an additional six Dash 8-300's Making them a *very* common site 
in almost any airport with passenger service in the West.

This FS2000 model has full moving parts including, gear, gear doors, 
ailerons, elevator, spoilers, flaps and a steerable nose wheel.  
Texture features include separate textures for gear up/down and full 
night lighting including strobe effect on upper tail surface and 
additional night lighting effects with gear down.

Note: As there are separate textures for gear up/down for the engines
and the front 2/3s of the fuselage, the textures may redraw on gear 
extension/retraction.


Some personal notes from the AirBC repaint author:
--------------------------------------------------

First I would like to say that this work is a derivative of the very 
fine work of Chris Bawden and Gerrit Kranenbarg on their original 
SunState Dash 8 release (see orginal.jpg included in this archive and 
look for qfdash8.zip on your favourite Flightsim archive site).  

I have often wanted to do a realistic looking AirBC Dash 8 but, having 
very little experience in this sort of thing, did not know where to 
start.  When I saw the Sunstate Dash 8 I knew I had finally found the 
starting point.  From there it was a matter of experimenting with 
PaintShop Pro to revise Gerrit's excellent textures from the Sunstate 
livery to the AirBC livery.  This included hand drawing the stylized 
B.C. Coat of Arms and the AirBC logo, neither of which I could find 
suitable source images for on the Internet.

I must extend a big thank you to Chris and Gerrit who graciously 
agreed to assist me.  Without their original release and invaluable 
help, this release would not have happened.

I must also thank Airliners.net (http://www.airliners.net) for the 
AirBC Dash 8 photos I used as reference while creating the new 
textures and, in particular, John W. A. Merer and Ben Wang for their 
photgraphs of C-FADK also on Airliners.net.

Finally, the AirBC "Nanaimo" aircraft was chosen because I grew up in 
a town by the same name that is located on the East coast of Vancouver 
Island.  I have often flown the regional route between CYVR and CYCD 
(the airport serving Nanaimo) on similar AirBC aircraft.  I have even 
logged some cockpit time on longer legs (albeit in the jumpseat behind
the crew).

I hope you enjoy flying this release as much as I did creating it.


CREDITS
-------

Visual model and performance model by Chris Bawden.  Original textures
and night lighting modification by Gerrit Kranenbarg.  AirBC repaint 
by Mike Kelly.

Comments to Chris - chrisb@uq.net.au
         or Gerrit - g.kranenbarg@planet.nl
         or Mike - yllekm@hotmail.com

This aircraft may not be distributed or modified in any way without 
the permission of the authors.


INSTALLATION
------------

Just unzip into your FS2000 "Aircraft" directory.  This plane works only with the FS2000 Professional version.  It is based on the King 
Air 350 and uses that plane's panel and sounds.  There are some excellent Dash 8 freeware panels and sounds available to further enhance this release. Make sure to get the "Pro" version of these enhancements.

Note:  For the AirBC Dash 8-102 FS2000 Standard version, please see 
the included file abcd8s.zip.


FS2000 vs real Dash 8-100
-------------------------

Dash 8 performance information was supplied by Andy Serenc, Sunstate
Airlines (QANTAS regional) Shorts 360 check captain.  Sunstate also 
fly the Dash 8 and the performance figures reflect the Dash 8-100 
model used by Sunstate.

The FS2000 flight model was based on performance information for the 
real aircraft.  The only setting I was unable to replicate was the 
prop rpm settings.  The real Dash 8 prop settings are Takeoff - 
1,200rpm, Climb - 1,050rpm and Cruise - 900rpm.  As the flight model 
is based on the standard Kingair I wasn't able to modify the prop rpms
down to the Dash 8 settings so the prop rpms quoted in the performace 
information above are not realistic.  However all other settings do 
match the real Dash 8-100 performance specifications.


PERFORMANCE
-----------

The information below is also listed in the aircraft checklist and can
be accessed from FS2000 by selecting -> Aircraft -> Kneeboard -> 
Checklists from the menu.

Fuel
The Dash 8 100 will take 5,600lbs of fuel.  Setting tanks at 100% will 
give you 5,600lbs of fuel and place the aircraft weight at maximum
takeoff weight.  A more normal fuel load would be tanks at 65% which 
will give you a takeoff weight of 32,900lbs and a range of about 
1,150nm (2,130kms).

Takeoff
- Flap 5 or 15 
- Rotate - 95kts

Climb Power
- < 10,000 ft - 80% to 90% torque
- >10,000 ft, < 20,000 ft - 75% to 80% torque
- > 20,000 ft - 70% to 75% torque

Rate of climb
- 1,500 fpm - < 10,000 ft
- reducing to 1,000 fpm by 20,000 ft
- reducing to 500 fpm by 25,000 ft

Climb Speed (indicated)
- Standard Profile - 160kts

Cruise
@ 15,000 ft
- 200kts true
- approx 170kts indicated
- 72% torque
- pull prop levers back to 1,500rpm to reduce to 600lb hr fuel 
  consumption

@ 20,000 ft
- 250kts true
- approx 185kts indicated
- 65% torque
- pull prop levers back to 1,500rpm to reduce to 550lb hr fuel 
  consumption

@ 25,000 ft 
- 250kts true
- approx 170kts indicated
- 55% torque
- pull prop levers back to 1,500rpm to reduce to 470lb hr fuel 
  consumption

Max Cruise
- 268kts @ 15,000 ft
- 266kts @ 20,000 ft

Descent
- 1,700 fpm

Approach
- Max gear extension - 158 kts
- max flaps -  5 - 148 kts
            - 15 - 148 kts
            - 35 - 130 kts

Landing
- Flaps 35 - 95 kts
- Flaps 15 - 100 kts
- Flaps 0 - 120 kts
- Stall - 79 kts
