Electric System Setup Information

On this page you can find additional information and parameters that are used when setting up the Electrical Systems for an aircraft.

Numeric Inputs#

Previous iterations of electrical systems in FSX and Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 used either a curve or a value as part of the input, and if you used a curve then it would be automatically interpolated based on the component properties (APU, engine generator, battery voltage, etc…). However this led to a certain inflexibility in the setup of the electrics, and as such the current system has removed these hard-coded dependencies as much as possible, meaning that any numeric input is now either a parameter constant or a curve.

The two types of parameter constants that can be used as numeric input are as follows:

• SimVars: For example you can use the following to get the first engine RPM.

  \[data.simvar(GENERAL ENG RPM:1, rpm)\]

• Global Variables: For example the following gets the global (user created) variable GLOBAL_VAR as a boolean.

  \[data.globalvar(GLOBAL\_VAR, bool)\]

Here is a full example setting up a Generator where a constant parameter is being used, the SimVar GENERAL ENG PCT MAX RPM, along with a curve:

generator.1 = Name:LH_ACGenerator # Vrms:115 # PowerRating:90 # GovernedRPM:[data.simvar(GENERAL ENG RPM:1, rpm)] #ReferenceRPM:2000 #ReferenceFrequency:400

These different types of parameter constant can be used directly as an input for any hash-map parameter in any component in the electrical system.

It is worth noting that for curves you can supply an additional value to re-map the curve that has been given to be within a different range. The supplied value should be enclosed in () after the curve path, for example:

/* A curve */
curve.1 = Name:MyCurve #Points: 100:0, 500:27, 800:28
/* Using that curve to remap the aircraft ram air RPM to a voltage */
supplier.1 = (...) GovernedRPM:[curve.MyCurve([data.simvar(GENERAL ENG RPM:1, rpm)])]

If you are unsure what value to use then simply supply a 1 so no re-mapping is applied.

Finally, some commonly used real life values are exposed for your use as parameters, such as the chemical voltage of a cell given its current capacity for different compositions, eg: Lithium-Ion, NiCad, etc… You can find these built-in values from the links below:

• Cell Types
• Trip Curves

Consumers/Suppliers And Inline Setup#

It is important to be aware of the fact that all Supplier and Consumer data should be in one place, ie: it can be in either a supplier, or a consumer, but not in both. If a supplier/consumer is given to a component as part of the component definition, then all other supplier/consumer parameters given directly in the item definition will be ignored. Essentially, supplier/consumer configurations have priority over “inline” configurations.

Consider the following consumer and circuit definitions:

consumer.6 = Name:ConsumerStarter #Voltage:24 #Wattage:3500
consumer.7 = Name:ConsumerFuelPump #Voltage:24 #Amperage:2
circuit.4 = Type:CIRCUIT_STARTER #ConsumerCfg:ConsumerStarter #Name:StarterB
circuit.5 = Type:CIRCUIT_PITOT_HEAT #Voltage:12 #Wattage:40 #Name:PitotHeat
circuit.6 = Type:CIRCUIT_FUEL_PUMP #ConsumerCfg:ConsumerFuelPump #Wattage:48 #Name:FuelPumpA #WearAndTearCollision:GlobalDamage

In the example above, circuits 4 and 5 are valid, but in circuit 6, the wattage will be ignored because a consumer configuration has already been given, and so the information from the consumer will be used.

Cell Types#

The following built-in battery cell types are available for use in the Supplier component. These are simply easy to remember parameters that are used instead of hard-coding the underlying Curve values. In the tables below, the values given here for the curves are for a single cell of the given battery type.

• LithiumIon

  Using this parameter you’ll get the values appropriate for a battery of the type lithium ion. This battery has the following curves:

   

  State of Charge % (”SOC”)	Low Load Cell Voltage (V) (0.1 C-rate)	High Load Cell Voltage (V) (15 C-rate)
  0	3.1	2.8
  10	3.3	3.0
  20	3.65	3.18
  30	3.75	3.25
  40	3.75	3.32
  60	3.75	3.39
  70	3.75	3.395
  80	3.75	3.405
  90	3.8	3.41
  100	4.15	3.62

  !

• NiZn

  Using this parameter you’ll get the values appropriate for a battery of the type nickel-zinc. This battery has the following curves:

   

  State of Charge % (”SOC”)	Low Load Cell Voltage (V) (0.1 C-rate)	High Load Cell Voltage (V) (15 C-rate)
  0	1.3	0
  10	1.6	1.3
  20	1.64	1.45
  30	1.66	1.49
  40	1.69	1.5
  60	1.70	1.51
  70	1.71	1.52
  80	1.72	1.52
  90	1.76	1.55
  100	1.85	1.85

  !

• LeadAcid

  Using this parameter you’ll get the values appropriate for a battery of the type lead-acid. This battery has the following curves:

   

  State of Charge % (”SOC”)	Low Load Cell Voltage (V) (0.1 C-rate)	High Load Cell Voltage (V) (15 C-rate)
  0	1.8	0
  10	1.92	0
  20	1.94	0
  30	1.97	0
  40	1.99	0
  60	2.02	0
  70	2.04	1.46
  80	2.06	1.55
  90	2.08	1.62
  100	2.1	1.66

  !

• NiCd

  Using this parameter you’ll get the values appropriate for a battery of the type nickel-cadmium. This battery has the following curves:

   

  State of Charge % (”SOC”)	Low Load Cell Voltage (V) (0.1 C-rate)	High Load Cell Voltage (V) (15 C-rate)
  0	1	0
  10	1.15	0
  20	1.17	0
  30	1.18	0
  40	1.19	0
  60	1.2	1.05
  70	1.2	1.09
  80	1.2	1.095
  90	1.22	1.1
  100	1.3	1.15

  !

You can see how these battery parameters are used in the example below:

supplier.1 = Name:SupplierBatteryA #SType:Battery #BatteryType:NiCd
battery.1 = Name:MAIN_BATTERY #ConsumerCfg:ConsumerBatteryA #SupplierCfg:SupplierBatteryA

To compute the output voltage of a battery, the simulation estimates the voltage for one cell from low and high voltage curves, depending on battery type. It first determines the C-rate from the load currently drawn from the battery, and then an interpolation is performed to get a voltage value between the low and high load voltage curves. Once the simulation has calculated the voltage of one cell, it is multiplied by the number of cells in the battery that was determined from the battery nominal voltage at the time of the aircraft spawning.

With this method, output voltage depends on the state of the battery charge and load, as well as the Wear and Tear amount, ie: more load, more wear, and less remaining capacity, will all result in less voltage output.

Trip Curves#

A trip curve is used to define how much of an overload a Connection component can sustain before tripping the Breaker. The overload is based on IEC(opens in a new tab) and IEEE(opens in a new tab) formulas that give a duration before overload for a given load and design load. Within the simulation these have been transferred into built in parameters that you can use, following the format as outlined in the section on Numeric Inputs. For example:

breaker.1 = Name:A_Breaker # RatedCurrent:5 # TripCurveType:IEC_Vinv

The main trip-curves relating to both standards are built into the simulation as easy to remember parameters which can be used where necessary:

Parameter

Description

Curve Values

Formula

IEC_Sinv

Standard inverse trip curve.

0.14, 00.2

Curve values are (k, a)

IEC_Vinv

Very inverse trip curve.

13.5, 1

IEC_Einv

Extremely inverse trip curve.

80, 2

IEC_LTSinv

Long time standard inverse trip curve.

120, 1

IEEE_Vinv

Very inverse trip curve.

19.61, 0.491, 2

Curve values are (A, B, p)

IEEE_Minv

Moderately inverse trip curve.

28.2, 0.1217, 2

IEEE_Einv

Extremely inverse trip curve.

0.0515, 0.114, 0.02

Circuit Types#

When defining any circuit.N for the electrical system, the first parameter of the hash-map is a variable that defines the type of circuit. The table below shows all the variables that correspond to each of the available types as well as a brief description of what that circuit controls.

Key Events#

The table below shows the different key event IDs that can be used to modify things within the electrical system of an aircraft. These are often used along with the Aircraft Electrics Variables to control the electrical systems with the aircraft. For more details on how to use these events, please see here: Event ID’s As Key Events.