A new F-104 Star Fighter is coming to X-Plane 12 Brought to you by Colimata!

The Starfighter, developed by Lockheed, is a supersonic air superiority fighter designed to quickly claim control of enemy airspace. This required it to be super maneuverable and fast. The unique characteristics of its stubby wings, T-tail empennage, and dartish shape make it unmistakable from anything else. Later, it was developed into an all-role, multi-weather aircraft during the 60s, giving it more versatility. Over two thousand airframe variants were built, with the final retirement by the Italian Air Force in 2004, after serving for over fifteen air forces. The Starfighter was fast, designed with the GE J79 turbojet giving performance up to Mach 1.7, even increasing to Mach 2 for later variants. Max thrust produced 15,880 pounds in full burner and 10,000 at military power. The fuel system is supported by tip tanks, internal tanks, and pylons, totaling up to 12,260 lbs.

Colimata shared previews of the upcoming aircraft via screenshots in this forum post. These images show off the loadmaster configuration interface, allowing you to load weapons from rockets to missiles and drop tanks to various hard points on the 104's airframe. The Star Fighter will have a custom radar supporting air-to-air and air-to-ground modes. These modes offer multiple levels of complexity based on the user's skill and avionics knowledge. C functions aid with targeting hostile aircraft and armaments. Citing Colimatas post, The package will include three variants, with each unique cockpits. These models range from the G variant, S, and the 21c with the most modern cockpit. Colimanta states that all variants will come with a "versatile" nav system that will work with X-Plane flight plans.

Quoting Colimatas targeting system statement.

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"The Air-to-Air mode starts with a search screen. A line that indicates the angle of the beam, a target line that can be rotated, and the detected aircraft symbols.

In 'complex' mode, the aircraft symbols update only when the beam hits them.

If the target line is rotated on an aircraft symbol and the 'lock' button is pushed, the system goes into 'target lock' mode. The screen changes. We get a horizon line. A target distance circle and a steering dot. If the enemy is in range of an armed weapon the 'fire-X' symbol appears and a beep sound can be heard." The targeting system looks to be robust, providing a learning curve that brings in replay value of waning to master its systems.

Further posts covered updates of external modeling. Colimata emphasizes details of the 3d model, such as animated systems and livery textures amounting to 4k high-resolution textures. Minor important details like the thousands of rivets, panel details, and decals across the airframe are accurately reproduced based on the real-world counterpart.

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As for liveries, several will ship with the package, according to Colimata; of course, The famous, polished livery will be included. Colimata will also provide paint kits for the community's creative means of creating the numerous liveries associated with the Star Fighter.

Progress is moving along strongly by their indication via their x-plane.org post with the aircraft variants in beta under shakedown testing. 

A prospective release date has been announced for the F-104 FXP during the beginning of December. More information via their postings on X-Plane.Org

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As usual stay tuned to Threshold for more flight simulation news and updates!