Aha!  There you are Batman!

OK we'll get on with what RollerBall and Hagar suggested (and I concur).

In order to modify an aircraft's *.air file first you have to have an Editor Utility.  As I said in a previous post I use William M. Roth's Air Editor v1.52.  You can get it here:

[url]http://members.dsl-only.net/~eagle/AirEd.zip[/url]

Install the Air Editor program.  I have mine installed in my FS 2004\Addons folder, however, you can install it anywhere.

The next thing to do is to go into your AI Connie folder and make a backup copy of the Constellation's *.air file.  Don't miss this step!!

Next right click on the AI Connie's *.air file.  Left click on Properties.  A description window will appear.  Make sure that the General Tab is selected at the top (usually it is selected by default -- but it's good to make sure).

Next look on the third line down.  It should read "Opens With:..."  if it is blank click the button on the right named "Change".  

You may not see any programs listed at the top of the Recommended Programs list.  Left click the Browse button and go to the directory where you installed the Air Editor Utility.  Open its folder and locate a file called AirEd.exe.  Double click on it.  This will add the Air Editor as the default program that you use to open all *.air files.  Don't forget to click a check into the small box that's labeled "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file" underneath the big window.  Next click OK at the bottom of the window.  Close the Properties window for the AI Connie *.air file.  Now any time you want to modify an aircraft's *.air file Windows XP will use Air Editor v1.52 to make the changes.

Now double click the AI Connie *.air file and it should open into the Air Editor program.  The window that appears will have a listing of different aircraft characteristics arranged in a numerical order.

As Hagar suggested, look down this list until you see an entry for section #310 [Engine Type].  You will see that it has the "Engine Type=" and a number.  Look and see what that number is.  As Hagar and RollerBall have both correctly said the numbers are supposed to correspond to the following options:

0=Piston, 1=Jet, 2=None, 3=Helo-Turbine, 4=Rocket, 5=Turboprop

If your line #310 says "Engine Type=0" then there is where your AI piston engine sound is coming from.

To change this left click on the gray box to the left with the letters [int8].  A small box will appear to the right of the line with a number in it.  Just use your backspace key to erase this number then replace it with the number 5 (you'll see above that '5' means that the aircraft is a turboprop).  Press the Enter key on the keyboard to make the change.

Now go up to the top of the Air Editor program and left click on File then Save.  You can then Exit the Air Editor program and see if this changes the sound characteristics of the AI Constellation.

If this doesn't work then all I can think of doing is opening your Main FS 2004 Sound folder and make a new folder called AI Connie.  Copy all of the *.wav and the Sound.cfg files from your flyable Constellation into this new AI Connie folder.  Next open up the Sound.cfg file in the AI Connie Sound folder.  

Make the following change:

[FLTSIM.0]
product_code=FSIM
alias=beech_king_air_350\sound  

Change it to this:

[FLTSIM.0]
product_code=FSIM
alias=AI Connie\sound  

Hagar?  RollerBall?  Ozzy?  Anybody?  What do you think?  If the *.air file modification doesn't work then I'll be the first to say that I'm stumped.

As for the YABBC tags question I don't know what you're referring to Batman.  I noticed earlier that you changed your picture.  Is this what you were asking?

[quote author=Graycat8524  link=1091912316/0#14 date=1091990670]Peace?[/quote]
There's no peace to declare. Please don't misunderstand my comments. They were intended in a lighthearted vein. Compared to someone like you who's been doing this since 1983 I'm a complete novice. LOL ;)

Unfortunately the smilies seem to have stopped working in this thread. ??? Ah well. ::) :D

Hey - what's all this 'I remember flightsim when you had to feed punched cards into a clockword powered machine' stuff as soon as my back's turned. Calm down boys - it's only a commercial  (Doug will know what I mean I'm sure..)

Anyway, as I mentioned, I think everyone is wasting their time here.

When working on AI helis I've changed the engine type in the air file to 3 but I still get the engine sound from the aircraft the air file was originally taken from.

So unless someone can come along and tell me how, my experience is that you can't change the engine sound. It's linked to the air file used for the AI. Somehow the AI aircraft recognises the air file (let's face it, there are sooooo many unknowns and M$ have ignored all the zillions of requests to tell all about the air file) and it's not editable at present. I guess some day someone will discover the variable, but so far we don't know what it is.

Quote:


Don't worry Doug - all done by a laying-on of hands and extracting the demons