Using Eric Marciano's F-16 Panel

[crtskills]

I am having a problem using Eric Marciano's F-16 Panel with Kirk Olsson's F-16 Fighting Falcon.  The Panel works fine in every respect except I cannot see outside the cockpit, it is all black.  I have the gauges from Eric Marciano's F-16 Panel copied into my FS9 Gauges File, and I've tried coping the panel file into my gauges file and I've tried without the panel file in the gauges file, either way I get the same result, a black view around the cockpit, does anyone have a possible fix?

[Graycat8524]

I haven't used Eric Marciano's F-16 Panel before, however, I found it, downloaded it, and installed it.  I must say that I was impressed.  This is a very good panel.  It worked just fine for me right out of the box.

I have a couple of questions for you Crtskills.

First question:  Were you aware that Kirk Olsson's USVIPER.ZIP comes with a virtual cockpit?  I mention this only because Eric Marciano's F-16 panel comes with full interior views of the cockpit.  If the aircraft comes with a virtual cockpit you don't really need these interior views.  

There's nothing wrong with these interior views (in fact I think they look really cool) so I think I'll just leave them in.

Second question: How did you install Eric Marciano's panel?  Normally on any Add-on (whether it be a new Panel, Sounds, Effects, etc.) I will first unzip the downloaded file into a Temp directory (i.e. Main FS9 Folder\Aircraft\Name of Aircraft Folder\Temp).  

Next I will backup the Panel.cfg file in the new Temp folder.  I will then go into this new panel (Temp) folder and make sure that everything is in the right place.  

Normally I will then copy/paste any gauges into the main FS Gauges folder (being careful not to overwrite any newer gauges or default gauges).
 
I then go to the Aircraft folder and rename the old Panel folder to "Original Panel" or "Panel_0".

The final step is to rename the Temp folder I just installed to "Panel".

Once I test out this new panel I can do one of two things.  I can keep it and delete the "Panel_0" folder, or if I don't like the new panel I can delete the new panel and rename the old "Panel_0" folder back to "Panel".

What may have happened in your case is you didn't copy over some interior view bitmaps into the Eric Marciano's F-16 Panel folder.  The Panel.cfg file calls for different cockpit views to be shown (Forward_Right, Forward_Left, Left, Right, etc.).  If the bitmaps corresponding to these Panel.cfg views are missing then you will see nothing but black when you attempt to see in different directions outside of your cockpit.

To cure this problem first take a look inside the F-16 panel folder that you installed.  See if there are eight files named:

Forward_Left.bmp
Forward_Right.bmp
Left.bmp
Right.bmp
Rear.bmp
Rear_Left.bmp
Rear_Right.bmp
Up.bmp

If not then you need to re-install these eight bitmaps back into your Panel folder.

This should get you fixed up.