Author: buccaneer
Posted: Tue Oct 16, 2007 10:53 pm (GMT 2)
Topic Replies: 224
Part Four: New Technology for your Comanche I
Hot Stuff: Unison's LASAR Ignition System (Part One)
Unison's LASAR is the first microprocessor-based, FAA-certified engine control system available for widespread application in general aviation aircraft. But how does it work? How involved is the installation? Does it require changing the way you fly your Lycoming engine? Dave Higdon installed a LASAR in his Piper Comanche and answers those questions and more in this first of a two-part series.
By Dave Higdon, Photographs by Dave Higdon
Articles in This Series
Part One:The Diamond DA40 Star
Part Two:The Cirrus SR20
Part Three:The Lancair Columbia 300
Part Four:Adding new technology to the Comanche I & II
Part Five: More new technology
Part Six:Wrap-up and comparing.
I'm really glad that using the latest version of Unison Industries' Limited Authority Spark Advance Regulator (LASAR) is far easier than installing it. Through no fault of the Unison's LASAR hardware itself, a team comprised of one aircraft owner, one experienced IA, and one factory field representative from Unison managed to take six or seven hours of work and spread it out across 48. Our team worked from early afternoon Monday to early afternoon Wednesday before we were able to fly a few turns around the pattern at Dead Cow International Airport (71K) in my newly LASAR-equipped Comanche 180. In between opening the first box of the LASAR system hardware to that first no-squawks start, Murphy ruled, assuring that whatever could go wrong, did ? or at least went somewhat awry.
But that's the bad news. The good news is that, after working through a number of foibles and clearing a couple of unavoidable obstacles, we achieved a very clean installation of a cutting-edge ignition system, one that matches what today's pilots and aircraft owners demand at every turn: modern powerplant systems to match the modern avionics they're installing in their older airplanes. Even before that first circuit around 71K, we noticed differences in how easily and smoothly the Lycoming O-360 started. Now, Air Comanche starts quicker and easier than most small-bore Lycomings. The engine felt immediately smoother, without struggling a few seconds to clear its throat before settling down to a smooth idle after starting. At that moment, the thought of hundreds of equally-easy starts in the future erased any doubts built up during the prior 48 hours. But before going any further, let's discuss what the LASAR system is and what it does.
Of Brains and Maps
The Basics...
As far was what the left-seat occupant sees, Unison's LASAR system simply replaces the old mechanical magnetos with newer ones designed for the LASAR, plus some black boxes and a bit of wiring.. From the panel, all the pilot sees is an annunciator light that informs of a successful self-test cycle or a controller-box failure. What you get in place of inefficient, fixed-timing magnetos is a system that matches the modern Capacitive Discharge Ignition, or CDI, that began replacing breaker-point ignition (coils, distributors and points) in automotive engines a quarter century ago. LASAR delivers a hotter spark, uses both mags during engine start and provides an engine with seamlessly-variable spark timing precisely matched to the power setting.
The complete Unison LASAR system components for a Lycoming O-180, sans sparkplugs.
LASAR also incorporates its own spark-boosting hardware comparable to the circuitry in Unison's SlickStart spark-booster system. That integral circuitry sends roughly double the voltage that mechanical mags generate to the spark plugs, resulting in a hotter, cleaner spark across the electrodes. In turn, this hotter spark helps burn away carbon and lead deposits, and overcomes flooding and worn or mis-gapped plugs. Many piston engines start on only the left magneto, with timing retarded by either an impulse coupling or a so-called shower-of-sparks circuit working through the left mag. But with LASAR's electronic "brain" controlling both magnetos' timing, the system retards the timing of both mags and fires them during an engine start.
LASAR does not use a flat percent-of-power line, but a binary "map" that retards or advances the ignition timing based on the different RPM and manifold pressure combinations for the same power level. As a result, the engine gets the best spark timing for any given power level, regardless of whether you use the highest RPM and lowest manifold pressure or flip the combination to the highest manifold pressure and lowest RPM. The map, which is stored in the electronic brain or controller box of a LASAR system, helps the brain decide whether to fire the plugs earlier or later depending on the combination of engine speed and manifold pressure selected. The controller box gets its speed and crank-angle readings from sensors in the magnetos. A manifold pressure line from the engine plugs straight into the controller box, as does a bayonet-style cylinder-head temperature probe.
If LASAR has a weak link, it's in its power source. The LASAR system needs at least seven volts to work, meaning that a dead battery prevents you from starting the engine, even by hand-propping it. To fix this shortcoming, Unison developed the LASAR Bush Kit, which adds an impulse coupling to the left mag. With the Bush Kit, a LASAR-equipped engine can be started with a dead battery, a failed controller box, or both.
...Why It Does What It Does...
The earlier the plugs fire, the more you can lean the engine to reach peak; the more you can lean, the less fuel you consume. Incomplete combustion wastes expensive fuel and prevents the engine from producing the maximum possible power from each explosion in each cylinder. Providing the optimum spark timing for every possible combination of power levels improves an engine's efficiency by burning its fuel for maximum power. That perfect zone exists only at one combination of manifold pressure and RPM in an engine with fixed-timing ignition. The fixed timing compromise matches only one power setting across the infinite combinations available to the pilot. All other settings mismatch the spark timing to some degree and fail to fully consume even the best-metered fuel mixture. With settings available from zero to 42 degrees before Top Dead Center, however, the LASAR matches the spark advance to make possible the most "fire in the hole" from the smallest possible amount of fuel.
...And LASAR's Lineage
Other, experimental electronic ignition systems preceded Unison's to the market. The LASAR system, however, is the first to win FAA approval for type-certificated airplanes. Most of the earlier experimental systems required some type of alternative ignition source ? retaining a single, mechanical magneto, typically ? or, at the least, an alternative power source for the electronic systems. Unison covered that redundancy problem completely in the LASAR system. Upon failure of the controller, or any of the magneto hardware that talks to the controller box, the system instantly and without pilot intervention reverts to the old, reliable, proven mechanical function of the Slicks magnetos that are part of the system. In effect, it's like having four ignition systems: two independent electronic systems and two redundant mechanical systems.
Unison's certification work earned it FAA approval for virtually every Lycoming engine flying, along with STCs for installation in most Lycoming-powered airframes. In a bit of good news for Continental drivers, the word to me is that Unison has secured access to Mobile-built engines and has started the extensive test-cell work needed to make LASAR available for the TCM line sometime next year. Meanwhile Lycoming drivers are making the switch.
On-The-Job Training
Lessons Learned...
The old starting vibrator removed from Dave Higdon's Comanche during the conversion to the LASAR system.
Obviously, anyone contemplating installing the LASAR system on their airplane wants to know how that changeover will go and whether the work is worth it. For me, working on and learning about my airplane is an enjoyable, worthwhile activity: This upgrade, like any other, should be fun. Which brings me back to illuminate why Murphy and his law paid us a visit and explain why our experiences are worst-case.
Lesson One: Murphy can show at his own whim, despite your best efforts. And particularly without good preparation. Give in and Murphy can nearly take over a job and make you question your decision, or even your reason for living. Ignore the question; it's a trick question. Ignore Murphy, too; at some point the tricks run out.
Lesson Two: If you decide your plane deserves this system, work with a good professional and the factory in advance. Remember: You decided on its worth to your flying; don't be swayed by opinions or predictions as unpredictable as what might go wrong. You'll see what I mean below.
Lesson Three: Just remember one big thing up front: A decision to install the LASAR system should be based mainly on an honest assessment of how it performs, not how easy it is to install in your airplane the one and only time you'll need to do it.
...The Cost-Benefit Analysis...
If Unison's claims bear fruit in better performance, lower fuel consumption, a stronger climb (thanks to greater power at altitude), cleaner plugs and less maintenance, then the $2,600 retail price represents more of an investment than an expenditure. At some point, that investment will pay off and begin to return dividends. At least, that's my justification for wanting a LASAR system on our Comanche. At our utilization level, any significant reduction in fuel cost translates into shorter, less-expensive visits to the gas pump. Reduced maintenance requirements, longer plug life, and easier starting are also attractive inducements. The bottom line overall savings serve to well-ice the cake.
But for the moment, these are strictly open questions that I'll deal with in much greater detail in Part Two of this product review of Unison's LASAR: A few more hours of structured flights and we'll have what we need to weigh the performance evidence.
Beyond Basics: Doing It
The folks at Unison's spark-product division in Rockford, Ill., designed the system with a modest, unassuming appearance. They also made it modular, with the controller box resembling your basic paperback-sized black box with two computer connections and a pneumatic connection along one side. A sturdy-looking Y-shaped black wiring harness connects the control box to the LASAR magnetos.
The Mags...
The old Slick magneto removed from Dave Higdon's Comanche is on the right. The new Slick mag, with the LASAR pigtail, is on the left.
Which brings us to the mags, themselves. One difference distinguishes what otherwise resemble ordinary-looking Slick mags: A unique, six-inch-long black pigtail, which provides the only external indication that the LASAR magnetos contain something different from the standard Slick. That pigtail connects the mag to the Y-harness that plugs into the controller unit. In fact, Unison's engineers fit the hardware necessary to both conventional-magneto and LASAR-ignition functions into the same space as conventional Slick mags. So, installing a pair of LASAR mags involves nothing different from standard-magneto installation. Install the drive gear, fit the gasket to a clean accessory case flange, and snug it down with the new lugs provided. At this point, you can time the mags to the engine, before anything else gets installed or hooked up.
Properly timing the two mags requires a special "buzz box" from Unison that you or your shop can purchase. The magnetos' pigtails plug into the timing box instead of hooking up to the hot lead. Once the self-powered timing box is hooked up, you first dial the mags in with the engine at Top Dead Center for the appropriate cylinder. In other words, this is done at Zero Advance. Then you check them for proper setting at 25 degrees of advance, necessary for proper mags function in their mechanical, back-up mode. Setting the mags involves nothing more complicated than setting mechanical mags with a traditional buzz box. That's all there is too it.
...And Mounting The Black Box
The area aft of the engine and its accessory case and ahead of the firewall of Dave Higdon's Comanche before the conversion to the LASAR system. Note the engine mount tubes.
As for the controller box itself, you have simply to find a space large enough to bolt it down and wire it up. My AI, The Leprechaun, and the very patient Unison field rep, John Newman, noodled out a location that takes advantage of the Comanche 180's very long, very strong engine-mount tubes after finding every candidate firewall spot slightly smaller than needed. In this case, two existing tabs on the engine mount anchor the front of the mounting plate required for the controller. To mount the aft end of that plate, The Leprechaun used two Adele clamps around the mount tubes. In turn, the LASAR system control unit mounts to the plate.
The combination proved very strong, very stable, easy to reach and see, and convenient for routing the harness to the mags and pulling through the firewall the four wires that give power LASAR to the system and the malfunction annunciator light. Mounting the light took less time than deciding on a location. Installing a new 10 amp breaker in the breaker panel took no more time than the annunciator light. Actual total time for installing and wiring the mags, mounting and wiring the control box, the breaker and annunciator light totaled around six hours ? with another 90 minutes devoted to troubleshooting some wiring mistakes (discussed below).
Meet Mr. Murphy
And His Partner, OPS...
That should have been the end of it, with first run the next step before noon Tuesday. But these efforts only concluded the portion of the project that went quickly and easily and began, shall we say, the less-productive moments of this project. For example, before we got an hour into it, Murphy struck, inflicting us with a nominal case of OPS: Old Plane Syndrome. OPS is an affliction symptomized primarily by spells of unexpected things breaking, failing or wearing out simply because they're old and because they can. So, other work either stalls or gets sidetracked until the now-required replacement or fix is accomplished.
At its worst, OPS problems arise in the course of working on something otherwise simple and even unrelated. At its best, it happens to something you're already working on and only adds time to the project. We endured a little of both extremes. And we suffered with Murphy.
...Day One...
The system controller was mounted to a plate bolted to the engine mounting tubes just forward of the firewall.
Murphy struck first. We found that one of the new LASAR mags shipped to the shop was incorrect for this installation; the new Autolite spark plugs and high-tension leads would work but didn't match the large-barrel hardware already on our bird, hardware better suited to the higher cruising altitudes we favor. An overnight shipment countered Murphy, who typically would not afflict someone dealing strictly through an FBO or maintenance vendor who examined the airplane and ordered the correct hardware. The information supplied by me to the folks at Unison didn't deliver the complete picture a retailer would see before ordering the hardware for an installing shop. These problems weren't their fault; Murphy and I made them happen..
And it didn't really hurt us much in the time department since we still faced the jobs of: removing the existing mags, the plugs and ignition harnesses; locating space in the panel for a new warning light; finding a spot to mount the control box; making the electrical connections, wire a breaker, install a new bayonet-style cylinder-head temperature probe and tap into the manifold-pressure gauge line. Even without all the proper parts on hand, we had plenty to do to keep progressing.
Thinking ourselves not too hurt, we felt a little slapped around when taunted by the inaccessibility of screws on clamps holding plug wires to induction runners. With access so cramped and convoluted, finding tools that fit and loosening the clamps to remove the old leads consumed nearly two hours. Installing the new ignition leads and tightening the clamps proved much quicker with the proper tools already at hand.
We'd be ready when all the correct hardware arrived Tuesday. By the close of Day One, we knew we needed a new circuit breaker to handle the power load. But we didn't know Murphy planned to spend the night.
...Day Two...
The correct mag and proper plugs and matching harness all arrived Tuesday morning. A little early, of course, teasing us with the prospects of completing the installation that day. But, it wasn't to be. Instead, Murphy tossed us another load of OPS. This time up, a rivet snapped in the ignition switch, freeing a critical connector from the body of the device. Shortly, I was off to the Ignition Switch Store for a replacement. Oddly, the switch that broke was only 10 years old ? much younger than the rest of our 1961 airplane. Oh, well.
Working under the panel on the circuit breaker swap and annunciator light is Spencer Atha.
Similarly, the new 10-amp circuit breaker came in with a slightly larger barrel diameter then the old breaker coming out. The smaller shafts went away years ago, I'm told. My slightly disembodied voice asked whether using a small, round file might provide the simplest solution. The safest option, The Leprechaun countered, was a hole-cutting tool to open the hole cleanly, uniformly. Another delay. And then some breaks came our way.
For example, a firewall-access point we used two years ago to route some new engine-instrument wiring gave us an easy path for the four wires that connect behind the instrument panel. The wires connected easily enough and the breaker slid right in to the newly enlarged opening. But, undaunted, Murphy fought back. First, between a misinterpretation of one wiring diagram and another schematic that was simply wrong, the annunciator light wiring had to be reworked. Likewise, the ignition-switch wiring went wrong somewhere ? even though one of our crew carefully moved each individual wire to the new switch's posts from the old.
We learned of this misstep the first time we turned the new ignition key that came with the new switch. Some reexamination of the wiring got us to where the starter turned. The ignition, however, didn't come on until I released the key to "Run" from the "Start" position.
This is where having a Unison tech rep nearby came in handy. Newman plugged in his notebook PC, connected by a custom cable to the controller box, allowing us to see which mag was hot at which switch setting during the second round of troubleshooting. But high-technology aside, it still took The Leprechaun and his colleague Spencer, working together with a multimeter, to sort out the wires and their correct switch connections. In another 45 minutes, everything clicked. From that point forward, every start has been easier, quicker, smoother.
...And The Morals Of This Story
Let's face it. Upgrading airplanes ? especially older ones ? always takes time; OPS, Murphy, new decisions. They all add up to extra effort and longer projects. In retrospect, using a committee of workers probably added to the time needed by dint of our efforts to divvy up chores according the aptitude required. An apprentice A&P could probably remove and reinstall plugs and leads faster than me. Call me mechanically-inclined, just not particularly practiced or polished. So, by my observations, our team collectively spent between 15 and 16 hours to complete the installation ? a period that included pulling old spark plugs and leads, opening new factory-fresh plugs, checking their gaps and installing them, and routing and tying off the new high-tension leads.
Earl Long (left, a.k.a. "The Leprechaun") and Unison's John Newman using the company's special "buzz box" to set mag timing on Dave Higdon's Comanche during the conversion to the LASAR system.
Remove from the picture the problem with the circuit breaker and the need to replace the ignition switch and reduce the humbling amount of time it took me to remove and replace the ignition leads. When you do that, the net amount of time actually involving the LASAR system hardware installation and hook-up took no more than half that time ? between seven and eight hours, by my notes. And remember, we used several people on different areas of the installation: Imagine the advantages of a single, focused mechanic handling installation. So, it's not hard to conceive that a skilled aviation maintenance technician will require much less time to install the system on an airplane that presents fewer complications. Ultimately, it's easy to imagine a LASAR-experienced A&P getting the process down to the four hours Unison says it should take ? after several turns at a particular aircraft type or one with easy access to the engine accessory case, firewall space and under-panel depths. And then, there's the time involved in replacing items other pilots may opt to keep as-is. For example, many installation needs may not require the new plugs and new leads; they can justifiably forego that part of the job.
There's no real trick to the installation, though, and if you fly Lycoming now and are coming up on time to rebuild or replace your magnetos, there's really nothing in the installation itself to fear - except for Murphy and OPS, itself. In the end, however, the time it took us to install the LASAR in my Comanche is probably appropriate, especially considering the fact that The Leprechaun had never done one of these before. Similarly, the end result is an installation in which everything is easy to touch and check during pre-flight inspections. So far, after about 25 hours at the time this was written, there have been no problems with anything coming loose, nor any starting or operating problems.
The End Of The Beginning
But the fun part is still ahead: Airborne research that should answer the question ? at least for me ? of whether the LASAR can really make a difference and deliver on Unison's efficiency and performance claims. As this was written, in the days immediately following the installation and with only some 25 hours of operating experience to draw on for comparing the pre-LASAR and post-LASAR performance of our Comanche, the upgrade already impresses me with ease of operation and its impact on starting performance. On the first point, the LASAR is operationally transparent; on the second, it's hot stuff.
A close-up of Unison's special "buzz box."
Importantly, especially for club- or partner-operated airplanes, using the system requires no new procedures or special considerations. During the mag checks, however, the system-inoperative annunciator lights up and continues to glow for another 20 seconds after the mag checks are complete. And starting on the LASAR's hotter spark ? and with both mags sparking ? lights up the combustibles in all cylinders with urgency and enthusiasm. The engine immediately settles into a smooth idle without any of the coughing or stumbling common when an engine with a conventional ignition wakes up itself.
But how well the LASAR works remains an unsettled question for me. As this Part One of AVweb's product review of Unison's LASAR system goes together in final form, my time with it is at about the midpoint for reporting on its performance impact. About 25 hours of use have given me a chance to make some limited comparisons of fuel-consumption numbers against flows noted at various altitude and power settings with the old, traditional system, and a few things have become clear. Without going into any quantitative comparisons, these things are clear: Our Comanche seems happy with the change, as does our Comanche pilot and the keeper of our company books.
In Part Two, numbers to back up my preliminary impressions are coming from some solid flying hours, including flying some of that time monitoring the system on our notebook computer. Once my image of LASAR's performance impact comes into final focus, I'll pump them into Part Two so you can see the LASAR system's impact on climb and cruise fuel consumption levels, differences at best-economy and best-power mixture settings, and a glimpse of the system at work during segments of these flights. With a little luck and my usual fall flying schedule, my research should be far enough along to give you some representative numbers in a few more weeks.
About the Author ...
Dave Higdon has a distinguished background in aviation journalism. As aviation editor for The Wichita Eagle for more than five years, he has established a reputation as one of the best general aviation reporters in the business. Previously, Dave held a variety of aviation journalism assignments with The Journal of Commerce, Air Transport World, and AOPA. He has covered every facet of aviation from sport aviation in Tennessee to the FAA in Washington, DC to Cessna, Beech, Boeing and Learjet in Kansas. He's also a professional aviation photographer. Dave is an instrument-rated private pilot and owns a very clean Piper Comanche. He and his wife Annie live in Wichita, Kansas.
_________________Jannie
ONE man in a thousand is a LEADER of MEN, the rest follow women!!!
Heading, Altitude,Reference points, Time; Attitude, Wings Level: FREDAS |
Silverlight 2 Beta2 was released today. You can download both Silverlight 2 Beta2 and the Visual Studio and Expression Blend tools support to target it here. Beta2 adds a lot of new features (more details below), but is still a 4.6 MB download that takes less than 10 seconds to install on a machine. It does not require the .NET Framework or any other software to be installed for it to work, and all features work cross-browser on both Mac and Windows machines. These features will also be supported on Linux via the Moonlight 2 release. Silverlight 2 Beta2 supports a go-live license that allows you to start using and deploying Silverlight 2 for commercial applications. There will be some API changes between Beta2 and the final release, so you should expect that applications you write with Beta2 will need to make some updates when the final release comes out. But we think that these changes will be straight-forward and relatively easy, and that you can begin planning and starting commercial projects now. You can build Silverlight Beta2 applications using the VS 2008 Tools for Silverlight and Expression Blend 2.5 June Preview downloads. You can download both of them here. The VS 2008 Tools for Silverlight download works with both VS 2008 and the recent VS 2008 SP1 beta release. UI and Control Improvements Silverlight 2 Beta2 includes a bunch of work in the UI and Control space: More Built-in Controls In Beta 1 only a few controls were included with the core Silverlight setup. Most common controls (including Button, ListBox, Slider, etc) were shipped within separate assemblies that you had to bundle with your applications (which increased the app download size). Beta 2 now installs 30+ of the most common controls as part of the core Silverlight 2 download. This means that you can now build Silverlight 2 applications that use core controls that are as small as 3kb in size - making Silverlight application downloads small and startup time fast. In addition to the core controls included with the base Silverlight 2 setup, we are also this week shipping additional higher-level controls that are implemented in separate assemblies that you can then reference and include with your applications. This includes controls like DataGrid (more details on its new Beta2 features below), Calendar (now with multi-day selection and blackout date support in Beta2), and a TabPanel control (new in Beta2). We ultimately expect to ship over a 100 controls for Silverlight. Control Template Editing Support One of the most powerful features of the WPF and Silverlight programming model is the ability to completely customize the look and feel of controls. This allows developers and designers to sculpt the UI of controls in both subtle and dramatic ways, and enables a tremendous amount of flexibility. I covered these concepts a little in my previous Silverlight Control Templating blog post here. This week's Expression Blend 2.5 June Preview now adds designer support for editing control templates - which makes it easy for you to quickly change the look of any control without having to drop-down to XAML source to-do it. To see control template editing in action, just drag/drop two Slider controls onto the Expression Blend design surface: We might decide that the slider head in the default Slider control template is too large and wide for our application. To use control template editing to change it, we can right-click on one of the sliders in the designer and select the "Edit Control Parts" context menu item. We can choose to create a new empty control template for our slider (and start from scratch), or alternatively edit a copy of the built-in control template (and start from that and tweak it): After we choose to edit a copy of the existing control template, Blend will prompt us to create and name a re-usable style resource that we'll define our control template within. We can name it and then choose to store the style at either the application level (within App.xaml) or within our current page/user-control: When we click "ok" we'll find ourselves in template editing mode for our Slider control. We can change, tweak, or add/remove any of the underlying elements within the Slider control's template. Notice below how in template editing mode we can see and select any of the underlying elements that make up the slider's control template (these are circled in red below in the "Objects" window). To make our slider head narrower, we can select the "HorizontalThumb" element within the control template and adjust its width (either graphically or via the property grid): We can then use the breadcrumb navigation bar at the top of the designer to navigate back to our page and see the control template changes applied: Notice that right now only one of our slider controls is using the new Style resource with the control template we defined. To apply the same style resource to the other slider control as well, we can select it, right-click, and then use the "Apply Resource" context menu to apply our "ScottSlider" style to it as well: Once we do this both our sliders reference the same style: Changes we make to the "ScottSlider" style going forward will automatically apply to both controls. Note that all controls shipped with Silverlight 2 support control templates and will support the above editing experience in Expression Blend. Visual State Manager (VSM) Support Control templates in Silverlight and WPF support customizing both the "look" of a control, as well as the "feel" of a control. By "feel" I mean changing its interactive responsiveness. For example: how it reacts when pushed, when it gets focus, loses focus, is in a pushed state, is in a disabled state, has something inside it selected, etc. Often you want animations to execute when the user interacts with a control like this. One of the new things we are introducing with Silverlight 2 Beta2 is a "Visual State Manager" (VSM) feature that makes it much easier to build interactive control templates. VSM introduces two basic concepts that you can take advantage of within control templates: "Visual States" and "State Transitions". For example, a control like Button defines multiple visual states for itself - "Normal", "MouseOver", "Pressed", "Disabled", "Focused", "Unfocused". When in template editing mode in Blend, designers now have the ability to easily edit what the button looks like in each particular state, as well as setup transition rules to control how long it should take to animate when moving from one state to another. At runtime Silverlight will then dynamically run the appropriate animation Storyboards to smoothly move the control from one state to another. What is nice about this model is that designers do not need to write code, do not need to manually create animation storyboards, and do not need to understand the object model of controls in order to be productive. This makes the learning curve for creating interactive control templates really easy, and means that existing graphic designers can very easily work on Silverlight projects. Later this year we will also be adding Visual State Manager (VSM) support to WPF as well, which will let you use the same approach with Windows applications as well as share control templates between WPF and Silverlight projects. To see an example of this in action, let's add a Button control onto our design surface: We can then right click on the button and edit its control template. Instead of starting with the existing default control template (like we did with the slider example above), let's create an empty control template and start from scratch: Blend will prompt us for the name of the Style resource we want to create. We'll name it "ScottButton" and click ok. This will then put the designer in control editing mode for the Button, and start with an empty control template: One of the things to notice above is the new "States" window inside Blend. This will show us all of the available "Visual States" that the Button control exposes. Above the "Base" state is currently selected - which allows us to define the common visual tree of our Button control template. We can then add some vector elements into our base state that defines the look of a custom button like below. We could use the built-in vector drawing tool support provided by Blend to author these graphics, or alternatively use Expression Design or Adobe Illustrator to build the vector art and then import it into Blend. Below we are adding 4 "Path" elements into our control template - one a rounded background (named "background"), one a drop shadow (named "shadow"), one a 40% opacity "shine" that adds a glow near the top, and one that defines the default inner content (in this case a picture of a house): Note: we could have alternatively imported an image, but using vector elements will give us the flexibility to scale/stretch/transform the button later and retain a crisp look and feel at any resolution or scale (particularly useful with Silverlight mobile scenarios - where screen resolutions might be different or smaller). It will also allow us to easily animate/change any vector element within the artwork. Once we've finished designing our base state above, we can press F5 to run our application in the browser: As you can see above - our Button control now has a nicer look. Despite its new look, the button still raises the same focus, click and hover events just like before - so a developer using the button does not need to change any code when working with a button that uses our new control template. One downside with our new button control template, though, is that it isn't interactive. This means that I don't get any visual feedback if the button gains/looses focus, or if a mouse hovers over it. I also don't get a nice depress/bounce-back animation when I click it. To add interactivity to our button, we'll return back to Blend and work with our Button's control template again. Previously we added vector graphic elements to the "Base" state of our Button control. This allowed us to define the default visual look of all visual states of our Button. We can now go back and customize individual Button visual states further. For example, to implement a mouse-over behavior for our Button, we can select the "MouseOver" state in the "States" window, and then tweak the look of the button when it is in that state. Below I've selected the "shine" vector element inside our control template and adjusted its Opacity property in the property grid to have it be more visible when in the MouseOver state. Notice how Blend automatically highlighted the "Shine" element with a red dot and then listed the Opacity property below it in our objects window. This makes it easy to quickly track all changes that we've made between the "Base" state and the "MouseOver" state in our control template: We can then select the "Pressed" state in the "States" window, and customize what a button looks like when it is pressed. We'll change two things from the "base" state. The first change is to make the "shine" element visible (like the MouseOver state). The second change will be to slightly offset the contents of the button control - while keeping the shadow element stationary. This will give the button a nice "depressed" look and contrast nicely with its base visual: We can implement the offset change to the background, content and shine elements by selecting them in the designer, and then apply an offset render transform to them in the property browser: And now when we run our application again in the browser, we'll find that our Button now has interactive visual feedback when it is being used. Below is the "normal" look of our Button: Hovering the mouse over the Button will then cause it to glow like below: Clicking the button will then cause it to depress and hide the shadow (it will then bounce back once the mouse button is released): Note that we did not have to write any code or XAML to change our Button's look and feel - the new Visual State Manager feature automatically handled moving between visual states for us. By default Silverlight dynamically constructs and runs a transition Storyboard for you as you move from visual state to visual state (providing a smooth animation between the two states). You do not need to write any code in order to make this happen (note: you do still have the ability to drop down and add a custom Storyboard transition if you want to, but for most cases you can probably use the automatic Storyboard transition). One feature you can take advantage of with Silverlight's automatic transition feature is to customize the time duration it takes for a visual state transition to occur. You can do this by clicking the arrow to the right of a visual state and setup a rule that controls how long it should take the transition animation to run when moving from one particular state to another. For example, we could indicate that we want it to take .2 seconds to transition from the "Normal" to "MouseOver" visual state by adding the rule below: We can then configure this rule to take .2 seconds to transition between Normal->MouseOver like so: We can then click on the "MouseOver" state and setup a rule that causes the transition from MouseOver->Normal to take .4 seconds: Now when we re-run our application we'll have slower animation transitions for MouseOver scenarios, which adds a slightly smoother and more polished feel to our application. We did not have to write a single line of code to enable this. All controls shipped with Silverlight 2 will have built-in support for Control Template and Visual State Manager customization like above. To learn more about the new Visual State Manager and Control Template Editing features, please check out the tutorials here and here, and the videos on it here, here, and here. TextBox Beta2 includes some significant improvements to the built-in TextBox editing control. Text scrolling with text-wrap, multi-line text selection, document navigation keys, and copy/paste from the clipboard are now supported. Beta2 also now includes IME Level 3 input support (including candidate window selection) for non-western character sets: Input Support Beta2 adds additional keyboard support in FullScreen mode (arrow, tab, enter, home, end, pageup/pagedown, space). Note: full key input support isn't allowed to avoid password spoofing scenarios. Beta2 also adds new APIs to support inking and stylus input support. UI Automation and Accessibility Beta2 adds UI Automation Framework support into Silverlight. UI Automation (or UIA) enables screen readers and other assistive tools to identify and interact with the components that make up your Silverlight 2 application. Beta2 uses the UIA framework and adds UIA based behaviors to an initial set of Silverlight controls. By the final release of Silverlight 2 all controls will have UIA based behaviors built-in. We will also add support for high-contrast scenarios. These features will enable you to build accessible, section 508 compliant, applications. This UIA support will also enable automated UI testing of applications. Animation and Graphic System Beta2 adds support for animating custom dependency properties. Object animation support (animating structs) is also now supported. Beta2 also supports the ability to create Storyboards in code that can animate parts of the render tree without having to be added to it (allowing you to embed animations entirely in code). Per frame animation callback support will be added in the final release. Beta2 includes a new Visual Tree Helper static class that provides advanced visual tree inspection APIs. It provides features such as the ability to enumerate children of an element and getting the ancestor/parent of a given reference element. These APIs work against any UIElement you pass to it. DeepZoom Beta2 now supports an XML based manifest file for DeepZoom collections. Beta2 also adds extensible MultiScaleTileSource support for DeepZoom (which allows developers to hook up existing image pyramids that don’t conform with the Deep Zoom format to the high performance rendering of Deep Zoom). WPF Compatibility Silverlight Beta2 includes a lot of fixes/changes to improve API compatibility between Silverlight and WPF (note: the final Silverlight release will contain some additional compatibility work as well). We are also adding some new APIs we are introducing in Silverlight 2 to WPF in .NET 3.5 SP1 this summer. This work, combined with the VSM support we are adding to WPF later this year, will enable good code re-use across browser and desktop applications. Media Improvements Silverlight 2 Beta2 includes some significant Media related feature work: Adaptive Streaming Beta2 adds support for "adaptive streaming" - which enables you to encode media at multiple bit-rates and then have a Silverlight application dynamically switch between them depending on t |