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Smoke & Steam for SimHeaven

Smoke & Steam for SimHeaven is a scenery extension for X-Plane that adds particle-based smoke and steam effects to industrial chimneys and cooling towers placed by SimHeaven X-World. The effects cover X-World objects worldwide and use the native X-Plane 12 particle system.

Background

  • Type: Scenery extension (particle library, no plugin dependency)
  • Author: Günther Kremp (particle effects by Helfried Miersch)
  • Distribution: X-Plane.org Forums (Freeware, non-commercial use only)
  • Platforms: Windows, macOS, Linux (standard scenery folder, platform-independent)
  • Compatibility: X-Plane 12 only
  • Dependency: SimHeaven X-World must be installed

The extension installs as a standalone particle library (simHeaven_X-World_Particles_Library) that references existing X-World chimney and cooling tower objects. X-World itself is developed by Armin "PilotBalu" (SimHeaven) and available as freeware from simheaven.com.

Technical Background: X-Plane 12 Particle System

X-Plane 12 supports particle emitters in scenery objects (DSF). Each OBJ file can reference a .pss particle system definition via the PARTICLE_SYSTEM directive and place EMITTER sources at specific positions. Emitters run continuously — ideal for persistent effects like chimney smoke — while effects are time-limited sequences (e.g., explosions). The particle appearance (texture, opacity, scale, lifetime) is defined per particle type in the .pss file.

Features

  • Smoke on industrial chimneys from SimHeaven X-World
  • Steam on cooling towers from SimHeaven X-World
  • Worldwide coverage — effects appear wherever X-World places matching objects
  • Smaller chimneys and cooling towers are intentionally excluded to preserve frame rates on lower-end hardware

Value in Flight Simulation

X-Plane's default scenery does not animate industrial structures — chimneys and cooling towers remain static objects without visual activity. This extension adds a visual layer that makes industrial areas identifiable from a distance during VFR flight: rising smoke columns and steam plumes serve as orientation points and increase the perceived realism of the ground environment. On Linux, the package installs as a standard scenery folder without plugin dependencies.

Installation

Download: X-Plane.org Forums | SimHeaven

  1. Extract the ZIP into a directory outside of X-Plane
  2. Copy the folder simHeaven_X-World_Particles_Library to X-Plane 12/Custom Scenery/
  3. Register the folder in scenery_packs.ini above X-World

Load order in scenery_packs.ini

SCENERY_PACK Custom Scenery/simHeaven_X-World_Particles_Library/
SCENERY_PACK Custom Scenery/simHeaven_X-World_Europe_.../
SCENERY_PACK Custom Scenery/simHeaven_X-World_Vegetation_Library/

Further Reading

Topic Page Focus
Scenery Components How X-Plane Builds the World scenery_packs.ini load order and layer interaction
Scenery Sources Sources Overview of scenery providers and databases

Sources