Airfoillabs Shares August Update on 737 MAX for X-Plane 12
Quick summary· AI-generated
Airfoillabs reports the 737 MAX is 80% complete with a late-2026 beta target. Four major aircraft systems (electrical, master caution, IRS, hydraulics) have reached functional completion, along with a full pedestal radio/avionics stack and working EFB with live moving map and real dispatch flight plan fetching. The developer emphasizes procedural systems simulation where individual components are modeled and connected, so failures and state changes propagate realistically rather than being scripted — for example, the master warning/caution annunciators respond to actual electrical state rather than triggers.
Excerpt from Threshold
Airfoillabs (AFL) has published an August development update for their upcoming AFL 737 MAX, the developer’s “study-level”, Boeing 737 MAX for X-Plane 12.
The developer is currently targeting “late 2026” for the start of initial beta testing.
The aircraft remains in development, with Airfoillabs describing the project as roughly 80% complete and nearing the first beta release.
The 737 MAX is being developed with an extra focus on a detailed systems simulation, rather than scripted behaviour, AFL says.
Airfoillabs continues this by saying individual components are modelled and connected, reacting to one another and to each other’s effects, allowing failures and changes in one system to propagate and affect other parts of the aircraft procedurally.
On current progress, AFL notes:
Over the last nine weeks the AFL 737 MAX went from “electrical system nearly done” to a flyable systems platform.
Four aircraft systems reached functional completion – electrical, master caution, inertial reference and hydraulics – a complete pedestal radio and avionics stack was built from nothing, the weather radar went from a blank pedestal to a working navigation display overlay, and the EFB grew into a tool that fetches a real dispatch flight plan and draws a live moving map.
Quote from Airfoillabs
Electrical system
AFL says the electrical system is functionally complete, and includes three generators, the APU and ground power, two batteries, three transformer-rectifier units and a static inverter in its simulation.
AC and DC buses, transfer relays, bus ties, and other components are simulated individually, and the aircraft’s annunciators respond to the actual state of the electrical system, AFL says.
AFL again illustrates how its systems simulation works by illustrating the Master Warning and Caution System:
The important part is what drives them – fault detection is wired to actual component state, not scripted triggers. BAT DISCHARGE comes from real net battery current, TR UNIT from the actual rectifier state, STANDBY PWR OFF from the standby subsystem itself. If a light is on, something underneath genuinely caused it.
Quote from Airfoillabs
Hydraulics and Inertial Reference System (IRS)
The hydraulic systems are similarly modelled as fluid networks. Systems A and B each have reservoirs, engine-driven and electric pumps, standpipes, shut-off and shuttle valves and the power transfer unit modelled.
The system accounts for pressure, leaks and fire shut-off…
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