The cross-bar just gets higher and higher!

Just over a year ago (September of 2002), I first got wind of RealAir Simulations’ work on a FS version of the American Champion Citabria Super Decathlon. During that year, Microsoft released their next version of Flight Simulator with the early release of FS2004: Century Of Flight, but that didn’t affect RealAir and the work they were doing on their Decathlon. RealAir is no novice at simulation aircraft design, as their prior release of the Decathlon for FLYII and the SIAI-Marchetti SF.260 for FS2002 are now both legendary. 

In the real-world, the American Champion Citabria group is a privately held company specializing in custom aircraft catering to those seeking something a bit different. The Super Decathlon is their production version of an aerobatic trainer and considering its base price of $113,000, it is affordable to those with a few extra dollars in their pocket. With 180 hp on hand and a dry weight of just under 1,800 pounds, the Super Decathlon is a sprightly performer that is a joy to fly. 

RealAir Simulations is the partnership of Sean Moloney and Rob Young, neither of who are considered unknowns in the Flight Simulation world. Sean with his aircraft design expertise and then there is Rob Young and his many extraordinary examples into the black art of airfile tweaking perfection. It was with their release of the FS2002 SIAI-Marchetti SF.260 last year that turned the airfile gurus on their heads when the 260 would spin just as pretty as you please, a first for Microsoft’s Flight Simulator.

As a commercial release, Rob did express his concern that in the time it has taken to perfect their design (over 12 months in the making), there have been two fairly nice and respectable freeware releases of the Decathlon and a Scout for FS2004, so how did RealAir do in comparison to their freeware examples, well they needed to not have worried and that says a lot too, as the freeware examples are very good.

The documentation included is as complete and as thorough as anyone could hope for.	Comparing the performance hit on my system between the RealAir Decathlon and the default Extra shows little if any difference.	I did show a very small difference in the fps from the VC mode, though your system may vary somewhat from my results.

Installation and documentation!

After having purchased the RealAir Simulations Super Decathlon from their secure website ($25USD), you given your download site which only takes a few minutes considering the moderate files size of 20.6MB. After unzipping the downloaded file, you simply follow the set-by-set procedures (be sure to have your password handy, which will have been sent to you with your download site by Email) for a complete installation. After you’ve successfully installed the RealAir Simulations Super Decathlon into you Flight Simulator 9 folder, its time to look over the documentation, which by any standard is over-the-top in its thoroughness and visual presentation. Presented primarily in the PDF format (Adobe Acrobat), the documentation includes; a Flying Guide, Pilot’s Operating Handbook, FS setup guide (including guidance on modifying the aircraft configuration file for varying the smoke patterns), and even web-links for further assistance with your purchase and all of this is accessible through a single HTML document.

I know that most individuals are like me and are always in a hurry to take to the air with their latest install, but its important that before you take off into the wild blue yonder that you take a moment to read through the included manuals, as they are laid out in a very pleasant fashion, making it enjoyable to read and to give you a little insight into best set up your system and ways to best extract the most from your new ACC Super Decathlon.

A very nice blue & yellow with the standard Decathlon star burst on the wing top and tail.	I like this one, red & yellow with the Honda sponsorship decal on the tail.	The RealAir factory colors.	My personal favorite, red-black-white with the wing (top) and tail star burst.
A very dark blue and crème color.	Note here the opening door, fully rendered interior, and the visible line patterns to the wing ribs.	I like the overall appearance of the red on yellow livery plus this aircraft is very realistic looking.	Even over the mountains, you will occasionally run across others flying through your practice space.
External views of this aircraft are highly realistic and when combined with the latest scenery, the emersion level goes up a bunch.	Note that the pilot’s head is looking directly at you when I have rudder dialed in.	I just love looking at these aircraft, very very well done.	Right down to the smallest detail, like the turnbuckle on the horizontal stabilizer cable, nothing was overlooked.

The Aircraft:

Having the choice of 5 different liveries is nice and RealAir now has their standard house colors of powder blue on white (which is very attractive), so I found myself split between the house colors and the red-white-black livery, but the Honda red-yellow isn’t bad either. I should also point out that during your setup you are offered the choice of having new clean windows or having slightly soiled (dirty) windows, of which I opted for the latter, and I must say that Sean has really got the touch on not too much or not too little and the soiled or dirty windows are very realistic in their appearance.

The external texturing is another area that the boys at RealAir have pushed the envelope, as from any angle and under all lighting conditions, the external textures are near perfect, showing just the correct amount of normal wear & tear marks, oil and fuel stains, and the natural light reflections are equally realistic. No matter which of the 5 liveries you choose, each of them are at the top rung of the latter for excellence. Outstanding work on their part!

These aircraft also have all the normal animations one would expect with a commercial release (opening door with sounds, flexing gear struts, rotating tires, you know the routine), but I noticed too that the pilot moves his head in concert with your control inputs, which is a very nice touch.

The 3D virtual panel is extremely sharp and clear.	From either the 3D VC or the 2D panel, all of the available pop-ups are there waiting.	Like the 3D VC, the 2D panel is equally sharp and clear.
The basic panels for both the 2D and 3D VC mode (note the missing gauges on the basic panel).	From the VC mode your interior is fully rendered.	Sometimes it is difficult to tell if you’re in the 2D panel or 3D VC mode (the insert shot is the 2D panel).

Panels:

The panel for an aircraft intended for aerobatics or aerobatic training is simple just by its intended use, but despite this RealAir has worked at getting their Super Decathlon panel/s ever so much better than I expected, not only in their appearance, but in their low impact on your system’s hardware. 

Each of the 5 Decathlons offer the user a choice of two 2D panels, the standard panel and a basic panel, with the basic panel being minus the gyro compass and artificial-horizon. Its no secret that in an aerobatic aircraft, gyros have a hard time keeping up with the unusual attitudes these aircraft generally experience, so in this respect they are of little use during an aerobatic routine. The one thing I noticed almost immediately was that RealAir 2D panel is not only extremely sharp and clear, the panel height is such that on occasion I found myself preferring the 2D mode for landing rather than falling on the 3D virtual panel, as has become normal for me now. The panel layout is such that it does provide for an unobstructed forward view under almost all flight conditions other than taxi (remember the Super Decathlon is a tail-dragger).

The 3D virtual cockpit and panel is equally as sharp and clear as the 2D panel, leading one to sometimes mix them up, if you have your seat adjusted just right. This says a lot about how far many are coming in their interior designs, when you can barely tell any difference between the 2D and 3D VC mode, the days of the standard 2D panel are numbered. The same popup windows available in the 2D mode are there in the VC as well. The popup windows include, the default Garmin GPS, electrical panel, trim gauge, fuel selector panel, and the basic radio stack (no auto-pilot here). The virtual cockpit is fully rendered and swinging your head reveals a very high quality rendition of the Super Decathlon’s interior. 

Test System AMD 1.2Ghz processor 512MB SDRAM ATI 9700 Pro 128MB 44GB Hard drive 19" ViewSonic monitor Windows98SE Altec-Lansing Surround-Sound 5 Speaker system Saitek 3D Cyborg "Gold" joystick w/throttle	Airfile: With the RealAir Super Decathlon, you do get a set of very high quality aircraft, in appearance and with their interior and panel configurations, but it is the airfile that really is the stand-out for this commercial release and Rob Young has pushed the realism a notch or two ever higher as compared to their earlier work. There are a number of accomplished airfile programmers in our hobby, but over the last few years I’ve come to truly appreciate Rob Young for his deep understanding of the compromises that must be made between striking the numbers precisely verses generating a realistic feel. That’s no easy task to accomplish considering the wide variety of controls or hardware everyone is presumably using on their home systems. Designing the airfile or flight modeling for a PC based flight simulator is a black art on to itself, something I’m not unfamiliar with, considering my past experience at chassis set-up with the Indianapolis style (open-wheeled) racecars. I truly believed that Rob could not improve much on the flight modeling he had done with the RealAir release of their SIAI-Marchetti SF.260 last year, but I was wrong. Before I jumped into the air with the RealAir Super Decathlon, I did read through the material supplied (something I can’t harp on enough about for everyone to do) and I set-up my “aircraft realism” settings to what Rob recommended. From the VC mode (I used the small airport at Forks, Washington as my base for test flying the Decathlon) my first time in the aircraft was under calm and clear conditions and I found that applying full power had the same effect as in real-life with an aircraft of this weight and power. At low speeds, you have all but no rudder control and with 180 horsepower available in a 2,000 lb aircraft, differential braking is barely sufficient to maintain directional control until you’ve achieved 40 knots or more, but keeping this aircraft on the runway until you’ve reached that 40 knots can be a problem! Admittedly I was a bit hard on the runway edge lights on my first takeoff, but then again this is only a simulation (sorry GeoRender). A smooth application of power as you gain forward speed is necessary on an aircraft of this type and once I fell back on my real-world experience with high powered tail-draggers, take-offs were simple, sweet, and short. Once airborne, I settled in at 80 knots for a maximum rate of climb (1,100 fpm working from near sea-level at Forks) and at 3,500 ASL I leveled off and started a series of figure eights just to get a feel for the aircraft. One of the problems that have plagued the default aircraft in Flight Simulator, for just about forever, is their inability to maintain their attitude during a turn. If you roll into a 15º to 20º bank for a standard rate turn, you will notice that after a moment, the ball will fall out toward the downhill wing, so you dial in more rudder, which forces you to apply more up pitch and release aileron, as your banking angle will increase. Once you’ve corrected the attitude change, it starts all over again, meaning you simply can’t maintain a stable attitude while turning, like you can with a real-world aircraft. Apparently Rob was or is aware of this FS weakness and his Decathlon airfile, rather intended or not, does not react at all like the default aircraft and you can maintain a stable rate of turn with having to constantly apply deliberate inputs to correct the situation. I began a series of basic aerobatic maneuvers by first starting with a stall and then a stall into a spin. The really cool thing was that with active-camera, the stall buffeting was noticeable just prior to the break with the subsequent nose drop and the first thing that came to my mind then was, oh boy, this is really good! I very quickly realized that Rob Young has truly perfected his art of flight modeling in Flight Simulator, as this FS aircraft does present as true to life feeling of how a real aircraft reacts as anything I’ve ever flown in Flight Simulator. With my spin attempts I pulled back the power, entered a stall condition, kicked the rudder to starboard, and the RealAir Decathlon entered a tail-high spin requiring about a turn and a half for recovery. The view from the cockpit is very realistic and seeing the ground approaching and spinning around a single point contributes to the feel or creating a strong sense of reality with the experience. I suppose the only way you’re going to be able to improve on this experience is to do it in a real Decathlon, as I just can’t imagine much more improvement can be gained within the limitations of a PC based flight simulation. After a bit of practice, hammerheads, tail-slides, loops (inside and outside), snap-rolls, and Cuban eights have become almost second nature in this really wonderful little airplane. Unlike the more powerful aerobatic aircraft, such as the default Extra300, Sukhoi Su26/31, or other similar aircraft, the Super Decathlon is a fairly heavy aircraft with only 180 hp available, plus you’ve got all that side surface area of its fuselage creating extra drag. In the Super Decathlon, precise aerobatic maneuvers require a lot of fore thought and planning, as you can’t just jump into a loop or Cuban eight without running out of flying speed, unless you understand your aircraft’s performance envelop completely and what a joy to have an FS aircraft that so closely matches its real-world counterpart, the words uncanny and extraordinary come immediately to mind. My reason for using the small airport at Forks, Washington becomes apparent when you view the screenshots of my crosswind landings. I have the GeoRender scenery add-on (LAGO) installed and at the western end of the runway there is a small factory that has a smokestack emitting a constant black smoke that can be used to judge wind direction and speed (note the black smoke in my screenshots). Crosswind landings are always tough, but in a tail-dragger the inexperienced or novice pilot can get into trouble very quickly if you fail to consider all the factors involved! Terms like ground-looping, weather-vaning, backside of the power curve, or side-slipping all need to become apart of your vocabulary and as they always say, practice makes perfect, or so it should. In my practice crosswind landings with the RealAir Super Decathlon I found that it is a superb handling FS aircraft, particularly when compared to the default aircraft (such as the J3 Cub), with the exception that the Decathlon is the one model from ACC that is sans landing flaps. Landing in slight to moderate crosswinds, any tail-dragger is fairly easy to master for smooth and safe landings, but in a stiff and gusty crosswind (for my landings in the RealAir Decathlon, I set up a 15 knot crosswind at 75º to starboard, with gusts to 25 knots) weather-vaning and then ground-looping is always a possibility. With most tail-draggers (in Flight Simulator) unusual wind conditions sometimes get ahead of the limits of the flight modeling and an unrealistic feel, in my opinion, is the result. In the RealAir Decathlon, Rob Young has overcome some of Flight Simulator’s shortcomings and his airfile for the Decathlon reacts, as close to the real thing as I believe is possible in a PC based flight sim. And yes, this FS aircraft will ground-loop, as I found out on my first cross-wind landing! Taxiing is something else that I also noticed Rob has greatly improved upon as compared to other similar aircraft I’ve test flown in FS2004 and even in a full beam crosswind, weather-vaning is easily overcome with a combination of rudder and differential braking. Regardless of all the obvious attributes this payware FS aircraft offers, it is the flight modeling that is its finest feature and in my opinion is worth the entry price for this part alone.
Spins are as easy as pie with Rob Young at the controls of the airfile.
Hammerheads, wingovers, and tail slides are all possible, I just need more practice.
Even perfectly round loops can be done despite the low power (180 hp) of the Decathlon.
Whatever the maneuver, the airfile for the RealAir Decathlon will amaze you on its accuracy.
Climbing in the vertical setting up for a tail slide, the view of the exterior texturing shows just how good the RealAir Decathlon is!
Takes a bit of practice, but crosswind landings in a tail-dragger are interesting and good for the ego when you master them.

Sounds:

Sounds are normally pretty good with most payware aircraft I’ve come across and rarely would I fault or overly praise any commercial offering on its sound alone, but in too many cases a reviewer (myself included) will tend to simplify our comments concerning the included sounds with any package. This is usually because most reviewers will spend most of their time evaluating the appearance of an aircraft, test flying for checking out the flight modeling, and nit-picking the panel/s, but when it comes to the sounds, little weight is given to this section as most consider this to be of far less importance as those other features I mentioned. 

Attempting to provide a realistic experience of flight on a PC requires that 3 of our 5 senses be addressed and those would be sight, touch, and hearing. We can have the visuals and the feel of a FS aircraft perfected, but if the sounds are only adequate, then our level of emersion is degraded, rather we actually are aware of it or not. The sounds that RealAir has provided for their Decathlon are deliciously smooth and realistic, but it is their just perfect application of wind sound that so adds to their total package. Also the wind sound increases as your speed climbs, which greatly adds to your feel for the aircraft’s speed, without having to look at your airspeed indicator, this feature is especially important when performing aerobatics. With experience and time in this aircraft, I found that I could estimate the indicated airspeed of this aircraft based on the sound alone, that’s quite extraordinary and I certainly didn’t expect it. The combination or blend of the total sounds you would experience, in a real Decathlon, have been applied absolutely perfectly by Sean and Rob.

Summary:

Rob Young and Sean Moloney of RealAir Simulations have another winner on their hands with their latest FS aircraft release, the American Champion Citabria Super Decathlon. Despite their initial concerns about the two freeware releases (actually there is only one freeware version of the Decathlon for FS2004, the other release is of the Scout model rather than the aerobatic Decathlon), they need not have worried, regardless that I consider that either of those freeware releases to be very top quality, freeware or not, the RealAir Simulations’ Super Decathlon is absolutely superb in all respects and I do consider the price of this payware FS aircraft to be fully worth the investment of $25USD. Rob and Sean have invested a great deal of time (over a year) in developing this aircraft and the results show the dedication to perfection they both apply to their work.

I know that the majority of those individuals that use Flight Simulator (FS2004), do so for the purpose of flying the heavies (jetliners), so the idea of purchasing a small single-engine aircraft, and one designed for the purpose of aerobatics, may not exactly be something you’re looking for, I do understand that. Then you add the absolutely huge volume of available high quality freeware aircraft, of all sizes and descriptions, one may wonder why would anyone consider purchasing a small single-engine aircraft like the RealAir Simulations Super Decathlon, particularly at the hefty price of 25 bucks? That’s a fair question and my only answer is that this aircraft is certainly not for everyone, but if you would like to own and fly an aircraft, in Flight Simulator, that most duplicates what it is like to fly a real aircraft, then the RealAir Simulations Super Decathlon is your answer, as it offers the best in visuals, feel, and sounds of anything I’ve ever test flown to date.

I do have one minor criticism and that it would have nice to have also included the “Scout” model along with the Super Decathlon, as the Scout is virtually identical, other than being somewhat heavier and having flaps, and it would have given us a version more suitable to bush flying. What you do get is very very good and though some of you may think the price is too high, remember the old adage, “you get what you pay for”!  

If after reading this review you feel inspired to check out the Decathlon for yourself, you can find the Real Air Simulation website here

What I Like About the RealAir Super Decathlon

• Highly accurate exterior modeling and texturing
• Extraordinarily accurate flight modeling
• Very complete and thorough documentation
• Excellent choice of paints
• Superb panels, both the 2D and 3D virtual
• Clarity of gauges in VC
• Seems very easy on frame rates
• The "gold standard" for accurate sounds

What I Don't Like About the RealAir Super Decathlon

• A bit pricey
• Would liked to have seen the Scout model included