I have been successfully flying the PMDG 737 series for a while now and I have been considering moving up to the Queen of the Skies.However there is one point holding me back. I have many commitments and I find that flights of up to an hour or so can be satisfactorily fitted in . This length of flight with the 737 fits in to a number of actual 737 routes and to me this helps with the realism of the simulation.My problem with the 747 is that to approach reality I would need to get involved in much longer flights. At a guess 2-3 hours or much more. I don't have time for this and I feel flying it on unrealistic short routes would detract from the experience.I am wondering what length of flight others carry out in the Queen of the Skies and whether there are real world routes I could fly with it which are around an hour in length,Best wishes to all, John Morgan

Hi John,There are shorter hauls (less than 3 hours) involving the 747 but the majority are longer. Try JAL domestic routes for exmaple. There's a few routes of little over an hour there.I've found my personal circumstances have changed a little bit lately and I don't have the time to fly longer hauls either (I used to!). As such I just pick a suitable route and fly it. Also I've joined Cargolux VA and will focus on flying shorter routes through them, as the FTG airlines don't offer quite as many short 747 routes.At the end of the day the 744/F packages are awesome in any capacity, and your enjoyment of them shouldn't be diminished in any way by flying shorter routes. Let's not forget, there's always the occasional day off work sick when a trans atlantic sector beckons!

Thanks Mark,I see that we are going to get a new 737 out with FSX. I may wait for it, might be less of a learning curve as well though I do wonder whether I can resist the challenge of the Queen of the Skies for that long,Best wishes, John

Resistance is futile, puurrrrchhaaaasssse! :-)Besides which you've got to have something to fill in the time until the new stable of aircraft come out. I usually get one decent length flight in a fortnight with a few shorties in between and I consider the 744/744F money well spent for the enjoyment gained out of that.