Piper Cub is a death trap!!!

[Stuntie 0]

I have just been trying to take off in the FS2004 Piper Cub.The thing is an absolute death tap.You even look at the rudder and you swerve right round - pretty much 360. You don't use rudder she swerves off anyway.And the moment she starts to swerve - you roll right over - with a stall warning as well - whilst you are on the ground.I have tried a couple of dozen times - and only got airborne twice - and both were the kind of dangerous takeoffs that would put you off flying for life!Oh, yes as soon as I tried to land - swerve, roll, boom.I may not be an experienced and talented aviator, but I can get all the other planes up without problem - even the Jenny and the Comet.I can get them off the deck with ease - if not a lot of finesse.So it's not me being totally inept.What make me more surprised is the fact that the Cub is supposed to be a training aircraft.If it really flew like that it would have such a high death rate that The USAF/USAAC would have been lucky to field any pilots at all!Is it just me?Am I missing something?Is there some special technique or anything?Or is the Cub a dangerous beast?

[Hornit 3]

Number one, dont put a crosswind in this sim, the effects are WAY overmodeled, i dont care what anyone else who comes in here says, its not even close to reality. A 10 kt crosswind is easily and effortlessly corrected for in the real world, even in small aircraft. In this sim its like you are trying to take off in a hurricane, so just get rid of it. if you use downloaded wx, than i guess you have to deal with it. Secondly MS has dorked up the taildraggers in this sim in a big way. It seems they have a mind of thier own while the tailwheel is down and dont really seem to respond to control inputs in any normal manner. So if you get rid of the xwinds, and dont mess with the rudder, she flies great! nice simulaton of the Cub eh?? Thanks MS.Hornit

[Guest SoarPics]

Do a search for "farmer" in this forum. Last week he posted a link (in a thread about the Cub flight dynamics) to a site that has a tweaked .air and aircraft.cfg. Works a peach!!!

[Guest dpc]

Use rudder to taxi.Use diff breaking ONLY for stearing on start of take off role. Stay off the rudder until the tail comes off the ground and then resume stearing. This will work in cross wind as well.

[Guest Oldthaiger]

dpc is exactly right, be ready to apply right rudder as soon as the tail wheel comes off the ground, same applies to the DC-3. And if you have the STa by Bill Lyons, well, hope the runway is wide. :-lol The Cub reminded me of what it was like when I learned to fly in one, uncontrolled grass field and TALL trees everywhere, the 65 HP made it interesting. BTW no breaks on that cub so you had to learn how to use the engine, throttle and elevator. Yes, elevator to lift the tail and make sharp static turns, fs still will not perform that one.Hang in there and have fun.John

[Hornit 3]

I have some time in Cubs also and this sim is nothing like I remember! :)Hornit

[davido53 2]

Aw, jeez, dontcha know this sim is the greatest thing since sliced bread, according to Computer Gaming World? 5 Stars baby!some of you real time pilots need to get with the program...:-lol

[Donmo 6]

In the AVSIM flight school, there is a great topic on how to fly tailwheeled aircraft. It may be worth the time to read it. As stated in this thread, the x-wind is NOT realistic; It seems to be magnified. Easy on the brakes.....they cost money. Rudder usage is free!!Don

[Hornit 3]

Sorry guys! :) Really I have x-winds off, just enjoy driving around with all this wonderful freeware add-on stuff!Hornit

[Guest JonP01]

>I have just been trying to take off in the FS2004 Piper Cub.>>The thing is an absolute death tap.>You even look at the rudder and you swerve right round ->pretty much 360. You don't use rudder she swerves off anyway.>And the moment she starts to swerve - you roll right over ->with a stall warning as well - whilst you are on the ground.>I have tried a couple of dozen times - and only got airborne>twice - and both were the kind of dangerous takeoffs that>would put you off flying for life!>Oh, yes as soon as I tried to land - swerve, roll, boom.>>I may not be an experienced and talented aviator, but I can>get all the other planes up without problem - even the Jenny>and the Comet.>I can get them off the deck with ease - if not a lot of>finesse.>So it's not me being totally inept.>>What make me more surprised is the fact that the Cub is>supposed to be a training aircraft.>If it really flew like that it would have such a high death>rate that The USAF/USAAC would have been lucky to field any>pilots at all!>>>Is it just me?>Am I missing something?>Is there some special technique or anything?>Or is the Cub a dangerous beast?>>Well to answer your specific questions:1. Is it just me? No, I had problems with it for the first week, but like anything else after a lot of practice I've learned to handle it in any reasonable conditions.2. Am I missing something? Maybe just a lot of practice :-)3. Is there a special technique? Well, whether this is correct or not (I doubt it is), this is how I handle the Cub without crashing it. At take off, you need to be prepared to use full rudder, and to get the full rudder on EXTREMELY quickly. If you fail to start correcting with the rudder immediately as soon as the prop torque starts pulling the aircraft, you will never recover and you'll at best run off the runway and at worst tip over. You will also probably find that you need to keep working the rudder with both legs to keep it straight during the take off run. As I say, the key to taking off is lots of rudder and to react VERY quickly. Think of it like driving a racing car and correcting the oversteer. You reactions for this need to be immediate and it is the same in the Cub.For landing, unless you have a perfect dead-on headwind, do not attempt a three-pointer. And if you have a headwind and do try a three point landing, don't ease back until your airspeed is very low, otherwise you will simply take off again. You need to ease back on the stick in a three pointer slowly, and at a sufficently low speed.If you are landing in a crosswind, always land on the main gear at an indicated airspeed of around 50 mph. Make sure you have corrected with rudder and aileron as much as possible just before you come down square with the runway on the main wheels, with the wings as level as possible. When you land on the main wheels, your throttle should *not* be at idle - it should be at around 1200 - 1300 RPM. This will provide you with sufficient ongoing thrust to maintain the aerodynamics of the critical control surfaces (in this particular case rudder and ailerons). That way, if you actually touch down a few degrees askew, you will still have sufficent speed to make fine corrections. You should continue to keep the throttle open at around 1200 RPM and you will automatically start to lose speed, due to the drag of the landing gear. Whilst doing so, keep correcting with the rudder to keep the aircraft straight. The critical thing in landing this aircraft is *not* to cut the throttle until you are on the main wheels, at a sufficiently low speed and you are perfectly aligned with the length of the runway. Once you achieved these three things, then you can cut the throttle to idle. As your airspeed drops down to about 38 - 39 mph, start to pull back gently on the stick and at the same time, pull the stick to the hard left if you are landing in a left hand crosswind, or to the hard right if you are landing in a right hand crosswind. So once you really start losing speed, you'll find your stick will be either be in the "left back corner" or "right back corner" depending on the crosswind. As soon as the tailwheel hits the ground, you will have ground steering via rudder input. This is where I have made one modification to the Piper's aircraft.cfg file, and that is to reduce the steering radius of the tailwheel to 18 degrees. You will find this is all you need to taxi with the rudder input only, and the 18 degrees is also quite sufficient to keep the aircraft straight during the late rollout, without making it oversensitive. It took me about four days and hundreds of stuffed landings to come up this technique, and although it may not represent what happens in the real world, it does make the Cub both flyable and great fun. I haven't stacked it once since mastering this technique, and that includes landing in the severe thunderstorm weather theme. I was originally going to give up on the Cub, but now it's become my equal favourite aircraft with the Trimotor. I just love taking off and landing in thw Cub now.4. And is the Cub dangerous? It sure is. If real aircraft flew like this, you'd never get me near one.

[Guest Dutch Falcon]

If you follow the link in this post: http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...g_id=2010&page=you will find some files that greatly improve the cub's handling.The strength of the turbulence is directly proportional to the temperature of your coffee.

[Guest Tim W]

If you think the cub is bad, try the ME109 in IL2 Forgotton Battles, thats a real handful on takefoff!RegardsTim

[Guest JonP01]

>If you think the cub is bad, try the ME109 in IL2 Forgotton>Battles, thats a real handful on takefoff!>>Regards>Tim>Yeh, actually after the 1.1 patch, they all are harder to fly. As for the Cub, I tried that 3rd Party flight model before, but to be honest, I find the MS stock flight model extremely entertaining.

[Guest jason2112]

I have tried the modified FDE for the Cub, and while it makes the plane much easier to fly, I have certain doubts regarding the low speed and stall behavior. I can't bring the modified Cub to a stall, no matter how high I keep the nose. I simply start to sink and touch down with 30 kts airspeed.Bill Lyons' Classic Cub seems to have another issue, it needs about 60 kts to take off compared to 30-35 kts with the FS2004 Cub (modification doesn't change this much).I don't really want to complain about this, I enjoy all of these Cub versions. But maybe some real world pilots could comment on this - stall behavior, take off speed, etc. ...VOlker :]

[Guest Douglas K]

>Number one, dont put a crosswind in this sim, the effects are WAY overmodeled, i dont care what anyone else who comes in here says, its not even close to reality. A 10 kt crosswind is easily and effortlessly corrected for in the real world, even in small aircraft. In this sim its like you are trying to take off in a hurricane, so just get rid of it.I have some time in Cubs also and this sim is nothing like I remember!If you think the cub is bad, try the ME109 in IL2 Forgotton Battles, thats a real handful on takefoff!I find the MS stock flight model extremely entertaining.