Newbie comments

[tttocs 301]

A quick intro for this, my first post here. I'm new to this whole sim thing, but am a non-current GA pilot who mostly flew complex singles before stopping a few years ago. A renewed interest in flying brought me to the sim world looking for good GA complex singles. I'm still at the basics level, but bought the 210 as I liked the looks of it and it was the kind of plane that I enjoyed flying in the real world. This is my only "for pay" plane so far, and UTX US my only software add-on - for hardware, a Saitek yoke and throttle quadrant. More will come, I'm sure, but I'm slowly getting all of this dialed in, reading and drinking from the proverbial firehose and so far avoiding filling forums with newbie questions. So far. A couple of comments relative to the 210 however, after about 20 flight hours. Any thoughts or comments would be appreciated. First, let me say that I'm generally VERY pleased with the plane. It mostly feels the way I think it should feel, and most systems are fairly intuitive and easy to figure out. As a newb, I probably would've appreciated documentation that had a bit more sim information (little things that most of you have long known but I missed like, say, to make the yoke disappear, click on the base of it), but that's a newb's perspective not really a knock. The aircraft docs seem more than adequate. Two things I have struggled with a bit. First of all, elevator trim. At first I thought it was simply the difference between a sim and flying in the real world where trim has "feel" to it, but practice was not making perfect. A single tap on the button assigned to trim on my Saitek yoke simply made too big of a change. After a bit of searching, I found and changed "Elevator_Trim_Effectiveness" from the default value of 1.4 to 1.0. I may tweak further, but this made a huge difference in flyability. 1.4 seems WAY too aggressive to me. After finding this forum, I see that there is a thread related to elevator issues below. My issue, however, was not with the elevator feel itself, but with the trim sensitivity. The second nit has to do with the virtual cockpit lighting. Not the panel lighting itself, but the overall brightness and resulting visibilty in the cockpit during the day. I find that when flying mid-day, unless the sun is at my back the panel is just too dim for these aging eyes, especially with the rather small markings on this plane's HSI. I'm always relieved when flying north with the sun at my back where the panel is nice, bright and contrasty. I can immediately feel myself relax and my scan improve. Anybody know of any way to change this? Otherwise, I'm a happy virtual 210 owner who'll continue to learn and tweak and is frankly amazed at how good these tools can be. Thanks for reading, Scott

[Ron Attwood 3,464]

Once the bug has bitten FSX can work out to be as expensive as real flying! As for trimming an aircraft, I agree wholeheartedly....until I got hold of a Saitek Cessna trimwheel! It's about the size of a real one and it requires a fair bit of movement to get a result. So porpoising through the virtual sky is a thing of the past. All this for 50 bucks. While you're in the store pick up a Saitek TPM as well. Aircraft size push/pull throttle, prop and mixture plus 9 quality toggle switches. Immersion is all. End of adverts

[tttocs 301]

Thanks for the comments, Ron. I've thought about both the Saitek trimwheel and the TPM, so it's good to hear positive comments on both. I'd still like to try to get the simulated "electric trim" dialed in though, even if I decide to add the trim wheel. As with the real thing, I see both time and money disappearing in astonishing quantities! Nice to be able to spend a couple of hours in the air without the fuel bill and hourly fee into the maintenance account, though. Scott

[GHarrall 494]

I made the same change to this parameter a couple of months ago. Makes a big difference.

[bobw737 0]

HiWhere can I find "Elevator_Trim_Effectiveness" to make the adjustment?ThanksBob

Edited January 10, 2012 by bobw737

[dusty_sourdough 8]

You will find it listed in the 210 aircraft cfg. (FSX/simobjects/Carenado Centurion T210)Look under the heading (flight tuning) in the cfg......about halfway down that heading.

Edited January 10, 2012 by dusty_sourdough

[raymar 969]

Just keep in mind that if you change any of the parameters that single little change will most likely afftect many other parameters and you may get some ugly results down the road. It is just not that easy.Ray

[tttocs 301]

Hi Ray,

Just keep in mind that if you change any of the parameters that single little change will most likely afftect many other parameters and you may get some ugly results down the road. It is just not that easy.

This particular change (trim effectiveness only) was suggested by a number of users and was, for me, almost a necessity. I've put about 90 hours on this plane now and I haven't noted any adverse affects from it. As noted in my initial post, this was my first add-on plane after getting involved with the hobby, and the trim issue just about had me giving up on it, as it took the fun out of hand-flying. This change put the fun back in. So far, 5 planes later (V35B, A36, C337 and both Real Air Dukes) this remains the only plane I've had to do this with.Perhaps as Ron suggested the big Saitek trim wheel would help but absent that, this is worth a try and easily reversed if it doesn't work out.Scott Edited January 17, 2012 by tttocs

[Guest BeaverDriver]

Unfortunately the Saiteks are known for being pretty sensitive. I have the X52 system but tend to use it for helicopters only, which seem to respond much differently. For fixed winged aircraft I use the CH yoke, rudder and throttle quadrant and get good results. I too have changed the sensitivies in the cfg file though and as long as you don't go nuts, you should be ok with doing that. I've not had any serious side effects unless I've gone a bit too far, but I always comment out the original settings before I make a change so I can easily go back if necessary. You did make a very good choice with the 210 though. It's one of the better machines IMO and is really nice to fly, especially cross country. Enjoy and welcome to the money pi... errr "hobby" :D.

[tttocs 301]

Unfortunately the Saiteks are known for being pretty sensitive.

Glenn,The problem really wasn't the yoke, although I agree the Saitek is a bit on the touchy side and took some time for me to get dialed in and used to. I could/can control pitch just fine, but what I couldn't do was get the plane trimmed up for consistent airspeeds in climb or, especially, to trim out once I'd reached desired altitude. No matter how fine I tried to be, I'd over or undershoot. Holding altitude at all pretty much required AP to prevent flopping all over the sky (and I could hear echos of my old instrument instructor: "c'mon, Scott - just as easy to be at your assigned altitude as it is 200 feet above it..."). Lowering the trim setting fixed this for me nicely.

Enjoy and welcome to the money pi... errr "hobby"

Thanks. I think I've become well initiated (in terms of both time and $$) over the months since I first posted this. The learning curve remains exponential, however!Scott