>I promise you that Microsoft Flight Simulator will never be approved by the FAA for ANY type of real-world flight training under any circumstances. MSFS is not in the same league, not even by a long shot. The DF Baron is not evil, lol, it simply manifests the shortcomings of FS2004 more than some it's comtemporaries.

I don't understand what is wrong in liking a group of add-on aircraft in FS9, and thinking one of them stinks. If I made a list , I would have a couple that I hated also. Someone posts their opinion and their likes and dislikes, and the $250,000+ per year pilot "experts" on this forum start hurling insults at the poster for posting his views on the subject..... Go figure.... :-bang

>I don't understand what is wrong in liking a group of add-on aircraft in FS9, and thinking one of them stinks. If I made a list , I would have a couple that I hated also. Someone posts their opinion and their likes and dislikes, and the $250,000+ per year pilot "experts" on this forum start hurling insults at the poster for posting his views on the subject..... Go figure.... < Bob Firstly I only wish I made anything like $250,000 from my aviation interests :-) Second I am NO expert aviation or flightsimming.Ricardo made a good post and I have read his past posts with interest.What I feel and I maybe wrong is that there is a little more to his picking out DreamFleet than just their poor single engine behaviour with the Baron 58.I could mention many which are far worse.I would like Ricardo to point me in the direction of an MSFS twin which does a brilliant job of duplicating single engine /slow speed behaviour in FS?I am not slamming Ricardo or challenging his views only questioning why DreamFleet????? in particular.Maybe he can respondPeter

Has anyone here flown a recent Wings of Power aircraft? I am on the development team for Wings of Power. I don't want this to come across wrong, but I haven't flown anything that comes close to our Asolute Realism tech. I know there is a bit of a wall between the civilian and military fliers, which is why I am curious to know if anyone here has any experience with the Wings of Power planes.Scott.

>Has anyone here flown a recent Wings of Power aircraft? >>I am on the development team for Wings of Power. I don't want>this to come across wrong, but I haven't flown anything that>comes close to our Asolute Realism tech. >>I know there is a bit of a wall between the civilian and>military fliers, which is why I am curious to know if anyone>here has any experience with the Wings of Power planes.>Since you asked, I prefer the RealAir Spitfire, as listed in the initial post over the Wings of Power P-51. The P-51D is my favorite aircraft of all time, and I've flown in a 1944 D model, including mild aerobatics. However, I prefer the RealAir for sim flight. I don't agree with the intial authors intitial post regarding the DF Baron, but do agree, that the RealAir Spit, is the most fun......ever!L.Adamson

>I know the Navy has used MS Flight Simulator, but only as a>conceptual trainer, not actual simulation of hands on flight>training. X-Plane by contrast has managed FAA certification>for a limited number of training hours. The alogorithms>X-Plane uses for flight dynamics is light years ahead of>Microsoft and always has been. There's a good reason why one>program has FAA certification and the other does not :) >Look here: http://www.x-plane.com/FTD.html> Now, you blew it..... :-roll The X-Plane certification has little to do with flight dynamics, and some "old" X-Plane die hards will actually admit that. And of course, the only way X-Plane is legal for training hours, is when it's coupled with a $125,000 dollar flight simulator.I DO own X-Plane, but prefer the RealAir SF260's & Spitfires flight dynamics by quite a margin, which keeps me with MSFS. I have not found an X-Plane, that has the "feel" or aerobatic capability of these RealAir single engine aircraft. I just happen to like sliding canopy's and aerobatics! And honestly, my DF Baron actually looses altitude in a slip without gaining airspeed. RealAir has been the leader in the "slip game", but the Baron did better than I expected. Rudder pedals are a must, for these manuvers.... :D L.Adamson

Well, I haven't seen MSFS with any FAA certifications for flight training, irregardless of $125,000 coupled simulators. :) I was mostly trying to point out the role in which the US Navy was using MSFS, as I believe the original poster of this particular subject misunderstood such.I agree about the Realair planes though. The single engine fidelity they encompass is astounding for a desktop simulation. Perhaps when I use planes like this, it makes me expect the same kind of perfection for other add-ons, when in fact I should realize that this kind of genius is very difficult to replicate under the general limitations of MSFS.

<>Im a college student in a university proffessional pilot program and one of our alumni let me a classmate fly American's 777 sim. Moreover, we were able to complete 2 landings in that sim successfully and I believe practice from PSS 777 helped me be more oriented with the aircraft, at least for my landing. (ILS 17C DFW)Marcus

Well said; I couldn't agree more.

Jim:BINGO! In my review of the CS 707 is stated that I wasn't going to try to ascertain the accuracy of the flight dynamic for many reasons, rather just fly the plane and if it is reasonably stable and pertains to the peformance manual then good enough.In msfs there is NO tactile feedback. There is no measurement of pressure required on the rudder to conteract a cross wind. There is no resistance on the yoke to differenciate between the heavy handed feel of manual cable-pully vs. FBW. There is no buffeting on the flight controls to preclude the oncoming stall. There is no feedback to judge between being in ground effect and not. And there is no difference in peformance and "feel" to airframes with 20 years on them and a few hard landings vs a brand new airframe just out of the factory. These are just a FEW quirks to "simulating" real world flight dynamics. Multimillion dollar Level-D sims mimic the aerodyamic co-efficient on every single relevant airstream facing part + tactile feedback + motion to offer an ACCURATE simulation of a particular aircraft. MSFS approximates far less variables to try to get the model as close to the numbers printed in the manual as possible and there is a HUGE difference between the two.The whole argument of accurate vs. inaccurage flight models in MSFS is academic at best. 99% of the people in this forum are NOT qualified to tell if the flight dynamics were accurate even if they were sitting in a full level D simulator much less simplistically approximated in MSFS. Sure a manual can explain that a given aircraft SHOULD perform in a certain way given certin conditions of wx, weight, configuration, speed, etc. But it is NOT the fact that the aircraft WILL respond that way but HOW and WHY it responds that way that makes an accurate flight model Show me a developer who can mimic the onset of stall in a 777-200 at MTOW with the port engine out and seized (as opposed to windmilling), damage to four starboard vortex generators, at 2c SAT, 3,700 MSL with rime on the port wing causing partial seperation of laminar airflow behind the spoilerons....and then we can talk about accurate flight models. :-lol

>I absolutely love it when people get all defensive because>someone stepped on their private parts. The internet is fun.>I think your sig's the best one on this forum :-)http://online.vatsimindicators.net/916312/3.png

We're pilot's ourselves with experience in these warbirds. However, our experience doesn't come close to those who flew them in combat or today in competitions. These are the folks we rely on quite a bit, and usually spend time translating their experience into the sim.The toughest thing I find for all warbirds in FS2004, is there is a large section of the FS2004 community that won't even take a look at any of them, including realair, alphasim, etc. It's sort of like a "if you want to fly a warbird, fly a combat sim."The way I look at it is everyone who has been to a museum or an airshow has to have dreamed of getting in one of these aircraft. Just flying any warbird today is a thrill in itself, including the T-6 trainers. When you make a combat sim, compromises are made and usually in the cockpit in terms of function and simulation. Anyway, I check in on this forum often and I wonder why warbirds don't really permeate in here much.Scottwww.shockwaveproductions.com

I can only speak for PMDG's aircraft, but whoever said that there are considerations made for the fact that we're dealing with simulated airplanes on a 19" monitor, often being flown with a cheap joystick that has no real resistance etc is exactly right. The guy that does our FDEs has a PhD in computational fluid dynamics and produces mathematical flight and turbine models for the aviation industry in real life. I'll tell you what though - if he made things 100% as they are in real life, (which was actually done basically early on in the 747 development) you'd have a ton of people complaining on this very forum about how "unrealistic" the flight dynamics are. A real 747 is incredibly responsive on the controls and will roll and pitch at a faster rate than what you see in our simulation. The reason for this isn't that Vangelis and the real pilots on the test team didn't know this, but rather that a consideration had to be made for the fact that someone with a twitchy joystick (ie, almost everyone that doesn't own PFC gear or something to that effect) would be fliping the plane onto its back with almost no effort at all. In the real plane you can do this, but it takes a whole bunch of physical force to deflect the yoke like that, which is something you can't simulate for the average user. There's also the psychological aspect - most average people would not expect a huge aircraft like a 747 to roll like a smaller agile plane, even if you told them it basically does...In the end I agree with the sentiment that a lot of people have stated here - realism is nice, but it has to be balanced with controllability and fun-factor for the average user. Armchair captains going around claiming that X FDE sucks and Y FDE is accurate does no one any good...

<>You have NO IDEA what you are talking about. The press on this matter is all over the internet. Learn to Google before you further embarrass yourself. You will find dozens of articles such as..."IDG) -- Armchair jet jockeys play Microsoft Corp.'s Flight Simulator on their PCs to capture a bit of the thrill of the real thing, which replicates an actual flight experience closely enough that the Navy is making its customized version of Flight Simulator standard issue for all student naval aviators." <>First, you can't "promise" anything regarding what Microsoft might or might not do. The ONLY reason MSFS does not have FAA certification is because MS has no interest in applying for it!!Besides, you misrepresent the X Plane product. See below from the Xplane website."Actually LOGGING this time requires you to be in a Motus full-motion sim (price tag: about $150,000.00) with an instructor, so this route will only be affordable if you train at a fight training center that uses a Fidelity Flight Simulations Motus platform... but, if you want the software without the $150,000 cost... then you can have it for $50.00 right here!"So, it costs slightly more than the price of the software to be able to log any time in it.I have FLOWN the Xplane based sim sir, at KMQY, and can tell you for a FACT that their twin flight dynamics are NOT noticeably better than many FS twins...including the DF Baron. The algorithms you refer to merely permit the XPlane software to interface with the MUTUS motion base and oh, by the way it takes SIX SERVERS to run it!!Check out the link below to see the EXACT sim I have time in. How much time to YOU have in MOTUS sims? I have quite a few and even more in frequent recurrency training at Flight Safety International in full motion Cessna 400 series sims.I have nothing against XPlane or Elite...which I have also owned and flown but to suggest that they are "lightyears" ahead of FS in sim software technology is absurd.http://www.wingsmqy.com/motus6.htmJim

Hi Ian,<> That was not the bet. The bet was on the FIRST try. (-:<> And no fair getting help with the rudders!:)"Nope. ONE shot...zero time..no help of any kind. Of course, the bet will never happen because the "winner" will expect to be just as dead as the loser. (-:Congratulations on how well you handled the landings though. Keep up the good work.Regards,Jim