Virtualcol CRJ Update Released!

[Chock 17,769]

Simpler add-on aeroplanes for flight sims still have their place. There is a danger that if every add-on aeroplane is massively complex, we risk not including those who are just getting interested in the subject.

After all, when you and I were first getting into flight sims, we were in the fortunate position of there not actually being any completely realistic 737s and A320s etc, where one has to know how all the bleed air and APU settings work just to crank the engines. so we were able to enjoy a gentle learning curve which allied itself to the ever-expanding realism and fidelity of simulated aeroplanes. Should we expect others new to the hobby to forego that gentle introduction?

Recall if you will, back when the very first PMDG Boeing 737 came out for FS9. Remember how many posts were all over the internet with people being unable to start the second engine because they were not au fait with the 737's overhead switches? I bet if you searched Google you could still find some of them.

We could take the realism levels of simulated airliners to extremes and not let anyone even crank the engines until they'd performed a walkaround, checked the METARs and NOTAMS in their flight office, uploaded the flight plan from their laptop into the FMC, checked the zig-zag sheet for correct loading and signed it off, etc ,etc. Now I know some people would love all that, but it'd hardly appeal to someone who was just getting into things, in fact it would put them off.

[ErichB 3,642]

1 minute ago, Chock said:

...., but it'd hardly appeal to someone who was just getting into things, in fact it would put them off.

I don't disagree.  

[Chock 17,769]

3 minutes ago, ErichB said:

I don't disagree.  

Exactly. Although one thing I do find slightly anachronistic to be honest, is that one would imagine someone new to flight simming would be (typically) using a Steam version of FSX and not P3D, so it is a little bizarre to find simpler add-ons making their way into it when I suspect that P3D probably is more for us nerds who want the seat adjuster in the cockpit to be exactly like they are in the real thing lol. Still, I wouldn't want anyone excluded from the party.

[ErichB 3,642]

3 minutes ago, Chock said:

Exactly. Although one thing I do find slightly anachronistic to be honest, is that one would imagine someone new to flight simming would be (typically) using a Steam version of FSX and not P3D, so it is a little bizarre to find simpler add-ons making there way into it when I suspect that P3D probably is more for us nerds who want the seat adjuster in the cockpit to be exactly like they are in the real thing lol. Still, I wouldn't want anyone excluded from the party.

Which funnily enough is exactly my point. (although implicit)

[dave2013 1,130]

On 6/26/2017 at 10:04 AM, joemiller said:

You need to visit their forums, read and you'll find out why it has taken this long.

No thanks.  I'll pass on reading 324 pages and over 8,000 posts.

Their CRJ forum has been in existence since 2010 which is pretty amazing. I don't think I've ever seen an addon talked about for so long and yet still not released.

Aerosoft's lack of progress and results has lost them my money on this one.  I'm pretty happy with Virtualcol's CRJs.

Dave

 

 

[Chock 17,769]

Aerosoft are apparently in some unspoken competition with Level D to see how long an aeroplane for FS can be in development without being released it would appear.

Actually, as far as I'm aware, the Aerosoft CRJ is now not far off actually showing up. And to be fair to them, part of the reason it took so long is that it wasn't originally their development, (I think) it was Digital Aviation's (could be wrong about that though), but in any case, it was some developer or other, and then it got taken over by Aerosoft, but only with a part time developer working on it, which accounts for the lengthy process, well, that and the fact that with P3D it's not quite as simple to develop something complex, because unlike with developing for FSX, where the platform is essentially 'frozen', P3D is in continual development, so sometimes the goalposts move.

In the meantime, if anyone is impatient for a more complex CRJ, there actually is one for XPlane (from X Aviation), which has been around since version 9/10 of XPlane but works in XPlane 11. And since I do own that one, I can confirm it works in 11 and is quite nice.

And guess where I bought that from? Yup, the Aerosoft online store. Oh the irony... So technically, there kind of is an Aerosoft CRJ already available, just not the one everyone thinks.

[ErichB 3,642]

12 minutes ago, Chock said:

(I think) it was Digital Aviation's (could be wrong about that though),

I think you're right.

[Chock 17,769]

Just took the CRJ1000 for a spin and was happy enough with how it flew (and landed) to add it to my fleet in Air Hauler, which is usually a sign that thing flies alright as far as I'm concerned, because it costs seventeen and a half million to buy the thing and over two million per month to lease it in AH2. Anyway, for that kind of money I leased it initially, just in case lol cos it only carries about 15000 cargo (unsurprisingly with it being basically a very long fuselaged LearJet).

[CodeNameRedNeck 1]

On 6/26/2017 at 8:13 PM, b1bmsgt said:

Funny, I don't get that at all. All CRJ models are rock steady in my sim...

 

Russ

It may have been my EzDok messing with the plane. I do not know for a fact but I have heard that it can have a big affect on the flight model of an aircraft. It's not a constant thing and the more I fly the CRJ the more I like it. 

[regis9 4,013]

I bought the package yesterday and did my first flight tonight, a short hop CYHZ-CYDF in the CRJ200.  My observations:

- Nice external model

- Virtual cockpit is a nice improvement over their previous work and pretty good for this price point

- Sounds are ok...I'll likely buy a soundpack from TSS if I decide this is something I'm going to fly enough.

- The aircraft was very slippery, at *idle thrust descent was around 320 knots without use of speedbrakes.  *pulling the throttles back to idle resulted in no lowered than 44% N1, seems high

- Flight model seems a bit...unstable at times.  I had a bit or porpoising during various phases of flight though the autopilot kept the plane on course and in flight overall. 

- The strobes are odd, they flash continuously rather than the typical pause between flashes.

Overall I'm happy with the purchase, it is very nice to be flying a CRJ again...last one for me would have been the Wilco version from many years ago.

**As I type this I'm wondering if I have a pre-patch version, that would explain the slipperiness.  I bought it from PC Aviator and they're notoriously slow at uploading updated versions...

 

 

[b1bmsgt 206]

On 6/22/2017 at 9:22 AM, b1bmsgt said:

Try this fix that I posted in another thread:

 

I went into the aircraft.cfg and did some experimentation. Conducting test flights out of Edwards AFB, I came up with 2 simple tweaks that help quite a bit. These are:

In the aircraft.cfg, find these lines:

[flight_tuning]
cruise_lift_scalar     =1.80000
parasite_drag_scalar   =1.0

 

After backing up your original file, change to

[flight_tuning]
cruise_lift_scalar     =0.90000
parasite_drag_scalar   =2.50000

 

I like this a lot better. You can actually lose airspeed while descending if you want to. Big difference.

I have only tried this in the -200 and -700, but I would think that it should work in the other versions as well. Please report back if you decide to try it out!

 

Russ

I have tried the update for the CRJ and, as others have also said, I like the way it flies better with my tweak to the original version rather than the updated version.

 

Russ

[kiki 89]

I just bought it from PCAviator. It is not that bad, actually it is pretty good for that price. I am not a beginner (been around since FS4!) but do very little flying these days (and mostly in the bush). Some times I want to fly places more crowded than Alaska and for that this is quite a good tool. If only they had done some parts of the cockpit liitle better... Who knows, I might get that DA/AS CRJ when it is released. So far this is good enough for me.

 

However, I needed that fix from above, so this seems to be without that update. Are the any other issues solved with the update?

[b1bmsgt 206]

2 hours ago, kiki said:

However, I needed that fix from above, so this seems to be without that update. Are the any other issues solved with the update?

I tried the update and didn't like it, so I went back to the original version with my fix. Most satisfactory!

The update aircraft seemed underpowered, as I believe others have also stated. I didn't notice any other changes with the update.

 

Russ

[Alti 65]

Hi, i got from simmarket an mail, Vcol CRJ is updated to V2.

But be warned: I have installed this pack, (before unistalled the first one!)  and get now this error while starting P3Dv4:

"There are multiple objects with the same title Name. ...

Virtualcol_***_crj_  ... "   This error came for every Vcol-Livery.

And also i get an P3D Crash: My sim crashes after Install with error clr.dll:

Name der fehlerhaften Anwendung: Prepar3D.exe, Version: 4.0.28.21686, Zeitstempel: 0x594a7255
Name des fehlerhaften Moduls: clr.dll, Version: 4.7.2101.1, Zeitstempel: 0x59326bcd

now i have deinstalled this and my P3Dv4 is now ready like before it was.

this was the last try i have given to this Software. 

no every more anything from Vcol !

 

[jfmitch 33]

I can't seem to find the switch to turn on oxygen to passengers in the CRJ200.  Searched the User Manual several times.