Flight Replicas Handley Page Halifax

[Chock 17,769]

Released the other day, if you fancy flying one of the other RAF heavies whilst waiting for that AH Lancaster to come out:

[tutmeister 695]

Nice, will give it a try

chris

[John_Cillis 2,406]

Makes me want to watch "The Battle of Britain" which I have on video..

[GHarrall 494]

On 8/12/2018 at 10:09 AM, Chock said:

Released the other day, if you fancy flying one of the other RAF heavies whilst waiting for that AH Lancaster to come out:

I saw FR had released this, have to say it looks top notch. What’s your first impression?

[Chock 17,769]

6 hours ago, GHarrall said:

I saw FR had released this, have to say it looks top notch. What’s your first impression?

Here's a video of it I made for you so you can judge for yourself a bit. Nothing fancy, but it gives you an idea of what to expect. Notice how long it takes to get airborne, it  does feel very much like a heavy bomber in that respect and the engines sound like they are working hard to pull it into the air:

On first appearance, it looks a bit like a 'cheap and cheerful' add-on, but that's only because texturing is, I think, not Flight Replicas' strong point, as you might know, particularly if you've got either of their other big vintage four engined props - the DC-4 or the North Star - both of which also have paint jobs which are rather flat and lifeless. In my opinion the liveries you get with Flight Replicas stuff are too clean as well. But, fortunately this is an easy fix and one which quite often requires nothing more than to download some better paint jobs if you're not inclined to have a go yourself, as I've done on occasion, for example on this, their DC-4-derived Carvair, which I painted up to make it look like it had some skin stressing and I daresay I'll have a crack at that for the Halifax too:

So, the very clean liveries on the new Halifax were not much of a surprise to me given that I'm used to it on their other stuff and kind of expected that, however, as with their other aeroplane add-ons, I know that under the somewhat less than impressive paint jobs which they tend to sport, they are certainly interesting aeroplanes with, whilst not absolutely everything simulated, enough in there to make them fun to fly and operate, as well as being quite often on subject material which other developers tend to bypass. This is certainly true of the Halifax, which tends to be overshadowed by the more famous AVRO Lancaster, one of which is coming soon from Aeroplane Heaven along with a Heinkel He111-P2 and a C119 Flying Box car, so there's some other nice old props to look forward to.

A nice thing to note with the flight Replicas Halifax though, is that in comparison to their other big prop add-ons, the Halifax is considerably less pricey (it cost me £16.95 from Just Flight's store, which is about half what I paid for their DC-4 and their North Star). At that price, I must admit I wasn't expecting it to be terribly well endowed with features, but I was actually pleasantly surprised on that score, i.e. it can actually drop its bomb load, has working superchargers and has a few different variants in there (including the post-war civilian BOAC passenger versions), with different virtual cockpits for those variants. The Flight Engineer's panel is there and whilst this is a bit simplified in comparison to the real thing, it does have some functionality and perhaps more importantly, the pilot's position has most switches and levers actually working too.

But what impressed me perhaps more than anything, is that it sounds pretty good and flies really well too. Now obviously I've never actually piloted a Halifax, since there are only three of them left in the world and none of those are in flying condition, but having seen the AVRO Lancaster - which had virtually identical overall performance to the Halifax - more times than I've had hot dinners, since the RAF's BoBMF preserved Lancaster is a frequent visitor to the NW of England's skies and I always turn out to see it whenever it does fly around. So, I know very well how the Lancaster looks and manoeuvers in the sky and the kinds of sounds it emits, and the Flight Replicas Halifax really does manage to do a great job of evoking that performance in every part of its flight envelope, so it certainly does not fly like it only costs £16.95. The fact that it does that so well makes me easily forgive the less than stunning paint jobs, which can be easily improved DIY anyway.

As far as the sounds go, some of these are custom-made, a few are from their DC-4, and some are default sim sounds, but in any case they do make it enjoyable to listen to and whilst they might not be recorded from Bristol Hercules engine, I have actually seen and heard one of those running in real life and it's not a million miles off what I recall one of those sounding like, so I'm happy enough with its audio.

For 16 quid, it's well worth having in my opinion.

 

 

 

[Chock 17,769]

For those who prefer an AVRO Lancaster, it looks very much like the Just Flight/Aeroplane Heaven one is imminent for release. JF have updated their 'in development' page for it and it looks pretty much good to go. Some stunning modeling both inside and out, with PBR texturing, if it's as good as their B-17F/G, it'll be a no-brainer purchase:

https://www.justflight.com/product/lancaster-b-mk-one

[tutmeister 695]

Thanks chock, been impatiently waiting this one.

Chris

[GHarrall 494]

On 8/15/2018 at 5:32 AM, Chock said:

Here's a video of it I made for you so you can judge for yourself a bit. Nothing fancy, but it gives you an idea of what to expect. Notice how long it takes to get airborne, it  does feel very much like a heavy bomber in that respect and the engines sound like they are working hard to pull it into the air:

On first appearance, it looks a bit like a 'cheap and cheerful' add-on, but that's only because texturing is, I think, not Flight Replicas' strong point, as you might know, particularly if you've got either of their other big vintage four engined props - the DC-4 or the North Star - both of which also have paint jobs which are rather flat and lifeless. In my opinion the liveries you get with Flight Replicas stuff are too clean as well. But, fortunately this is an easy fix and one which quite often requires nothing more than to download some better paint jobs if you're not inclined to have a go yourself, as I've done on occasion, for example on this, their DC-4-derived Carvair, which I painted up to make it look like it had some skin stressing and I daresay I'll have a crack at that for the Halifax too:

So, the very clean liveries on the new Halifax were not much of a surprise to me given that I'm used to it on their other stuff and kind of expected that, however, as with their other aeroplane add-ons, I know that under the somewhat less than impressive paint jobs which they tend to sport, they are certainly interesting aeroplanes with, whilst not absolutely everything simulated, enough in there to make them fun to fly and operate, as well as being quite often on subject material which other developers tend to bypass. This is certainly true of the Halifax, which tends to be overshadowed by the more famous AVRO Lancaster, one of which is coming soon from Aeroplane Heaven along with a Heinkel He111-P2 and a C119 Flying Box car, so there's some other nice old props to look forward to.

A nice thing to note with the flight Replicas Halifax though, is that in comparison to their other big prop add-ons, the Halifax is considerably less pricey (it cost me £16.95 from Just Flight's store, which is about half what I paid for their DC-4 and their North Star). At that price, I must admit I wasn't expecting it to be terribly well endowed with features, but I was actually pleasantly surprised on that score, i.e. it can actually drop its bomb load, has working superchargers and has a few different variants in there (including the post-war civilian BOAC passenger versions), with different virtual cockpits for those variants. The Flight Engineer's panel is there and whilst this is a bit simplified in comparison to the real thing, it does have some functionality and perhaps more importantly, the pilot's position has most switches and levers actually working too.

But what impressed me perhaps more than anything, is that it sounds pretty good and flies really well too. Now obviously I've never actually piloted a Halifax, since there are only three of them left in the world and none of those are in flying condition, but having seen the AVRO Lancaster - which had virtually identical overall performance to the Halifax - more times than I've had hot dinners, since the RAF's BoBMF preserved Lancaster is a frequent visitor to the NW of England's skies and I always turn out to see it whenever it does fly around. So, I know very well how the Lancaster looks and manoeuvers in the sky and the kinds of sounds it emits, and the Flight Replicas Halifax really does manage to do a great job of evoking that performance in every part of its flight envelope, so it certainly does not fly like it only costs £16.95. The fact that it does that so well makes me easily forgive the less than stunning paint jobs, which can be easily improved DIY anyway.

As far as the sounds go, some of these are custom-made, a few are from their DC-4, and some are default sim sounds, but in any case they do make it enjoyable to listen to and whilst they might not be recorded from Bristol Hercules engine, I have actually seen and heard one of those running in real life and it's not a million miles off what I recall one of those sounding like, so I'm happy enough with its audio.

For 16 quid, it's well worth having in my opinion.

 

 

 

Thanks for the info. I went ahead and purchased the Halifax. I'm not disappointed.

The Halifax is one of my 9 year olds sons favourite WWII bombers because we have a fully restored one in the museum just down the road in Trenton, ON.

Along with the Lancaster of course and we are also lucky enough to have one flying here in Hamilton, ON.

We are currently reading one of my dads boyhood novels "I flew with Braddock" which is weird reading it to my son when I heard it being read to me so much by my dad. (I grew up in Stafford and only moved here back in 2000)