Vans Aircraft B717 Don't Buy!

[Guest jayson2830]

I purchased Vans B717 and it is nothing but junk. The Autopilot doesnt work right and the FMS is junk. Their website has a forum listed but when you try to go there it directs you to a site that says it has been highjacked by "Sanal Yargic The turkish Highjacker".Rich

[Guest Three Greens]

We'll all wait for your B717 to be completed then....Is there any chance you read up on the acft before purchase?http://www.flusiforum.de/reviews/includer....eing%20B717-200Put it into BabelFish if your German isnt up to scratch.I get a little dissapointed when I log in and see these sort of ' junk' comments - every acft model isnt going to be for everybody.If I was spending USD30 on something I would be tempted to do a little research first.I wonder if you have tried to contact VANS by email before getting all upset or even posting somehere else if their forums have been hacked.ScottP.s. perhaps we need a whingeathon forum.

[G7USL 117]

Scott,Looks very nice and functional from what you have shown with the URL.

[Guest Three Greens]

Dave,I have to say - I dont own it. I made the decision based on what I had read and what people had said about it.That was sort of my point.Scott

[Guest jayson2830]

Scott I think I detected some sarcasm in your reply. First of all I am not designing a B717 and if I were doing it for Payware I would provide a means of Tech Support to resolve any problems. If my forum got hacked I would get it fixed. Second of all I did search for reviews on vans B717 and the ones I found were complimentary.(perhaps they had a tech supt forum at the time they purchased) If I had seen the review on Flugsimulation I would not have made the purchase. Now, having said all of that I don't think I should have been so harsh in my first posting. I was upset at the time and have now cooled off to the point where I can say that it may not be junk but it does have a lot of problems with the PFD panel. IE: Autothrottle works sometimes (if you play with it). Will not capture the Altitude set in the Altitude window. Settings in the Vertical Speed window have no effect. The Fms has a number of problems with it. On the positive side the aircraft handles nicely when flying with the autopilot off. The 2d panel is nicely done and has a lot of neat features. To summarize, I am sorry I called it junk and I apologize to Vans Aircraft for that.If I can work out the problems it could be a very nice package.Rich

[Guest Three Greens]

Rich,Trust me - you are not the first person in this hobby to be "caught in the headlights" and bought something because it looks good and you really like the aircraft/scenery that it is. I have done it on more than one occasion and would hate to calculate how much I have spent on all my addons - not to even think how much I do or dont use some of them.Unfortunately when you compare some of the lessor offerings available that we pay for to things like PMDG or LevelD or Carenado there is a huge gap - and these often dont compare to the above very well.I was going to suggest - scanning the forums and even posting for opinions before purchasing - but then we all have different likes and I have some things which others absolutely panned that I think are very good - so go figure!It was sarcasm to btw. <- Sorry!Scott

[graemeb 14]

I will jump in here to say that I did in fact purchase this when it came out a couple of years ago. Since then there has been a free v2 upgrade, and a couple of minor patches.This not a *bad* product, but it is definitely 'entry level' when it comes to panel and detail. However, at the time there was no other 717 available, so it filled a niche. It is a 'Lite' product.I do think that the web site and forum leave a lot to be desired. The tech support is almost non-existent. I did receive replies to my early emails, but only after some persistence in re-sending messages.So whilst I enjoy the 717 for what it is, I don't think I will be rushing back to Vans for another product. All part of the FS experience :-)

[Guest thedoggg]

The panel on this is rather nice in the looks department even if it doesn't work exactly like the real thing. This is no level D but it's a nice light add on in the same lines as CLS. Something is weird about the Vans models that you have to zoom in so much same with their 727's. It's not bad but the Jet city model looks better to me. Too bad JCA doesn't have a panel and VC like this one.Regards, Carlos

[graemeb 14]

Carlos,You can easily fix the zoomed external view by using the freeware AFCAD2 program to adjust the aircraft radius. Use the "Tools-Aircraft Editor", then select the Vans Boeing 717 and change the "aircraft radius" to something like 22 metres.