57 minutes ago, Naki18 said:

This looks great and is my sort of aircaft being part touring, part aerobatic.  Not a well known aircraft in my neck of the woods.  Wish it had a GPS though.

Bit of a Quandary....do I buy this or the Seminole which is on sale?  Or wait for the Milviz 310 or A2A Aerostar for my twin piston experience?  Or buy the Seminole and wait for the JR SF-260?

Ah, there is the dilemma. I bought the Mooney... it is good for a Carenado airplane... good enough. But after 25 hours in it the lack of depth kind of shows through. Use FLT plan go on your phone or tablet for a EFB... it works awesome. I am considering this... but the A2A and perhaps Mil Viz would be day one purchases. The SF260 is also up there... which I may wait for before buying this one as they are similiar...

 

The Seminole... to me is so lacklustre. Not exciting!

1 hour ago, Ce_Zeta said:

For me, this is the first real Release for FS20.

i hope that they can removed the registrations from the repaints and use the dynamic ones from the simulator.

I don't think so

Just a note, Andrey personally got 2Co to refund my money last night within an hour of a botched purchase. So ATI customer service will be great for anyone who ever has an issue.

15 minutes ago, jpe828 said:

Ah, there is the dilemma. I bought the Mooney... it is good for a Carenado airplane... good enough. But after 25 hours in it the lack of depth kind of shows through. Use FLT plan go on your phone or tablet for a EFB... it works awesome. I am considering this... but the A2A and perhaps Mil Viz would be day one purchases. The SF260 is also up there... which I may wait for before buying this one as they are similiar...

 

The Seminole... to me is so lacklustre. Not exciting!

Yes, agreed.  I have the Mooney as well (and the Macchi MB 339) and like it but i always wanted a Mooney in flightsim.

  I might bite with this.  I understand a GPS is in a future update.

Will still get the SF-260 too though, when it eventually gets here.  One of my favorite aircraft IRL.

Edited December 27, 20205 yr by Naki18

Now little what I like about P149D

- working fuses (feels like X-plane) love it

- gerky niddle - love it

- steam gauges - love it

- adjustable/moving light - love it 

- default pilot view with cowling - love it

- authentic german marking - love it

-high quality details in cockpit - love it

-great fps - love it 🙂

I usually fly tubeliners most of the time, but on the good reports so far on this plane i bought it, and what a lovley plane it is to fly... I can see a lot of vfr flying coming my way. Cockpits nicely detailed, great views, and handles like a dream.

Ugh, I tell myself to hold out for the SF260... but this is tempting with everyone raving over it.

3 minutes ago, jpe828 said:

Ugh, I tell myself to hold out for the SF260... but this is tempting with everyone raving over it.

Haha I have the same thought!  I just love the SF260.  I loved the Realair version (just the best flight model ever) and I loved the the XP11 version.  I will be buying the MSFS version as well.

5 minutes ago, ryanbatcund said:

Haha I have the same thought!  I just love the SF260.  I loved the Realair version (just the best flight model ever) and I loved the the XP11 version.  I will be buying the MSFS version as well.

Right! I had some very serious hours in the Real Air model. I like that the one coming to MSFS has a GPS, and even AP. Doesn't help that the SF260 and FW are kind of similar in being agile low wing aircraft. 

Could you please compare this aircraft with the Carenado M20R? 

Generally speaking : cockpit textures, flight model ( physics, aerodynamics, etc ) sound..

Thank you in advance 

If someone could do a video of it, that would be amazing... maybe startup and a lap in the pattern.

5 minutes ago, Sphynnx said:

Could you please compare this aircraft with the Carenado M20R? 

Generally speaking : cockpit textures, flight model ( physics, aerodynamics, etc ) sound..

Thank you in advance 

I own both, and like them both....I’d say they are very similar in terms of quality at least IMHO.

To me they’re both excellent reproductions of very different aircraft...one a fast, modern steam gauged single and the other a 1950s era (also quite fast) trainer with interesting gauges and labels in German.

I love the handling of the Piaggio...I feel like I can ace most landings in it and on rollout and takeoffs it doesn’t wildly gyrate from side to side like every other aircraft in my hangar.
 

Both good purchases...but the Piaggio has already found a place in my heart that I thought only the Aerocommander 690 in XP11 could fill.  🙂 And there IS a US reg repaint for it, so I don’t feel “off” flying it around Seattle or Wisconsin. 

I can’t stop flying it!

Steve

48 minutes ago, Sphynnx said:

Could you please compare this aircraft with the Carenado M20R? 

Generally speaking : cockpit textures, flight model ( physics, aerodynamics, etc ) sound..

Thank you in advance 

In my opinion it’s better than M20R. 99% knobs and switches work in Piaggo. In fact this is the first airplane for MSFS where each circuit breaker works. I believe developers will support and enhance it further . The only drawback is lack of autopilot 

5 minutes ago, sd_flyer said:

In my opinion it’s better than M20R. 99% knobs and switches work in Piaggo. In fact this is the first airplane for MSFS where each circuit breaker works. I believe developers will support and enhance it further . The only drawback is lack of autopilot 

Ah, I will have to bite the bullet... does the cockpit shake, rattle and roll? Sounds pretty good? Feel realistic? Is it semi study level in terms of systems? 

 

I see with the Cri Cri the dev updated it pretty quickly which is encouraging. Yes, no AP is annoying but sometimes hand flying is rewarding while flying VFR hops! How does it trim out for level flight?

2 hours ago, Sphynnx said:

Could you please compare this aircraft with the Carenado M20R? 

Generally speaking : cockpit textures, flight model ( physics, aerodynamics, etc ) sound..

Thank you in advance 

Okay, comparison coming up...

It compares favourably in terms of visuals with Carenado's Mooney, and as you know, visuals are a strong point with Carenado, so this is a good thing. It has a 'lived in' look in its VC, which is detailed and worn, but the wear is convincing and not overdone, since this is, after all, a military aeroplane which tends to mean they get fairly well looked after and cleaned etc; the hammered-metal paint on the coaming and typical dull black painted panels of a German aeroplane of this era (as I think has been the one they referenced, rather than an Italian one, although I might be wrong about that), with switches very much of that period are well modeled, so it all looks very convincing.

Externally the paint jobs are very clean, as again befits either a military trainer or a well-cared for classic, as these things are these days, since if you wanted to buy a real one of these things today, it'd probably cost you about 65 thousand quid or so. Thus they tend to get looked after because whilst that isn't a fortune, it is still quite a bit of cash.

A minus point here with the external model, is that some visual glitches can crop up, with pilots occasionally being placed so they stick out of the cockpit. This doesn't happen a lot, but there is obviously some issue here which does need addressing with a patch, because I've not seen any Carenado aeroplanes do this, or any Asobo ones either for that matter. Aside for this, the thing looks great and most of the time this glitch is not there to spoil that.

Flight-wise, I'm only guessing here because I've never flown a real one, but I have flown stuff similar to it in terms of their role, such as an SA Bulldog and a DH Chipmunk, and it seems to fly about as one would expect it to although strictly speaking, the P.149 was originally a 'tourer' despite its use as a military training aeroplane, since it was intended to be a commercial nosewheel-equipped four/five seat development of the two-seater P.148, the 148 genuinely being a pure ab-initio trainer. Thus the 149 was also used as a liaison aeroplane, so it's more like an aerobatic tourer which can be used for training, than a pure trainer, hence me comparing it to the Bulldog, which is a bit like that too.

Beyond this speculation on my part as to what the real thing handles like, I can say that it does fly really very nicely in the sim, with you well able to pin it onto a heading precisely just using the whiskey compass, and it isn't difficult to keep it going straight either, so for those concerned about it not having a magenta line to follow with an autopilot, this is not as much of a hardship as you might suppose. However, since we are comparing it to the Carenado Mooney on this occasion, if you want a good IFR single which can be flown through crappy weather, and in which it will not be tiring to do so when you have no visual horizon reference, then this is not the plane for you.

You can fly it IFR, but you'll be working to do that since there is no GPS and no autopilot, but a GPS may come in a patch (possibly). It's really a chuck it around the sky aerobatic VFR day tourer if you want to quantify its role. And very good at that role it is, quite possibly the nicest overall add-on aeroplane yet for MSFS, even in spite of its visual glitches.

The sound could do with some improvement for the switchology. Overall it is pretty good, with a decent engine sound, and despite what some people are claiming, the sound level does indeed change when you open the canopy. In the VC the sound needs improving: Those kind of clunky spring-loaded switches, mounted in hammerite-painted panels with 1/4 inch jack nuts, have a really distinctive sound when you flip them (hard to describe, but anyone who ever had a 1960s reel to reel tape recorder or amp will know what I'm talking about here), and this thing could do with some sounds a bit more like that when you flip the switches in order to really 'put you there'. This is not a deal breaker of course, but it would be a nice touch to make things more convincing.

So overall when comparing it to the Mooney from Carenado, in terms of what you'd use the two for, that's a bit 'apples and oranges', but in terms of quality, I think this one edges it a bit over the Carenado, or at least it almost certainly will when it gets a patch, and of course patches can be a bit hit and miss from Carenado sometimes although in fairness to them, recently they have done okay on that score for the most part, so we'll see how the developer of this thing stacks up against that.

If you want my personal opinion, I think it is well worth the 18 quid price tag if you want a nice aeroplane of this type. It's a good all-rounder, great for VFR, and fun to chuck about the sky, although a bit less convincing if you get out of shape, since it seems very reluctant to spin, and I doubt the real thing would be so accommodating given some of the things I was doing with it, but fun for all that. With no autopilot and no fancy glass PFDs nor GPS to hold your hand, it is less suited to effortless longer IFR trips - if that's what you like - in which case the Mooney would be a better choice, but if you want a bit of old-school stick and rudder flying, it'll be right up your straße. If you think 'aerobatic Messerschmitt bf108', you're kind of in the right ballpark.

Edited December 28, 20205 yr by Chock