Last week-ish, it was the T-38 Talon II by Aero Dynamics coming out a week before the Famous Flyer T-38A by BBS, and just now, we have the "KwikFlite" Not-an-SR-71 Archangel releasing today via inibuilds:

 

The Aero Dynamics T-38A & C is honestly a great, Hi Fi addon. The BBS/MilViz version has yet to make an appearance at all (i'd probably get it just to support whoever made it, and their version in P3D was "chef's kiss").

I haven't ever purchased a KwikFlite addon, and can't see myself doing so due to their "casual" approach to fidelity.

I'll wait for the BlackBird Blackbird releasing this Thursday (hopefully BBS do NOT postpone/cancel this one!). It's been in development for almost 10 years, and from the recent "State of the Sim" webcast on Twitch, i'm "pretty sure" it's going to be the one to get.👍

 

I’m a beta tester of the Blackbird Sled and it is the one to get.

-B

Does the fidelity of this match or exceed the typical Blackbird products? (I know the Blackbird SR-71 hasn't been released yet, but Blackbird products for MSFS have a standard fidelity across their product line).

8 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

Does the fidelity of this match or exceed the typical Blackbird products? (I know the Blackbird SR-71 hasn't been released yet, but Blackbird products for MSFS have a standard fidelity across their product line).

Yes.

47 minutes ago, abrams_tank said:

Does the fidelity of this match or exceed the typical Blackbird products? (I know the Blackbird SR-71 hasn't been released yet, but Blackbird products for MSFS have a standard fidelity across their product line).

BlackBird Sims nee MilViz has made commercial grade add-ons for the USAF & USN IRL training programs. 

BBS is the one to stick with if you want By The Book, Study Level fidelity. 

  

Can the SR-71 fly like a civilian airliner—for example, operating under IFR and performing ILS approaches?

1 hour ago, MayuyuYukirin said:

Can the SR-71 fly like a civilian airliner—for example, operating under IFR and performing ILS approaches?

Sure it can.

only problem with be compliance with NAPs 😁

2 hours ago, btacon said:

I’m a beta tester of the Blackbird Sled and it is the one to get.

-B

Having followed many of your posts over past year or so, I find that an extremely encouraging endorsement  👍

3 hours ago, abrams_tank said:

Does the fidelity of this match or exceed the typical Blackbird products?

Another beta tester here. Have you flown the BBS Cessna 310R? It was ground breaking when it was released, the first MSFS addon with state preservation and extensive failures. Its lead developer, Dutch, is also the lead developer for the SR-71, and he did wonders with it. Just look at the feature list on the BBS store. 

I would say it is deep study level: with full realism on, you can fly it according to the official (declassified) POH, any mistakes have consequences, and it can also trigger random failures. But you have many realism settings, you don't have to trigger failures. In easy mode, you can fly Mach 3.5 at 10000' with the plane upside down. With full realism, you would lose the plane if you tried. 

 

2 hours ago, MayuyuYukirin said:

Can the SR-71 fly like a civilian airliner—for example, operating under IFR and performing ILS approaches?

If you insist, you could set up a flight plan in Simbrief and follow airways and arrivals. The autopilot (or more precisely, the astro-nagiational system, ANS) can follow any lateral route you provide, and you also have the choice to fly it with a GPS (which wasn't available back in the day). 

Having said that, flying the SR-71 like a civilian airliner is not very realistic and clashes with many of the features of the plane:

- The SR-71 uses huge amounts of fuel (about 20 tons per hour), so in-air refueling is required on almost every flight. Real life missions were up to 11 hours long, so even multiple in-air refueling was common. Simbrief and Little Nav Map always complain that the route exceeds the capacity of your fuel tanks unless you set up a fictional profile where the SR-71 has a fuel capacity of 500,000 lbs (instead of the 80,000 lbs that it actually has).

- Most of the time you will be cruising at 70,000' - 80,000', and controlled air space ends at 60,000'. You will then switch off all lights and the transponder. Every 90 minutes or so, you descend to about 25000' to refuel. If you are above friendly territory, you switch the transponder back on. If not, you better stay dark 🙂

- The stall speed is about 170 Kts and you have to deploy surface delimiters below 290 Kts. That means you would have to fly the plane with "flaps out" whenever you are below 10,000' to avoid exceeding the 250 Kts speed limit (surface delimiters aren't flaps, but they are used in a similar way when it comes to procedures).

- The SR-71 has ILS approach needles like commercial jets, but the autopilot does not follow it automatically. You must manually fly the ILS approach and make sure the needles stay centered, just like in reality.

19 minutes ago, qqwertz said:

Another beta tester here. Have you flown the BBS Cessna 310R? It was ground breaking when it was released, the first MSFS addon with state preservation and extensive failures. Its lead developer, Dutch, is also the lead developer for the SR-71, and he did wonders with it. Just look at the feature list on the BBS store. 

I would say it is deep study level: with full realism on, you can fly it according to the official (declassified) POH, any mistakes have consequences, and it can also trigger random failures. But you have many realism settings, you don't have to trigger failures. In easy mode, you can fly Mach 3.5 at 10000' with the plane upside down. With full realism, you would lose the plane if you tried. 

 

If you insist, you could set up a flight plan in Simbrief and follow airways and arrivals. The autopilot (or more precisely, the astro-nagiational system, ANS) can follow any lateral route you provide, and you also have the choice to fly it with a GPS (which wasn't available back in the day). 

Having said that, flying the SR-71 like a civilian airliner is not very realistic and clashes with many of the features of the plane:

- The SR-71 uses huge amounts of fuel (about 20 tons per hour), so in-air refueling is required on almost every flight. Real life missions were up to 11 hours long, so even multiple in-air refueling was common. Simbrief and Little Nav Map always complain that the route exceeds the capacity of your fuel tanks unless you set up a fictional profile where the SR-71 has a fuel capacity of 500,000 lbs (instead of the 80,000 lbs that it actually has).

- Most of the time you will be cruising at 70,000' - 80,000', and controlled air space ends at 60,000'. You will then switch off all lights and the transponder. Every 90 minutes or so, you descend to about 25000' to refuel. If you are above friendly territory, you switch the transponder back on. If not, you better stay dark 🙂

- The stall speed is about 170 Kts and you have to deploy surface delimiters below 290 Kts. That means you would have to fly the plane with "flaps out" whenever you are below 10,000' to avoid exceeding the 250 Kts speed limit (surface delimiters aren't flaps, but they are used in a similar way when it comes to procedures).

- The SR-71 has ILS approach needles like commercial jets, but the autopilot does not follow it automatically. You must manually fly the ILS approach and make sure the needles stay centered, just like in reality.

Thanks 

Do you know the SR-71 beta version will be release in marketplace with beta price？

55 minutes ago, MayuyuYukirin said:

Do you know the SR-71 beta version will be release in marketplace with beta price？

I don't know for sure, but I believe that they will try to do that.

5 hours ago, qqwertz said:

Every 90 minutes or so, you descend to about 25000' to refuel. If you are above friendly territory, you switch the transponder back on. If not, you better stay dark 🙂

I can't imagine that they ever refueled over unfriendly territory. With or without transponder.

30 minutes ago, fsiscool said:

I can't imagine that they ever refueled over unfriendly territory. With or without transponder.

You are right, they did not. I didn't mean to imply that, but my answer could certainly be interpreted in that way, sorry.

10 hours ago, MayuyuYukirin said:

Can the SR-71 fly like a civilian airliner—for example, operating under IFR and performing ILS approaches?

The aircraft is a right pain in the butt to fly, even at reduced fidelity levels. 
Its 1960’s technology and has very little in the way of automation vs airliners

You could fly it like an OLD airliner, but if that’s what you want to do, the Concorde is going to be a better bet for you. Still a challenging aircraft when flown realistically, also an entirely steam gauge cockpit, AND it was purpose designed to fly in and out of civ airports on civ routes under ATC control 🤙

 

Edited December 16, 2025Dec 16 by UrgentSiesta

13 minutes ago, UrgentSiesta said:

The aircraft is a right pain in the butt to fly, even at reduced fidelity levels. 
Its 1960’s technology and has very little in the way of automation vs airliners

You could fly it like an OLD airliner, but if that’s what you want to do, the Concorde is going to be a better bet for you. Still a challenging aircraft when flown realistically, also an entirely steam gauge cockpit, AND it was purpose designed to fly in and out of civ airports on civ routes under ATC control 🤙

 

Blackbird Sim is simulating the stage of the airplane during the late 1980s, which is much easier to fly than the original plane in the 1960s. The main difference is the addition of computers that take care of a lot of things that pilots had to do manually in the 1960s. In particular

- If the airflow into the compressor inlet is slightly off, you will get an unstart. Think of one engine failing for a period of time. This makes the airplane extremely hard to control. You can avoid unstarts by making sure the airflow is good. Thats the purpose of the spikes, the peaky cones in front of the engines. It has to be positioned in such a way that the cone of the sonic boom just touches the compressor inlet. In the 60s they had to do that manually, but in this BBS model the computer takes care of that.

- Similarly to the Concorde, the SR-71 has 6 different tanks that are used to control its center of gravity (CG). There is a precise schedule which tank has to be emptied first, which second and so on to make sure that the plane is balanced to obtain the right angle of attack for supersonic flight. In the 60s the pilots did that, in the BBS model the computer does most of the work.

Mind you, there can still be unstarts if you fly with full realism and forget to operate some switches when you pass Mach 1.7, 2.0, and 2.6. And the CG can still get into a critical range if you don't pay attention, but you only have to take action occasionally, not all the time like in the 60s. Plus, there is a whole lot more that you have to pay attention to: compressor inlet temperature, nitrogen consumption, temperature of radio and electronic equipment. Trust me, that model is anything but boring 🙂

Peter