7 hours ago, St Mawgan said:

I can't seem to map the condition levers. 

Same issue for me too... Saitek throttle quadrant here, unable to use mixture levers as a condition levers like any other turboprop add on. After landing I shut down the engines accidentally manipulating the conditions levers with the mouse.

Hi everyone,

Ok this is going to be a long one:

I wanted to share some early thoughts on the new Carenado King Air 200 after spending roughly 4 to 5 hours flying it. These are just my humble personal impressions, and I fully understand that more time with the aircraft will likely change or refine some of them. I also want to stress that I’m a big King Air fan, so my comments come from a place of enthusiasm and genuine interest in seeing this aircraft become the best it can be.

First of all, the model itself is very nice. The aircraft looks beautiful, and the exterior textures are well done. From a visual standpoint, it’s definitely an attractive package and clearly shows the level of detail Carenado usually delivers. The 3D modeling is very solid overall.

As for the interior, I’ll admit I’m not much of a cabin person. What matters most to me are systems, flight dynamics, cockpit usability, and sound, so that’s where most of my attention goes.

Regarding the cockpit, it is good, functional and nicely laid out  but I do feel there is room for improvement in the texture quality and overall visual sharpness, especially in VR. Comparing it to the cockpit textures in the Black Square aircraft, those feel a bit more refined. The Carenado cockpit is certainly usable and good, but in VR it could benefit from some additional polish.

On the sound side, they are not bad at all, but I think they could definitely be improved. They feel somewhat similar to the sounds in the C90 GTX, and one specific thing I noticed is that the audio gives the impression that the aircraft is entering beta range earlier than it actually is. That may just be perception, but it stood out during operations.

Regarding controls, I did encounter a few issues. I use both the Turtle Beach VelocityOne Flight yoke and the VelocityOne stick, and on both devices the trim wheel appears inverted. The buttons themselves work fine, but the wheel direction definitely needs attention.

Another thing I noticed with the trim is that when I move the trim using hardware controls(buttons on the yoke), the trim wheel in the cockpit does visually move but the buttons on the yoke on the aircraft does not. It only animates when clicking it with the mouse. That might be a synchronization or animation issue worth looking into.

I also noticed that the rudder boost system is not included. It would be a very nice addition, especially from an operational and emergency handling perspective.

As for the flight model, my personal impression is that the aircraft feels somewhat nervous and twitchy, particularly at higher speeds. Some sensitivity is normal in turboprops, of course, but in this case it feels a bit more pronounced than expected. I notice this behavior in yaw, roll, and pitch stability.

One more thing I wanted to ask the community about: I’m experiencing an issue with the altimeter calibration. When I set the altimeter using the non-standard unit following the given meter, the altitude seems incorrect, while the standard altimeter reads correctly. I’ve noticed something similar in the C90 GTX, so I’m not sure if this is a bug, a modeling detail, or simply something on my side. I’d appreciate feedback from others who may have seen the same behavior.

Another limitation worth mentioning  and this is something many people have already noticed  is that the condition levers currently cannot be mapped. That would be a very welcome improvement.

From a VR perspective, I also noticed a few small visual gaps or holes in the cockpit geometry in certain viewing angles. Nothing major, but something that could likely be cleaned up in future updates.

Overall, this is a very nice aircraft, especially for those of us who love the King Air family. It has a solid foundation and a lot of potential. There are just a few areas that would benefit from refinement and continued development.

It would also be very helpful if the autopilot control panel could be popped out or placed as a secondary window in a more accessible location  similar to how it works in the Black Square aircraft. I understand that may not be perfectly realistic, but from a usability standpoint,having that panel more visible in front of the pilot could be helpful.

Again, these are just my personal impressions after a relatively short time with the aircraft. I do have some previous experience with Level-D simulators on airplanes and even experimented with developing a King Air model many years ago, so my comments come from that perspective  but they are still just opinions.

I genuinely hope Carenado continues to support and refine this aircraft, because it has the potential to become a fantastic King Air simulation with a few updates and improvements.

And of course  here’s hoping that someday we might also see a Black Square King Air 200.

Let’s keep the feedback constructive and push together to help make this aircraft even better.

Have some nice flights, everyone.

great post, thanks very much!!

I feel like every post about Carenado becomes a promotion for Black Sqaure. 😀

46 minutes ago, oronair said:

'

I genuinely hope Carenado continues to support and refine this aircraft, because i-t has the potential to become a fantastic King Air simulation with a few updates and improvements.

Not sure if Carenado does this. 

It would be a different story if we were talking about FlightFx.

dd

Edited March 27Mar 27 by Sky_Pilot071

Tim and I did a paint each for this thing already in case you're looking for something a little more interesting haha

Just look in Other and sort vis Newest 

https://flightsim.to/liveries/other-liveries-msfs2024

Is anyone having issues with getting the FD’s to display on the EADI? The autopilot flies what is commanded on the AP panel, but no matter what mode it is in, the flight director does not display

I ended up submitting a bug report for a few items...  nothing is super game breaking... just a little annoying for the broken APR mode when flying with the GTN (I didn't check the GNS)

APR button changes CDI to VLOC during RNAV approach

IAS button inop

clickspots are miniscule for the push knob functions like 100s and HDG CRS sync

rudder boost inop

weird flight model in a bank (I get a weird wobble even with proper rudder input during initial bank)

no DR dynamic registration on livery 1

condition levers not mappable,

trim for hardware bindings backwards

EADI/EHSI remain on after battery off (this might be me I forgot to check for a standby battery or something)

i added request for the second 750 or even a 650 hehe

Also TimHH just put out a superb paint for it!

 

 

in light of all these issues (who would have thought) why would anyone buy this half baked beauty when for $ 10 more, they can have the default KingAir 350 and BKSQ steam gauge overhaul, which works pretty well even in MSFS 2024?

Talk about 'different strokes for different folks'. Pretty much all of the things people complain about as wrong or missing or non-functional with this (and many other) aircraft that are pushed out for MSFS are completely meaningless for me. One of the joys of being a seriously non-serious simmer. As long as it looks good and is an aircraft I like, I can live with not a single gauge or button being functional or accurate, just as long as it responds to throttle, brakes, ailerons and rudder I'm happy. It really does make for less stressful simming.

I haven't been simming much the last couple of weeks, but I shall be back to my usual regular usage shortly, and I'm looking forward to grabbing this (and the upcoming Tri-star) and zooming around with all the pleasure my ineptitide can give me.

1 hour ago, turbomax said:

in light of all these issues (who would have thought) why would anyone buy this half baked beauty when for $ 10 more, they can have the default KingAir 350 and BKSQ steam gauge overhaul, which works pretty well even in MSFS 2024?

I already have the black square stuff obviously... but for me it's just a little different.  Would I rather have a high end black square king air 350 or any variant?  Absolutely.  But this is fairly inexpensive and the cockpit is a little different than the fully analog B350.  It's also a notch up in visual fidelity over the older 2020 BS king air.  Does the old BS truly work in 2024?  You'd probably need to have 2020 installed to bring the old king air over as the new 2024 model is totally different.  2020 is long gone from my drive so this is the only king air option (aside from the default C90 and B350 which is a step down in quality from this imo).  I'm hoping after the Praetor they'll do a Fusion for the 2024 B350 King Air.

Edited March 28Mar 28 by ryanbatc

2 hours ago, ryanbatc said:

Does the old BS truly work in 2024? 

absolutely, and probably better than the Carenado B200. that's  why I was wondering. I could only imagine users without MSFS 2020 and who are satisfied with Ctrl-E startup procedure. and there's nothing wrong with that. I will reconsider the B200 once they have resolved your bug list, if BKSQ hasn't released their 2024 version by then. 

Edited March 28Mar 28 by turbomax

2 hours ago, andy1252 said:

as long as it responds to throttle

ok, you don't use mixture, condition or prop levers then. like they don't do in those modern biz jets anymore. 🤣

6 minutes ago, turbomax said:

ok, you don't use mixture, condition or prop levers then

Not unless the particular aircraft absolutely insists on it. I seem to remember a Spitfire that would flame out after a while unless you managed it properly. Fortunately (for me), it turned out that you could turn the engine damage business completely off with a particular radio button press.

You wouldn't believe how much time I save flying a big tube - so much more to ignore <grin>

 

2 hours ago, turbomax said:

absolutely, and probably better than the Carenado B200. that's  why I was wondering. I could only imagine users without MSFS 2020 and who are satisfied with Ctrl-E startup procedure. and there's nothing wrong with that. I will reconsider the B200 once they have resolved your bug list, if BKSQ hasn't released their 2024 version by then. 

The issue is getting the 2020 king air into 2024... for me at least.  i dont have 20 installed anymore.  unless theres a way to enable the 2020version in the My Library which there might be.

You can definitely do a regular startup in the Carenado aircraft though.  It's a turbine, not too difficult.  And even though it's a Carenado you can still fly it as realistically as possible with checklists, performance data etc.  I mean some of the higher end addons essentially have an auto start or saved states anyway...  basically the same thing as ctrlE.

I guess my point is that, every addon, be it low end or Fenix/A2A/Black Square, is contributing to the success of this genre.  I want it to succeed!  Carenado does eventually issue updates, but slowly.  Some of that is the Marketplace, some is Carenado.  For the price, I paid about 27 USD, it's fair.  It's an entertainment product just like everything else we use.

Edited March 29Mar 29 by ryanbatc