The book max speed for the Legacy Turbo is 310kts TAS, so I decided a challenge was in order. Could I actually reach that speed? Could I beat it (within engine limits)? The 310kts TAS figure is achievable at FL250, and oil cooling, turbo charger, mixture and ram air settings all need to be carefully managed. Anyone can 'firewall' the throttle and get high speeds but the challenge was to reach this speed with all engine parameters in the green.

I planned an IFR flight from YMAV Avalon to YMLT Launceston at FL250. Full fuel was required. There was just me as PIC on board, with almost no other payload.

The climb was uneventful, using the oil cooler door, ram air and mixture settings to maintain a healthy engine status. Even at FL220, the Legacy was still climbing at 1300fpm. The turbo maintained my target climb manifold pressure of 25 inches - all the way up to FL195. On reaching this altitude, MP started to drop off, but I still had plenty of throttle left to increase it and maintain 25 inches

At FL250, I leaned to around 25% fuel:air and carefully set wide open throttle, ensuring the oil temp, CHT and EGT all stayed within limits. The TSIO-550 achieved a manifold pressure of 29 inches at this high altitude and WOT. Remarkable performance.

And the result:-

314kts TAS, straight and level, everything "in the green"!

During the descent, I wanted to see what maximum speed I could achieve, with all parameters still in range:-

340kts TAS! from a single engine piston.

The air was calm and my descent was at -1000fpm but I didn't want to push it and go too far into the yellow on the speed tape.


The FSW Legacy is truly outstanding, even just a week after release. It's had 8 updates in that time. In my opinion it's now the best fast GA piston aircraft ever released for MSFS. There is wear and tear, maintenance, tons of options, gorgeous modeling and texturing, stunning sounds and the flight model now feels absolutely perfect.

Completely unedited screenshots, with texture resolution only set to Medium.


On arriving at 'Launnie', after pretty good IFR ATC service from BATC, this was one happy pilot :-

So ...... it's over to you @ryanbatc (or any other speed-loving GA pilots).

The challenge is set!

Edited May 25May 25 by JYW

How slow can she cleanly fly for low level vfr pilotage flights? ...and does her long nose really get in the way of the forward view for spotting landmarks? I get the feeling this aircraft was designed to be flown fast so my concern at low speeds she might fly kinda nose-high?

17 minutes ago, hangar said:

How slow can she cleanly fly for low level vfr pilotage flights? ...and does her long nose really get in the way of the forward view for spotting landmarks? I get the feeling this aircraft was designed to be flown fast so my concern at low speeds she might fly kinda nose-high?

Visibility is fantastic with that canopy. Side views are panoramic. The nose is long but if you set your view up just a touch, visibility over the front is perfect.

It is built for speed though. Clean, you wouldn't want to be any lower than 90kts in straight and level flight. It requires a lot of nose up trim to fly level below that speed. Not built for low and slow but an amazing machine.

Edited May 25May 25 by JYW

@hangar The newly released Falco has become my new VFR touring aircraft. Excellent visibility and the speed to get places, not bad in the slow speed regime either with some flap out.

2 hours ago, JYW said:

Even at FL220, the Legacy was still climbing at 1300fpm

That beats the 787 😔

34 minutes ago, JYW said:

Clean, you wouldn't want to be any lower than 90kts in straight and level flight. It requires a lot of nose up trim to fly level below that speed.

125kias clean is good enough for me, as long as it can do it with a flat nose, so 90 sounds amazing, albeit too slow for my patience! 😁

7 minutes ago, jon b said:

@hangar The newly released Falco has become my new VFR touring aircraft. Excellent visibility and the speed to get places, not bad in the slow speed regime either with some flap out.

Thanks Jon... looks like she'd make a really good VR experience.

Yes, I fly it in VR and the visibility is excellent. It only needs a very light touch on the stick though, it’s very nimble, but not twitchy if you just use a light touch as per recommended for the real aircraft.

6 hours ago, jon b said:

That beats the 787 😔

Yeah, but the 787 is paying you instead of you paying the Legacy! 🤣👍

34gph, at FL250, and 25% mixture? Wow, just wow. I thought it won't gonna go over 20gph, at most. Practically only 10gph less than a turboprop, for example, TBM900, that is (way) larger and heavier. I'm missing something here.

Edited May 25May 25 by Pe11e

4 hours ago, Pe11e said:

34gph, at FL250, and 25% mixture? Wow, just wow. I thought it won't gonna go over 20gph, at most. Practically only 10gph less than a turboprop, for example, TBM900, that is (way) larger and heavier. I'm missing something here.

It's a beta... The turbo charged model is still a WIP. Mainly though, it's very difficult to find performance numbers unless you have a pilot with the same engine irl.

Right now it's a bit too powerful. Should be more like 280 ktas at FL250 and roughly 18 gph. That would be about the fastest one of these would go. UNLESS we're talking about the Reno Racer models - those will break 300 ktas in the mid 20s.

9 minutes ago, ryanbatc said:

It's a beta... The turbo charged model is still a WIP. Mainly though, it's very difficult to find performance numbers unless you have a pilot with the same engine irl.

Right now it's a bit too powerful. Should be more like 280 ktas at FL250 and roughly 18 gph. That would be about the fastest one of these would go. UNLESS we're talking about the Reno Racer models - those will break 300 ktas in the mid 20s.

How's the standard engine version in terms of flight and fuel consumption numbers? I should maybe fly that one until turbo charged is tweaked properly.

1 hour ago, ryanbatc said:

It's a beta... The turbo charged model is still a WIP. Mainly though, it's very difficult to find performance numbers unless you have a pilot with the same engine irl.

Right now it's a bit too powerful. Should be more like 280 ktas at FL250 and roughly 18 gph. That would be about the fastest one of these would go. UNLESS we're talking about the Reno Racer models - those will break 300 ktas in the mid 20s.

Maybe if you do the Stihl chainsaw livery / repaint it will go that fast....

Ars Technica

400mph, 50 feet up—what it takes to race and win world’s...

It took just one moment for this pilot to realize he should be racing airplanes.

Edited May 26May 26 by Flyfaster_MTN002

1 hour ago, Flyfaster_MTN002 said:

Maybe if you do the Stihl chainsaw livery / repaint it will go that fast....

Ars Technica

400mph, 50 feet up—what it takes to race and win world’s...

It took just one moment for this pilot to realize he should be racing airplanes.

Pretty sure this is the hyper performing race variant Ryan’s referring to.

We’ll get that one, but later on in dev.🤙

8 hours ago, Pe11e said:

How's the standard engine version in terms of flight and fuel consumption numbers? I should maybe fly that one until turbo charged is tweaked properly.

The standard fuel burn modelling is good up to critical altitude (FL180 by book), after that, yes it's gulping the fuel.

Glad we don't pay for the fuel in MSFS!

There is no confirmed published top speed for the Super Legacy (the turbocharged version), just claims - some verified and others not. There are many account in races of the Super LEgacy exceeding 300ktas, so I'd say it's feasible.

I fly the NA version of the Legacy 90% of the time. This post was just a fun challenge to see what the current model could achieve, flat out but within engine limits. I thought Ryan would be up for the challenge but note he hasn't bit 😊