Thanks for a really good review of the SU Texans pack. I trained and instructed on the Harvard Mk IIA in the South African Air Force in the 1960s, so it was probably closer to the British version. I would like to add my recollections to Drew's observations: Aileron trim, but no wheelThe Harvard had elevator and rudder trim only Propeller pitch will cut engineNo. We used full fine pitch (i.e. pitch lever fully forward) for T/O, reducing to 2000rpm and 29" boost for climb and aerobatics. Cruise was 26" boost @ 1850rpm. The engine was cut by pushing the mixture control fully forward to the full lean position. MagnetosThe switch in the MkII had positions (L to R) OFF.. L..R..BOTH. Before T/O we would run up the engine (with pitch full fine) at 2000rpm, and check the drop when switching as follows:BOTH=2000R= No more than 200rpm dropBOTH=back up to 2000rpm (and repeat for L magneto) Missing throttle warning hornOn the downwind leg the first of the vital actions (or landing checks) was: Close throttle to test warning horn, then lower the gear. So it was BEEEP; Gear; Mixture rich; Pitch fully fine; Fuel...etc. Modern radio, autopilotWe had VHF radio with a small dual-rotary control with which we could select a channel (eg, A, B, C, etc) and a preset frequency (eg, 1, 2, 3). A small frequency card gave the tower frequency as, say, G1. There was NO autopilot. Mismatched navigation systemThe Harvard Mk II had a floating compass (very basic) and a vacuum-driven Direction Indicator (DI) which had to be synchronised with the compass every 30 minutes (on nav exercises). The T-6G had a radio compass.The Mk II had only ADF, no VOR or anything remotely like HSI or GPS! I think the review is spot on, even though I do not own this model (I have the Alphasim Harvard/Texan)
