mtrainer

My thoughts - if you can't afford the quality add-ons you desire, it's time to find a cheaper hobby or a better paying job. Whining on forums about price is counter productive. I'm highly selective about the add-ons I have purchased and the beauty of it is, unless you're flying 40+ hours a week you don't need a hanger full of airplanes and every major airport in the world rendered in detail. Prepar3D with about $300 of add-ons provides a year or more of studying, flying, practice, and sheer enjoyment. Limit your aircraft and your locations; you'll never cringe when the base platform moves forward (and it always will). Mark Trainer

Agreed - And nope on that particular leg of the flight I didn't review the cabin altitude settings. I just went for it! It was the very end of a long flight and I was getting punchy. The plane is indeed extremely fragile up there, with an exceptionally nose-high attitude, you're essentially "mushing" through thin air with an IAS reading a few knots above your stall speed. When you do stall out, you rapidly find yourself dropping right back to 41K before getting leveled out. Perfect example of getting right up there in the very top of the corner. Pushing things to their limit is one of the things I love best about the whole concept of the simulation - it allows you to try out the statistical outliers. First Simulator: SubLogic Flight Simulator II for the Commodore 64. Try landing a plane with a FPS of...2. Current sims are easy! Best simulator I spent time in (two separate flights each time in the pilot's seat): KC-10 Extender, Singer-Link System, Barksdale AFB Mark

Best news I've heard all day. Awesome! I can't wait to purchase it. Mark Trainer

Right Michael, It was a last minute thought toward the end of the flight- why not see how high I can go as well? 46K was all I get out the plane. Mark

Thanks for all the kind responses. For some reason I'm partial to taking off from the Hawaiian Islands and seeing just how far I can get. PHLI (Lihue) to KCRP (Corpus Christy, Texas) sounds like a really fun flight- I just may have to give this one a shot. Let us know how it goes Dan! Mark Trainer

Hello, I recently completed a flight from PHLI (Lihue, Hawaii) to KCPR (Casper, WY) in Prepar3D/PDMG 737NGX which took approximately 7 hours and registered roughly 2242 nm in the plane and 3,346 miles according to google maps. I achieved a maximum altitude of 46K (yeah not optimum for fuel I was beginning to mush through the air at the end), started with a full tank and landed with 2.5K to spare. I also had a full load of passengers and cargo. I was trying to reach Chicago, but when it became obvious I wasn't going to make it I landed at Casper (my first time landing there too). I have also flown once from Lihue to Las Vegas in the sim which is doable. I'm thinking of trying to reach Anchorage from Lihue as my next attempt for long distance flights. I don't use the simulation speed-up feature, I let it run on A/P and pop in from time to time to make sure something hasn't gone horribly wrong. Also if you uncheck "pause sim on task switch" you can even minimize the FS window, move it to a different monitor and continue to use your PC. What is your farthest flight without refueling? Mark Trainer

Hi R, You're not the only one confused by the sudden and huge lineup of REX products. You may want to try their dedicated forum for the best answer. A couple of months ago I did purchase ASN (Active Sky Next) quickly followed by REX 4 Texture Direct w/ Soft Clouds. Seems to be a good combo in my opinion. So....if you were to only update to ASN, it would "inject" weather (either live or historical) into Prepar3D. But Prepar3D doesn't seem to have the huge variety of clouds types needed for real weather injection. Hence, I found it necessary to also include a "Texture" package for ASN to properly drive the weather (REX 4). The REX 4 textures include cloud types that don't come with the standard Prepar3D- making, in my opinion, buying both a real necessity. Now- I've been reading about AS2016, Active Sky Art, etc....and feel they have somewhat diluted their product line but if you watch the videos on their site you can get a feel for what you're really paying for. For what it is worth, as someone who started on Bruce Artwick's Sublogic Flight Simulator II for the C64 in 1984, I have flown simulations non-stop since then (Amiga 2000, every MS product sold, X-Plane, others, including the Singer Link KC-10 System at Barksdale AFB Louisiana). I have purchased lots of add-ons over the years that were a waste of money but I am enjoying REX4+ASN and it seems to be one of my better add-on purchases. Good luck with your decision. Mark Trainer

Hi Damian, In your original post you mentioned trouble performing manual landings as well- although you did mention you use the FUNCTION keys for throttle control, I'm not certain what joystick you are using as your main input device. Assuming you are indeed using a joystick of some sort I recommend using control sensitivities that are quite low; for me adjusting the sliders to the (very) low end made the plane much more "hand flyable" and more accurate. Good Luck! Mark Trainer