Question for Jomni, PanzersEast or other Flight Simmers

Started by Tuna, August 22, 2013, 09:06:59 AM

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JudgeDredd

I can't help you with your specific questions - but the addons I would recommend are

1. Air Hauler - start a business as a small time pilot and work your way up - hauling small cargo at first and gaining rank and money to get bigger aircraft and also hire AI pilots to help with cash flow
2. FSX Passengers - haven't played it for a while - but similar to Air Hauler but you just fly passengers about.

Both of those keep stats on your takeoff, flight and landings.

For me both those addons give you something to do in FSX - otherwise it's just a bland sandbox game (I'm not a massive fan of sandbox - I tend to need a focus)

Another couple of addons I bought were Traffic X and REX. Traffic X brings the sky and the airports to life and REX brings your environment to life with better lighting on the ground at airports and roads at night and also the weather.

Those are really the only ones I've bought.

I don't play FSX that often - but when I do I tend to now fire up Air Hauler. Be aware though with Air Hauler. Start a business, choose and airfield and don't fly for a few months and you'll see your bank account diminish quite considerably as it takes all the missed monthly insurance and rent - I had to start a new career because I was hit so financially hard. Now I make it a requirement that I fly at least enough jobs to pay the rent. But when jobs are between 2 and 6k then you normally only need to fly one or two - which isn't normally a problem as when it's installed you generally fly more than that in a month anyway. I just thought I'd warn you about that because I was a wee bit peeved that I had to ruin my career because I had uninstalled FSX (to make some space on my HD before I bought a new drive)
Alba gu' brath

JudgeDredd

My FSX doesn't look nearly as good as I see other peoples...my system just isn't up to it.
Alba gu' brath

Yskonyn

Toonces I would recommend anything made by PMDG (precisionmanuals.com). Their aircraft are wonderful pieces of work.
As you have already eyed yourself; A2A creates some pretty cool stuff too.

For awesome weather effects I would highly recommend REX (realenvironmentxtreme.com), but beware that your PC has to be decent and configured correctly or you will struggle with performance.

As for the Air Hauler and FSX Pax utilities. You can indeed import all your add-on aircraft into the database of those utilities so you can use them.

TrafficX is a pretty nice deal too. The world gets much more alive (although FS ATC struggles sometimes creating jams), but the models of the addon traffic are low quality and might ruin your immersion. Also, it does take another chunck of processing power away, which you will need, especially with the PMDG aircraft.

Lastly, if you want realistic ATC procedures you should take a look at Radar Contact v4 (http://www.jdtllc.com/). It's a bit of a hassle to setup, but it does provide a pretty realistic ATC experience with different controller voices, sector handovers, decent ventors, etc.
"Pilots do not get paid for what they do daily, but they get paid for what they are capable of doing.
However, if pilots would need to do daily what they are capable of doing, nobody would dare to fly anymore."

PanzersEast

Just to pile on here....

OpusFSX - probably the best weather and motion software available for FSX.  It does not have textures like REX, but has live weather and has accurate weather over the runway up to 200km away.  It also has a dynamic head movement and camera shake added to turbulence and movement of the A/C.

ORBX FTX Global - Excellent ground textures and has 3d night lighting that has 0 effect on FPS.  Take a look at some of my screen shots to get a feel of what it is.  This is not a landclass or mesh software, it currently is textures only.  For mesh I would recommend FS Genesis and Scenery Tech for landclass.

AirHauler - Like already mentioned, it is an excellent program and give meaning to flying.  An excellent way to run a business and fly.

MyTrafficX - very good traffic software, I normally run at around %16 traffic for both.

Payware A/C I have a tone of A/C but a couple of my favorites are: A2A B-17 w/ accusim, Airbus X Extended, CS 777 and 707, Anything by Carenado or PMDG and the list continues........

C-117D Skytrooper (Freeware)
http://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/fslib.php?searchid=14051235

PE



Toonces

Ok, I'm going to spend the day re-installing FSX and configuring it.

I have my eye on a few planes, so I'm going to figure out what I have that still works and maybe buy one or two more.

I saw that FS Passengers has a free demo so I might try that out and then, once all of that is running, I'm going to look into Air Hauler some more as well. 

I suspect this will take some time, so step one, install FSX is up...
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

jomni

@Tuna

I'm too late and it looks like you have gotten a hang of it.  They are right. Talking to ATC will get you in the proper vector and altitude to intercept the localiser and glideslope.
But take note that FS default ATC is not very good because of the instructions that it gives you.  As suggested, the add-on called Radar Contact does a better job.  Or if you want to deal with real people doing ATC then try flying in the VATSIM network as I do.

To bring things to the next level, you need to learn how to read and fly charts.  With the approaches indicated in the charts, you can safely get into position even without ATC instruction (actually FSX default ATC might ask you to run into a mountain).  This is how real world pilots do things. 

This website has some very useful tutorials http://www.navfltsm.addr.com/

So after your first successful ILS landing, you say "Yay! I'm now one level up."
But you should remember to keep practicing landing without ILS (do VOR approaches) as not all airports have ILS.
These manual VOR approaches can be very satisfying to those jaded with the routine of ILS landings.

-------------------------------

@Toonces
As for other recommendations.  If you want updated graphics, I highly recommend getting the ENB mod.  The is one .dll, an .ini, and probably a palette file that you add in your main FSX install.  You can get several ENB packages off the net.  Alternatively you can use SweetFx.  It does almost the same thing as ENB.


ENB - http://jomnisgames.blogspot.com/2012/01/rex-natural-enbplus.html
SweetFx - http://jomnisgames.blogspot.com/2013/03/sweetfx-in-fsx.html

If you want really nice ground textures, I recommend FTX Global.  But take note that it is expensive at nearly $100. 
http://fullterrain.com/product_ftxglobal.html

That's just the tip of things.  I also have REX for environment textures. But I don't use their weather engine and use OPUS instead.
REX - http://www.realenvironmentxtreme.com/
Opus - http://www.opussoftware.co.uk/opusfsi.htm

Not to mention the planes. 

As you can see, it can get to be a very expensive hobby.  But I fly more hours than I play wargames these days so it's all worth it.  Flightsim is permanently in my hard drive throughout the years.



Toonces

Thanks for the tips.  I'm going to spend some time with the basics and ensure it grabs me before I go overboard on extras.  I'm hoping that Air Hauler or FX Passengers gets me interested in civilian flying.

I'll keep you guys posted.
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

Toonces

It's like riding a bike!

Took up a Cessna 172 to configure the controls, did a quick hop from Dillingham to Honolulu Intl, then booted up the CRJ700 and did a quick VFR flight from Dillingham to HNL visual into 4L for a full stop. 

The stock aircraft have really improved from FS9 it seems.

Ok, now to see what's what with this Air Hauler and FS Passengers business!
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

Tuna

LOL.. I don't even know what commands to use to talk to the ATC.. I guess that will be the next thing to teach myself!

I did a VOR landing last night in the 737... I landed.. alive, no crash.. but it was ugly as heck.. good thing that's just flat grass next to the runways!

Toonces

I am shocked at how much I am enjoying flying FSX and civilian sims in general again.  I don't think I've properly flown a civvie sim about 8 years or more!

I bought Air Hauler and started a company flying out of Deep Water Cay in the Bahamas on medium using the Grand Caravan.  I did one flight but once I realized I had gooned some stuff off, and the novelty of flying a Grand Caravan at 120kts over long stretches of uninteresting water wore off, I restarted a company on easy flying out of Atlantic City.  Did two routes yesterday in the Lear 45.  Was passing 3,500 for 5,000 out of ACY for Syracuse last night when we had a massive power failure in the neighborhood, so I'll have to see what the did to my career mode.

I haven't bought any other expansions yet but I can already tell I'm going to need to upgrade some stuff.  I debated buying MyTraffic 2013, but decided to try World of AI first and see if that's acceptable.  I downloaded most of the U.S. routes last night but haven't tried them in sim yet.  I also downloaded the demo for FS Passengers and a freeware Pan Am L-1011 but haven't tried either of those yet.  I think I'm going to prefer Air Hauler to FS Passengers, but I really want to fly some heavier jets! 

I'm going to log a few hours again today (in fact, right after I hit post) and then probably look at some more add-ons.  The Radar Contact add-on has been repeatedly recommended here and on other sites.

I find the Lear extremely difficult to fly.  I mean, if you want to keep it under 250kts under 10k you really have to be ahead of the jet after rotate.  The key seems to be to have the autopilot parameters set up before you take off so you can click that puppy on and get the jet under control as fast as possible.  Very twitchy and overpowered airplane!
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

JudgeDredd

Air Hauler is better than FS Passengers imo. I had originally got FS Passengers and it did the trick - but Air Hauler seems a bit more polished and there's more variety.

I made the same mistake with Air Hauler - choosing the wrong base! Flying for ages to make $2-4k was not fun. And I was in a Cessna (I choose the hardcore route).

I had my reputation up to 42.5 (you get 0.5 rep for every successful delivery) and then it happened! I choose a haulage job where I had to complete it in 24 hours...forgot about it and by the time I completed it I was 2 hours over. I lost 2 rep points putting me back down to 40.5  >:(

The Cessna route is very difficult. Smaller jobs, less money, slow aircraft.
Alba gu' brath

JudgeDredd

So how do you actually get moving in the Learjet?

I've managed to start the engines - but my throttles are having no effect - and I hear the engines whining up - then whining down again all on their own!
Alba gu' brath

Toonces

The engines take a few seconds to spool up and down.  Give it about 46% and wait till it gets moving before you kick the rudders.  You have to taxi with power on.
"If you had a chance, right now, to go back in time and stop Hitler, wouldn't you do it?  I mean, I personally wouldn't stop him because I think he's awesome." - Eric Cartman

"Does a watch list mean you are being watched or is it a come on to Toonces?" - Biggs

JudgeDredd

Nah - something else is going wrong.

I watched a video and the startup was like this:
1. Make sure batteries are on
2. Turn on avionics
3. Turn on engine generators
4. Turn on left and right ignition
5. Start left engine
6. Left engine spools to 7 then suddenly jumps up to 60+ - then back down to idle
7. Repeat steps 4, 5 and 6 for right engine

The problem I've got is when I start the left engine (6), my rpm doesn't spool above 8.3. And if I just sit and wait there, it sounds like the engine is spooling up (whining noise increases) and then spooling down (whining noise decreases) and just keeps doing this - all the while the RPM stays at 8.3

This was the vid I watched
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eR4VoMN6gig
Alba gu' brath

Yskonyn

"Pilots do not get paid for what they do daily, but they get paid for what they are capable of doing.
However, if pilots would need to do daily what they are capable of doing, nobody would dare to fly anymore."