Flight1 Pilatus PC-12

By Andrew Herd (24 June 2005)

he Pilatus PC-12 is thoroughly modern aircraft, which was first announced in the late eighties - aimed at the lucrative Raytheon/Beech King Air market. At the time it was seen as a cheeky move, but wise heads in the industry pointed at how well the Swiss company's previous products had been designed - and the fact that the King Air was nearly twenty years old. It turned out to be wise counsel, because is wasn't long before the PC-12 line was shifting nearly a third more hulls than its rival.

The prototype PC-12 flew in 1991, with certification following in Switzerland in '93 and in the US a year later. Pilatus offer several versions ranging from the 'standard' nine seater regional airliner, through a four seat passenger/cargo combi, a six place corporate layout and a pure cargo lifter; all of them powered by a single PT6A-67B turboprop. One of the attractive features of the PC-12 compared to the King Air, apart from reduced operating costs, is the fact that the cabin is six inches wider and it is remarkably quiet inside - this has meant that most hulls produced to date have been sold to the corporate market, which appreciates the 230 knot economy cruising speed and the VFR range of over 2000 nm.

In the late '90s, a number of countries, including Canada, Australia and the US, cleared single-engined turboprops for IFR commercial passenger carrying operations and this created new opportunities for the PC-12, which is impressively capable by any standards. The reputation of the plane was enhanced by the way the Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia chose it while the hull was still on the drawing board - the King Air was on the RFDS shortlist, but they couldn't afford the operating costs of the twin - with the result that the service now operates eighteen PC-12s. The hull is very flexible and PC-12s are used for a wide variety of purposes including aerial photography and search and rescue; the design has been referred to as the 'ultimate aerial SUV'.

Having written the above, it is surprising to reflect that we haven't seen a first class PC-12 payware addon before, but I guess that the FS product cycle hasn't favored it - before the release of FS2004, we were lucky to see more than a handful of good quality GA planes for each version of Flight Simulator and you could more or less forget the twilight world of the CPL. The one exception was Abacus' excellent 'Corporate Pilot' for FS2000, which was good by the standards of its day, but lacked a PC-12 and offered nothing like the quality you are about to read about here, because Flight1 have gone and done it again, releasing a package that cuts right to the bone of what flight simulation is all about.

The package is a 103 Mb download, protected by Flight1's key system, which requires an Internet connection for product registration and activation. I had no problems with the download or the installation, which used the usual automatic routine. Although downloading is the only way of obtaining the product at the time of writing, I have no doubt that a boxed version will become available in due course, as is normally the case with Flight1's addons.

In addition to placing the aircraft files in the FS2004 folder, the installation creates a new program group under the Flight1 banner, containing links to the PC-12 configuration manager, an operations manual, a tutorial and the text-o-matic utility, which can be used to add additional liveries. Configuration manager allows you the welcome choice English, French, German or Spanish for the callouts; whether or not to include the virtual cockpit; which gauge resolution to use in the virtual cockpit (VC); and whether or not to include a bug and adjustment knob on the airspeed indicator. You don't get any fancy options for setting up passenger load, baggage or fuel, all of which needs to be done via the FS menus - but this is no hardship, really. The operations manual is CHM format with the extended help and search facilities that go with that, and everything you need to know is in there, though the writing keeps to the point and very few words are wasted. In a similar vein, the tutorial talks the reader through each illustrated stage of a PC-12 flight; a clever idea that makes the package an ideal first purchase for readers who have never bought an FS addon before. Just make sure you have the speakers switched on before you use it, as there is a talk-through of almost every aspect of flying the plane included.

The visual model is extremely good, as internally developed Flight1 planes always are - Flight1 are in the unique position of being a developer which also publishes other developers' software. Internally developed Flight1 products include a Cessna 152, 172, 441, 421C and a Piper Meridian, all of which are superb; and the PC-12 is a worthy addition to the list, although it is about as idiosyncratic an aircraft as you are ever likely to see. Pilatus are well known for designs in which function triumphs over aesthetics, but which end up looking good somehow, the STOL Porter being the best example. The PC-12 follows this tradition and while it doesn't have the sleek looks of the Meridian or even the Socata TBM 700, it can't be said to be unattractive either - and Flight1 have captured its lines very well, as you can see in the screenshots.

Since Flight1 usually provide a single livery for their addons; the PC-12 came as a complete surprise, because there are no less than four different versions. In addition to the 'Standard', there are cargo and executive versions, and the 'Spectre'. The Cargo comes in Canadian colors; the executive with a single Swiss and two (eye-catching) US liveries; the Spectre with a US police scheme that looks a million dollars; and the Standard in a conventional US paint job. All the textures are first class and as you can see in the screenshots, the model includes very fine detailing, including gear bay interiors, aerials, rivet lines and all the decals. Though there is little weathering evident on any of the schemes, the exhausts have the most realistic burnishing I have seen and the complex contours around the nose are done about as well as you could possibly wish.

All the windows are transparent and all the usual gear and control surface animations are present - the pilot stares steadfastly ahead most of the time, but it turns out he is animated if you watch him for long enough (try hitting the spoiler key). As I mentioned earlier, there aren't any fancy moving gizmos in the cockpit, but the passenger and rear doors on the left side both open and watching the way the handles move and the steps fold out as they deploy is an exercise in itself.

As you might expect if you have any of the Flight1 Cessnas or the Meridian, the panel is first class and in an another departure for this developer, all the internal cockpit views are provided, although these use 'VC views' instead of dedicated 2D shots. Past Flight1 releases have followed Microsoft's lead and only shown the panel in the 2D views, for good reason. All round 2D views are always associated with a certain amount of waiting, because the textures involved can take a while to load and skin, though once the bitmaps are in the cache, the delays disappear - the best way to deal with this legacy of FS2004's internal coding is to look left, right and half left and half right before you take off, which will load all the textures before you need them.

The panel is dominated by the Bendix-King Electronic Attitude and Direction Indicator (EADI) and Electronic Horizontal Situation Indicators (EHSI). Bendix-King are a division of Honeywell now and the full system shown here costs over a quarter of a million dollars, which is why you don't see it in many club Cessnas - both instruments can be zoomed in the sim, as shown in the screenshot above right. The GPS is a Bendix-King KLN90B, an IFR approach capable system which would set you back just under $9000 and then you get a pair of KLN165A Nav/Comms ($8000 the pair), a KR87 ADF (just over $3000 if you don't need an antenna), a KT76C transponder ($2300 or so) and a KFC225 autopilot (don't ask). You also get a backup steam HSI, a radar altimeter and a set of digital engine gauges to die for. If I had to fly with a panel like this for the rest of my days, I would be a happy bunny indeed.

I counted a dozen subpanels, including zoomed versions of the EADI/EHSI, radios, GPS, engine instrument system (EIS) and Alt Alert. The other panels are the overhead, pedestal, brakes, trim, EHSI controller, crew alert and warning system (CAWS) and compass. Although there aren't any simicons, the subpanels are called up using hotspots that are logically placed and if you have any of the Flight1 Cessnas, you will probably be able to find them without even looking in the manual. There isn't a right hand seat view, nor is there a landing view, but the forward visibility is excellent, the real plane is certified for single pilot operation and right hand seat flying is a minority sport among simmers anyway (-:

I don't normally get that enthusiastic about FS avionics, but I was most impressed by the EADI. Leaving aside the beauty of the graphic, using the approach mode on this instrument is so intuitive that someone who had never flown an ILS before could probably use it - the only problem is getting the PC-12 set up so it will do what you are asking it <g>. The way 'normal' FS autopilots work is unfortunately not the way many, if not most real world autopilots work, but this is the real McCoy. Setting up a descent in the PC-12 for example, in order to intercept a localiser, means selecting a lower altitude on the Alt Alert, then choosing a descent rate, pressing 'Eng' to put the descent rate into effect and 'Arm' to pass the target altitude to the autopilot. You also need to have the correct Nav source selected using the button set on the panel below the altimeter. Once you make the turn to approach the localiser, hitting Apr on the autopilot will set the plane up in approach mode and all you have to do after that is look after the throttle, gear and flaps.

While many readers will turn their noses up at the idea of a 'text-based' GPS like the one in the panel here, it is a fact that the majority of commercial aircraft presently certified to fly GPS approaches are fitted with such units, because they are they were the only ones to pass Technical Standard Order (TSO), without which instruments cannot legally be relied upon. For example, our Rallye has a GPS in the panel, but we cannot (technically) navigate using it; we can only use it for checking against the map, because it does not have the magic TSO. Given that none of us have a full British instrument rating, and the plane isn't certified for flight in instrument meteorological conditions either, this is hardly a problem, but imagine the temptation if you have an IR and you are in a plane which is IFR certified, but it is fitted with a GPS that is not... Anyway, although it only merits a single page in the reference manual, the GPS in the PC-12 uses the same logic as the default FS2004 unit, with the result that if you can use one, you can use the other.

The VC has moving everything and fully active controls, which means that you could fly the sim entirely in this mode, if you wished. For once, it is possible to move the viewpoint back far enough to have a proper 'pilot's view' and still be able to use the instruments - many FS VC's simply don't allow you to get your virtual nose off the panel without losing the ability to use any of the knobs and switches. As you can see, there is also a virtual cabin, the contents of which change depending on which version of the plane you have loaded. The labels on the boxes make more sense if you read them in conjunction with the credits (-:

The flight model is very good indeed. Internally developed Flight1 products have a deserved repuation for being just about the best there is in terms of balance and attention to realism in the way the avionics work and the planes handle and the PC-12 continues the tradition. Real PC-12s have a reputation of being easy to fly, but not suffering fools gladly and the sim is a pleasure to fly as long as you don't abuse it. Abuse includes not carrying power into the flare, which will result in kangaroo landings, assuming the gear stands up to your arrival, but apart from that, as long as you work your way through the multimedia tutorial, the PC-12 is a pussycat. One of its great attractions is that throttled right back it is capable of maintaining 2500 foot per minute descents without overspeeding and with full flap it is possible to fly impressively steep approaches, though nowhere near the angle a Porter can manage.

The sound set is excellent. Regular readers will be aware of my view that one aeroengine sounds much like another, but the PC-12 has a soundscape all of its own and I just wish all GA planes sounded like it. There is a kind of hushed roar in the cockpit from the PT6A and the switches didn't deafen me, so the addon gets extra marks for bucking the trend.

Overall? Liked it a lot. I said earlier that this addon would make a great first buy for readers who have mastered all the default planes and are looking for something a little different. You get a fast IFR cruiser with a decent range and a terrific rate of climb that can be flown using the Nav radios, once you have mastered the interaction between the Alt Select and the autopilot. More experienced users will have seen at once that this sim breaks a lot of new ground, in being the first I have seen presented with modern Bendix-King flight displays and this alone should trigger a lot of sales.

I didn't discover any show stopping bugs, although I have no doubt there will be a patch at some stage - there always is for FS addons of this complexity - and the combination of an impressive 2D panel, excellent VC, superb visual model and real-as-it-gets flight model triggers another gold Armchair Aviator Award. Regular readers (I have both your addresses) will be wondering what is going on, but there has been such a flush of truly great simulations out recently that I haven't had any choice but to hand the things out. An AAA says that a product can be bought without fear of disappointment and if you enjoy flying the Flight1 PC-12 as much as I did reviewing it, then your money will have been really well spent.