Comments about the A36

[cloudflyer]

First of all, it's a fantastic model and handles pretty much like the real one. I love all the equipment in it. Two things bother me though. When the engine is shut down, there is instant silence. There should be some lingering/diminishing noises as the engine comes to a halt. Second problem is the plane flies at an unusually high AOA on approach between 70 and 80 kts. In the flare, the tail comes close to hitting. Looks unrealstic in spot mode too. I fly with the CG at the rearmost station to avoid this. Other than that, it's worth every penny.

Michael

[Lou_Betti]

Hi Michael,

Glad you like. :-)

We do not have "free reign" when it comes to sounds in FS, we do the best we can within what MS provides us, and the sounds were recorded form the actual aircraft we modeled, so what is there is what came from the real thing. Not sure we would want to add something that didn't come from it. ;-)

Julie, the owner of the real A36 we modeled was extremely pleased with the aircraft's flight dynamics in all phases of flight, along with all the other beta testers, several of whom are also real pilots, including myself.

Regards,
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[font size=1][font color=blue]Can you pilot a plane, instead of programming an FMC to do it for you?[/font color= blue][/font size=1]

[alastairmonk]

Hi Michael,

If you check the manual (p 6-5) you'll see that the minimum safe airspeed with full 30-degree flaps is 79 KIAS. If you approach at closer to 85 KIAS the cockpit view is much better ! See what you think.

Alastair

[metzgergva]

AoA have been modelled excactly to real flight data. Check you load on landing that you did not fill her up too much and use the speed guidance in the manual and on the kneeboard (F10)

[nojwod]

I find normal approach speed across the threshold is about 90kts with a full load of fuel. it will serttle quite nicely from there with just a little power on. It's not a Cessna and doesn't land like one. In some respects it provides a good basis for a twin.

Happy flying

John

[nojwod]

I also forgot to mention that MSFS models normal air right down to touchdown. So where you would be getting ground effect in the real world, you don't here. This means that if you flare a little in MSFS and the aircraft descends the last few feet a bit faster than you'd expect, and you don't actually bounce, it probably means that in real life you'd have accomplished a sweet touchdown.

When flying the bigger iron in MSFS, where the ground effect will start to affect the descent rate at 30 feet, I'm quite happy if it looks like it was a slightly heavy landing on replay. Trying to emulate the kiss type touchdowns usually results in an unrealistically high nose up attitude in the sim. I'll take the more realistic attitude anyday.

Hopefully in the next version of MSFS they'll model ground effect. Shouldn't be that hard to do. Just increase lift component a few percent when the aircraft is at a percentage of its wingspan above the ground, and although not perfect, it would model real world behaviour reasonably well.

[metzgergva]

Don't know where you get your information from, but the ground effect is modelled on the A36.

[zfehr]

And one of the best jobs of modeling ground effect to date. Are you responsible for this Alexander? If so my congratulations on a fine job.

Best,
Zane

[nojwod]

then I stand corrected... to a point. All I can say is I find the ground effect a little weaker than what I perceive in reality. But now we're straying into personal impressions so best we leave this one alone!

[flyinggriffin]

With heavier airplanes you have to keep some power into the flare untill you touch. Doing a power off landing will most times end up with you dropping it in. The natural tendency is to chop the power as you flare. If the planes C/g is towards the nose, chopping power will cause it to drop.

True story about a Bonanza pilot who carried way too much airspeed on a night landing. I was out doing some night work and flew back to the airport. My plane was behind a Bonanza that was doing a straight in instrument approach at the speed of heat. I turned behind him on final and was chugging along. As I am on short final the tower gives the A-36 the usual.." left turn at Delta, stay on this frequency" The Beech driver radios back that he hasn't touched down yet. Mind you, the runway is 7000ft long and Delta is about 5,000ft from the approach end. This guy was 2/3s down the runway and still had not slowed down enough to land. He finally slammed it down and smoked the brakes, using the whole runway. Yours truly had to go around, one of the many I have had to do as result of someone messing up in front of me.

[nojwod]

HOwdy Grffin

Yep, I'm a power on man as you recommend. My beef with FS is that to obtain a realistic flare where the heavy sits a few feet above the ground as the last 10 knots washes off, the nose-up angle is generally about 50% greater than in real life. That's all, and it's not a serious problem. That's why with a realistic speed, flare and nose-up angle, an Fs heavy will still fly gently into the tarmac rather than float on a ground effect cushion of air.

It's possible that FS would need to model a few ground effect stages as it transitioned through the last 50ft of altitude, to truly reflect reality, and I'm unlikely to see that in the near future..

[metzgergva]

To give you some insight. The ground efect is modelled in FS as a curve of additional lift as a function of height over surface. So it is up to each flight dynamics designer to adjust it for the plane he designs. It is relatively easy, but difficult to get the right data as in real you can't do what we can do in FS - fly at 5 ft above ground over water to measure it....

So it is a lot of guessing or you have a pilot knowing his plane very well and can give you a feel for it.

Enjoy the Bonanza!

PS: Thank you Zane for your kind words.

[zfehr]

Hi Alexander,

Noticed the Katana in your sig and looked up the docs on it... yep, you did the FD for that too. I'm looking forward to your next project ;).

Zane