MAD1

Hi Joop. Are you including either built-in ('canned') or real-time weather in your sim? Interesting to consider it. Of course, in the Learjet you fly way above the soup, however as not all airports in your flight plan have ILS e.g. Bamaga, departing and more critically landing could be a challenge. You might have to wait a few days for a particular leg to be VFR conditions at your destination airport at least. Here is the current satellite imagery of cloud (via our Australian Bureau of Meteorology and the Japan Meteorological Agency satellite Himawari 8) http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/satellite. http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/satellite/?tz=AEST&unit=p23&domain=15&view=06&satSubmit=Refresh+View 'IDY28000 Australian Government Bureau of Meteorology Bureau National Operations Centre Satellite Notes for 1800UTC Chart Issued at 9:14 am EDT Thursday on 01 December 2022 ... Another trough lies off the Top End coast and connects to a low moving east over the western coast of Cape York Peninsula ... Showers and thunderstorms can also be seen over the Arafura Sea, Gulf of Carpentaria, Cape York Peninsula including the Torres Strait ...'.

Thanks daspinall for the info. Interesting that the radio direction finding equipment wasn't working. Perhaps an accident, perhaps not (many good things e.g. discoveries, and bad things e.g. tragic events, happen via an accidental alignment of random events). Suggest it'd be good for you to start your own thread re the Amelia circumnavigation attempt (so as not to steal Joop's thunder in this thread). Doesn't matter if you don't get to do the flight for a year etc., am sure like me, many simmers worldwide would find your flight planning interesting to follow, plus the related geographical and historical tidbits.

The island is US territory, and much US activity in the 1930s and WW2.

Wow Joop, over to the Aussie continent (contrary to what some people claim, Aus IS the largest island in the world as well as being a continent), to Bamaga, Cape York, Queensland. IATA: ABM, ICAO: YNPE. I'll have to clean up the place to welcome you, and (in my imagination) get to Bamaga to welcome you on landing with a beer and a tour around the local area! Here is the local info https://www.nparc.qld.gov.au/services/airport and by the way, I work (from home) in a Queensland government department, in geographic data management (GIS) for water management. So, your original route map will need updating. Also, daspinall, the Amelia flight would be very interesting to follow. I recall she disappeared over the Pacific, is that right? Yes, Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amelia_Earhart : 'During an attempt at becoming the first woman to complete a circumnavigational flight of the globe in 1937 in a Purdue-funded Lockheed Model 10-E Electra, Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappeared over the central Pacific Ocean near Howland Island. The two were last seen in Lae, New Guinea, on July 2, 1937, on the last land stop before Howland Island and one of their final legs of the flight. She presumably died in the Pacific during the circumnavigation'. Just read the local council blurb. Interesting, especially the WW2 history and the two wrecks - Beaufort and DC3. Wikipedia has the airport listed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Peninsula_Airport and Cape York IS a very remote area, and that area is has a very high indigenous population. I haven't been to Cape York (been to Cairns and Atherton Tableland, at the southern end, but would like to go someday). In the Wet season (monsoon) in summer, huge rainfalls occur and many places get cut off for months. Now, serendipitty, just reading the Wikipedia article re Howland Island, much content relevant to airmen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howland_Island. I didn't know anything about the island or neighbouring islands. There are so many stories, unknown, about islands in the Pacific, and the WW2 and subsequent history is unknown to most folks. Fascinating!!! And this is our 'near north'!

Good luck Joop with your fuel planning. And if you get it wrong, you'll be enjoying a nice swim in the Pacific Ocean!

In recent years it's never been better to be an 'armchair tourist', whereby with e.g. Google Earth and Maps, and Streetview, plus Wikipedia, one can wander the globe, almost as good as doing it for real (however nothing replaces actually being there). Indeed, it's great for nostalgia, revisiting places one has actually been to. I also do the same as CRJ_simpilot and enjoy Streetview to explore. Putting all that into your FS experience provides a rich environment, only needs a little imagination to pretend you flew into an airport, with a few circuits before landing (or as Joop does, jump into another aircraft to get an overview of the place), then hire a car and went into town to see the sites.

Hi chris34, somehow I missed your first two posts 4-5-22, 8-3-22, or vaguely remember the posts, however I don't recall looking at your YouTube. Just watched your 'Love letter to Flight Simulator 2004'. Beautifully done sir, lovely music and your dulcit voice commentary, and I love the gentle pace of the video. Very professional video work, Hollywood quality. Will now watch the 747 video on this lovely sunny late spring morning here in the Northern Rivers region of New South Wales, Australia. You have a new fan! You've captured the essence of the joy, fraternity and pure altruism that is the flight sim community.

Hi Joop, glad you're back, thought I might have invaded your adventure too much and you decided to stop communicating. Of course, European summer holiday season explains you're absence. Haven't read in detail your last two posts yet or watched the videos, will enjoy them. Thanks for the info re your flight planning, interesting. Enjoy your eastward journey towards my part of the world.

'Don't change nuthin'! As others have said, call it whatever you want on your own home installation. In the forums, this flightsim.com, and elsewhere, there is enough alternative naming already to cause confusion, especially to newbies. The best and preferred nominal naming is 'FS' FSyyyy for the official year of the product (even though annoyingly Microsoft released each of them the year before!) hence we all understand the naming convention: FS98 (for 1998), FS2000, FS2002, FS2004 (aka FS9), FSX (for the tenth iteration, i.e. FS10, or 2010?), FS2020, ... . The alternative of FS9 etc. (for the 9th iteration of the FS lineage?) we also understand. Whatever any individual wants to use as an alias is their business.

Interesting that this thread was started 13 Nov 2017, here is post number 1. Now, 5 years later, it's still occassionally picked up. Moto: 'FS2002 lives!'. Re Rod Machado, see https://rodmachado.com

Hi Joop, have watched Stage 2 and now just watching this Monday morning here your Stage 3 Rome to Athens https://youtu.be/YuCw9vu1LYo. As I've never used any flight planning in my FS2002, but have wanted to, am interested in your flight planning. What is your strategy/logic? Is it basically the simplest direct route, or do you let FS2004 guide you? Does the sim recommend a route e.g. with AI enabled, are there smarts built into the sim that help you plan your flight? Am interested to follow the route using Google Maps and plot those waypoints, then fly via Google Maps the route (given that all my computers went under water in the catastropic flood here Feb 28 this year, but I do have the original FS2002, and FS2000, boxed sims (didn't go under water, the plastic box I store them in floated!) including original CDs so can re-install FS2002 when I get time to do so). One thing I like about your project, it seems simple and 'off the shelf' software, just the sim and the built-in functionality in it. Hence any of us with only the standard sim can do the same. Shows that it's indeed possible to have both fun and a fairly realistic flying experience with an old sim (that runs on older, cheaper hardware), without going out and trying to find the newest gadgets. This is my world, my trusty FS2002, so much built-in functionality. Finally, your landings are very smooth, looks like you're on automatic, not manually flying the final few seconds before the flare and wheel-touch. Is that so? Does the Learjet have that functionality, flying e.g. an ILS all the way to touchdown? Cheers, your 'armchair co-pilot'. MAD1.

Just watched the first video Stage 1 entirely. Very good, nicely done video.

Very interesting is your commentary - I like the comments about the experience on each leg, both visually and with the actual flying. Having done some of that route - the long haul Australia to London, Australia to LA etc. a few times in my life as a passenger in e.g. a 747, it brings back memories of some views out the window. Keep posting your progress as you do each leg please, as I and possibly some other people are keeping you company as 'armchair tourists' or in this case 'armchair flyers'. I just had a quick look at your first YouTube video (didn't watch all of it, only a few snippets), very nice, well done. So I can and will definitely be sitting in the copilot's seat and fly the world with you! (Especially given that all my PCs and FS2002 is not working these days, having been flooded to the roof in my house in Feb 2020, so being able to be in the cockpit and be a passenger is very good, including the sound. Just like being there - in the sim that is!)

Will be interesting to watch your progress along the route. Being in Australia, am interested in the airports you've selected near me, I see on your route map that it's across Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, then I think it looks like New Caledonia, the islands across the Pacific. Without checking the atlas, I think it's Fiji, ?, Hawaii, LA. Could you provide a list in this chat of those airports please. Someday I'd like to do a similar around-the-world flight. But that'll have to wait until retirement I think. Good luck with the trip.

There is a vast library of scenery available, some development by commercial scenery businesses and some developed by 'amateurs', all of which was built with different types of software and techniques. Give us some more info about what you are interested in. Also, to clarify, this forum is for the very old Flight Simulater 2002 version (the year 2002) not to be confused with the newest variant 'Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020' which many people refer to as FS2020 and which has it's own forum in FlightSim.com.

I have limited time to devote to my 'hobby', have looked at a couple of his videos, and yes indeed, they are excellent. There is so much info out there re flight instruction, it can all be a bit overwhelming. But, I suppose that just indicates the passion of such a vast international fraternity, which is a good thing. Thanks lnuss for reminding us of those videos.

Wow NMLW (poster 6), 18,183 posts! I agree with ViperPilot2 (poster 3) 'it'll run on just about any old computer out there ...What better way to introduce someone new to FlightSim? For us old gummers on a budget, FS9 is an ideal platform, with decades worth of content to draw from.'. Good design and a good product will last. The fact it has endured in the sim community (with many sharp critics), if it continues to be heralded by those critics, it must be good. As a professionally trained IT guy, similar to a bicycle, once the fundamental design is sorted out, there's nothing to change except tweaking around the edges, pretty cosmetics etc. And if it does a reasonably good job as a flight sim, not just eye candy or a gamey thing, then it will endure. Other posters here also give the evidence of 'why?' And if endorsed by the 'old boys', as it has in this thread, then the jury is in, it's simply good! (For me, being FS2002, its predecessor, I feel much the same way about FS2002, seems to have everything I need as an occasional user, again not wanting to blow a load of cash on hardware. I hope to upgrade to FS2004/FS9 sometime. As the saying goes 'if it ain't broke don't fix it' might be morphed to 'if it makes you happy, don't change nothin'!

I have the Logitech Extreme 3d Pro, bought new maybe 10 years ago Australian $50. Well made, have hardly used it as I find it too 'sharp', i.e. reactive in its movements, but then again I didn't spend much time to fiddle with the settings in my FS2002 setup. Then I came across an old yoke, which was much more gentle and responsive to small movements. When I get a chance (that damn stuff keeps interfering - life, work, wife, household chores etc. etc.) would like to revisit it.

Hi ftldave, when I lived in London for 2 years 1981-82 I went to Farnborough once, must have been 1981, a dream fulfilment, and saw the British Concorde do a low pass. Wonderful. Yes, agree with all that you say, but it seems the Overture will really happen. And yes, maybe the Overture is just so much hoop la. We'll see. The new aviation fuels are real, a major theme at this years Farnborough apparently. I think all this new world 21st century thinking is wonderful. About bloody time (to use the UK/Aussie vernacular). Wow, 1999, was it that long ago, no wonder I'm feeling old, that tragedy seems much more recent. And the US recent floods we saw on TV was Kentucky.

Well CRJ_simpilot your post is up to your usual standard, very interesting if a bit strange - the anti-gravity thing I mean, certainly the quantum computing thing is a reality, if only in a research sense. Re weather and climate, we see on the news here about the devastating floods in Texas I think it was recently, plus the wildfires in California I think, and just today, more heatwaves and fires in Europe, and 40+ degrees C in England, unheard of. Could this be climate change in action as predicted 40 years ago? Something seems to be happening, more intense and more frequent extreme weather. Re supersonics, I wonder if any of you are interested to get your hands on a sim of e.g. the Overture or XB-1. No doubt somebody will put out a sim soonish. Keep calm and safe CRJ_simpilot, the world needs people like you to rattle our traditional thinking.

Hi all, am finally back in FlightSim after being flooded to the ceiling Feb 28 in unprecedented Australian east coast flooding event. My town's floodplain central area was devastated, 2.4m above the highest known floods, 1 in 100 year level, in 1954 and 1974. Will be years before we all recover. PCs all went under, so no sim setup for awhile yet. But, good to be able to read the forums etc. Listening today to our national radio Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Science Show, had a guy at Farnborough Air Show talking about the Overture supersonic passenger aircraft with totally synthetic fuels being developed by Boom (http://boomsupersonic.com) slated to launch in 2026, to be the first passenger ship since Concord, as well as their XB-1. Also how they are or going to make the fuel using hydrogen and carbon dioxide taken from the air, using a modified industrial process that was developed in the 1920s (which used carbon monoxide, which they said the Germans used in WW2). Interesting times ahead. Your thoughts?

Hi djtnm, good to hear. There's nothing wrong with FS2002, it's a good sim, and as you found, dirt cheap and available. I also have the box, CDs in pristine condition. (And also the box, CDs in pristine condition for FS2000). My friend found them at the local recycle centre, free, and gave them to me 15 years ago. Has the advantage they'll run very nicely on older software e.g. WinXP and newer, and on older, cheaper hardware. For a general sim experience they're very good.

I've found all information replies in this thread very informative. (Am only messing with the Cessna 172 for now, but desire is to graduate up to airliner stuff someday, so the complex replies including mrzippy's RW airline info is very handy). The key golden rule is 'LOW and SLOW is a killer', so only be in that zone on take-off and final approach for landing. Hence, initial climb goal is to get to a safe altitude as quickly as possible, e.g. circuit height (nominally 1000 ft above ground level, AGL) or above. Doesn't matter what aircraft type, GA or bigger. Planes don't perform well if used as a farmer's plough, they don't like burying themselves in dirt, and the only part to touch the ground should be the tyres. (Captarnaud's other post is related What-is-the-safe-altitude-to-make-a-turn-after-take-off.)

Common sense applies as well as regulations. I only learnt to fly a Blanik glider, and the golden rule drummed into me was 'height is safety', given no engine. Of course, you can turn at any time, your choice (but you might incur the wrath of the authorities and fellow pilots), but given the aircraft flies most efficiently and safely with level wings, the worst situation to be in is in a climb, slow, nose up, wings not level, i.e. in a turn attitude, and LOW and SLOW, when the engine sputters and conks out. Bad situation. With that wing dipped you're in a configuration to go into a stall spin without sufficient altitude to recover (your 'new best friend' will be the ground and you'll enjoy a holiday in hospital, if you survive). Better to climb straight out for awhile e.g. to pass the 500 ft Above Ground Level (AGL) before doing anything. Get as high as possible as quickly as possible, so set yourself up for maximum climb rate, e.g. I think in the Cessna 172 type its about 80 knots roughly, full throttle. Simply concentrate on getting to a safe altitutude and form a nice rectangular circuit if doing circuit practice, e.g. start (it takes time) a slow, gentle 90 degree turn left about 500' , then do the next turn 90 degree left at about 1000' (say start at 900) so that you join the 'downwind leg' at the nominal 1000' circuit height. Other pilots in the circuit will appreciate your proper and fully expected behaviour. By getting into this simple, comfortable routine, your mind and body (that 'seat of the pants' feel) has time to focus on each leg of the climb out, nothing is rushed, and you are one with the aircraft. The same applies to landing, and what you intend to do on the flight - plan everything before you get in the plane, including knowing what turns you are going to make, at what altitude etc. Flying can then be enjoyable with minimal stress.