neilends

Have you watched the mini-series that came out a year or so ago, on Chernobyl? If you haven't, it is spectacularly well done. It holds special meaning now given the pandemic. Then, just as now (at least in my country), scientists tried to speak, but government was too incompetent to listen. But I'd better get off that soap box.

Sold! :D

Even the back of the plane is [an intentional] piece of crap: Sunset over Viti Levu, Fiji:

The game delivers moments sometimes that makes one feel like it's a freaking work of art. Playing the "Skypark" game, I was tasked with smuggling a bunch of glass bongs between two villages in Fiji. (I work in government so this was obviously a task I accepted because of my status as an undercover agent. I do not condone any smuggling activities or bonging activities.) I chose to accomplish this using old school methods through and through. First, I opted for the Cessna 152. Second, I opted for an add-on that I cannot believe is free. If you like Cessnas, you must give this livery a shot, known as "Rusty Mess" (link). While the exterior might be a tad excessive, the dude who created the interior is, I again insist, an artist. Even the knobs are broken! Anyway, with the 152 choice I also forced the choice on myself of not having any GPS technology. I would need to rely on VOR alone, and I did not have autopilot either. I had to scratch down some notes in my pre-flight planning to get all this done. As the sun set over Fiji, I took off from Vatulele Airport on the island of the same name, on a 330 radial toward the VOR station located close to Nadi International Airport. Most of this leg took me over Fiji's largest and principal island known as Viti Levu, and the scenery was gorgeous. Upon reaching the Nadi VOR, I headed out toward the ocean on the pre-planned 357 radial from the VOR. As I labored to keep the plane on the radial, it was THIS leg and this moment that finally made it click for me on how VOR's radials work. Without autopilot, it was a chore to maintain a particular altitude and I wound up floating up to about 14,000 feet (the C152's ceiling is 10,000). So as I approached my destination, a dirt strip on Yasawa Island, I turned off the engine to float and glide down for a while. I was using VR by the way. The sun had set. The colors were brilliant. The sound of the wind was in my ears. The rusted, worn out interior of my plane and the lack of any fancy computers telling me where to go just added to the effect. Landing was smooth as butter.

Let us know if you find a good link for the Goose download. The creator seems to have worked really hard to create a cool model, but then he's dumped it on some atrocious websites that make it impossible to download without getting spammed and threatened with viruses.

Two common mistakes I have made whenever this happens: (1) It turns out I didn't reboot MSFS after installing the download. Or, (2) For a third-party add-on, I didn't check to make sure that I am moving the correct folder into the "Community" folder. Some third-party creators complicate things by creating multiple folders, and you then have to figure out which one is the only one that will be recognized by MSFS.

Say, just for kicks if you feel like it, let us know what date/time on UTC you will attempt this crossing again, and let us know what server you will use. With that information we could actually join you on the flight in our own planes. I can't do a lot of group flying because it requires an exact match of personal schedules, but when I have it's been fun.

I've been doing this and it seems to work well. I didn't realize that Asobo was specifically suggesting this method, which means it's not just an urban myth!

Similar story here. I purchased it and do not use it. For one thing, it seemed to cause software crashes to Flight Simulator. But then I noticed that MSFS live weather isn't really so bad anyway. I never load live weather up from the early menus by the way. Load it up only after your flight session is loaded, from the top of the screen menu.

Thanks. That is a super interesting idea, speaking as a student pilot!

How are you using Foreflight with MSFS? Do you have some sim version of it?

Flew from Birpur, a small border town in the Indian state of Bihar, to Lukla, Nepal, in live weather/live time. A C172 cannot really fly in the Himalayan mountain range, so I used a Beechcraft Bonanza which easily has enough power for the climb needed to 18,000 feet or so. It was blue skies in India but almost exactly upon reaching the Himalayan range in Nepal I was hit with very thick cloud cover. I stayed on top of it for the most part but knew that the descent would be challenging. Lukla is elevation 9,000 but it's surrounded by peaks that are about 14,000 feet. The Bonanza has some de-icing equipment but not anything for the windshield, unless I've overlooked something. Sure enough, during the descent, the windshield iced up about as badly as I've ever experienced anywhere. Despite being in VR mode and having one or two small clear views through the front window, I could barely navigate a path to safely descend through the multiple turns needed for the runway, though I did get it in sight. Sadly, I crashed and died, becoming one of the many statistics of pilots who took on the Lukla challenge.

I like flying the C-172 in challenging mountain areas like that. You'll need nav-aids and also a comfort level with the topo technology of your G-1000 display, assuming you're flying the expensive version of the C172 (not the classic version). You have to turn the topo features on with a button. That way you can kind of route-pick on the fly. Your fatality rate will still be anywhere from 25 to 50%, in my experience anyway. Without the topo it's probably more like 75%.

This is a very rudimentary attempt at the Spirit of St. Louis, but I gave it a shot for kicks and it was fun/interesting. For this the VR headset is a huge advantage, because the line of vision from the pilot's seat is so bizarre. I don't know how accurate the model is, and nor did I figure out whether the fuel capacity and fuel efficiency are correct (for purposes of an Atlantic crossing). http://www.allflightmods.com/microsoft-flight-simulator-2020/msfs2020-aircraft/spirit-of-st-louis-aircraft/

I think snow on the ground is a problem, and something MSFS has been working on. I fly a lot in Alaska and it seems to be improving. This might be an urban myth, but I've heard that it's better, if you're trying to trigger accurate live weather, to only turn it on after you have loaded your flight up. In other words, don't turn live weather on from the main menu or navigation map before the flight loads up. Instead, set it to clear skies when you load up. Then, once you're in the plane, go up to the top of your screen and change conditions to live time and live weather. I've been doing this and it seems to work well.

Canary Islands, Spain.

There are many trained pilots here so I speak humbly and subject to correction, but in the US many small airports are "non-towered," so there is no ATC. Instead, pilots in the area tune in to the "traffic" frequency for that airport, and publicly announce their intentions one at a time. That way the pilots in theory are all communicating with each other, rather than relying on an ATC professional to do the communicating and coordinating. Of course this assumes and requires that pilots actually do tune in to the traffic frequency, and accurately communicate their position and intention, and that they do so frequently.

My specific reason for flying to Tonga in MSFS was that it was reasonably close by, and accessible by the plane that I prefer to use, the Cessna 172. When I was in Fiji in real life, I learned that Tonga was a "neighboring" island nation to Fiji (although they are quite far), because the island I was visiting happened to be flooded that week with volcanic material. Where did the volcanic material come from? Locals told me it was from a small eruption in Tonga. That was pretty fascinating to learn. Fast forward about a decade and I had not really thought about Tonga again. Until I saw on the maps and nav charts of MFS that, through a few longer flights, I could actually reach Tonga by on a C172. Once I did so, I flew all over the Tongan islands. As I did so, it may interest you to know, I googled a lot and learned about the specific islands I was visiting, their airports, and general information about the country. I'm sure many MSF users do this. Anyway, end result: Tonga is now stuck in my brain.

I find these totally fascinating, but they can now be found all over the place so I figured a thread is justified. Nuuk, Greenland, South: Nuuk, Greenland, North: Lake Hood, Anchorage, Alaska (currently down at the moment but expected to be up again soon): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GtcfNZoXCk

I filled out the survey and it is legitimate. The author also has a LinkedIn profile that corroborates who he is. As for the topic, I am the son of a United Nations diplomat and have lived in 5 countries on 3 continents, so traveling the world is in my blood. I am always hungry for it, and I am very blessed to have seen many different parts of the world. How does MFS impact my views? Quite a bit, because I am already a travel nut and flying to places I am curious about makes me even *more* nutty about seeing them in real life. Example: I have traveled in real life to Fiji, so I decided to fly around out there in MFS. In doing so I decided to venture out and fly to the Kingdom of Tonga. Now, as my wife can attest, I am insisting that our next opportunity to travel whenever it may come up, we actually visit Tonga.

I'm getting close to reaching the Arctic Ocean on my Cessna 172 journey across Alaska, in live weather in February/March, most of which has been borderline suicidal so far. There was literally zero visibility on my latest leg. Without the fancy G1000 installed in the MSFS version of this plane, I would have no chance of finding the runway, much less avoiding most mountains. To finish this journey, I will attempt to wait things out until the weather actually clears up, which again may be a pipe dream in March in Alaska, but I'll see. Full details and pics here: https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/trip-journal-alaska-top-to-bottom-in-a-cessna-172/372044/7?u=sudburian

Following this thread, because I've had similar problems. I am able to start a C-172 by turning the ignition the old fashioned way. But there are other planes where I am apparently missing something, because I turn the ignition, the engine starts, the propellers begin moving, and then it dies. There is a fuel pump switch and shut-off valve in the C-172 and both do work. I don't know about C-152s.

As long as I'm on a roll, there is a super cool live webcam of the Lake Hood airport here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GtcfNZoXCk&feature=emb_title

Little Navmap is very convenient for this function. You will have to tab to its separate window when you want that larger view, but as far as I know it's the best way to accomplish this for now. And the tabbing doesn't bother me that much.

Is it this one? https://flightsim.to/file/2041/lake-hood-airport