lnuss

Me too. But we had to teach about the Jepps, and I knew plenty of folks who used the Jepps. Since they're around and since some simmers might come across them sometime with a confusion factor, I thought I'd mention them. Great job.

Looks good Phrog- one thing I just discovered that I'd missed, though not overly important in the sim, is to comment on the date found in the right and left margins of the approach plate, which in real life lets you determine if the plate is current, but in the sim will let you know if there's a chance that it may not match the database in the sim (FSX data will date back to 2005 or so). Current charts often don't work right in FSX because of the changes over the last 18 years (on a 56 day update cycle), although the dates shown seem to indicate a 28 day cycle -- is that because the electronic cycle time is different? I might also note for simmers that you are using the NOAA (FAA) issued plates. Lot's of pros use the Jeppessen charts which look different (same info), but are also relatively expensive, certainly not cost effective for sim use.

Check out this site, the Aviation Formulary: http://www.edwilliams.org/avform147.htm

No, you'll still have performance gains as you climb, compared to the normally aspirated engine, since on a typical turbocharged light aircraft, the turbo doesn't really wait to kick in, any more than it does on a diesel truck or motorhome, so that turbo Cessna (maybe a C-182T, not C-172) will be boosted to sea level pressure all the way up to its critical altitude. Critical altitude is the maximum altitude where the engine turbochargers (or turbonormalizers) can maintain sea level standard pressure to the engines. Above the critical altitude the engines will produce less power, although still delivering more power than an normally aspirated engine at the same air density. Here's an excerpt from the avweb article linked below, which says it better than I can: Turbocharging can be employed in two ways. One, known as turbonormalizing, isused to maintain sea level manifold pressure (roughly 30 in. hg.) at altitude, therebyeliminating the progressive horsepower reduction that occurs with normally-aspirated engines as the aircraft climbs. The other, known as turboboosting, boosts manifoldpressure to a value significantly higher than sea level ambient (usually 35 to 45 in. hg.)to provide increased sea level horsepower. Boosted engines normally employ some means toprovide adequate detonation margins, such as reduced compression ratio and intercooling. Check out this article: https://www.avweb.com/ownership/troubleshooting-the-turbo-system/ Wikipedia has a bunch of interesting stuff, some even with animations. Try: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supercharger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbocharger Hope this helps.

Turbocharging doesn't make the difference, but carburetor does. If it has a carburetor it is subject to carburetor icing. Turbocharging doesn't totally eliminate the need for leaning mixtures, but up to its "critical altitude" it can still pull sea level power. It can be used as turbo-normalizing, that is, just keeping the engine fed with air at sea level pressure (29.92" Hg under "standard conditions" which would also be your manifold pressure). Or it can be used to add a higher pressure than normal, again up to its "critical altitude." Some WW II aircraft had superchargers that would let them pull 40" or more of manifold pressure (some quite a bit more), and some aircraft today have turbochargers that boost them up there or more. Higher pressure air helps generate more power by pulling in more fuel in a given time also. Looks like Phrog has more info...

If those processes are consuming a lot of resources, using the CPU heavily, then it might make a difference, but otherwise your suggested cleanup is a pretty fair bet. And if that doesn't do it then perhaps a small fan blowing on the case, through slots in the case, etc. might help. The overclocking might be a part of the problem, too -- that often heats things up under load, such as FSX. While it can't hurt to reduce the number of startup processes, and it'll maybe free up some computer resources, only those with heavy demands would contribute to an overheat.

It sounds as if you have some amount of rudder input, perhaps from a pedal not quite centered. I've seen that in the past and it always involved something generating rudder "deflection."

Keep in mind that it's rare than you CAN climb much over 600-700 fpm in a C-172 and much over 1200 fpm in a Bonanza, and that cruise altitudes for these aircraft are mostly under 10,000 feet above sea level. But it's very true that most inexperienced people have ear problems (pressure build-up or deficit) at rates much past 500 fpm. But most pilots learn to clear their ears more quickly and more frequently than most others learn to do. Some pilots (myself included) can tolerate rates of descent well over 2000 fpm, but it takes special technique. "going a long way horizontally but nowhere much vertically." Your destination isn't all that high, in most cases, but you certainly WANT to go a long ways horizontally, so it's well matched. In the real world (in the sim, do what you want) most of us do, indeed, bear passenger comfort in mind, and while higher climb rates are possible in many aircraft, you do sacrifice horizontal distance over time (i.e. speed) to get a faster rate of climb, and the goal is usually to get to the destination more quickly. So what's the actual problem? Seems well matched to me.

Good to hear they're looking into it Nels. I'd heard of the Wayback machine, but it never occurred to me that this article would show up there. I'm sure happy you thought to check it out. Thanks. Larry

Thanks Nels -- glad it's still accessible. It sure brings back memories... 'Twas fun

Thanks for the compliments. Phrog's Formation Tutorial offered a great look at the overall subject, both real world and sim, but multiplayer adds a few problems and a few advantages as well, and 1) Phrog asked me to do this and 2) I felt that few have had this wonderful experience in the way that Mike and I did it, and the direct connect offers experiences that are different from the server method that forum posts seem to say is the most common form of multiplayer in use. BTW, back in the FS98 days I wrote an article for Flightsim.com titled Fun With Multiplayer about some of the things Mike and I did back then, hoping to encourage other folks to get into this fun (and sometimes challenging) aspect of simming, but like so much of the stuff from the early days I don't find it on this new version of the site. I certainly hope this pair of articles will encourage many others to take up formation flying and to try multiplayer in new and wonderful ways. It's all very special to me.

Beautiful card, Nels - love it. I see you have some station pix on QRZ -- some neat stuff. Yes, propagation plays a big part in a lot of things. With our daily net we certainly see a lot of differences in propagation over time (or even from one minute to the next), and with a net time starting at 1300Z (1200Z in winter) we certainly experience the day/night changeover, too. So we have a couple of nice tools to help us keep things going, such as Netlogger to keep track of checkins and what order to transmit in, as well as SDRs (Software Defined Radio) on the net (Pennsylvania, Georgia and Utah works for us) so that for a station that is weak that day we can still hear him via the net (or check in SWL if not near the shack). 73

I'm not much of a contester, but one of the guys on our morning 40M net (he's in eastern Tennessee) got all thirteen in an hour and a half -- says usually it takes him 4+ hours. On another note, one regular on our morning net flies a Falcon 7000 all over the world. During the Olympics he had a number of Colorado skiers that he took to various venues. We've occasionally talked when he was airborne, once shortly after takeoff from KBJC (northeast Denver/Boulder area). He generally has a lot of interesting stories when he gets back from one of these trips (sometimes a month or two). Another guy is a retired airline pilot, and three or four others are pilots (not all active). One even was in the same field in the Air Force (bomb nav systems on B47/B52) and trained at Lowry (Denver) just as I did. On our weekly Amateur TV net one of the guys is a retired airline pilot. We've gotten together at breakfast a few times, and it gets interesting.e There's several pilots who get together almost daily, around 1600Z, on 7158 for a chat, too. And I've noticed time and again that a lot of pilots are also motorcycle riders and many are into music too. Lotsa common interests. Thanks for posting this. de N8GGG

I'm not quite clear on what you're suggesting I write additional. I probably can add some things if they're needed, though.

Wow! Nicely done! I have a few comments about this in the sim with multiplayer: It's best if you have voice communication with the other player(s) (I've used Microsoft Meeting, Freetel and some others, but for a number of years used a free and open source program called mumble (with the murmur server)- works very well, but sometimes awkward to set up initially - after that it's simple to use. In FS98 (I forget which version changed this) multiplayer formation is difficult because relative positions shown are affected instantly by internet delays, such that you'll sometimes get an instant stop or jump of the other player(s), followed at some point by catching up/corrections. In FSX (and some earlier) MS changed the position keeping to (apparently) use interpolation, that is, with internet delays it assumed the other aircraft are keeping the exact same path, altitude and speed, so that mostly it appears to remain smooth, but on rare occasion you have some sort of jump if the delay lasts too long and you or others have changed path, speed, etc. during the delay. Thankfully that's rare. In real life, any aircraft, ANY aircraft in coordinated flight which are turning at the same bank angle and airspeed will have exactly the same turning radius and rate as any other at that angle and speed. In FSX and before (and in P3D V1 and V2) not all flight models make this happen (actually few do), and it can sometimes be a real headache to change that on any specific aircraft (along with other flight model characteristics), thus making formation flight more difficult than it should be when aircraft don't react the same. A good friend of mine that I flew with enjoyed modifying FS aircraft handling to correct this and other problems, and his corrected aircraft are a joy to fly, some even being spinnable. Unfortunately he passed a few years back. His work handles so well that we could often fly almost as close as the Thunderbirds and Blue Angels, so long as we kept the maneuvers gentle, even through some rolls and (mostly) through loops. T-34 Formation- Carenado Beech T-34 Mentor in P3D V2.4 I'm looking backwards at my wingman- Mike loved to cut up. I'll emphasize, since all too many simmers tend to be a tad ham-fisted, that Phrog's comment about slow and small corrections is EXTREMELY important, and the closer you fly to another aircraft and the faster the speed that you are flying, the more critical this is. It helps TREMENDOUSLY if you not only use the VC as Phrog suggests, but if you have something such as TrackIR for looking around and keeping your eye on lead, though it's far from required, and Mike often didn't use TrackIR, though I always did. Propeller driven aircraft are (mostly) easier to fly formation in than jet aircraft, largely because of the instant power changes available and because of the considerable drag of the prop when reducing power. Jets are very slippery and anticipation is even more important than in props, and slow and small corrections MUST be used to avoid crashes and worse. Finally, a good joystick and some rudder pedals make this easier, though it can be done with a yoke and without pedals, but it's more difficult. I also want to repeat Phrog's warning: Hope I remembered most of the problems in formation flying that the sim introduces vs real life, though the consequences are not quite as bad in the sim.

A nice way of putting it- I find a similar result. And thanks for the additional notes on the subject -- very interesting.

Interesting video- thanks Frank. For history buffs (late 1930s to mid-1950s) also note that Ernest K. Gann's Fate Is The Hunter has an interesting segment about flying The Hump. In Chapter XIII - "Heat" - he is talking about, among other things, the problems with heat and with flying the C-87, the cargo version of the B-24. In my hard back copy the chapter starts on p. 250 (of 385), and the segment on The Hump starts on p. 261 (it runs through p. 271), after some discussion about almost destroying the Taj Mahal after an overloaded takeoff in a C-87 at Agra. He describes some of the goings-on at Chabua and during a flight he took over The Hump, including the way C-47s had to struggle and "hedge hop" on their way through the Himalayas due to lack of performance and considerable overloading, people losses, and more. For history buffs, that book is a marvel, covering a lot of WWII air transport (right from the very beginning of the war and of the efforts that culminated in creating the the Air Transport Command), as well as a great deal of airline history, all from his viewpoint in the cockpit of the airlines with DC-2s and DC-3s, DC-4s, C-87s and more, through the Korean War and up to the mid-50s. "Fate" is a fascinating book, and I learn a bit more each time I read it (I'm almost due again). BTW, the books and movies Island In The Sky and The High And The Mighty (movies surprisingly well done) are fictional stories closely based on some of his wild experiences that he described in "Fate."

Nice article, Nels, well done. You offer a very nice perspective, different from so many, and hopefully many folks will at least appreciate it, but preferably take up your challenge in one way or another. Thanks for this.

OK, I tried Chrome and it eliminated the problem. I was using Waterfox (a Firefox derivative) and there must be something about that one that's incompatible with the site. I also tried Firefox (much later than the Waterfox) and it, too, was fine. Thanks.

Perhaps it's because I haven't registered, but there were huge black chevrons going down the page:

Love it! I just came across this video for the first time (I explore here a little at a time), and I have to applaud the way you covered this extremely important subject. The emphasis on trim and gentle corrections is great too. That was a nice demonstration of adverse yaw. I might mention, for those simmers who deal with older aircraft such as a Champ or a Cub that, at least in real life, the adverse yaw is greater than in the C172, mainly due to the difference in the way ailerons are hinged- the downgoing aileron in those older aircraft travels a lot further in relation to the upgoing one than it does in the C172, creating more drag thus more yaw. Don't know if this new sim reflects that though. You've done a great job on all these videos, and it's neat to watch- thanks.

With the giant chevrons covering a lot of the page, there's little to learn there.

I prefer Winchell's...

Thanks for the clarification, Tom.

Of course that is a photographic phrase, not normally related to weaponry.