How do you keep FSX interesting?

hi and thx yall for having me. i saw this last night and came up with an idea. since planes put trains (pax anyway) outta biz. i decided to pick some famous 60s pax rail routes and fly them. not all the stops of course but most. i chose Ill Central City of New Orleans first. mdw to msy. i flew the king air. helps with the shorter rwys. i landed 10 times. took 7.5 hrs. (im also a train buf btw). try it. I know quite a few runs if ya need help picking one. the empire builder (GN Rwy) from chgo to the pacific nw will be my next attempt. fun stuff.

Flying is something that you try to achieve perfection at. So it is interesting to try to continue to achieve this even though you can never actually reach perfection. When I fly somewhere in a simulator I like to do some learning about that place, and even cook a recipe or two from the region.

Addons, lots of addons & any available expansions I can get my hands on which isn't much since all Microsoft gave us was Acceleration & Gold which was just Deluxe that includes Acceleration the only worth while expansion for FSX. Hopefully FS2020 expansions will include more but most of the addons I get are free from 3rd party developers & some work as well as or better than payware. Two of my favorite addons are the V-22 & updated F-22. Might try out the XB-70 for my next payware addon.

i pretty new to the whole flight sim genre but already have many hours (trying) flying.

i started with the cessna to get to know fsx a bit and now im trying out the boeing 737.

basicly for me to keep fsx interesting is continiously practising flying with a plane and looking for good looking addons. i also have plans for creating scenery and to build hardware to add on my desk for creating a little cockpit. it takes a lot of time but i really enjoy.

Since I got tired of the Aerosoft A320 being VC only, and since they didn't release the A330 for FSX, I've been merging everything I got to get an Airbus I like. That includes merging, fixing merged FDEs, creating new panel backgrounds with a visibility similar to the Aerosoft VC, and then ditching them because I doon't like how it looks, etc. All my flights are now a quick pattern around Toulouse...

Where did you get the idea that "planes put [passenger] trains outta biz"? Amtrak is doing great and is about to make a profit for the first time in its history! In many parts of the country (including here in VA), trains are packed (yes, even long-distance ones) and you need to make reservations well in advance. In Europe, trains are favored over planes for business travel for flights of 300 miles or less. Just FYI.

Where did you get the idea that "planes put [passenger] trains outta biz"? Amtrak is doing great and is about to make a profit for the first time in its history! In many parts of the country (including here in VA), trains are packed (yes, even long-distance ones) and you need to make reservations well in advance. In Europe, trains are favored over planes for business travel for flights of 300 miles or less. Just FYI.

 

Perhaps because those journeys tend to average 300 miles or less, and are unlikely to cross a border? If you're going to quote statistics, at least choose accurate ones!

FWIW, if I have to go to Birmingham from here in Southampton, I always take the plane, although I may take a train to the airport. Trains here are expensive, slow and don't go point-to-point...

I've taken to going on Google Earth, spinning the globe and flying from whichever airport is nearest the hand symbol when the world stops.

 

Today it was Katukurunda to Ratmalana terminating at Bandaranaike.

 

Random chance gets me to fly from locations that I probably would not have thought of.

I am taking advantage of the current quarantine to actually learn the programming of the FMC's in Level D and my PMDG. Something which has taken me almost 17 years to get around to doing. :)

I am taking advantage of the current quarantine to actually learn the programming of the FMC's in Level D and my PMDG. Something which has taken me almost 17 years to get around to doing. :)

 

I learned all that in about a week all by myself. LOL

Perhaps because those journeys tend to average 300 miles or less, and are unlikely to cross a border? If you're going to quote statistics, at least choose accurate ones!

FWIW, if I have to go to Birmingham from here in Southampton, I always take the plane, although I may take a train to the airport. Trains here are expensive, slow and don't go point-to-point...

 

My point is that trains are NOT "out of business", far from it!

I recently purchased some Orbx scenery add-ons, the screenshots look great, but so far I haven't come across anything particularly interesting when using them. Doubtless I'm looking in the wrong places. Can anyone please suggest routes and starting points to get the most of these add-ons? I have the following areas;

Australia

Pacific Fjords

Alaska South

Scotland

Norway

I like to pick a random location in Alaska, google airports about an hour away, then do a vor to vor flight or even a gps. I love it, its stunning and obviously playing around with the weather and time of day makes it different each time. Its my favourite thing of all, using atc adds to the fun too and also can be a pain, but it keeps it fun

One way to see things in the sim that you have never seen before is to accomplish a round-the-world flight with real world weather and time. If you do it in something lower/slower like a turbo-prop, you will see terrain, lighting, and weather combinations that you have never bumped into, and it is surprisingly interesting. I finally broke down and did this a few years ago (used the real air turbine Duke). It was the most interesting set of flights I have had in a long time. Especially when I ended up in parts of the world that I rarely explore. Having a tool like FSTramp is helpful for planning distances between airports. Took me about 2 months to finish the flight in real time. I would save my flight each time I reached a destination, and my next flight would pick up from there.

I keep it fresh several ways.

 

I chose really interesting real-world special flights. For example, a C-130 or C-5 to Antarctica.

 

Or I imagine I'm carrying cargo charter to the DoD (MoD for you Euros) to Shemya (there is a listening radar there for Soviet ICBMs).

Or there's an antenna farm in northern Thailand. Sometimes those places need a very quick spare part.

 

Or, I take some real-world event, like a tsunami or hurricane/typhoon, and I pretend to be doing SAR or Relief flights into the area, or refugees out of the area. Sometimes I do multiples - I'll fly in a 747 cargo to a main airport, a C-130 (or any civilian regional STOL type plane) from the main airport to a remote strip. Then I'll fly some helos to distribute the goods in odd places, or within the city.

 

Mostly though I fly on VATSIM.

The only drawback I have to VATSIM is time. It takes a long time to fly anyway in VATSIM of serious distance (because you cannot time-accelerate), and even if you fly short regionals it always is a long time in VASTIM because you have to figure out where there are controllers now, how long they'll be on - you don't want to invest 30 mins of pre-flight and one hour of flight time just to get to TOD and the freaking controller at your destination sgings off! Then after you figure a nice routing with controllers you have to google the charts, aerodrome diagrams, program your FMC (because nowadays it is a b1tch if you don't fly RNAV and FMC), yada yada yada... Extreme enjoyment but I find it's hard to do a "correct" vatsim flight in less than 1:30-2 hours.

 

For the past six months or so I've kept FSX extremely interesting, fresh, and engaging by purchasing the PMDG 747. Big fan. Huge. That thing is uber realistic. They have no-BS one hour and 90 mins pre-flight start-up states! Again, downside is you need time. There is an engine-running state, but still, you gotta get charts, figure out a route, program the FMC - you're still looking at 15 mins or so before even getting off the ground. I'm not grumbling, i find it highly entertaining, just giving an honest "cons" to all the "pros".

 

To keep FSX at it's most fresh, I sometimes combine all three:

Fly the PMDG 747 with a 50 mins pre-flight state, do it on VATSIM, and fly to or from interesting airfields.

 

For example, if the VATSIM controllers action is at LAX that day I'll fly into or out of that Air Force Plant 42 in Palmdale (where they made the SR-71 and U-2). Or if Boston is action I'll choose that air force base just west of Boston city instead of flying into/out of Logan.

Sometimes you get interesting conversations about your "special" destination/origin and missions, and you can just tell em 'nothing to see here, citizen, go back to your life".

 

I especially love flying into a very busy VATSIM session or "Event" as they call it without pre-signing up for a slot on their website. Sure, they make me hold a lot, or my departure can get delayed, but it sure is fun piling onto the ruckus at a busy event, especially unannounced. I also love to go into a busy terminal area during a well-populated Event and choose an airport near, but not the actual Event airport. For example, gatwick instead of everyone is at heathrow. Or some old Naval Air Station (now abandoned) around the Bay instead of SFO where everybody else is going.

 

One time there was a VATSIM Event for Daytona Beach coinciding with NASCAR Daytona 500. Now the VATSIM people didn't advertise it, but it was public knowledge that the President was going to visit the race, so when I flew in I was bumped to make room for Air Force One! Now usualy you're not allowed to play emergency or hijack or AF1 in the VATSIM, but since it was a real-life happening I guess they let it happen. There was an entourage of planes with AF1: AF2, some military cargo planes, a whole bunch. I was flying in some cars and parts for some of the race teams in my Kalitta cargo 747 and the controllers had the nerve to ask me to move to a different apron just as I was about to shut down the engines! Something about security and distance for the Prez, and whatnot!!

 

All those little oddities and misadventures keep it fresh. So in summary, the two biggest things are doing it live with real people (i.e. VATSIM) and getting a hyper realistic add-on (i.e. PMDG 747).

Thanks! I will check it out!

My point is that trains are NOT "out of business", far from it!

 

Trains have NOT been replaced by planes. That is my point. Foolish to think any such thing...

I shall recite the last four weeks of my life.

Week1. Got excited again now that P3Dv5 and MSFS2020 are nearing release.

Dug out the old discs. reinstalled P3Dv4.

Week2. Re-installed all my scenery and purchased the final few gaps.

Week 3. Had to rewire and clean behind the PC. Cleaned and re-connected all my controllers. Setup VR.

Week 4. Spent the entire week trying to get all my scenery installed. Tweaking. Frigging about. Broke the sim twice. More frigging, more tweaking. More scenery.

So in essence I keep the sim interesting with the constant struggle of trying to get everything to work. In between I enjoy brief flights.

i shall recite the last four weeks of my life.

Week1. Got excited again now that p3dv5 and msfs2020 are nearing release.

Dug out the old discs. Reinstalled p3dv4.

Week2. Re-installed all my scenery and purchased the final few gaps.

Week 3. Had to rewire and clean behind the pc. Cleaned and re-connected all my controllers. Setup vr.

Week 4. Spent the entire week trying to get all my scenery installed. Tweaking. Frigging about. Broke the sim twice. More frigging, more tweaking. More scenery.

So in essence i keep the sim interesting with the constant struggle of trying to get everything to work. In between i enjoy brief flights.

 

lol!

Get the FSX SDK, from there the world is your oyster. My first success was adding a nearby WW2 airfield, Wroughton, to FSX. I then added some hangers to make it better. I created the hangers using GMAX that comes with the SDK.

 

I then came across Google earth, and I realised that there were lots and lots of grass strips near to where I live, so I added them, and after adding each one I'd fly to it.

 

I then modelled the Shard in London, as it came after FSX was realesed, and I added it to FSX and flew around it.

 

Eventually I started modelling aircraft. There is nothing nicer than flying your own plane, into an airfield that you've added, and knowing that no one else in the world can do that.

 

Ok, I am a very experienced software developer, and have some artistic ability which helps, but its not been easy, however it has been challenging and interesting.

I shall recite the last four weeks of my life.

Week1. Got excited again now that P3Dv5 and MSFS2020 are nearing release.

Dug out the old discs. reinstalled P3Dv4.

Week2. Re-installed all my scenery and purchased the final few gaps.

Week 3. Had to rewire and clean behind the PC. Cleaned and re-connected all my controllers. Setup VR.

Week 4. Spent the entire week trying to get all my scenery installed. Tweaking. Frigging about. Broke the sim twice. More frigging, more tweaking. More scenery.

So in essence I keep the sim interesting with the constant struggle of trying to get everything to work. In between I enjoy brief flights.

 

Hilarious - this is literally my FSX experience. Got back into it a few weeks ago, bought a yoke and rudders, dusted off FSX which I bought for £4 ages ago in a Steam sale, tried X-Plane (computer not powerful enough), looked at PSD and though they are joking right - $US200 and they tell you it's not a consumer flight sim ...

 

Anyway, having lots of fun tweaking, discovering FSUIPC and Chase Plane (both amazing fun) and bought an A2A C182 (wow, difficult!), and the DHC-2 from MilViz, but spending most of my time learning how to fly in Carenado's C152 from Steam (great little plane ... very forgiving). In between tweaking (75% of my time), I have finally managed to do a pattern, touch and goes and now the table my yoke is bolted too doesn't shake as I try to land, it barely moves :-)

 

Next up is ratching up the realism on the planes and one day flying from my (virtual) home base of Homer Alaska, to Ballarat in Australia where I grew up. Figure that'll keep me going for a good decade!

Next up is ratching up the realism on the planes and one day flying from my (virtual) home base of Homer Alaska, to Ballarat in Australia where I grew up.

 

It's a small world, dagbostar! I have rellies in Ballarat, at Sulky, and a couple in Bendigo. Hardly anyone outside Oz knows that region was the centre of the world's biggest gold rush after the Klondike. There's still gold in the creek on my rellies land.

It's a small world, dagbostar! I have rellies in Ballarat, at Sulky, and a couple in Bendigo. Hardly anyone outside Oz knows that region was the centre of the world's biggest gold rush after the Klondike. There's still gold in the creek on my rellies land.

 

Did Parker Schnable knock on their door to see if he could buy some land to mine for gold? Don't know if the TV series "Gold Rush" is shown in the UK?

I have been flight simming at least weekly since retiring 6 years ago on Tuesdays from 2pm to 4pm with friends on JoinFS and Teamspeak3. I was using FSX, then moved to P3Dv3. Found that most FSX planes still work fine but most addon scenery doesn’t but still happy with the move up. However P3Dv4 (64 bit) is a no go for me, as I will not give up FSPassenger (one of the things I use to make flying interesting).

 

Just got my internet download speed up to 200 from 20 a couple months ago. Then last week came across a YouTube video describing how to get “FSEarth Tiles” to work with FSX and P3D. Later I found Anderson had posted this “how to” here at this site a couple years ago ( I missed it some how).

 

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/content.php?17223-Build-Your-Own-VFR-Scenery-With-FSEarthTiles

 

The issue I had with commercial products is they were TOO LARGE in size. I get it that the whole product is at Level 1 but you just don’t need that detail everywhere. FSEarth Tiles is perfect because I get to choose exactly what I want covered and at what detail level.

 

Being able to download PHOTO REAL earth tiles from all over the world has really made P3D come alive. I started as was suggested by downloading the images at level 3 and then any City or smaller particular area at level 1 or 2. The whole state of Ohio was only 4.7 gig and then I added all of Cincinnati (my home town) inside the I-275 loop at level 1 for an additional 1.5 gig. The result is fantastic. Then I added Kentucky at 6 gig, Indiana at 3.6 gig. Our group also flies a lot in Florida and that was another 13 gig.

 

My wife and I were planning on traveling to New Hampshire this June on vacation (but everything is shut down now). So, I downloaded Vermont and NH for another 3.3 gig, so I could fly to Mount Washington, which was our destination for going there.

 

So, the “8 things” that keep me interested and in the air flying with P3D/FSX are planes from Flightsim, Teamspeak3, JoinFS, Active Sky Next, LittleNavMap, FSPassenger, FreeMeshX Global and now FSEarth Tiles. Heck 6 of the 8 things are totally free.

Did Parker Schnable knock on their door to see if he could buy some land to mine for gold? Don't know if the TV series "Gold Rush" is shown in the UK?

 

LOL Charlie, if they do I haven't seen it - but Melbourne University send a scientist to test the creek for gold content once a year, and it's still there for sure!