What Do You Fly? IFR? VFR? What's more fun?

Well, looking to get into different styles of flying. I do VFR for the most part, and General Aviation, but considering breaking off into airliners, and IFR and corporate jets.

What do you all like to do? What's more satisfying and fun flying? IFR or VFR? General Aviation? Corporate Jets? Or Airliners?

I used to fly a variety of planes in previous sims, but now I tend to just fly the GA aircraft.. & mainly my (Just Flight) Piper Arrow at the moment. It’s excellent in VR :) and MSFS is really good for VFR flying as you know.

Regards

Steve

What do you all like to do? What's more satisfying and fun flying? IFR or VFR? General Aviation? Corporate Jets? Or Airliners?

Flying IFR in the Citation Longitude and CJ4 and the TBM930 liveries are most satisfying for me. I further enjoy setting up flight plans to anywhere state side using Skyvector and Little Nav Map. The Citations and TBM are fun to fly no matter how rough live weather can be.

I like running mountain passes in real world weather with the Xcub. I get to do trips in wx I would never consider in real life. Even though the Xcub is not an IFR aircraft, I find the little Garmin very easy to fly in and out of airports with no procedure in appalling conditions and mountains all around. On two occasions I have touched down after doing a go around since I couldn't see the runway at 100 feet using the live map. On each second try I just kept following the map screen and touched down seeing the runway only in flare.

When I first started flying with the glass cockpit I hated the thing. Then I started learning it and pushing limits. It gives much better situational awareness than the gauges alone in IFR. While I don't intend to fly Aspen to Crusted Butt with clouds under 13k for real, it is immensely enjoyable to do that in the sim.

Well, looking to get into different styles of flying. I do VFR for the most part, and General Aviation, but considering breaking off into airliners, and IFR and corporate jets.

Ok, that's nice that you want to expand your skills and experiences!

I do have a suggestion though: learn how to do IFR in the GA birds first! Then try the faster larger jets.

Why?

Well, you won't get task saturated, you will be able to "keep ahead of the plane" rather than falling well behind it. See, going from a 100knot plane to a 250 knot plane might seem like it's not a big deal, except, now you have less than half the time you used to, to do alll the tasks needed: change radio stations, switch to a new VOR, contact ATC and give/get the transmissions in time, get the plane ready for an approach in a busy airspace. You'd think it's just about landing speed, but really it's about all those "pilot tasks" having WAY less time to do them in.

Also, it's easier to keep from getting lost at 100 knots than at 500!

MAybe start with the autopilot, get it set up for a useful altitude. Using the map, get a bearing and distance and time. Engage the "Heading" function on the ap, and toy around with that, set the heading number you found from the map, onto your horizontal situation indicator. That will be useful for when you are out of range of ADF's and VOR's.

Now learn about ADF's and then VOR indicators and how to set up the Nav radios. After that, get a timer handy, so you can time your legs from teh flight plan (I'm talking about learning how to fly without dependingj on a GPS display, because despite how well they work, they can and do fail on rare occasions).

Then you can learn how to follow an ILS glideslope manually, in thick fog, without resorting to pushing the "Apr" button!

What do you all like to do? What's more satisfying and fun flying? IFR or VFR? General Aviation? Corporate Jets? Or Airliners?

All of it. GA, corporate jets. REgional airliners. Airliner heavies.

Now, below is more about my FS2004 days as there was a LOT more aircraft to fly, but the point is still worth looking at:

Military cargo planes, because they go to more remote locations no airline would even consider. Pick a conflict in the past or even present and fly there!

Bush pilot planes like the Beaver and TWin Otter, that sometimes land on beaches, for scientists and geologists, hunters and explorers, whether in Canada's remote wilderness (try the moutain flying in British Columbia) or Africa, Norway.

Search and Rescue helis and fixed wings (like the, Jayhawk, Buffalo and Caribou)

Vintage airliners like the DC-8, B-707, B-337 and SuperConnie. Canada to Paris, America to England. Germany to Jordan.

SR-71 and U-2 spyplane flights... both are much more interesting to fly than you might realise! The Blackbird burns huge fuel getting to altitude and speed, but once there, it's a rocket sled! Slowing down for an approach takes a huge amount of thinking ahead, and good timing, because otherwise you find yourself at 10,000 feet 100 miles from base and feeling kinda dumb. The U-2 can climb like a homesick angel... and then you realise you are now in a Mach corner: 5 knots too fast, you go transonic and have your wings ripped off, 5 knots too slow, and you seriously risk a stall... because the higher you go, the lower speed Mach becomes in knots of airspeed. And the higher you go, the thinner the air, so your stall speed keeps going up... until the two basically box you in! Actually I used to fly an RQ-4 Global HAwk like that too. They flew many missions from Kadena AFB in Okinawa, and Lakenheath in England. One time I landed at normal airport in Norway, and later discovered something like that really happened! Targets to fly to could include Murmansk, Beirut, Tripoli.

I also loved being "Commander Test Pilot Nervz O'Steel", get some of the 1960's test planes, the X series, and try those out. The "lifting body" gliders are just wild! They drop like a stone, have no power of their own, so... you either land safe, or you die! There's no go-arounds, get it right the first time! Or maybe the X-15: blast off from a B-52, and either go for raw level speed, or as high altitude as you can get it... then when your 90 seconds of fuel is spent, glide back to Edwards AFB in the California desert! These were the early research projects that led to the Moon Apollo research, and also the Space Shuttle.

The big thing is, use your imagination, create a scenario to imagine, for your flight. Plan accordingly. Where do you want to fly? Why are you flying there? What might go wrong? What's the purpose or mission for the flight?

One of my favorite flights ever was when I took a 1950's military cargo plane, a beast called the C-124 Globemaster II, for a flight that began in Seattle at McChord AFB, up the coastline of BC, until I eventually got to Anchorage (Elmendorf AFB?). Then, I decided to fly the Aleutian islands, stopping by each strip until I got to the last island. Managing fuel and taking some fuel at the larger strips. Then I turned the weather nasty, foggy and stormy, can't see squat, not enough Nav beacons to be anything but worried. Dip below the clouds to 300ft to do a manual approach in the dark to a gravel strip. Take off again for Anchorage, now the clouds are very low. Desperately try the ADF beacon to line up for the Elmendorf ILS beacon, and manually hand-fly the needles down to minimums, keep it headed to the runway lights and down!

I did that flight in 2008, and I still remember it!

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If you look at post #16 in this thread below, you'll see some interesting aircraft being made for this sim, and a few already here:

https://www.flightsim.com/vbfs/showthread.php?329950-what-vintage-classic-aircraft-are-planned-for-FS2020/page2

I can add little to Herc79's excellent post, except to say that at this moment in time most of the kinds of airplanes that he mentions are apparently not yet available in FS2020 (since this thread is in the 2020 folder, I am assuming that you are indeed talking about Microsoft's newest).

Actually, having recently gotten started in 2020 due to finally buying a computer that will run it well, I must say that the real strength of this platform, at this point, is indeed VFR flying. In fact, with the sole exception of Aerofly FS2, there is nothing out there that matches the scenery of 2020 (although XP11 with a ton of orthophoto scenery and something that will add some gamma and contrast to the picture will in fact come comfortably close). So what I am doing is going back to the past and recapturing some of my VFR flights in the new sim, which is so much like actually flying that it boggles the mind!

My own 2 cents is that, except for simple IFR using VOR's and light planes, 2020 is not really ready for IFR flying at this point - the airplanes (in the case of airliners) and the GPS that are included are so stripped down that they are good for little other than going direct. XP11 (and I imagine Prepar3, although I do not have that one) are best for airliner type IFR for now. That will change some soon, but that is where I spend that kind of time now.

But the VFR stuff in 2020 - amazing. Take full advantage of it!

Well, looking to get into different styles of flying. I do VFR for the most part, and General Aviation, but considering breaking off into airliners, and IFR and corporate jets.

 

What do you all like to do? What's more satisfying and fun flying? IFR or VFR? General Aviation? Corporate Jets? Or Airliners?

It depends on what i am flying and where. I love VFR in the King Air and will also VFR the airliners too but it depends on weather and destination airport. No way will i fly VFR into Quito (SEQM) with any clouds in anything. I've scraped myself off too many mountains. I guess I look at it like this, if I want to be lazy I'll fly around on auto pilot using IFR or if the destination can be tricky, otherwise I'll fly VFR and just bee line it to where I am going.

I like to fly both VFR and IFR, and now I think I have all the aircraft I need:

IFR Flights:

• Medium Haul Airliner - FlyByWire A320nx
  
• Short Haul Airliner - Aersoft CRJ-700
  
• IFR Skills and fun - JustFlight Piper Arrow III
  
• 
  

VFR Flights:

• Practice and exploration - JustFlight Piper Arrow III
  
• Ph**king around and having fun - FlyingIron Spitfire IXc
  

I have lots of options to explore this wonderful world that Asobo and MS have created. Now will someone make a GOOD Dash-8?

I think 2020 is under rated for how good the IFR side is. Sure the gps functions and automation are way behind, but gps is not all of IFR and you can always print off approach plates and maps. The biggest advantage in 2020 for IFR is the cloud subtlety and the real wx feature which provides unknowns when transitioning from instruments to visual and back.

In FSX to get complete soup you had to set clouds to 10/10 and set the elevations and distance. If you set the lower limit to minimums or near with 8/10 below it, you always popped out with the runway in sight. In 2020, you can randomly pick a start and finish airport, not check the wx and see what happens in flight (yes, totally opposite of real flight). It is the ambiguous aspect of wx that makes it interesting.

The fact that the clouds have so many variations makes it much more a decision game of trying to sneak over a pass while seeing the cliff off your right side versus turning around or "illegally" carrying on in ifr and avoiding terrain.

Also as Herc says, it is fun to have a mission. Cargo type doesn't matter as long as it stays strapped down and the CG doesn't move!

Now will someone make a GOOD Dash-8?

I wouldn't mind seeing a Q-400, and eventually someone will make a good one (rather than the rather..."basic" freeware version).

But I'd REALLY love to see the earlier Dash-8's, like the 100 200 and 300, there's lots still in use, and they are quite the ticket for airports in mountain towns like West Kootenay Regional Airport, (Castlegar Airport) (IATA: YCG, ICAO: CYCG), in the western Canada Rocky Mountain range (think between Vancouver and Calgary Canada).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Kootenay_Regional_Airport

Then again I'd also like to see the Dash-7, and the Caribou and Buffalo as well!

In case you all haven't seen this, here's a curious and fun looking plane!

https://secure.simmarket.com/bluemesh-amphibious-ultra-light-aircraft-skywaves-msfs.phtml

I could see that being popular with many sportsmen!

In FSX and the previous sims it was all about IFR for me, as the scenery graphics were not really there for realistic VFR flying imo, other than in a few parts of the world where addon scenery raised the bar enough for it to be acceptable. Fly outside these areas and the scenery looked too bland to make it worthwhile for VFR flight.

All change in MSFS with it's worldwide scenery. Now I am largely flying around in VFR mode enjoying the view. I stick with the c172 for VFR and when I do want to do a longer IFR flight I use the Longitude.

I have a complex home cockpit based upon an Embraer Phenom 300 and so far I have only set it up for use with these two aircraft although in time I will probably add profiles for others.

Despite a few niggles MSFS has truly rekindled my love of flight simulation and we have so much to look forward to with it in the future.

Sent from my SM-T813 using Tapatalk

The H-135 Airbus. Which is a common search and rescue heli in Europe, and does many Med-Evac in America too these days. US Army has bought a very similar unit they call the UH-74 Lakota (which I think is based on the EC-145 ?)

Fortunately it's 100% free mod, and is rapidly approaching "payware" grade. Among other things, it has a glass cockpit with many bells and whistles, a working autopilot and is rapidly evolving, lately seems to be updated about one to two versions each week.

Video from today, of latest version 0.9, an intro to latest version, and flight:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTAIjSTVSx4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTAIjSTVSx4

https://flightsim.to/file/8970/airbus-h135-helicopter-project

Once you have all that up and running well, with good framerates...

Step 3:

https://www.neofly.net/

This is a program that gives you missions, flights, and such. You can fly cargo for customers, you can do emergency rescues of car accidents, find sinking yatchs, looking for downed planes, and other types of flights! One of the coolest things, is that because MSFS: models the whole world, you can get neofly to generate flights from whatever airfield you'd care to fly from! Maybe you want to fly in the mountains and coastline of western Canada, or maybe from wherever you are from.

Now... the base neofly is free, but if you donate through patreon, you can get the custom mission scenery for emergency flights, like an overturned crashed vehicle (bus, car, plane, boat) an ambulance, fire truck and such.

https://www.neofly.net/store

No, I've not tried this yet, been too busy, but there you go. Real world terrain of the whole world, free heli, and a program to make emergency flights!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJDfQ7vnO-CfEdosZG5hpRw

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJDfQ7vnO-CfEdosZG5hpRw

My main enjoyment of the sim is the ability to sightsee and as well as just enjoying different aircraft in my local area I like to do extended trips - I've "done" Route 66 across the US, followed a couple of road trips and currently enjoying a tour of European Capitals. I've also got the old BOAC route to India lined up. a South African Bush Trip and a tour of Canada too, all places I'll never get the chance of visiting for real.

For sightseeing, VFR is definitely the way to go and the aircraft I use depends on the length and complexity of the flight. For VFR touring I prefer the Beechcraft Bonanza, a relatively easy machine to operate but with excellent performance. But even the lowly C152 has it's uses - I "rent" one at my European Capital stops to sightsee the local area as I'm using the CJ4 to get around.

Which brings me to IFR. As an ex-PPL I never got around to finishing my instrument ratings so the opportunity to improve myself is one I also enjoy also. The CJ4 is a bit of a handful to learn IFR (I occasionally due a bit in the BE36) but I'm getting there! Not really interested in the airliners though, too much new stuff to learn in my more mature years!

I like to make everything as realistic as I can, not appreciating until now how much I've missed my actual flying days. But my overall point is you should try a bit of everything, be it just bumbling around or taking 300 passengers trans-continental.

But whatever you finally decide on, the important point is to ENJOY IT!