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Interview With Andi/FlightsimPM Conducted By Ray Andersen Tell us a little bit about yourself and the sorts of things you have done or enjoyed besides flight simulation? My home country is in east Europe (Romania) where I grew up. I moved here to Italy about eight years ago after getting my diploma in Ecology but I didn't have any real hobbies. I like a lot of things but never was dedicated to a specific thing or hobby so I think flight and planes were my biggest discovery about what I like and what should I do. When moving to Italy I found a job as a craftsman but it was not what I was looking for as my interests were guiding me towards technology and computers. Working as a craftsman for almost five years did help me a lot in what I'm doing. In what ways do you feel that your craftsman skills have helped you in what you do with aviation? Aviation or not being a craftsman knowing to use certain tools complex or not I think that everyone loves when out of nothing you are able to build anything but being craftsman the end product is the difference. Do you have any real world aviation experience, fly any planes, or own any aircraft? I don't have any type of experience as a real pilot but I flew a few times as a passenger with small aircraft around the local airport. Tell us more about your real flights as a passenger around the local airport? Was it with a friend or an instructor? What kind of aircraft was it? Did you get to take the controls and feel what it was like to fly the aircraft at all? How old were you at the time? Where you scared or nervous of excited to be flying for real? I flew a few times around the local airport a few years ago as a passenger in a P-92. I never got the chance to take the controls but I was very excited about it. Hopefully I can do it again very soon as I made some friends there which in the future might help with advice about real flying. Tell us about the company - who founded it, when, where, why and maybe a little history? My first flight simulator was FS2004. I bought it in 2005 because it was too expensive for me at that time and I didn't really understand what it was. I fell in love with it right after I got it. I never thought I could push this hobby to such a level. Right after the financial crisis I lost my job and that gave me some free time to dedicate to my hobby. I started to build my first cockpit although I was amazed to see how much flight simulator hardware costs. I did what I could and stared to buy Saitek hardware one piece at a time until I finished my humble cockpit. Just after that I felt that it was not enough and had to make something to add a bit of realism to it. This is how the first Boeing 737 Saitek handles were born. A few days later I uploaded a video on YouTube about the handles. A guy contacted me to see if I could sell him the handles or make him a set. After three weeks of e-mails I decided to build my first set of handles for sale. At that point FlightSimPM was born. It was 2011 and the reason was because I felt like I could offer people a bit of realism for a small fee. Is the YouTube video of your very first product (the handles) still up on YouTube and if so could you send us the link? Here you can find the first Saitek handles that I have built, in two videos: What is the company's mission and vision? The mission of my company is to provide a bit of realism for everyone that cannot afford or do not want to spend too much money on this type of hardware. How do you choose your next project - inquiry from flight simmers, market research or other? Most of my projects were born based on people's requests and also I'm always taking a look around on FlightSim.Com forums to see what people are looking for. What do you find to be the most challenging and interesting aspect of a project and why? It's hard to say as all projects are challenging in some way or another. The most challenging thing about any project and about FlightSimPM is to keep up with all the requests I get every day. People think that here at FlightSimPM there is a team building flight simulator hardware but there is no team only me one guy and that is very challenging. At the end of the day though, it is the most satisfying thing to be able to offer support and make everyone happy. You mentioned that you get many requests and there is only you and one other guy doing the work. Do you both work at it full time now and make your living from it? I'm working full time 7 days a week 10-12 hours a day to be able to keep up with everyone and hardly have time for me or my family. Actually at this moment I'm taking my projects to some local factories otherwise it's too hard for one man only to deal with everything but as I said the most important thing is to be able to make everyone happy at the end of the day (beside my wife which is the hardest thing as she has her own requests). The second guy helps when he can as he has his own job. Have you thought of adding more people to your team so you can cover more products? It's equal if factories build your stuff but there is no fun in it. Just a few weeks ago I have been contacted by a guy who seems to know much about servos, programming, etc. and hope we will make something soon. Anyway the answer is yes I hope to be able to make a team here at FlightSimPM. What is your favorite development and why? I like all my projects and don't have a favorite or less favorite one. I can tell you that the 737 throttle quadrant was a bit challenging and not fun to build. The fun part was when it was finished and being able to use it and have fun with it. When you have something working out of nothing I think it's very satisfying. What are your top three selling products and why do you think they are the top three? My top three selling products are B737 Saitek Handles, Airbus A320 Saitek Handles and least but not last the Boeing 737 Throttle Quadrant PRO. Saitek Handles or my throttle quadrant pro offer a bit of realism depending on how much a simmer wants to invest in such hardware. When talking about flight simulation and flightsim setups, I think that heaving a yoke and throttle quadrant in your setup is one of the most basic things you could have. What makes your products unique from other hardware? I don't know if my products are unique or not, I think this is a question for my customers and what they think about FlightSimPM products. There are not many places where you can buy such products for this price and I'm trying to offer the best support I can which in my opinion is very important. I care a lot about my products and customers. Why did you choose the Saitek throttle quadrant as the "basis" for your throttle handles series? The answer is very simple because it's the most common and affordable throttle quadrant on the market. In the next few months the handles will be available for CH Products throttles also. Are you planning on developing other cockpit hardware besides throttle quadrants? Yes I'm already working on new projects like a 737 overhead panel and a 737 yoke but it will take some time as it's very hard when you have only two hands. You have developed a replica of the Boeing B737 throttle quadrant, are you also planning on doing the Airbus and/or Boeing B747 full version - here I mean not just as handles but the complete setup? Yes I'm planning to release other throttle quadrants later on this year but it's hard to decide which one it will be. I guess it will have to be more of a customer decision. What types of simulators do your customers mostly use, Microsoft Flight Simulators, Prepar3D or X-Plane? Most of my customers use FSX and FS2004 although I have many questions if my hardware is compatible with X-Plane and the answer is yes the bad part is that I cannot offer any type of support since I do not use X-Plane as customers have to be 100% sure before placing an order but this will be solved soon. Could you provide us with any web sites, product photo links, Facebook pages, YouTube Channels, or Twitter feeds you currently have to support and announce your products? http://www.flightsimpm.com/products https://www.facebook.com/pages/Flightsimpm/1458563141024942 http://www.youtube.com/user/piromoretta -
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