Like a good dry gin, from what I remember.
Such beautiful countryside, and a very lovely plane- I’ve heard very good things about that one.
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fine adventure! very nice from you and thx for stopping by.
hope I catch you still at the airport so I can hand you one fine bottle ( let me know your home address via PM and I will manage the rest 
)
as @Navynuke99 mentioned, almost like a gin, you will see. wondering Navy, from where do you know!? story time!
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Nice trip. And kudos for flying it in the Arrow. 400nm is a long way to go in a GA aircraft (at least for me).
In case you have not left yet, have a look at these sceneries for the Czech Republic:
https://flightsim.to/profile/apollon01/uploads
Castles, churches, industrial objects and many GA airports.
If you find some time and do not mind to deviate a bit from your plan, please fly over LKKM or do a touch & go. That is a place of my heart and the adjacent town of Kromeriz is my hometown in which I grew up 
The airport of LKKM as well as the town’s landmarks are all included in the sceneries 
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It is great. If it only had anti-icing it would be perfect.
Many, many years ago, I dated a girl from the Czech Republic (Novy Jicin- @Aginor may fly over it on his way to Prague), and she brought back bottles of Borovicka and Becherovka when she came back from Christmas.
From what she told me, both are typically served in drinks with tonic water, or used as mixers.
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Going to try to knock out a bunch of reports. It’s probably gotta be as boring to write about the same flight as it would be to read :-).
The TLDR: Weather was the same, 5kts to 9 kts from, roughly 210, late afternoon/evening flights all in the Lama … except for one 172SP flight that I decided to squeeze in one evening (night flight).
I am doing real time/real weather, and although the time seems correct, the weather feels like ground-hog day. Though, as I look out my window … it’s pretty accurate to what we are getting here (and it generally comes up from the US Eastern coast or from Ottawa/Montreal. So who knows
After the reports, I will dip a bit into the experience so far.
Leg 4: KBHB (Hancock/Bar Harbour) to KRKD (Knox Country)
IFR following flight, if I remember correctly. Little bump there around Brooksville was a problem I experienced, again, with the engine surging. More on that later. After some ‘smooth’ flying the last leg, I added some AI aircraft in the mix this time.
Aaaand I guess this is one of the DCS pilots who likes to ‘taxi to the wire’?
X-Plane ATC still has issues. This was going on for a while and I wasn’t able to switch frequencies…
Since the ATC got mad at me for interrupting them and dumped me, I made my own way to KRKD. This runway had a ‘little’ bit of a crosswind - but in a helicopter that’s not as much of a problem
Leg 5: KRKD (Knox Country) to KBXM (Brunswick Executive)
Another IFR following ride but I stuck this one out to the end. And I probably will not do that again unless I really need the IFR bits. The reason? The long approach vectoring:
The default scenery is pretty okay. Much better than the olden days.
These peeps were probably as tired of my IFR vectored approach as I was
Leg 6: KBXM (Brunswick Executive) to KSFM (Standford Seacoast)
More AI, but this time getting those tundra tires onto the solid surface.
On final. Note the weird haze. I get that a lot in the clouds with XP12 in VR.
Leg 7: KSFM (Standford Seacoast) to KOWD (Norwood Memorial)
This was a different flight. I decided that since it was getting dark, I would take up something that had an autopilot so I could not stress out with ATC in the dark.
ATC decided that I needed a little knot tied in my flight plan. For reasons that only they know.
It was pretty dark, but it reminded me of the times that I flew into YFC at night on Air Canada or Porter. I could always make out patterns in the lights to help me figure out our flight into YFC, but you would often overfly roads and be utterly confused.
I tried a VFR approach and was directed to ‘Join downwind’ … but I don’t know what parameters to hit for that, and I never saw any options in the ATC menu to announce position, final or whatever. So I made my best guess and it looked like this:
And that wasn’t what I was supposed to do
In VR this screen REALLY sucks. It pops up as you are trying to not wreck your airframe as you roll out from touchdown, but you have to let go of something to grab thew mouse to click it away. But I got it parked.
Leg 8: KOWD (Norwood Memorial) to KUQU (Quonset State)
Back in the Lama. IFR ATC got me to the general area and then I cancelled coverage and brought it in myself.
You can see the difference between my intended plan (grey lines) and the ATC directed plan.
I really feel that the scenery is mostly bog-standard XP11 scenery but I’m okay with it for VR and helicopters
I should have diverted for the frigate … and if it was moving I would have been unable to avoid the temptation.
Instead, I ‘stole’ a parking spot with the Coast Guard. They were nice enough about it.
Leg 9: KUQU (Quonset State) to KBID (Block Island State)
This was a VFR radio Nav flight … and I guess I hit the True radial instead of the Mag one
More AI traffic.
Heading out over the open water. Island in the distance.
Decent approach but I wasn’t happy with the hover-taxi to the parking area.
Hover Taxi with Wind: This is taking some practice - which should not be surprising. Any forward movement into the wind, with any speed (mine or it’s) generally has be ballooning my taxi and then settling it onto the taxiway. Replace ‘settling’, which sounds gentle, with grinding and scraping the skids. I am starting to get the hang of it now. Heading in to parking is the hardest because I am trying to put it down on a particular spot, all nice and neat. Sometimes I get close, but sometimes I throw all that patience and the nice small cyclic/collective/pedal movements out the window and make a hash of it, and basically have move away from the parking spot and start over.
I’m going to blame it on wind gusts at all the wrong times
Engine Surging: Turns out the aircraft flight model was fighting with XP12. When I reduced the number of AI aircraft, or the visual settings, my VR stutters went away and the engine stopped surging. During taxi/takeoff and landing, it was not as much of an issue - probably because I was not pulling as much torque? It usually happened to be me in straight and level flight but after getting the visuals and VR settings down, and increasing the number of passes at the flight model per frame, I have not had them since. Nothing else has changed, so I am blaming that.
VR Stutters: In the HP Reverb G2, for at least 10 minutes of getting into the sim and in VR (I start 2d and get things set up so I don’t have to deal with them in flight/VR), there were a lot of stutters that started to work them selves out if I left it for a while. Then I would only get a few from time to time. BUT, switching to OpenXR and all my VR woes went away. I was also able to increase the graphical setting back up to a pretty high level an everything is smooth (AMD 5800X, Nvidia 3080Ti, 32gb ram, etc). If you want to try it, check out @fearlessfrog’s post over on the X-Plane.org forums here: Improve X-Plane 12 VR Performance with OpenXR (WMR) - VR in X-Plane 12 - X-Plane.Org Forum
MSFS versus XP12: I love what they have added to XP12. I have not had the opportunity to get into rain or snow yet, but everything else is pretty great. Except. MSFS takes the visual crown for sure. Hands down. When MSFS adds helicopters, I am going to have a hard choice to make for which becomes my default sim. It will come down to VR performance and my flawed perceptions and ‘trust’ in the flight model, really. VR is likely going to drive what I want to fly. I will still swap when certain aircraft or challenges pull me in a direction.
10 Likes
a little cant do it justice 
never heard of any procedure to enter pattern with right turns. landing on runway 12, from that downwind pos, making right turns makes more sense to me. but who knows what the ATC was expecting 
wow, seems to me like work
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The lines are definitely getting blurry… I was going to fly the majority of the trek in the 650 but came to the conclusion that I’m doing this for fun. I would still highly recommend the product to anyone who wants that level of detail though…it quite amazing.
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Side question:
Are you ever concerned that you might get used to some sim-ism that is different from real life and mix it into your real life procedures?
Or is is that spot on? Or is that not a problem because the environment is so different?
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That’s a good question. I haven’t considered it to be a problem because of the environment. When flying the real airplane the stakes are higher of course, and it’s a physical thing rather than something rendered on a screen. You are also just one member of a two pilot crew, where you work together to follow checklists and procedures. It’s just different.
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Yeah, that makes sense. The workflow is very different then.
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I did have those same instructions, given to me flying the Citabria in Louisville once.
And, after I got past my initial confusion, I did what you did; which seemed to be what they wanted.
So, nice job I’d say!
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this could be problem, I would say, in case you would start your training in home sim using home sim related materials.
then in case there are some difference to the real deal (and usually there are) you could transfer them over.
but normally its the other way around I would say. you start with the real deal and transfer that knowledge into the sim. there are usually differences but with the knowledge of the real deal you can work around them in home sim.
but agree with @PaulRix that in different environments brain can surprisingly act appropriate to that environment.
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OK, finally back from training, so I can get back to the important stuff! 
When we last left our hero, he had just ditched approximately 280NM west of Sydney, Australia.
Luckily, he was within a day’s sailing of a large container ship, which fished him out of the drink.
There was a casualty, however. And so, I’d like to dedicate this report to:
First Lieutenant V.B. Wilson 1995-1999 RIP
Leg 16 Vicinity of S34.21.35/E156.47.10 TO Sydney/Kingsford Smith Airport, New South Wales, Australia (YSSY).
The Widgeon showed up bright and early for me…too bright and early for whatever mostly clear fluid the engine room gang poured down my yap the previous night.
“Mind if I take the leg?”, I asked.
“Sure, what’s the worst that could happen?”
“I know, right? Here, hold my beer!”
Well, after giving the boys a friendly flyby, I decided that it’s best for me to move along.
Besides, I didn’t want to go for a swim twice…people will begin to talk!
So, close. I was so close. Well, you know what they say, no use crying over spilled 40 million dollar jets.
I meet the Maersk Deva’s sister ship. You should hear those guys talk smack about that pig boat!
The Sun also rises as my first cup of Navy coffee kicks in. I haven’t blinked since.
What kind of flight would it be without at least a small emergency?
Hint, the electrical system works better with the alternators turned on.
Approaching the coast, the weather comes in with a low overcast layer.
Time to see if it has a bottom.
Turns out the overcast is relatively high at 2 grand or so. Sydney airport pokes out into the famous Botany Bay.
Yes, that Botany Bay.
Alright, all lined up.
But, then, as the Middle Marker beeped sonorously in my headset, I thought…
“Wait. Wasn’t there a really great sushi place by the opera house?”
Really good sushi, I mean.
Seriously, I got the lobster sashimi as an appetizer
And it looked like something that Captain Nemo fought off the hull of the Nautilus!
Man! Those Aussies think of everything! I’ve heard of a water taxi before, but this is ridiculous!
And here we are, finally. Oh, crap. I just remembered…
I’m Vegan now!
9 Likes
Time to leave Shetlands and move on to Faroe Islands.
This was not a very long trip at some 213 nm though made challenging by lack of “long(er) range” navs en route. And the weather of course. I mean, there is a bunch of NDBs but those do not reach too far and the only VOR at Sumburgh is a bit off my track so can be used just as a fallback option only.
Anyway, if the winds are not too strong I should not get lost. So I dusted off the Electra and…
…set the ADF and VOR as per the charts.
Well, sort of. The Scatsta NDB frequency is 315.5 kHz but the Electra allows to tune in just whole kHz as opposed to decimals. As far as I know, in real world the NDB should be picked with either 315 or 316 kHz tuned in so it should not be a problem, eh? Here I was sitting on the runway so neither of the VOR and NDB signals were received. This should changed once in the air.
Good bye Out Skerries!
The thing is, even when airborne I was not able to receive the two nav aids 
And moreover when fiddling with the radios I got into this.
As I did not feel like pressing on without the help of the radio navigation, the decision was made quickly - get below the deck, fly south to find either Tingwall or, if missed, Sumburgh, check the radios and go again. The day is not over yet after all!
Tingwall it is.
The issue with the NAV had to do something with mixing analog Electra with the GTN 750 addon. The GTN addon was set to send the GPS signal to the VOR gauge. After changing that to the LOC1, the VOR gauge in Electra became responsive. Done, now the ADF…
I suspected the problem was the XXX.5 kHz frequency. After some googling left and right I learnt that there was no way to tune it on the analog instruments. That was a bummer as without that NDB the flight would be too risky.
But there was a work around - just bind a key for changing the ADF frequency by 0.1 kHz and problem solved!
Again sitting on the runway with the radios set. Only now it is in Tingwall. Ready to go.
All looks fine, the needles were alive shortly after take off
It looked like I would need their help every nm of the trip.
Now when I know where I am flying, let’s have a look at the engines.
The Electra is supposed to sport two Pratt & Whitney R-985 Wasp Juniors. These are supercharged engines with critical altitude of 5000 ft allowing the aircraft to reach some 21k ft. Though the MSFS Electra, according to its engines.cfg, does not provide for superchargers. This means that:
- the take off manifold pressure does not go past 29 inHg, and
- the manifold pressure starts dropping from its max pretty much right after take off.
On the other hand, Aeroplane Heaven seemed to do some black magic in the engines.cfg to bump up the power output of the engines and I reached cruising altitude of FL018 without much fuss (that was after I remembered to lean properly). Not ideal but workable.
Now while still in cruise let’s talk my enroute NDBs.
The plan was to fly magnetic heading 303 degrees from the Scatsta NDB towards the Nolso NDB located on Faroe Islands. This leg was about 180 nm long with the Scatsta NDB range covering me for 38nm and I was supposed to pick up the Nolso NDB some 75 nm away. That left me with a bit over 60 nm over water without radio nav coverage. But the 38 nm miles of Scatsta NDB should be OK to figure out the wind correction angle and continue with that heading until the Nolso NDB is picked up.
Cool plan. Sounds a bit easy so let’s not use the Sperry gyropilot
Here the Nolso NDB came into range. Not bad for not being too far off
Cruising above the clouds offered great views but it was clear sooner or later I had to get below those beautiful clouds.
Of course I did not check the weather at my destination so why should I be surprised by this?
Clouds pretty much all the way to the ground. I would not be happy to see the ground rising above me in this weather in real life 
Civilization!
Followed by the airport
Fortunately, today these guys did not have to earn their salaries
I might need something cold from this shop.
And yes, not having a clue about the weather and especially the wind direction I just pressed on and landed straight ahead with the windsock nowhere to be seen.
I checked later only to see that I landed with a handsome quartering tailwind.
I think in real life this would not end up well
Next leg will bring me to Vestmannaeyjar (say it three times quickly) in Iceland. I am looking forward to it!
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Just wow! In my last leg I tried to go to Faroe/Vargar as well, but crashed in bad weather. And this with a hud and terrain warning all over the place, sigh.
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I think I was just lucky
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