One last thought for now. If you have not done so, maybe ask Michael Potter to introduce you to Dave Hadfield. His insights might be wonderful on flying so many of the aircraft you build. Worth an hour's meeting at Timmies methinks!
- Kenneth
Thanks, Kenneth, for that thoughtful reply. Thanks, too, for the suggestion - I had dinner with Dave Hadfield about ten years ago, at a fund raiser in the Vintage Wings hangar, and we talked about flight simming, etc.. We talked about beta testing the P-40N, and communicated back and forth for quite a while - but in the end, it fell through. Too large a gap, I think, between the real thing and flight simulation to be really be able to bridge the fields. I haven't been able to keep in closer contact with Vintage Wings as their Gatineau hangar is just a little too far for comfort now. Dave has done, and continues to do so, YouTube videos about flying the aircraft he flies - Spitfire, P-40N, Fox Moth, Hurricane - and his comments, from procedures to handling, all very useful when writing the flight dynamics for sim aircraft! Numbers are one thing - the feeling of flight, definitely another.
(Speaking of bridging the fields, that's why I'm happy that it's a member of Spitfire Mk.Vb BM597's flight crew that will be talking with Dave Harvey about Spitfire handling - said flight crew also being an experienced flight sim user, and beta tester on the Spit.)
That's Michael Potter's Spitfire that my daughter is standing next to, in the photo, when VW came down for a visit - since sold, I believe.
Commander Mike Crosley's book "They Gave Me a Seafire" describes how difficult it was to fly Spitfires in formation, due to the sensitive elevators - so no wonder it wasn't easy with the Spitfire formation. Imagine 12! Apparently the RN pilots much preferred Hurricanes for formation work.
No intention to stop making the aircraft - and man, the requests keep coming in - but one's brain certainly starts to zone out after a few months, it does become difficult to 'see' the project and its million details after a while. So a bit of a slog, but good people like the beta testers and users are all experts at bringing dev's back to reality and motivation.
Mike