FSX Native Hangar Queen?

[BendyFlyer]

Many happy hours in these birds. Have to take this one for some fun. Heres a quick video of an Aero Commander landing on an Island in the Northern Kimberleys - Troughton Island (YTTI). Worth some practice with for short field buffs. Hint the strip is less than 1000 ft and each end is the sea.

 

[Bushpounder]

Yep, me too!!!

I was talking about the Aero Commander 500.

Don

 

[BendyFlyer]

Milton, thanks a lot. I had forgotten how much fun these aeroplanes were. This is a very good rendition and like the beat up time honoured look (except for the dirty windscreen ) . Goes just like the real thing and that includes the little nose wobble as the gear goes up and down which the real thing did as well due the turn of the gear as it retracted backwards.

I have only two small issues if you may, the first is acceleration clean is too fast once past 120 knots and similarly hard to slow down with power reduction until you get the airframe dirty etc but this may be an FSX thing as a lot of aircraft are like this in FSX. The other is no trim setting indication either by tool tips or wheel movement hard to set the trim for take off (again an FS9 to FSX thing perhaps). Sounds are great. Even managed several circuits at YTTI just for the memories. Once you have flown these aeroplanes getting back into one is like slipping into a favourite pair of gloves. I had thought about the Carenado 500S but like this so much now I will not bother, may even find some clean paints to tart about in LOL.

Nothing wrong with the earlier Aero Commander just had smaller engines and two blade props. 500S (Shrike) got a little smarter looking with a pointy nose and sharp wing tips and the IO-540 s at 285 HP and three blade props made a lot of difference, we used to operate them with regulatory approval to go to 8,500 pounds take off weight. One of the nicest aeroplanes I ever, flew a delight, the controls were so nicely balanced and effective you could basically fly them with finger tip holds but they had this massive metal control column which on first impression looked like it had been borrowed from a C-47. They went well with one engine out and they clipped along very nicely for two small piston engines. They were a bit squeezy up front but the view was superb and they had no vices what so ever. In the late Bob Hoovers hands he made them perform in a spectacular fashion, the trick was the Ted Smith design and the balance and control effectiveness, you did not need to push and shove these about, just a little touch and they went where you wanted them to. You can see why President Eisenhower used one, they were over engineered to some extent compared to other light twins, with fire systems etc but easy to maintain, went well and had a nice comfortable cabin and pax's used to love the big rear bench seat.

A great piece of work is my view and that is from an old AC500 driver, thanks a lot the clean up was worth effort. One small thing - any chance of clean windows as an option? or the glass of water on the dash for the slow rolls!!

 

[aspen31]

Just a quick note to say I have tried this machine in Prepar3d V3 - (latest) and with the exception of the starter everything in the VC I have tried works well in this sim. The airplane looks great and performs well.
Thanks to Mr Shupe for another job well done.
Best!
Warren (aspen31)

 

[semo]

Easter Treat

Happy Easter, Mr. Shupe, and thank you for all the FSX candy you have produced lately. Please don't stop, your productivity is amazing.
Maybe a Fsx lodestar or PV would be a nice addition. The Boston and B-26 will come along in time. What a collect for 2017 already.

 

[Penz]

Like Warren, I installed the Queen in P3D, works great as far as I can tell.

And such a great model! Thank you very much Milton.

- JP

 

[Milton Shupe]

Milton, thanks a lot. I had forgotten how much fun these aeroplanes were. This is a very good rendition and like the beat up time honoured look (except for the dirty windscreen ) . Goes just like the real thing and that includes the little nose wobble as the gear goes up and down which the real thing did as well due the turn of the gear as it retracted backwards.

I have only two small issues if you may, the first is acceleration clean is too fast once past 120 knots and similarly hard to slow down with power reduction until you get the airframe dirty etc but this may be an FSX thing as a lot of aircraft are like this in FSX. The other is no trim setting indication either by tool tips or wheel movement hard to set the trim for take off (again an FS9 to FSX thing perhaps). Sounds are great. Even managed several circuits at YTTI just for the memories. Once you have flown these aeroplanes getting back into one is like slipping into a favourite pair of gloves. I had thought about the Carenado 500S but like this so much now I will not bother, may even find some clean paints to tart about in LOL.

Nothing wrong with the earlier Aero Commander just had smaller engines and two blade props. 500S (Shrike) got a little smarter looking with a pointy nose and sharp wing tips and the IO-540 s at 285 HP and three blade props made a lot of difference, we used to operate them with regulatory approval to go to 8,500 pounds take off weight. One of the nicest aeroplanes I ever, flew a delight, the controls were so nicely balanced and effective you could basically fly them with finger tip holds but they had this massive metal control column which on first impression looked like it had been borrowed from a C-47. They went well with one engine out and they clipped along very nicely for two small piston engines. They were a bit squeezy up front but the view was superb and they had no vices what so ever. In the late Bob Hoovers hands he made them perform in a spectacular fashion, the trick was the Ted Smith design and the balance and control effectiveness, you did not need to push and shove these about, just a little touch and they went where you wanted them to. You can see why President Eisenhower used one, they were over engineered to some extent compared to other light twins, with fire systems etc but easy to maintain, went well and had a nice comfortable cabin and pax's used to love the big rear bench seat.

A great piece of work is my view and that is from an old AC500 driver, thanks a lot the clean up was worth effort. One small thing - any chance of clean windows as an option? or the glass of water on the dash for the slow rolls!!

BF, thank you for that report and comments. Well done Sir

I did clean up the windows and windscreen; you should have seen them before! I do not notice the dirt but maybe I am just now de-sensitized to it. Could you post a screen shot. BTW, are you running FSXA? Keep in mind, this is the "Hangar Queen" series so it was meant to be dirty. All the clean versions are coming soon. (AC520, 560A(HC), 680S, 500 clean versions, and maybe 500S.) The AC520 is about 40% done now and should be released this week.

RE: Trim: There are trim indicators overhead and on the panel. Do these tool tips not work in your sim? See attached please.

RE: Acceleration past 120: I have no specs on acceleration at weight, temperature, and density altitude for this aircraft so have no real measure to test against.

RE: Frame drag: Hmmm, might need to be a bit higher with offset adjustments to manage speed but had no real data to compare to as well. You must keep in mind that I have never flown an aircraft, nor sat in a cockpit, nor experienced your real world "feel". My flight models are strictly data based, and adjusted to what I think the aircraft would handle like.

I was unaware you have Aero Commander seat time. If you have time to beta test these aircraft in quick turn-around fashion (i.e. retired), I can share the pre-release versions, but otherwise I am releasing them with the same flight models I used for the FSX port over versions, with some minor tweaks as I test.

 

[Milton Shupe]

Just a quick note to say I have tried this machine in Prepar3d V3 - (latest) and with the exception of the starter everything in the VC I have tried works well in this sim. The airplane looks great and performs well.
Thanks to Mr Shupe for another job well done.
Best!
Warren (aspen31)

Thanks Warren; that is great to hear. Will look at that starter issue.

Happy Easter, Mr. Shupe, and thank you for all the FSX candy you have produced lately. Please don't stop, your productivity is amazing.
Maybe a Fsx lodestar or PV would be a nice addition. The Boston and B-26 will come along in time. What a collect for 2017 already.

Semo, thank you Sir. I will keep chipping away at my inventory as I have time. Working on the AC520 now. But I do have the B-26B Marauder, the A-20 Havocs, and the Vultee XP-54 in late stages right now so things will be getting busy shortly.

Like Warren, I installed the Queen in P3D, works great as far as I can tell.

And such a great model! Thank you very much Milton.

- JP

Thank you JP; that is great to hear. I appreciate everyone's system reaction to this conversion.

 

[Milton Shupe]

Hangar Queen Starter Update

TO correct the starter issue, change this statement in the aircraft.cfg Piston Engine Section:

From: normalized_starter_torque=0.081
To: normalized_starter_torque=0.281

 

[napamule]

I did not fly it yet but increaseing the starter torque just makes it 'jump' at start (get it? Jump Start - hehe). With port overs I find the idle rpm friction is too much. Making that 0.800 instead of 1.000 helps with the 'hard to start' problem. Like I said, haven't tested. so it's just a 'maybe?' suggestion.
Chuck B
Napamule

 

[Milton Shupe]

I did not fly it yet but increaseing the starter torque just makes it 'jump' at start (get it? Jump Start - hehe). With port overs I find the idle rpm friction is too much. Making that 0.800 instead of 1.000 helps with the 'hard to start' problem. Like I said, haven't tested. so it's just a 'maybe?' suggestion.
Chuck B
Napamule

Hi Chuck, its been 5 years since I did the port overs I think so I do not recall exactly if I developed the FMs for FSXA or not.

One too must be careful of the idle rpm friction settings as it can change other characteristics. But it may work fine for this instance. Try it and see if it works for you and does not affect shutdown and prop timing with sounds.

 

[ToniJH]

Hi Milton, i have little issue with HSI gauge, is this possible to fix?

 

[Milton Shupe]

Hi Milton, i have little issue with HSI gauge, is this possible to fix?

I guess I do not understand the issue. Is that a radio compass face being displayed?

Attached are screen shots of what I see here from FSXA and from FSPStudio.

Can you explain if you have made changes.

BTW, I see you figured out how to clean the windscreen

 

[ToniJH]

The radio panel is working fine, i forgot to close that window when i take the screenshot.
HSI gauge is moving itself from original place and spins around. Im using P3D latest version, the plane works fine there, only that HSI gauge have issue.

 

[Milton Shupe]

Does the gauge display correctly in the VC?

 

[ToniJH]

I'll check that out

EDIT: There is the same issue in VC HSI gauge too, all other gauges works fine

 

[spokes2112]

No problem here - tested in FSX accel & P3D v3.4.22.19868 both 2D & VC.
P3D went all bass-ackwards when it comes to gauges. It looks for the gauge(s) from the P3D\Gauges folder first, then the panel folder.
FSX and prior it was the opposite.
Have a hunch you may have a ST_500.cab or folder residing in P3D\Gauges that may not be playing nice.

Edit - Looked at the code too, looks good, all the parts n pieces are there. The ones, if missing, that would cause such an anomaly.

 

[Milton Shupe]

No problem here - tested in FSX accel & P3D v3.4.22.19868 both 2D & VC.
P3D went all bass-ackwards when it comes to gauges. It looks for the gauge(s) from the P3D\Gauges folder first, then the panel folder.
FSX and prior it was the opposite.
Have a hunch you may have a ST_500.cab or folder residing in P3D\Gauges that may not be playing nice.

Edit - Looked at the code too, looks good, all the parts n pieces are there. The ones, if missing, would cause such an anomaly.

Roman, thank you for looking at that; greatly appreciated. Maybe the best action to take at this point then is to delete that ST_500.cab or folder residing in P3D\Gauges folder.

 

[falcon409]

Roman, thank you for looking at that; greatly appreciated. Maybe the best action to take at this point then is to delete that ST_500.cab or folder residing in P3D\Gauges folder.

I had a similar problem, although my heading Indicator card wasn't as off center as Toni showed in his screen. Deleting the ST_500.cab file from the gauges folder did the trick and that gauge is now as it should be. There were no other gauge problems. (This was in P3D_V3.5)

 

[blanston12]

I had a similar problem, although my heading Indicator card wasn't as off center as Toni showed in his screen. Deleting the ST_500.cab file from the gauges folder did the trick and that gauge is now as it should be. There were no other gauge problems. (This was in P3D_V3.5)

Has P3D 3.5 been released?