leading edge review - xplane10.files.wordpress.com

25 August 2010 | x p 1 0 r e v i e w s a i r c r a f t r e v i e w Goran Matovina | L e a d i n g E d g e S i m u l a t i o n sTheo Gregory

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The Sundowner & The DuchessIt almost sounds like the title to a movie, doesn’t it? Perhaps Marion Cotillard as the Duchess? Maybe you see a jaded, war-weary George Clooney as our pilot, a carefree American ex-pat living in a squalid flat just above an absinthe soaked saloon two doors down from the Moulin Rouge? Walking toward each other on a sidewalk lined with leering hookers, they bump into one another and so, perchance, meet. In due course they fall in love, but somehow she must break free of her domineering father, the King, and the life he has created for her… Oh, will they find true love! Kind of a timeless story, too.

Looking back on the recent past from the vantage of 2010, the 60s & 70s seemed to have been about falling in love and breaking free, too. Beechcraft must have felt these stirrings, even if from a different set of vantage points. They had been building staid,

solid, premium class private aircraft for more than forty years by that time: StaggerWings and Beech 18s, Bonanzas and Twin Bonanzas, Travel Airs and Barons, Dukes, Queen Airs and King Airs… and all were regarded during the 60s as established names in general aviation circles… indeed, these were widely considered THE BIG names in private

aviation. How did this come about?

Maybe you’d flown in the war and come home, become a doctor or a lawyer or a banker and had moved up into the big leagues. You made a few bucks and decided it was time to fly again, and there were Cessnas and Pipers to choose f rom… but, then there was Beechcraft. You had the money to go first class so decided either a Bonanza or Baron was for you, but you popped for a V-tail Bonanza to

get your feet wet slowly. Then you got some more money in the bank and bought a chalet in Aspen. Well, that Baron was just the thing to get you there

Beechcraft has long had a reputation as THE builder of premium general aviation aircraft. This highly regarded manufacturer of King Airs and Barons also turned out some of the best GA training aircraft ever made, and Goran Matovina and Theo Gregory have made it their mission to see that two of these aircraft come to life in X-Plane. So, are they good enough to compete in what is about to become a cut-throat market segment? Join us as we look for some answers to this important question, in a review by chipsim7...

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in style! Beech catered to this market and indeed I suppose they still do, and they’ve met demand by building the most reliable, the toughest yet sweetest handling aircraft you could ever hope to lay hands on.

But the seventies were overshadowed by another, more troubling trend, as well. Inflation had skyrocketed with the ongoing “police-action” in Vietnam, but as that conflict wound down the beginnings of a deep recession shuttered the global economy. Doctors and lawyers weren’t flocking to King Airs or even Barons anymore, and by the late-70s even Bonanzas were a hard sell. Beech needed to downsize and simplify their lineup or face going out of business. This is a big part o f t h e s t o r y b e h i n d t h e Sundowner and D u c h e s s , a n d what we regard today as basic general aviation trainers were in f a c t p a r t o f B e e c h c r a f t ’s desperate bid to remain financially solvent.

The , uh… Sundowner?

Well no, not really. How about Musketeer? Does that ring a bell?

Developed in the mid-60s to compete against GA trainers from Piper and Cessna, the A23-series was offered in a bewildering variety of models, though all very downscale when compared to their higher-priced stablemates. But by the mid-70s production of these lower-priced models had been amortized , and when the economy tanked it was a simple job to spruce them up a bit and offer them as lower-cost alternatives to Bonanzas and, in the case of the Duchess, Barons. Because the Musketeer and Duchess were solid, affordable, and rugged as hell, as they aged more and more of these low-cost, no-frills aircraft found their way into ongoing service at flight schools around the world. By the mid-80s production ceased not because of a huge improvement in the economy, but rather because Beech shifted emphasis and began producing King Air variants for commuter airlines. GA

development languished until the boom years of the late 90s.

So, best to get that little bit of history out of the way, and we hope it didn’t go down too hard! Anyway, I offer my take on those years as a way of putting these two a/c into perspective. I learned to fly in the sixties (in Cessnas, usually, though one Cherokee 140 still gives me nightmares) and transitioned on to bigger things, and most often in Beechcraft products, Travel Airs and Barons chief among them (though another Piper, a pressurized Navaho, did it’s very best to kill me one night!).

And now, Goran M a t o v i n a a n d Theo Gregory, two newcomers to the X-Plane des ign scene , have put their stamp on these times, giving us their interpretation o f t h e s e t w o classics to marvel at... and yes, to fly. So, how good are they?

First, let’s take a l o o k a t t h e Sundowner, as this was the first acf that the team chose to develop.

The image here, when I first looked at it in Photoshop, quite simply took my breath away. It feels like a dream. I woke up in the back seat of the aircraft and no one was behind the yoke, but you could only feel this way because the interior of the aircraft (modeled after a real one, by the way, that Goran trained in) is so completely and beautifully rendered that the line between simulation and reality is almost completely blurred. It is that good, and even the pictures here can’t do it justice; you need to see it to believe it.

By this virtue alone I would lend my full recommendation to purchase the SIM, but Goran’s Sundowner has a lot of other things going for it that make it a standout choice, and first among my reasons is a stellar flight model.

When I first flew this Sundowner, given her Swiss registration I started from LSGG/Geneva Cointrin and




hopped over the northern Alps to LFLL/Lyon StX. I set the weather to severe crud–storms, medium turbulence, etc., and the time to an hour before sunrise. Surely as rotten as can be set in X-P, and an awful, punishing environment to test fly a SIM the first time out. And, as the type is familiar to me I didn’t bother to read the manual, either, though I did alter some joystick settings (add mixture, delete speedbrakes), then I fired her up and set my freqs and taxied out to the active and let her rip.

About three hundred feet up I was in the storm, bouncing enough to get my attention while climbing for 7000. The Sundowner feels a little light, twitchy almost. In a word: tight. She’s the exact opposite of the last two acf I reviewed, the 787 and the A380, as well, so I had to get used to the comparatively nervous handling all over again. No “roll-inertia”, no “heavy” feel...just simple, direct and light on the controls. Within a few minutes we were good friends.

This isn’t a long flight, by the way, but I love the runways at LFLL as there are great VFR landmarks to be had–though they were of no use this first flight–and it turned out to be a particularly uneventful flight...other than a bit rough. And I think I made my point, at least to myself: Leading Edge’s Sundowner possesses what seems to me to be very accurate flight model that remains faithful to the light GA paradigm, and she has the avionics on hand to get you from point A-to-B in some very serious crud, and all the while with little to complain about. The only thing I missed by not reading the manual first was learning that by clicking the air inlets by your right knee you can make the control yokes disappear, and this does make the lower panel a bit more accessible visually, but it was no big deal.

The first point I wanted to address concerns some chatter I’ve heard on the net about this SIM being an alleged “frame-rate hog”. I have a modest computer, a 27 inch iMac with the i5/quad core processor, 512Mb of vram and 8Gb system ram. And I say modest in comparison to what many MsFS users boast of at the FSN, which sounds like a computer salesman’s idea of a wet-dream-come-true… water cooled processors, 2Gb of vram, etc., etc. I’ve now flown Sundowner over the full Paris scenery, EHAM, EDDM (full version) and KLGA, all of which have given me fog and stutters with

Falco, Mu-2, A-380 and the other usual suspects. I did get some light fogging over Paris (I think a Kleenex tissue would fog up over that scenery, but what do you expect!), but other than that? Nothing. Nada. Zip.

I have been running X-P 9.60rc1 lately, but if that has anything to do with not having framerate issues I’d be a little surprised. All I can say is, and your mileage may vary, of course, but I don’t consider this a framerate hog in any way, shape or form. Far from it, in fact, at least on my rig.

Another favorite flight of mine is to hop over the central Rockies in Colorado, a short flight from KTEX/Telluride to KASE/Aspen. Good scenery, even without the

latest ortho-stuff and challenging enough NAVAIDS (remember, old farts don’t fly

with GPS) to make it fun. Aspen Colorado possesses, for those of you unaware of the Silver City’s more arcane joys, the airport from Hell. It’s one of the few airports left in the world with two, yes, two localizers for one runway, this interesting aside to let you know that this airport truly is a challenge even under modest sVFR rules. And you can forget CAT II; the big boys stopped trying years ago. It can be done but it’s just not worth it. If you screw up you end up splattered all over Ajax Mountain, on the downhill race course. The place is littered with Twin Otters and Convair 580s, a testament to the testosterone driven intestinal fortitude of the pilots who worked for (the now long-since merged) Aspen Airways. UAL Pilot’s flying the BAe146 into Sardy Field (as KASE is known locally) were no less cautious.

KASE

KASE



But I’ve had pretty good luck with the Sundowner, however. It’s a nice flight, about an hour or so total time, but you take-off from an airport with the nose-bleeding elevation of 9070 ft/2765m, and which has one runway (6870 ft/2094m/Rwy 09 LOC 109.3). Aspen is no slouch in the altitude department, either, coming in at 7820ft/2382m above sea level, one runway 15/33, 7006ft/2135m/Rwy 15 LOC 111.15.

From the earliest times I flew with my dad, Aspen was always on our agenda. I’ve flown into that airport with him in Bonanzas and 210s and Barons, and later in C90s. I flew Aspen Airways a couple of times, too, and lived to tell about it, so obviously it wasn’t all that bad, but Sardy Field is n o p l a c e f o r lightweights. It’s pure alpine flying, with the peaks surrounding the f a c i l i t y r a n g i n g anywhere from 12-14 thousand ft. You gotta think fast in a single when things go wrong with these margins. If you aren’t prepared mentally, the trouble up here comes on fast and is always potentially deadly.

And I mention all this to give you a clue about the high altitude capabilities of this SIM. I consider the real Musketeer/Sundowner to be a little underpowered, and this SIM behaves accordingly. It’s a good thing, I feel, not to fudge the basic performance parameters, and Leading Edge held true to the real a/c. When you take off at nine thousand feet in a normally aspirated single engined trainer, you’d better not be counting on a thousand feet/per for very long. You need to know where you are at all times, and don’t go flying into clouds unless you know what’s in ‘em, either. Point is, however, Sundowner will get you there, even into KASE in pretty crappy weather, as long as you fly conservatively. Know where you are and don’t count on bucketfuls of extra power to pull you out of a tight situation, because it just ain’t there.

Is this a drawback? A reason to not buy this SIM? It is if all you want is a video game experience. If you want real-world performance to simulate real-world situations, this is exactly the type of SIM you want, and need, to hone your skill-set.

I think it appropriate to compare this SIM to Tom’s Falco and the stock C172SP included in the latest

versions of X-P. I like the full deck of NAVAIDS in the Falco, especially the HSI, and I like the dual NAVCOMMs in the 172. The Sundowner has neither, which reflects the cost-cutting nature of the real airplane. Too well, in fact. I’d love an HSI in this acf, or dual VORs, because the ubiquitous Garmin 430 included in X-P just isn’t an adequate substitute for dual NAVCOMMS, in my opinion. The current 430 just isn’t ready for prime-time yet.

That said, Goran’s 430 installation is better than most, certainly the equal to Tom Kyler’s Falco and Nils Danielsson’s BK-117, which gets me to the last point I want to talk about in the Sundowner: panel lighting.

I can hear Goran groaning now!

I always have complaints about cockpit lighting. Always. And I do this time too!

My big complaint? That I don’t have too much to complain about this time out!

The Sundowner has an exceedingly simple lighting setup: two 3D manipulators that you click and hold while you drag the mouse over one of two lighting knobs–increasing or decreasing intensity as you drag left or right. One control for the overhead dome, one for internal instrument lighting. That’s it. And it’s been done so well that I didn’t miss having little spots and floods and other ambient adjustments. And there are a couple of standout textures in his lighting setup that I feel need special mention:

First is the little red light in the center panel transponder control head that pulses when interrogated. Second is the little amber light in the VOR gauge on the lower of the pilot’s panel. Two itty-bitty lights, almost so small they get lost in the greater scheme of things. So, what’s the big deal?


Well, it is a big deal, and if you’ve been reading along with these reviews you’ll understand what I’m getting at and why I keep pounding away on this one simple point: the success of any simulation is only as successful as it’s weakest element. I suppose it’s agonizingly difficult to make the big pieces fit together, to make a coherent whole out of all the disparate pieces the designer has toiled over for months, and he (or she) might rush to get the product out when all is not quite perfect. One little element, one little light bulb can absolutely ruin the simulation at this point if it doesn’t ring true to the real thing.

Again, if you want to see what I’m talking about, you need to buy this SIM and fly at night for a while. If you’re a pilot–a real pilot, I mean–you’re going to know exactly what I mean as soon as you lay eyes on these two insignificant lights. If you’re a designer with no flight experience: look and learn. Pay attention to this one. I might expect this attention to detail in a pro who’d been doing this for years, but I didn’t expect it from a couple of rookies. They’ve obviously paid attention to pilots and forums and taken what they’ve learned and run with it. Excellent work here, men!

There is a big black hole in the middle of the panel right under the gyro-compass, and Goran advises the Sundowner he learned to fly in was “equipped” with exactly the same hole. Maybe that’s carrying experience a little too far, because this location, right in the middle of the pilot’s main instrument scan, is ripe for added capabilities.

Other than that, this panel looks perfect.

So, does it all work?

The manipulators used by X-Aviation have proven balky in the past, and have given many people a hard time. Some people have griped about intermittent or incorrect operation, notably on Tom Kyler’s first few releases of his Falco, and while I didn’t run into any issues with the Sundowner perhaps that’s because there’s no HSI. My Falco had a bad case of gimpy HSI heading bug syndrome, and the HSI must be so complicated to recreate I can only begin to guess at the sleepless nights this critter must cause.

Wrapping up the SundownerLet’s face it, as has been said before the

Sundowner ain’t no beauty queen. She’s got a fair case of the uglies, at least from the standpoint that a lot of low-end trainers weren’t designed with a lot of sex-appeal factored in (counter-example: think early LearJets from the same period), but Goran and Theo were true to their baby… they didn’t try to gussy her up with fancy paint jobs and a spotless panel.

They gave us a roughed up GA trainer that’s close to forty years old now, maybe even just like the trainer you first went up in so long ago it hurts to think about. Simon calls it the “vomit-spattered” panel because it looks so realistic! Maybe that’s carrying it too far but I think it conveys the point: Goran and Theo went out of their way to make this panel look like a lot of sweaty palmed newbie have earned their wings in here.

And I have to say it works. I love clean cockpits and generally dislike dirty ones, and my first inclination was to dislike the Sundowner’s for just this reason, but if I had I would have been missing the point. And you might too; you might not think about it beyond the simple messiness of the thing, but this panel represents a lot for anxiety and fear, and no small measure of the pride of accomplishment, too.

I wrote the first paragraphs of this review the first night I had this SIM and I’m finishing up more than a month later, and I’m still totally smitten with this bird. It’s got a big heart, it’s fun, and has what it takes for the long haul.

What do I mean by that? Aren’t these just empty platitudes? Not really, so let me explain.

First point, I doubt you’ll get tired of her. Like an old pair of shoes that just fit your feet, the Sundowner just feels right. Easy to handle, so this is the perfect SIM to take out when you feel like flying something simple and honest. Where everything works and isn’t so “gee-whiz” complicated you have to read a two hundred page manual just to figure out how to turn off a No Smoking light.

If you’re new to X-Plane, or better still, new to X-P AND to flying in general, this is the SIM you’ve been searching for. Sundowner is as close to the perfect learning SIM as I’ve run across in X-P if only because her handling feels a little more authentic than the Cessna 172SP that comes with X-P, which would be my number two pick. The Cessna looks brand new and has all the bells and whistles, but she lacks the feel that permeates Sundowner, and it is just this




feeling of aged authenticity that is such an important part of the SIM experience. The word you hear bandied about is “immersive”, or the ability to get you to suspend disbelief long enough to really pull you into the simulated environment. Sundowner is as immersive as you can get and not need a physician’s prescription.

My opinion? This is the best GA trainer currently available in X-P. Period.

Some notes from my logbook:A/P very easy to operate, but simple functionality, and operation covered in documentation;The disappearing control yokes are well implemented;The red LED ADF lights are a little too bright at night;Glare on the post mounted compass doesn’t vary much, can be a little hard to read;Flap movements aren’t audible (at all), so you’ll have to visually confirm settings. Good habit to get into, if only because that’s the way it is when wearing a headset!

But things change. Goran & Theo already have a list of things being modified for their first major update, and some interesting additions may find their way into the cockpit, too. They’re talking about rebuilding the entire panel, creating a smoother mesh, improving the night lighting and filling the cockpit with manipulators.

The hole in the panel? Yep, they’ve got plans for that, too, but are still undecided. I suspect they’ll remain true to the nature of the beast and won’t add an HSI, but oh how I wish they would! A second VOR would be almost as nice!

I’d like to see a couple of flight school liveries, too. Maybe some GA registrations from around the world, too. Kenya? Singapore? Brazil? X-P is a global product so why not address the global market?

One thing is certain, however. Competition is coming to X-Plane. MsFS developers are coming to X-Plane, and they’re going to be bringing some high-quality wares to our side of the fence. A year from now I doubt we’ll even recognize the landscape, and I think you can take it for granted that the number one engine behind this change is going to be the release of X-Plane/version 10… for instance:

The term “global illumination” is about to become a big part of our vocabulary, and this has to do with how light from one object interacts with other light sources.

But what was new is too soon old again, and that’s just the way our world goes. For the Sundowner, as good as he is, is about to meet the Duchess.

Does this mean you should ignore him now? Is he not worth the effort anymore when there’s such a dazzling new girl in the spotlight?

We’ll get to that in a moment, but let’s meet the new girl. She’s cute, she’s a little sexy even, but her beauty is more than skin deep.




S h e ’ s t h e n e w s t a r o n o u r h o r i z o n

Leading Edge Simulations latest creation, the Beechcraft Duchess, ushers in new levels of precision cockpit instrumentation, subtle cockpit rendering, and über-detailed controls. And yes, she’s kinda cute, too.

We started to get a look at Leading Edge’s new Duchess a few months ago, and the latest blender images we received from Goran Matovina and Theo Gregory were details of cockpit instrumentation, and let me tell you those first peeks were a revelation.

I bemoaned the lack of an HSI in the Sundowner from the moment I first opened the file, so was grateful when I saw one of the early, pre-release wide-angle panel shots of the new Duchess (right), and while there was indeed an HSI, something else caught my eye, too.

And I think it’s going to catch yours, too.We could just call it attention to detail and leave it at

that, but where’s the fun in that? So, there I sat, taking it all in. Where to start? How about all the Phillip’s head

screws not only lined up perfectly, but a couple of them are in need of a little touch-up paint!

Or take the brassing that shows up on the edge of black metal knobs here and there, or the almost invisible chipped-paint around the engine oil/temp and fuel gauges. Not enough detail for you yet? If you’re a diehard cynic, maybe the oil stains on the brake calipers will convince you? No? Well, keep looking… because everywhere you look you’re going to see that these guys are seriously working their way into deeper and deeper detail.

They’re still rookies, still learning, but they’ve been pouring their hearts and souls into the Sundowner and the Duchess and it shows everywhere you look.




The image (right) was taken during my very first flight in her on the day she was released, and it fairly depicts conditions of the time: twilight, and low clouds. True to form, like a kid on Christmas morning I downloaded the file(and more on this in a moment) and fired her up on the ramp a t S i m o n ’s n e w K M P I / Yo s e m i t e scenery, then took off for some touch and goes.

I don’t know how you feel about night flying but my words of wisdom to you are this: get used to it because that’s the most beautiful time to fly, either in a SIM or in the real world. In the Duchess this beauty turns into something quite magical. Now, squint your eyes real good and take a close look below:

The top image is night with 100% panel lighting and no flood lighting; the image below is with just a little bit of flood added. Difficult images to make out here, but I felt these would be useful as there has been a huge

amount of work put in to mak ing th is panel shine at night!One way this effort shows up is in new textures applied to r e n d e r s u b t l e reflections. We’ll look at these on individual instrument faces in a moment, but Goran and Theo have gone us one better and made a new texture best seen here:

In the lower half of the image, with zero flood lighting you see the black of night through the windshield, but apply some flood light (top) and what do you see? Well, seat cushion and floor console reflections!

See, I told you these guys are getting good!




Now let’s take a look at the primary instrument stack:

You can make out reflections all over the HSI in this daylight image. You pick up passing reflections and scattered sunlight off the face of all panel instruments in the Duchess, so if you want to toss the word immersive detail into the mix this is the place to do it! By the way, here’s the original HSI Blender render:

The 3M WX-8 is called a “stormscope” and it is not a radar. You’ll find a decent write up of how to use and interpret this oldie but goodie here: http://www.fepco.com/article.trw.html . Here’s the one in the Duchess in operation:

The green Xs represent storm activity:

In the scope closeup note the X indicators close to the a/c symbol, at eleven and three o’clock; these are the storm/lightning seen in the images immediately above and below.



http://www.fepco.com/article.trw.html





As I’ve said, I love HSIs in general and think this one is a winner, or will be once the bugs are ironed out.

As noted in the Sundowner article, there have been teething problems with X-Aviations HSI manipulators in the past, and they’re Showed-up in the Duchess, too, and as in earlier releases of the Falco these concern setting the heading bug (lower right knob on the face, at arrow). Ideally, placing the mouse/cursor over the knob reveals a +/- setting arc; drag your mouse one direction and the heading bug rotates around the dial, and in so doing you change the heading the A/P tracks on. Problems with this manipulator relate to this action, and in the most frustrating sense possible because the fault is intermittent.

I got three behaviors when setting the bug: 1) normal; 2) the bug would not move at all, no matter where or how I moved the mouse (this was what got me in the Falco), and; 3) the bug would move in one direction only (in this case, counter clockwise).

I wanted to highlight this problem and draw attention to Dan Klaue’s much belittled ERJ-140 while referring to this matter: the manipulators in the ERJ employ a dual-axis (x:y) movement, and do so flawlessly. The technology works, it’s simply a matter of mapping the actions correctly, but I think there are differences in the way a Mac interprets actions vs how a Windows PC does, and this must be a part of the problem. Regardless, Goran and Theo were all over it before I mentioned it and the first update, release imminent, will make this a non-issue. The folks at X-Aviation respond to these sorts of issues with lightning rapidity, and it’s a good thing to keep in mind when considering a purchase.

Autopilot operation is straight-forward and as simple as the Sundowner’s, which is to say it is not a full-featured FMC so don’t expect to set vertical rates of climb or work holding patterns with this thing.

Operation is detailed in the manual and I doubt you’ll have any issues with it.

If there is an issue with A/P operation it concerns visibility at night. Here’s a well lit twilight image:

The A/P controls are in the area circled on the far left side of the panel. Now, take a look at the area in darkness:

There’s a significant zone of darkness in this area, and it makes operation of the A/P more than a little difficult at night. I mentioned this to Goran and he had an interesting take on it. He modeled the panel on the real a/c, and included all the pros and cons he found there, and this is one of ‘em. The buttons in this case are not illuminated internally, and there are no posts to light the immediate area, so when it’s dark outside there’s just not enough light to see and operate the a/p controls. Even turning up the floods affords little useful improvement. I suspect only lighting the buttons internally will solve this issue, and as there’s a bit of a philosophical issue involved I’m not sure what I’d recommend. If you buy the file, use it for a while and let Goran know what you think. He’s very receptive to user feedback. Until then you’ll need to improvise.




The sound file included is interesting. There’s a deeper rumble within all the usual engine noise that really increases the sensation of power being applied on take-off. The only thing missing from multi-engine files like this is the occasional asynchronous throbbing you get in the real deal when your props are a little out of synch, but as I don’t have a huge hardware quadrant I can’t test this out. Needless to say, the sound file is a real improvement over what you find in most good files.

Framerate issues? Nope. Nada. Nothing… as in Zip, until I went to LOWI/extended and even then it was better than most of the other complicated files I’ve used there. Tom’s MU-2 bogs down at this facility like crazy, chugs like a train when flying out of there at night, but Duchess was flyable here (image, below).

I usually have problems over Paris, especially when xpfr’s full scenery is active, but I had acceptable conditions in the Duchess, i.e., no chugging and just a little fogging. Performance here was in line with the x737 and Falco, and perhaps a little better than the ERJ-140 and new 787 (Paris is lower image).

Both of these images resolved back to clear by taking a screenshot (cntr . ).

At the smaller airports I usually operate GA a/c from, frame-rates simply were not an issue.

As I’m fond of saying, SIMs succeed or fail by how well they pull you in, and as the bar keeps moving up, as the amount of realism keeps escalating (and the price of new, required hardware keeps falling) what appears realistic today may appear quite tame a year from now, but I think just pouring over these screenshots ought to convince you that Goran and Theo’s Duchess isn’t business as usual. For example, the reflections appear even in daylight:

The main instruments are constantly shifting mosaics of dancing reflections and scattered sunlight, while the exterior detailing reflects care and planning...

...and even the cowl flaps are operational...




But the cowl flaps, for instance, are not simply cosmetic upgrades. Use of (or failing to use) these appropriately can directly effect engine temps, yet too many SIMS omit this level of detail, which is a shame.I quickly ran out of hardware levers to manipulate all the settings you have direct control over in this SIM, and if I had room on my chart table for a multi-engine quadrant I’d get one simply because this SIM needs and deserves it. You really need to be able to manipulate throttle, props, mixture, cowl flaps and carb-heat in this SIM in order to fly smoothly, let alone handling the basics like aileron and elevator trim, gears and flaps. I ran out of hardware settings in a hurry, and missed not having them programmed and on hand. This is the first SIM that’s made me feel that way, too. Food for thought.The Duchess wasn’t a fast airplane, not like a Baron or a Cessna 310, but she’s no slouch, either. You can cruise along at 150-160 and get places at a decent clip. Flying from our home base at KMPI to KTVL/South Lake Tahoe, for example, takes less than an hour in the Duchess, and leaves time to loiter over Yosemite National Park. When X-Aviation releases their Nor/Cal scenery, I hope you all remember how spectacular Yosemite National Park is and pick up at least that portion of the package. That and San Francisco will be fascinating, to say the least.X-Aviation has omitted using GIZMO to validate purchase and to implement updates, and I’m glad. Downloading and installation were painless as a result.Once your purchase is validated you get a download link. After download and unzipping the file, your folder will have a platform specific install option. Hit that and follow the instructions; you’ll be up and flying in a few minutes with none of the tedious nonsense GIZMO entails.

The price is inching up. I guess that’s to be expected but I hope that doesn’t backfire on X-Aviation, or the market for add-ons in general. The price of the Duchess in relation to most other pay-ware is more that fair, however. You can spend more and get a helluva lot less for your money, and for the price I doubt you can find a more immersive GA file.So, this is our first take on the Duchess. I’ve only had her a few days but Simon and I wanted to get this review up and out for your consideration, so this isn’t yet the definitive word on the file. That won’t really be possible until a few maintenance tweaks are released, but my take on the file is simple: this is one of the very best files available in X-Plane. If you are into GA aircraft it’s a must have. If you are training to be a pilot, this is a must have. If you don’t care about realistic operations or immersive SIMs in general, and have little interest in learning to fly… well, you might want to give this one a pass.So, we’ll conclude with a few words about the Sundowner a few pages down, but first...

Our Über-subjective XP10 Reviews X-Rating for the Duchess is:

(With a MAX 10 per element, for a total of 100)

1. Frame Rate Performance: 8 2. Flight Model: 8 3. Flight Procedures: 9 4. Exterior Model Detail: 9 5. Cockpit & Panel Detail: 10 6. Avionics/Procedures: 8 7. Ease of use: 9 8. Documentation: 10 9. X-Factor : 10 10. Subjective Price Value: 9

Overall Score: 90

Is this !le worthy of your time & consideration? Yes indeed! is is another well conceived and executed !le by Goran and eo, is very fun to #y, and nicely represents the ‘state-of-the-art’ in evolving 3D implementation. Even in its current form it must be considered one of the very best !les currently available for X-Plane, and with thoughtful upgrades can only improve.

e !le is currently priced at 27.95 USD, and is available from: http://www.x-aviation.com/catalog/



http://www.x-aviation.com/catalog/



Food for thought:I kinda like the StormScope, but think the HSI ought to be right under the Horizon, the StormScope under the HSI;The first upgrade will address issues with the HSI and Airspeed indicator, manifold pressure and nose-gear cosmetics;A major upgrade for the Sundowner is imminent;Check out the forums for the latest on the SAAB 340 and 747/200 that Leading Edge is preparing for release. Amazing stuff.




So, we left the old man, the Sundowner, kind of hangin’ back there, but don’t make the mistake of thinking you should ignore him. As good as this new Duchess is, there’s something truly intriguing about him that I find comfortable, perhaps even valuable. Sure, he’s a single engine trainer, with fixed gear no less, and he sure ain’t sexy! But let me put it to you this way: After having him around for a while he’s become kind of like a friend. A lot of a/c come through Chaos Manor on their way to a review but sometimes, late at night, when the lights are down low and the pups are asleep, I fire up X-P and go straight to the Sundowner. It’s usually just a short flight, a half hour, maybe a little longer, but the time I spend in the Sundowner is comfort time. Maybe it’s just because that is the time of day I get to choose exactly what I want to fly. Ever since Sundowner found a place in my hangar, however, he’s found a little place in my heart.In the end, however, I be rootin’ for a marriage. I think keeping them both around will be the best thing for all of us!

Our Über-subjective XP10 Reviews X-Rating for the Sundowner (Version 1.0) is:

(With a MAX 10 per element, for a total of 100)

1. Frame Rate Performance: 9 2. Flight Model: 10 3. Flight Procedures: 9 4. Exterior Model Detail: 8 5. Cockpit & Panel Detail: 10 6. Avionics/Procedures: 8 7. Ease of use: 10 8. Documentation: 10 9. X-Factor: 10 10. Subjective Price Value: 9

Overall Score: 93 e !le is currently priced at 24.95 USD, and is available from: http://www.x-aviation.com/catalog/Note: a major upgrade is about to be released!





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