MSFS 2020 Tips

[Harold Henderson]

There's an American livery for the A320 in the MSFS Livery Mega Pack, and it's all free. You can get it on their Discord channel.

Community AND vendor freeware is starting to become available for MSFS.

Here's a shot of the MSFS A320 in American livery (a little imperfect) and free Paderborn Lippstadt Airport (EDLP) from Aerosoft. And, yes, pusback works!

MSFS 2020 A320 EDLP Padderborn GE.jpg (369.91 KiB) Viewed 5321 times

[Theodore Martin]

......
Almost as real as it gets! Come on Ted!
.......

Thanks for all the "blow-by-blows" on MSFS. It's pulling me closer and closer to that sim. However since I first have to upgrade to Win 10 and lose a lot of my current a/c, it will probably be a little while before I pull the trigger. If I can get FSX to work in Win 10 it would help because all of my a/c are in that sim and I would not have to reload P3Dv4. Last time I upgraded to Win 10 I could not get FSX to work properly.

[Harold Henderson]

There was a 2nd update to MSFS 2020 several days ago. So work continues refining the product.

My first payware purchase for MSFS 2020 - the Carenado M20R Ovation. Very good a/c with only minor bugs ... so far.

Cruising at FL135 over an Australian overcast. Climbing through the clouds I had icing visible on the windscreen and windows. Took the defrost a while to get rid of the ice.

Checkout the clouds!

200921 FS2020 Carenado M20R.jpg (158.98 KiB) Viewed 5296 times

200921 FS2020 Carenado M20R 2.jpg (134.44 KiB) Viewed 5296 times

[Theodore Martin]

Those clouds look very nice. Looking forward to seeing the "icing conditions" once I finally pull the trigger on MSFS.

[Harold Henderson]

... Looking forward to seeing the "icing conditions" once I finally pull the trigger on MSFS.

I have been flying the gaskets off that Mooney in Australia - I love that plane! The pics only do the MSFS clouds half-justice.

Australia is in winter right now so you don't have to go very high before you cross into negative C degrees. One flight, I climbed up to 13,500 for cruise and happened to go through a cloud layer. I was actually shocked when I saw the icing start accumulation on the windscreen and side windows! I found the defroster and pitot heaters and turned them on. The defrost of the windscreen was not instantaneous even after breaking into the clear skies above the solid overcast below. It took 10 or so minutes to clear the little bit of ice accumulated.

On descent, I had to fly through a pretty thick overcast with icing conditions. The defrost was NOT keeping up and the ice was accumulating rapidly until I could not see out the windscreen and side windows. I was flying blind but on autopilot. Highest obstacle at my destination was 1,500 ft, so I programed the a/p to level at 2,000. I broke out of the overcast about 2,200 ft - BLIND. I had to fly around for about 10 minutes using the a/p before I had clear enough vision to start searching for the airport!

Just as in real-life flying, you look for holes (particularly "canyons") to ascend/descend through if possible!! Better to avoid icing.

This was a very surprising cheek-clencher flight!!

So, you definitely have "visual" icing, but I'm not sure if icing effect on aerodynamics is implemented. Will have to test that.

Most people who are not real pilots would be surprised at how difficult it is to find airports visually - especially smaller ones! P3D did a better job with this than FSX, but MSFS 2020 goes another level!

"As real as it gets"

p.s. I do not get any royalties on MSFS 2020 sales.

[Harold Henderson]

Here's my icing aerodynamics test.

Flew the Mooney M20R Ovation to FL148 to get into the middle of the clouds. OAT -14C. Defroster OFF but pitot heat ON.

200925 MSFS icing 1.jpg (444.74 KiB) Viewed 5279 times

External

200925 MSFS icing 2.jpg (121.33 KiB) Viewed 5279 times

Airspeed had stabilized around 130 kts indicated. After about 10 minutes in icing conditions, airspeed started slowly decreasing. Eventually, the stall warning went off.

200925 MSFS icing 3.jpg (401.94 KiB) Viewed 5279 times

Note the high angle of attack relative to the bottom of the far clouds.

200925 MSFS icing 4.jpg (126.6 KiB) Viewed 5279 times

In a nose high stalled descent

200925 MSFS icing 5.jpg (362.69 KiB) Viewed 5279 times

So, it appears the effect of icing on the aerodynamics IS modeled.

[Theodore Martin]

Harold, those pics are amazing. It's hard to believe what they can do with software and graphics these days.

So I will definitely be going to MSFS but it will take me some time. I will have to assure I can get drivers for my peripherals (some are a little old) and that my apps work with Win 10, or buy new ones. Then load Win 10, purchase and load MSFS and working with my hardware, followed by reloading P3DV4 and all my a/c since MSFS airlines are limited. WOW, lots of computer work.....

[Harold Henderson]

Haven't posted in a while, so I thought I would give an update. Bottom line: after several updates (though updates are coming on a regular basis) MSFS 2020 is not quite ready for prime time AAV airline flying.

Number 1 deficiency IMO is the flight plans and autopilot systems are sub-basic level. Example, yesterday I tried setting up the A320 for my next leg.

1. First issue was the flight plan: no way I know of to import flight plans from sites like SimBrief. I meant to check if a FSX flight plan could be imported but I don't have FSX flight plans on my MSFS computer.

2. The Nav database does not appear to be current.

3. Using the MSFS flight planner is difficult to manually add all the waypoints and there seems to be a bug making it near impossible to get some waypoints added using the search look-ahead. It will only return 100 hits and the look-ahead starts looking at airports first. It appears if you can get enough characters typed in quick enough (sub-second) you can get a trimmed list that may include the sought nav aid.

4. You CAN add your flight plan and select arrival & departure procs from within the sim using the FMC BUT you cannot enter crossing restrictions. #2 above applies here.

5. The sim did seem to manage speeds adequately though I only got to the Cruise phase and did not get to descent.

So, right now, the only option for using the A320 - and I assume it would be the same for the 747 and 787 - is to manage altitude/speed manually to hit any restrictions.


In spite of several issues, I have been successfully flying the MSFS Cessna Longitude as a Cessna Citation X in FS Economy using simple flight plans created in the MSFS flight planner. Of course, the sim is as beautiful as ever.

201022 MSFS 2020 Cessna Longitude.jpg (606.97 KiB) Viewed 5208 times

[Harold Henderson]

UPDATE to Above.

It appears you can import a FSX PLN (flight plan) file. I generated one with FSBuild v2.4. I had one waypoint with a real on-thee-chart crossing restriction but FSBuild did not put it into the plan. So, I still don't know if MSFS 2020 will import crossing restrictions.

Still remains a serious problem that you cannot enter crossing restrictions through the FMC. There may be hope for NOT importing SIDs/STARs in the FSX flight plan and selecting them in the FMC BUT I don't think I'm seeing all of them in the FMC.

[Harold Henderson]

RE not seeing all SIDs and STARs: at KMIA you can pick any STAR you want as long as it is CURSO5 and that regardless of the runway you pick. If you want any other than CURSO5, then you have to manually enter waypoints into the FMC. Even if you do pick CURSO5, you still do not get speed/altitude constraints.

[Theodore Martin]

Thanks for the update Harold and that pic looks outstanding. Just goes to show there are positive and negatives for moving to MSFS 2020. Appears the best option is to use MSFS for GA flying and P3D for VA/airline flying. Hopefully by the time I move to MSFS all the bugs/limitations will be resolved.

[Harold Henderson]

PUCKER FACTOR ALERT!!!

Just experienced pucker factor to a degree unparalled in ANY other sim!!

Flying Cessna Longitude biz jet on ILS 32R into Port Moresby (AYPY). Using live weather. ATIS reported 3 mile viz with lowest clouds at 900 ft. I finally broke out just above 500 ft and there was the runway in front and below but could not see the far end of the runway. Landing from there was a snap.

With bouncing around and superb graphics this was the most immersive experience to date!! Unfortunately there is still no replay feature implemented, or I would show some visuals.

The biggest hurdle to really flying the MSFS 2020 A320 with live weather is the inability (as far as I know) to get weather updates for your destination until within ATIS radio range. Should be able to have confidence in your runway/approach long before that. I'll have to do a little more playing with the A320 to be sure it doesn't have that capability in there somewhere.

[Harold Henderson]

Aerosoft CRJ 550/700 set to release 16 March 2021. I feel a CRJ FREQ coming on!!

Here are some youtube vids to give you a taste of the a/c.

Come Fly With Me Ep1: The Safety Checks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAKFCi5TrSM

Come Fly With Me Ep2: The Outside Check!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UM33CRlnMgw

Come Fly With Me Ep3: Feeding the FMS!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94gvXtU9qGk

Come Fly With Me Ep4: The Originating Checks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DleGniOnJvs

Come Fly With Me Ep5: The Final Preparations!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aftvvGCQ09k

Come Fly With Me Ep6: Starting The Engines! (REVISED)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67ycMg2SLtE

Come Fly With Me Ep7: Taxi Out And Taking Off! (Revised)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btsANrgNHCA

[Harold Henderson]

Aerosoft CRJ 550/700 for MSFS released today! Looks great and flies as expected. On my first flight now.