FlyInside Flight Simulator Beta Branch - 0.5.6.0

[admin]

Hi All,

We've revamped the B407 and MD500 flight models. We'd love your feedback, we've taken a lot of input from helicopter pilots in developing these. If you find the helicopter too twitchy, check out the "Cyclic Adjust" under Settings -> Flight Model

We've also fixed several bugs around exiting/entering scenarios, so these should be more usable now.

• Huge revamps to B407 and MD500 flight models!
• Adds "Cyclic Sensitivity" adjustment to Flight Realism settings. If you find helicopters too twitchy you can easily turn this down.
• Fixes bug where loading scenarios or switching airports sometimes places user aircraft in wrong location
• Adds GPU selection under Settings -> Graphics
• Adds a couple of new (under development) scenarios
• Adds missing propeller textures
• Misc scenario improvements
• Fixes compatibility with some Intel GPUs
• Improves Controls screen so that longer controller names are now readable

In parallel, we have some really exciting features under development.

1. New scenery tools. You can see some of them in action here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tl7cVV-S9Xw.
2. A beautiful single-prop trainer aircraft, coming very soon!

Opting into Website-Version Beta:
1. Turn on Debugging Tools from "Help -> About -> Usage Options"
2. Open "Debugging Tools -> Debug Diagnostics"
3. Expand "Debug Options"
4. For "Updates URL" specify "https://cdn.flyinside-fsx.com/SimLatest.ClosedBeta/" (the final slash is important)
5. Restart your sim
6. Use "Sim -> Check for Updates" - It should show a prompt for version 0.5.6.0 currently

Opting into Steam Beta:
1. Open Steam
2. Go to the "Library" section
3. Right click on "FlyInside Flight Simulator"
4. Select Properties
5. Go to the "betas" tab
6. From the "Select the beta you would like to opt into:" dropdown select "beta"
7. Let Steam do its update thing!

Thanks,
Dan

[TomC]

Looks pretty good Dan. Only problem I had with both of these heli's is that there is no left yaw authority with the heli flight mode set to realistic (highest/hardest) and very little on the next hardest one. I had to fly with the one higher than beginner in order to properly control yaw. Heli's both flew a bit better and the cyclic adjustment feature works well. I found that 0.7-1.0 worked best for me. Anything lower felt too unresponsive. Climb rate seems a little lower (less power).

Graphics resolution seems a little better.

Thanks for the update and I look forward to further improvements.

[John Hargreaves]

Nice to see the sim making progress, I thought I'd pass on a couple of observations from trying out the 0.5.6.0 version.

I tried landing on a few building roofs with the Bell 407 and no matter how gently I landed, the sim said I had crashed my aircraft and I had to reload or rewind. This suggests that there is collision detection with buildings, but I wonder if it would be possible to get it so we can land on any suitable surface? X-Plane has little or no collisions, so you can't land a helicopter anywhere except on the ground or a specific helipad, while DCS and AFS2 have proper solid surfaces, so you can land a heli anywhere you could in real life. This adds a great deal of interest to these sims as you can hop from rooftop to rooftop in Manhattan for instance, and it is not only great fun but good practice for your flying skills.

Another suggestion would be to make a 'demo area', with one or two top quality airports and a small region that is developed to the best that the sim can achieve, so as to show off the potential of the sim and showcase just how good it could look in due course. I imagine something like the FFS version of Friday Harbour or Meigs field only done to current graphics standards. I guess a bit like XP11 has the Seattle area as the intro to the sim when it first launches.

Anyway, the hard work is clearly showing results, so you guys keep going as you see fit, and good luck.

[TomC]

John, I found the same problem landing on a building's helipad (or flat rooftop) with both heli's. For me this only started happening after changing aircraft a few times during the flight. I found that I needed to re-start the Sim and afterwards it landed on these fine. Also, try to only change aircraft when you already landed on a hard surface (preferably your normal start up point).

[John Hargreaves]

Ah yes, that adds up. I started in the MD500 then changed to the Bell 407, it was only after a while that I decided to try landing on a few tower blocks. I'll give it another go with a fresh start.

[admin]

Thanks for the feedback all! We'll take a look at that building/crash issue... reloading aircraft shouldn't make a difference but we're always finding new bugs

John - we're working on a few "demo areas" based upon those scenery tools I linked in the video. Those should be really nice with the helis! How are you finding the heli flight model (aside from building issues) compared to the other sims?

Thanks,
Dan

[TomC]

Please try a heli in expert flight mode and see if you get any left yaw control. Pretty easy to test and hard to believe that this was tested before it was released imho.

Also, we def need to see some Real scenery soon. For now, X-Plane 11, even at 40-45fps, wins hands-down for me.

[admin]

Tom - is it possible you have a controls setup issue? I can perform a slow left-pirouetting climb no problem, and am using <50% left-pedal in an OGE hover. If I yank the collective hard to climb as fast as possible straight-up I run out of tail authority, but I'm not convinced that's unrealistic

In terms of scenery, did you watch the video I linked? We're currently working on the tools to build realistic scenery in-sim.

[TomC]

Put the heli into a hover and in Realistic flight mode you will not be able to yaw left. Not very realistic imho.

[admin]

Tom I'm not sure you actually read my post I think you have a controls setup issue of some sort. If pushing full left pedal in a hover doesn't yaw your helicopter left, there's something off about your setup.