Items that should be adressed (feedback after several flights)
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@voice-of-reason
After a couple of flights on the TBM850 and after reading the posts here on the planned changes I would like to add my observations of the plane and things that should be addressed IMHO.As others have done here are I sorted them by importance. My background, and you can make of this what you like ;): EASA certified FI, simming for +15years and was a certified aircraft mechanic although this is ages ago ;).
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Engine behavior
Currently the engine behaves very strange for a free spinning PT6. Mainly this is due to the relation of torque and ITT when climbing higher. To my knowledge with increasing altitude and unchanged power lever, the torque should decrease as the air density decreases. In order to keep the torque, the power level has be moved forward which increases NG and ITT. This leads to the ITT becoming the limiting factor at higher altitudes. I see non of this behavior with the TBM850s PT6. The torque more or less stays put and the ITT barely scratches the first red line. I could be wrong but the engine does not feel like a PT6.
Next is ITT during engine startup and here the only reference I have are the well known Stevo Knivo videos on YouTube which depict a pretty similar earlier TBM850. In the videos the ITT does rise much much slower than on this plane despite he being in hot southern Florida and I did my testing in a autumn Europe with temperatures around 10-15°C. -
KMC 321 Mode Controller
The KMC 321 Mode Controller mode for the autopilot has a Up and DN rocker switch which according to the official Bendix Kind manual should do the following:
DN/UP (vertical trim) - Controls the vertical axis of the autopilot. The rocker switch function is dependent upon the autopilots active mode. Depressing and holding the switch up or down results in the following:
• In Pitch Attitude Hold mode the vertical trim switch adjusts the pitch attitude at a rate dependent upon the current airspeed. The maximum pitch rate is one degree per second.
• In Altitude Hold mode the vertical trim adiusts the altitude reference at a constant rate of 500 feet per minute.
• In Indicated Airspeed Hold mode the vertical trim switch adjusts the indicated airspeed reference at a constant rate of three quarters of a knot per second (0.75 kt/sec).
Currently the switch does, well, nothing ;) -
V/S mode very aggressive
Here it becomes more like an impression as obviously I am not rated on the TBM850. The V/S mode of the autopilot is very very aggressive. When dialing in a decent for example of 1000 or 2000 ft/min the plane instantly dives for that value. On a real plane such an aggressive maneuver would actually send everything in the cockpit flying and give the occupants some good airtime. Nothing desirable on your 4 mio Dollar executive transporter. -
Master Caution Warning when turning on Ignition
According to the POH it is mandatory to set the ignition to ON when flying into icing conditions. But doing so results in a Master Caution. Cancelling that and it returns for one more time. Cancelling it again and its gone.
This seems very strange. -
Landing lights
As other have said the landing light source is way to dim and your reply was, as far as I understood, that you placed the individual LEDs to emit the light. Scrap that please. place one bright fucking light source there as gives us nice shiny landing and taxi lights. Once the light is on nobody can see the LED panel anyway because its a fucking bright landing light :D. -
Tablet
A tablet or anything of that kind to open the doors, load the fuel and passengers and configure avionics would be very much appreciated. It does not have to look fancy but the cumbersome in game system sucks. Also the switches for the avionics just look out of place. The same with the hot and cold lights. I fully understand the intention and appreciate it but moving them to a tablet would be nice. -
Passengers
Lets face it, this is a people mover so some passengers that appear when the seat is used would be awesome and would really enhance the immersion. The models are available as everybody used the same ones anyway.
Also I would like to get rid of the copilot on the outside model when the seat is not in use. -
Panel Light has no source
Just a nitpick but I know you are shooting for something great here:
The panel light of the cockpit has no source. It just illuminated the panel which is nice but you cannot see any source like a lightbulb or similar which emits the light. Feels very FSX like ;)
Thank you very much for considering my 2 cents here and I look forward to you reply :).
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@mad_x Here's a reply to all of your points direct from the developer.
Thank you so much for your comprehensive feedback. As a fellow pilot, the devil is absolutely in the details, and I like to get as many of them right as possible. I hope you won't mind if I keep my responses relatively short, as I've been fielding a lot of messages since release, while also preparing a major update for next week. I think you will be happy to see that many of your requests have been addressed already in that update.
Engine behavior :
As you may know, the simulator's native turbine simulation is the limiting factor here. I have maybe 500 lines of code just trying to patch fixes on top of the native system, and to do much better, I would have to turn this project into a gas turbine thesis. Addressing your particular comments, in my updated version, the maximum available torque decreases from approximately 130% at SL to 90% at FL300 (don't quote me, I don't have the simulator open right now). Previously, the ITT would become limiting around FL260 with the bleed air switch on high. I found that this correlated perfectly with Steveo's videos in several different ambient temperature conditions. Please take a look at the following example I used while replying to another post, and let me know what you think. I have already increased the temperature on density altitude calculation based on customer feedback for this update, because I walk a fine line between matching online videos, and making my customers happy. I just try to do my best, in any case.An example from a Steveo video: 30,000ft, TQ=90%, RPM=2,000, OAT=-26°C, Bleed=Auto, ITT=800°C. Under the exact same conditions, the resulting ITT with the TBM 850 in MSFS is 804°C.
The rate at which the ITT accelerates towards peak after startup is a little harder to control, since this is ultimately dependent on the rate of gas generator acceleration, which is controlled by the underlying native simulation. There is supposedly a variable to control it, but I have yet to see where it makes a difference.
KMC 321 Mode Controller:
All changes have been made, and are ready for the update. Previously, the switch could only be used to adjust commanded vertical speed. I also found that a connected KAS297B will momentarily show the vertical speed information when it is adjusted externally, which is now implemented.V/S mode very aggressive:
This may be something that's possible with the tuning variables for the default autopilot controller. I will look into it, because you are absolutely correct.Master Caution Warning when turning on Ignition:
I cannot reproduce this on my end. All of the annunciator panel lights use the same template that I've been using in all my aircraft now. There's no reason for it to behave differently than any of the other annunciators, but if you happen to catch this on video, please do share.Landing lights:
Yes, that was the nature of my response. The details are that the sim's rendered will not illuminate small objects when they occupy a small area on the screen. There is a parameter for the the lighting system that's supposed to prevent this, but it does not currently work as intended for all lights. This can be seen on many quality payware aircraft, include other's from Just Flight. Replacing the LED's with a large source, as you suggest, would solve the problem when far away, but not when up close, in which case the light would like comically flat and without detail. I have the same problem with the Duke's landing lights, which contain individual filaments, so I will experiment with some options to see if I can come up with something that looks good in both scenarios. There is another improvement to the landing lights in this update which may help alleviate these symptoms, though.Tablet:
This has been one of the most requested features for this aircraft. I am sorry to say that this is where I must draw the line as a developer, at least for now. Developing a tablet interface, especially for an aircraft as complex as this one, requires a whole other set of web-development knowledge that I do not possess. I have no particular aversion to including a tablet interface, but I simply cannot justify the amount of time it would take to learn these skills to create an alternative method to access all the features that are currently available in my aircraft by other means. I'm sure this is disappointing news for many, and for that I apologize. If I find someone willing to make this interface in a way that it could be abstracted to all my past and future aircraft, I will certainly leap on the opportunity to include it.Passengers:
Similarly to my previous answer, I am an aircraft and cockpit modeler, not a character modeler, which requires a whole different set of skills. The models you see in the pilot's and copilot's seats are the only ones available for us to use for free, and they are animated by a system controlled by the simulator, meaning they cannot be used as passenger models, to the best of my knowledge. On the other hand, you will be happy to know that you will be able to enable/disable the copilot model with the "CREW MUSIC" switch in the next update, and both pilot and copilot will be visible only when there is over 70lbs of weight in each seat.Panel Light has no source:
The light tubes are hidden up in a recessed area of the glareshield, which makes them very hard to see, even if you wanted to, so I assumed that nobody would go looking there. Just for you, I have added an emissive material to the area, and you can now enjoy the panel lighting to its fullest.Thanks for all the feedback. I apologize that I cannot get to every feature that is requested of me, but I hope you find the explanations satisfying, if nothing else. Look for the update at the beginning of next week, and I hope you enjoy it thoroughly!
Hope that helps...
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@voice-of-reason Thank you for this response! It has a lot of sense!
As for the EFB. This is just a thought, but it would be helpful, if the developer could either:
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at least document what LVARS/events/simvars are used for the "WX radar efb" -> then somebody (I hope I will have time later in the month) can create an HTML panel (e.g. for flow plugin by Parallel, or just shown via toolbar panel) to emulate the "efb" for failures/doors.
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add a (hideable) EFB-gauge which then can be modified by a plugin with an "EFB UI". And by default it can "just" display typical reference speeds so it's not "useless" even without any modifications.
This is just my (mostly web software engineer) assumption as I have not developed in-MSFS interactable HTML gauges, but it may be an interesting project to try out, and from my SDK reading -- should be doable.
(Edit): Also, huge thank you (both JF and the developer) for the communication channel!
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@voice-of-reason
Thank you so much for the fast and comprehensive response to my observations. Sorry for the long message as I know I can be very nit-picky but the few aircraft I deep dive into are normally only the ones really worth it and with a nice developer team behind it :).One possible idea to circumvent the tablet idea: why not use the weather radar screen functions that you already implemented to do so?
I am not a programmer but this should be more straight forward to connect the input and and desired outputs with an infrastructure you have already in place :). Because everything is better than that crappy default system.For the passenger models I refer to the ones uses by GSX, many addon aircraft etc. They are available. Also some freeware mods (like the CJ4 one) do have models. So there are solutions out there which you would have to place in the aircraft but would not have to create them.
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I can fully understand why a developer choose not to include an EFB, that must take a lot of time! However, a possible solution for developers that doesn't want to do everything from scratch might be this upcoming product:
https://msfsaddons.com/2023/07/06/katiepilot-the-developer-behind-the-efb-on-the-fenix-a320-announces-efbpro-a-customisable-standalone-efb/I don't know if it will be possible to control things like doors etc from an app on this "OS" but if it is it certainly looks like an interesting alternative.
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From what I can see in the weather radar code -- it should be possible (and fairly easy) to write a mod that would replace some page of the weather radar (for example "standby" page [or if while in "standby" page after some button press] ) and display it's own UI.
Not sure if there is enough "screen real estate" for "proper EFB" there, but I may give it a shot at least to manage doors and stuff like that.
But ultimately, having a 3d model in the cockpit with html gauge that can be "replaced" via mode (i.e. like in this examle would be the ultimate solution for a moddable EFB).
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@voice-of-reason Here is the image is something I came up with in a couple of hours. Essentially, it is possible to customize the weather radar screen with such "custom EFB" that accepts mouse clicks and of course can have more complex UI. I will have time later in the month to make a more complete mode, but wanted to share what is possible and get feedback if the developer would be happy to either include the optional tablet model described earlier. Otherwise the mode would need to be installed as a "patch" to his code in the weather radar gauge, which IMO is not ideal.
Also, here is a short video on how it works: https://youtu.be/UmxAB_k1n4s (sorry for quality, it's still processing)
Also also, important note is that the "mode" only replaces the "TST" page of the weather radar.
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@knidarkness Thanks for this. I have sent the details and link to the developer, we'll reply in due course.
Thanks again.
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@voice-of-reason said in Items that should be adressed (feedback after several flights):
KMC 321 Mode Controller:
All changes have been made, and are ready for the update. Previously, the switch could only be used to adjust commanded vertical speed. I also found that a connected KAS297B will momentarily show the vertical speed information when it is adjusted externally, which is now implemented.Just to be sure, the IAS will also be implemented? I would like to use the real function to dial in the IAS during climb :).
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Ta-da, and now I can manage W&B without the toolbar W&B panel :)
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@knidarkness very nice to have ;-)
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Quick reply direct from Nick at Black Square, mainly for @knidarkness
'Thank you all for your contributions here. Clearly, a web designer is exactly what it takes to make this interface a reality! I would be delighted to work on this together (I believe you've been in touch with Just Flight on my behalf), but I will provide a warning out of an abundance of caution. When it comes to an aircraft as complex as mine, there can be cascades of unintended consequences when making modifications like this. For instance (though I'm sure you already thought of this), simply toggling the doors with the native commands does not lock/unlock them, which may confuse the pressurization system. Nearly every system in my aircraft has some caveat like this, some more severe than others. I am happy to put significant time into achieving a goal like this, but I thought I should offer fair warning that it's not always as easy as it may seem. I would look forward to the opportunity, though!'
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@voice-of-reason Thanks for relaying it back and to Nick for taking a look at it!
The warning is absolutely fair! It would be great to make this addition as this is quite nice QoL feature for products I thoroughly enjoy. For the fuel and payload -- you seem to be using the default simvars for tanks & payload stations, so that seems to work fine.
For the more complex "flows" so far I've been looking into the (IIRC)
interior.xml(or whatever is the filename that matches "clickspots" with proper events) and replicating the flow via the JS code (by calling theKevebts and/orLvarsas it is defined in the xml) with some delay between actions to allow for animations/internal state change. That seems to work for the doors at least, and I'd imagine should work for other stuff as that's (at least in the eyes of the sim) they way user would interact with the plane?As for the failures (which is ultimately something that's IMHO is very beneficial and at the same time most complex to properly integrate) -- probably the "simplest" way (as of now -- mostly guess) would be to have the triggering logic in the EFB/tablet/etc, and whenever we want a new fault to occur -- send custom event (or at worst change LVAR) that can be intercepted in the current codebase and set in the
activeFailuresListThis would allow to add more complex triggers (e.g. altitude, IAS, additional exceedances and so on) without completely overhauling (or overriding) existing codebase.For the immediate future (most likely in the end of this week, when I once again will have more free time, or at the latest the one after it) I'll spend a few more hours improving the WXR "fake-efb" and try to publish to flightsim[.]to.
The only question I don't have an answer to with it regard is how to make it into a mod without violating the license of the product -- because as of now I modify the
bksq_wradar1.jswhich is a part of a product, and hence can't be redistributed.I guess the "least bad" option would be to do a diff of two files and somehow merge them on user's machine (be it by python script or manually via online tool). But ultimately, having an HTML gauge that one can "harmlessly" override (i.e. tablet/notebook/something in VCockpit) would help with this aspect as well. And indeed simply having more space and not needing to rely on the WXR for "EFB screen" would be ideal.
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@knidarkness Can you please drop me an email and I'll get you connected to Nick at Black Square.
Email me at scott.phillips@justflight.com
Thanks.
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@voice-of-reason done!
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Can someone explain why I am getting a
"TQ Exceedance 2472.8" warning when I'm at 95 percent TQ and 2000 rpm and in 850 Mode ?
All temps are within limits.
Thnx.
EDIT: Sussed it: It's 121 % of 200 RPM in 850 mode. It's quite easy to exceed it.
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P.S. Any chance of the Lvar for toggling 850 mode ?