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Good sailplanes to use with CumulusX


HarryO

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This could well be old information for many, but if there are any reasonably experienced CumulusX pilots that know the basics of gliding pretty well but want an extra challenge for thermalling as well as aerobatics, I highly recommend the Discus-K model from Aerosoft. I've been flying the Discus-X model for a long while and assumed that the two were essentially identical but for some cosmetics, but for some reason I don't quite understand I think I was wrong. The Discus-K simulation has taken the enjoyment factor up another notch for me, as well as the difficulty. It is truly a nimble and responsive glider, beautiful to fly and is a nice test of gliding simulation skills. I really love the lack of electronic instruments leaving the experience down to the raw basics of flying itself. The part that surprised me is that the Discus-K simulation actually noticeably reduces the load on the CPU and frame rates (a small effect but noticeable), and increases the thrill at the same time. Just remember to un-comment the water ballast code in the aircraft.cfg file because the developers decided to disable the code by default I think because the K was primarily intended for aerobatics. However it is also a beautiful thermal ship as well!

Enjoy

Harry

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Harry,

thx for the interesting suggestion!

Maybe I'll offer one to my own for my birthday this year! For the time being I am really enjoying DiscusX, but, above all, I restarted enjoying FSX thx to CumulusX!

Although I still start Condorsoaring, I strangely (because of the well known usual limitations of MSFS) find additional realism in thermal and even ridge flying with

CumulusX! - Really looking forward for new features from Peter :-)

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Jcomm having been a long time DiscusX flyer in CumulusX, if you make the move to DiscusK thermalling is more challenging than the DiscusX. I'm only starting to get the hang of the DiscusK. I think the trick is that you have to turn a bit faster in thermals especially if you are not circling in the precise core of the thermal. If you set CumulusX to 100% turbulence effects, what happens is that the DiscusK seems to get thrown out of the thermal much more than the DiscusX if you are flying too slow. The inboard wing is in the lift but the outboard wing is not. In this case it seems that the natural tendancy is to try and push the inboard wing back down against the rising air but if you are flying too slow it seems to induce a stall of some kind and the glider is thrown out of the thermal even worse. So now I try to keep the speed up a bit during thermal turning and not force the glider to do anything it does not want to do. This typically means I seem to be turning the DiscusK at 55-60knots when I could turn the DiscusX a lot slower without being thrown out of the thermal as much. In some respects it might be that the DiscusK is setup with less stability than the DiscusX for extra performance, but making it a more difficult glider to master. Turning faster in thermals means you can bank tighter and stay in the lift. Once you have cored the thermal you are turning faster and have sacrificed some climb rate for the sake of staying out of the turbulence at the edges of the thermal. Flying the DiscusK is a real challenge! It might also help to reduce the sensitivity of the aileron axis a bit. What I found happening is that I would start to oscillate my bank angle trying to core the thermal as I flew too slow then pushed the inboard wing down then to have it pushed back up then me pushing it down again and so the bank angle was not steady. Once the glider is centered in the thermal only a bit of opposite aileron might be needed, but it's the process of trying to get into the lift that is the tricky bit! I don't think it is the sensitivity of my joystick but probably flying style bad habits from the DiscusX. The problems of flying in a thermal also depend on the thermals strength. I am flying between 12pm-2pm in the heat of the Australian summer and the thermals are strong combined with a moderate prevailing wind as well. I'm also experimenting with water ballast in the DiscusK and whether the simulation of ballast makes any sense in FSX/CumulusX. In real life it is a big factor because it helps with settling the glider down in turbulence as well as penetration into the wind and overall efficiency. It sure is fun to see the water streaming out of the back of the glider in the preparations for landing.

Enjoy!

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HarryO

Thanks for the interesting notes regarding DiscusK and CumulusX together :-)

When you refer to the way FSX deals with water ballast, are you saying that the Polars have nothing to do with the real thing when ballast is used?

In Condor, and in Silent Wings, ballast works credibly. I never checked with FSX though...

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water ballast simulation in FSX is not bad - the FSX aircraft within the sim has 'loading stations' that can be arbitrary weight and an X-Y-Z location relative to a defined mid-point of the aircraft, and this existing simulation capability is used for both aircraft fuel and conveniently for glider water ballast. FSX is simulating the aircraft in accordance with how heavy it is, and the FSX aircraft developer has a huge number of parameters available to define things like inertia in pitch and roll, all of which are affected by the aircraft weight including the current ballast.

So if you load the sim glider up with water, it will fly faster, the high speed glide angle will improve, and the aircraft will have more momentum in roll.

The Aerosoft Discus probably has the most detailed work of any FSX glider on the aerodynamics, so it's as good as it gets. The LS8, ASW28 and ASH25 have been repeatedly flight-tested using custom development gauges to test GLIDE performance with and without ballast, so they're ok. Messing wth the aerodynamic parameters really is a niche hobby though, even amongst developers, so it's no wonder the majority of FSX gliders do not have water ballast. FSX has other issues (e.g. the effect of flaps is not quite correct) and relative to those the ballast support is very good.

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Thanks for that B21 and Jcomm. Check out this post with respect to ballast, the wandering albatross bird and climate change! The post is a bit off topic but if you love gliding of all kinds it's a must read. Basically the observation is that as the ocean winds increase over the last few decades, the wandering albatross is able to reach more successful fishing grounds with the prevailing wind which makes them fatter and heavier which increases their wing loading but helps them soar better because the ballast increases their flight performance in the changing conditions.

"The researchers found that westerly winds in the Southern Ocean have increased, on average, by 15 percent over the past few decades. Both female and male flight speeds got a boost as a result, with females alone traveling about 311 miles per day in 1990, but about 435 miles per day as of 2010"

http://news.discover...eds-120112.html

Enjoy

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Oh, I know... B21... I spent years around it, and develloped a few FMs, including for commercial products :-), at least two for helicopters :-) (an area really challenging to tweak in MSFS...)

My main source of inspiration was Ron Freimuth, with whoom I had the extraordinary oportunity of exchanging many email messages and learn quite a LOT about the insides of MSFS. But it started long before, when Enrico Schiratti was still in the begining of his experience with the sim, as well as Maurizio Gaviolli :-) IIt was some.... 20 years ago! Whow! I was also able to participate on the first tests of SCASM with a scenery for Azores and Madeira, many years ago...

I still poll a few sites, namely Herve's exvellent source of information, which you most certainly know:

http://www.aero.sors.fr/index.html

In the past, and before leaving MSFS ;more than 3 years ago, and all simulation 2 years ago, I tried about all gliders from FSGLIDER, including those I had flown for real since 1980 (some rather old, such as the Bergfalke :-) ). It was allways a disapointment, and although I allways tried to tweak and re-tweak, it was no before starting using Condor and SW that I finally felt at home. Ah, around 1993 I was also an active user of the only glider simulation program available for many years - SFS!

The DiscusX from Aerosoft was rather a surprise to me. Actually I had been invited in the past to design a good AS-K21 (a glider I know very well from my RW flying...) but I never really started that project.

After testing the DiscusX, and now with CumulusX, using MSFS looks like I have discovered a new completely unknown simulator! The only problem now will be to buy a PC up-2-date... My rather old Pentium4 freezes easily running MSFS, and I keep everything to the minimums in order to get a more or less stable 10-12fps !

Regarding CumulusX!, it's good to know Peter is still actively working on it. I look forward for a possible update including some sort of wave. And, for the time being, and although I keep great expectation in the open Flight Gear project, sailpane & gliding simulation will be rather difficult to achieve at the levels raised by Condor, SW and now FSX2+CumulusX+Aerosoft's gliders. XPlane will certainly not become an alternative given it's rather closed and simplistic weather engine/model...

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Great reading! Thx!!!

"The researchers found that westerly winds in the Southern Ocean have increased, on average, by 15 percent over the past few decades. Both female and male flight speeds got a boost as a result, with females alone traveling about 311 miles per day in 1990, but about 435 miles per day as of 2010"

http://news.discover...eds-120112.html

Enjoy

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