I used to fly both these planes A LOT before I got into flying third-party planes which opened me up to a whole new world. But I decided to take a break from my new fancy Blacksquare Grand Caravan and did a few short flights with the 185 and the Beaver. I forgot how fun these planes are!
So if you have to pick between one of the two, which do you choose and why? Either due to real-world characteristics (I’m able to land in smaller spaces with the Beaver for instance) or in-sim features/performance (I have to use key commands to remove chocks on the Beaver when starting on ground with floats whereas I haven’t encountered bugs with the 185.)
Just curious to see your thoughts and whether any one has done serious flying with either of these two planes! For myself, I have the most fun using the 185 when I’m flying in wilderness near cities or towns, but when I’m in the BUSH aka middle of nowhere the beaver feels more thematic.
I’m a Beaver guy… pretty much my next choice after the Focke-Wull P.149 and warbirds I fly. I love using it for flying around the lakes of Maine. To me, it’s more fun, and romantic, than the 185, which is essentially a 172… My dream was always to buy a Beaver and fly people from Boston to the lakes of Maine and everywhere in between in an amphibian. Gotta love having a round engine in front of you (when you don’t have to pay for it).
Not that the 185 is a bad plane, I fly that, too. Especially when flying out of 70B SPB Millinocket, ME when I pretend to fly for Katahdin Air. Although technically they fly an amphibious C206.
Beaver, especially the float Beaver. Looking forward to more of the same with the Otter, when that is eventually released.
They’ve stripped the Beaver from the Milviz P3D version. No straight floats, no option for config (remove the canoe etc). Really really poor.
You can feel as you may. I still love the plane, personally. The amphibian is the only one I care about really. I’m here to have fun, not get all upset about what I can’t have.
I’d love a good otter update!
I do wish they kept the canoe as a toggle option. But to be fair, I always toggled it on haha!
IRL Beaver for sure. In MSFS2024 I am not so sure. It looks like I have used C185 more, it is pretty good after all. If Beaver would get good update (fuel consumption for example), that would be my choice.