DC3 veering

Is the extreme veering both left and right with the DC3 a known issue or is it something that I’m doing wrong. Have adjusted trim, used less powerandeven tried no flaps but still veers and death dives. Any help, advice appreciated

I have given up on this aircraft. In my opinion if the real DC3 handled like this on take off and landing no DC3 pilots would live long.
But lots of people on here disagree with me. So maybe we are just bad pilots? :roll_eyes:

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Well, you need to know that there are a few quirks with flying the tail draggers. When the tail starts to come up, she will act like a big WEATHER VANE. Needs good rudder control. Also, you need to ease her up and let her build speed before yanking back on the yoke. She will wing tip STALL below 70 MPH, and if you listen to her, as you fly, she will creak and moan when she is too slow, before killing you. We fly her a LOT, and are doing a trip through Africa and working our way north. Come see us!

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I’ve had someone on the Xbox pilots page tell me exactly that. I’m not a very good pilot, but this aircraft is unreal. I fly the Kodiak quite a bit and that can be a handful on take off but it doesn’t wing over and lawn dart :astonished: I’ve been looking forward to the DC 3 for ages as it’s such an icon of aviation.

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watch this video, it helps me a lot to fly with this plane :

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DC-3 v.0.3.6 after take off have CTD.

It’s definitely not that you’re not a good pilot. Tail draggers need a different technique to fly them, compared to tricycle undercarriage aircraft. We have tricycle undercarriages on aircraft today precisely because they’re a little easier to handle.
One of the best techniques on aircraft like the Beech 18 and the DC3 is to do a little “rudder dance” on landing or take off roll (if needed) a series of small and fairly rapid corrections and counter corrections with the rudder. This prevents the very normal tendency to over - correct a swing with one rudder movement - which is what takes up you off the runway into a ground loop. The Wilga is a good smaller aiircraft to introduce yourself to the vagaries of tail draggers. It takes a little practice but once you master it the DC3 becomes docile as long as you keep an eye on your approach speeds….
Once you do master tail draggers you will get a lot of pleasure from handling them nicely - I’m not a good pilot and it took me a while to get there but if I can do it it’s possible for everyone…

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The flight behaviour of the DC3 is garbage, as simple as that. I haven‘t tried the various improvement mods but there is a hell lot to do.

It is difficult, and is question of time, but with small and fairly corrections on the rudder during take off an landing you can prevent the normal tendency to go to the left or right and crash.

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It solved all my issues…

I’m sorry but that just isn’t true and it’s not even a helpful statement even if you are having issues.

The guy who developed the flight model released a video - the link is here somewhere which is a full account of the work he did on the flight model. I’d say based on that, that the flight model is excellent for MSFS…. The amount of detail and effort that went into it should be noted …

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This is a tough topic to provide useful feedback for. The Duckworks mod definitely improves the flight model on basic levels, but this obviously isn’t available to Xbox users. I imagine dancing on the rudder pedals is hard to do on an Xbox controller too. Then there’s the issue that a Flight Simulator taildragger isn’t necessarily acting like a real taildragger, so providing suggestions on how to fly a real taildragger may not be helpful for the user either. I’ve found some Flight Simulator taildraggers to be total murder machines, but after the Duckworks mod, the DC-3 isn’t one of them. The best I can offer is to just tinker with different control inputs and weather settings until you find something that actually works, regardless if it’s realistic or not. For example, for one of the Reno P-51’s I’ve found the best practice for take-off is to firewall the throttle with full aft stick and full nose up trim. Totally unrealistic, but it works while giving the ground model the least chance to kill you.

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