Glider Diana 2 by 61tree Studio

Discussion Hub Aircraft
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Hi gliding enthusiasts,
A beautiful glider has been available for FS’24 for a while now, and I’m surprised that nothing has been posted about it here on the forum yet. I only fly in VR, and when the Diana2 became available, I was immediately curious—and I have to say, it had those “wow” moments that I’m really excited about. So I’d like to give a quick introduction to it here. I’ll have to keep it to a few points, because without the manual, you probably wouldn’t be able to use all its features right away.

Diana 2
Diana 21920×1080 505 KB

Diana Mountains 1
Diana Mountains 11920×1080 332 KB

Diana Mountains 2
Diana Mountains 21920×1080 273 KB

The Diana 2 comes in many liveries, which also affect the interior design. The cockpit features are very extensive and include many animations. No spoiler alert!

Diana open Canopy
Diana open Canopy1920×1080 577 KB

Diana Cockpit
Diana Cockpit1920×1080 568 KB

Pilot
Pilot1920×1080 366 KB

But that’s not all—the pilot’s clothing and other items can be customized.

Diana Instruments
Diana Instruments1920×1080 455 KB

Diana General Settings
Diana General Settings1920×1080 418 KB

Various small notebooks are used for configuration and settings.
There is a wide selection of instruments, including the LX9050 and LX9070.

Diana Towplane
Diana Towplane1920×1080 459 KB

Diana starting
Diana starting1920×1080 400 KB

The Diana comes with an additional tow plane that enables a very realistic takeoff sequence. I’d also like to mention that this can, of course, be used with all other gliders as well. The free K7 is very limited in speed and literally crashes at 150 km/h. That’s not the case with this one, which can get all gliders up to a good altitude at 120 km/h, provided the terrain doesn’t have any major obstacles or runways that are too short.

DIana 09
DIana 091920×1032 178 KB

The Smartwatch
The Smartwatch1920×1080 408 KB

They didn’t skimp on the extra features. The smartwatch also plays music and can be used just like a full-fledged media player. I really like that on long-haul flights that don’t require much concentration. There are other watches available as well.

DIana 07
DIana 071920×1080 344 KB

There’s also a tablet on board that you can position as needed. Aside from a few fun features I’m not showing here, it also includes a very useful oxygen supply. As you can see, it also includes dehydration monitoring for long flights.
A little spoiler: It’s not just about the display. For example, low oxygen levels also affect the pilot’s ability to control the aircraft.

In my opinion, those are just the most important things. I think it’s a shame that other developers don’t go into such depth.
Of course, I’ve noticed things that could still be improved, but updates are released regularly, and the included software notifies you immediately and makes the update process super easy.

I wouldn’t want to be without the Diana 2 anymore, and it’s really great in VR.
At least in my Pimax. :wink:

Not to knock anything, but I also enjoy flying the K7, AS33, and a few others. But this is the “next level” when it comes to gliding.

I think you can sense my enthusiasm.

Continue to enjoy successful flights—all without an engine.
Warm regards

PS
My version runs on a PC with the MS Store version. I have to select two platforms here to write the article. I chose Xbox as well, but I can’t comment on that.

2

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Well I’ve had this for several months now. As a real pilot with several thousand hours in sailplanes, although I have never flown one in R/L -I have attempted to sit in the cockpit but am too big for it -it is a small cockpit designed for smaller ‘jockey sized’ pilots a trend that should be strongly discouraged by the FAI/IGC. The modelling is superb, no doubt about that. Some of the features i.e. the watches etc. are a bit gimmicky, and add very little in reality. I care not for for liveries that you would not find on real gliders - but I suppose that play’s to the ‘gamer’ element who have little idea about real gliding. The glider flies nicely -it is perhaps a little too docile on the ground -the r/l Diana 2 is know to have especially difficult handling on the ground and is prone to ground looping and flies under a special EASA approval that stipulates a pilot must have 100 hours experience minimum to fly it -the only manufactured sailplane that does. Despite winning many world championships in the 15m class (usually flown by a certain Mr. Kawa) less than a handful or two have been sold -which would qualify it as a commercial disaster with most other manufacturers. The towplane supplied is not powerful enough to launch a fully ballasted Diana unless one uses a totally unrealistic positive flap setting -usually the landing flap and does not accelerate fast enough. In R/L you would drop a wing go into a groundloop and run the risk of snapping the tailboom-it’s happened a few times in R/L. In real life you would be towing a fully ballasted Diana at 130-140 km/h minimum with a fast accelerating towplane to guarantee a safe launch. The airbrakes appear to be very ineffective, I don’t know if they are on the real glider, but I would be suprised if they were. But it is another glider for the sim which can only be good. I would say it is on a similar level to the Gotfriends AS33ME and Discus 2c with a few ‘gimmicks’ thrown in. Now if a realistic towplane could be developed that would be good, because at the moment none of them are. Also MS/Asobo need to develop their atmospheric model so proper thermal and wave soaring can be conducted in the sim. The thermal and ridge lift modelling is better but still not quite there. Why R/L pilots use Condor 3, despite its poorer graphics.

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Keep your eyes out for a new freeware JS3 as well, if your into gliding in MSFS…

p.s. max tow speed in a K-7 is probably 150 km/h -seems about right -but it’s a few years since I have flown one in R/L. A ‘vintage’ wood/metal training two seater with a low wing loading of 28kg/m2 is a very different proposition from a modern carbon/glass sailplane designed for competition with a wing loading of near 60kg/m2…

3

@RoterBaron63 @superhp18et Thank you for the nice write up and feedback. More features and fixes coming this Sunday with much more planned for future updates.

4

Just reading your post again looking for ways to improve Diana. “I would say it is on a similar level to the Gotfriends AS33ME and Discus 2c with a few ‘gimmicks’ thrown in.” I don’t really agree with this statement. Diana comes with a full LX9050 and SxHawk vario. Albeit they are still being developed, but a good amount of the units is finished and quite useable and will only get better with time. The LX9050 is hardly a gimmick, it’s a simulator in itself.

5

i completely missed that this released. i always enjoyed flying around in your proto glider so i’ll be picking this up without reservation!

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Hi, I’m usually the kind of person who wants a simulator to be as realistic as possible—especially in FS, which I’ve been flying since the mid-'90s. But I have to say that I find these extras very useful.

In real life, I’ve never flown with music, but in FS I’ve often played music externally through the speakers. Now I have it on the smartwatch and can use it whether I want to or not.

Even though I haven’t used multiplayer in large groups, the many liveries are certainly useful for that very purpose, precisely because everyone flying along is on the same installation level. That’s not the case with additionally purchased liveries—they aren’t displayed correctly.

As for the tow plane, it could certainly use a bit more power. But I get the feeling that the previous ones were designed to get us up as quickly and steeply as possible so we could get it behind us. I don’t tow a glider at maximum power, even if the K7 could handle it. In FS, it doesn’t.

So we know that, in FS, not too much emphasis is generally placed on realism for gliders. Otherwise, the weather would have been continuously improved for years now, or, for example, GF would have made the oxygen tank actually functional.

But what immediately appealed to me—as someone who only flies in VR—is what everyone else considers so important: “immersion.”

I’ve never been a fan of it, and I really didn’t understand why we don’t see ourselves as the pilot in the cockpit—just a static figure that only appears when you switch to the external view. As I recall, Touching Cloud was the first to do this, and Diana is now the second example. That’s why I want to emphasize this point, especially in VR.

Now, when it comes to gliding, I’m not a high-tech fan—the simple instruments of a K7 are enough for me. I usually use S4S because it displays the POIs, and PC Real-Time because I can’t see the clock on the wall in VR.

In any case, I’d familiarized myself quite a bit with the LX 9070 so I could at least use it on a basic level. At first, Diana only offered the LX 9050, and it was so complex that I found it a hassle to have to learn it all over again. Now Diana offers a choice between the 50 and the 70. Even though I’m not exactly the right person to evaluate something like this, I can still see how much work went into the LX 9050, and I think the Diana is interesting in that regard, if only for people who are passionate about this technology.

Those are my thoughts, and I still believe that the Diana2 is a project that clearly goes beyond the standard in the FS and is therefore groundbreaking.

You can complain about anything and everything—I’ve done that in a post or two here as well—but generally, I try to focus on the positive and get excited about things, even if they aren’t perfect.

Regards

7

I like the Proto-Glider, too, even though—as the name suggests—it belongs in the SIFI category. But it has such a wide range of features and capabilities that you can have fun with it for a long time.
Let’s see if I can find the time to give it a brief introduction here in a new post.
All the best

8

there was a thread for the proto glider but it got closed due to inactivity, just fyi

9

I was mainly refering to the watches and music etc… that’s a bit gimmicky and unnecessary… also are the suspect defencies with the airbrakes and flight model as highlighted -those are more important to myself but since I can’t get your installer to update to the latest version I can’t see how things may have improved. I have sent you an e-mail but no reply as of yet. Now your installer has locked me out even though I’m using the same e-mail and password as my account with you… as I had tried everything else I thought I’d sign out and sign back in… A little frustrating in the least. I have no issues with any other developer downloading updates…

10

I haven’t received any emails. There’s no installer updater, just a new version to download. The latest installer in accounts / downloads should be working fine. Let’s continue on Discord and I’ll try to sort you out.

11

Cheers for all your help this morning and thanks for the model and chat!