Although I had some technical issues on Thursday’s event that prevented me from finishing the course (multiple CTD’s and control problems), today I just spent almost 3 hours flying with John (Magic6420) and Tony (TONY880#4031).
It was some of the most enjoyable sim flying I have done in a long while. . I was in VR so no screenshots from me but needless to say, the scenery was stunning, the JF Hawk was a joy to fly and it was great to fly with new friends. Now I just need to brush up on my formation skills and banish my cat from the computer room - he likes to lay on the keyboard for some reason, causing all kinds of chaos when I’m flying in VR.
Thanks to all that flew on Thursday and to Astronut, with whom I have had a great trip today. The next session is going to be in around a fortnight, details will be posted here as soon as I can firm things up a bit. Life has a nasty habit of getting in the way, doesn’t it?
For now, we can move on and if you want to be involved, have a Hawk and want to see some of the more pointy bits of the World, then there are just two things you need to do.
Send me a PM to say hello and let me know that you are interested.
Send a friend request from within the sim. This will let me invite people directly, which will give you a synchronised time, weather and any other session specific details.
Thanks Magic for letting my be your wingman last evning ! By chance I dropped in at ENGS (Sion) and we where able set up a quick unplanned event to fly the Matterhorn low level vally route without too mutch ‘lag/stutter’
Formation low level flying adds a new dimention to FSMS
Thanks Magic for shearing the nice low level routes with me !
I think we will let the dust from the sim update settle a bit, but we will be putting up another session soon and maybe the week after next. Watch this space for those session updates. You know, or should do, what you have to do to be part of it by now
Currently working on a new section to add to the route and it is a good one, so polish your visors and put the brave pills on standby. Have flown a few practice sessions and thanks to those that joined in. It is really helpful to get your feedback and I appreciate it. I may get time for another practice on Saturday at around 1300GMT, but I can’t promise as yet.
Finally, there is a new version of the Hawk available now from Justflight, so go and get it. To close, I hope that your update experience wasn’t too painful and that some of the tweaks to the coding will help us all.
Cheers for now,
Magic
Edit… time now looking short for tomorrow practice unless the sim update goes miraculously well. At least, I can try, eh?
Edit 02… sorry about the no show there. The update took a long time and with much to change back in the settings, time just bled away. If all stays well another ad hoc practice session on Wednesday night.
With this update everything set back to ‘Easy’ and the mouse basically stopped working (Ctrl+0 seems to sort that as a stop gap solution). I reset everything to ‘Hard’ and it is almost sorted out. The good news is I’m getting stable enough framerates. Hope to see you Wednesday.
We are working on opening up a new section, running South of the Matterhorn and you are welcome to come along and let me know what you think. Just trying to build a memory for it now, so Wednesday likely to be a familiarisation trip and it would be good to see you. Looking around 1900GMT and you know where the comms are
Flying together is a great idea. Unfortunately my personal experience with flying together is the fact that it is mostly anarchy in the sky and on the ground. If i experience a well coordinated happening ( timeslots, taxiing, circle to land why other plane is active on the runway, safe separation in the sky) I’ll be your wingman
The main problems stem from the sim itself at present really. Even with invites, sometimes the sim will either not send or not receive them: aircraft can vanish for no reason, or some other difficulty crops up. It isnt a major problem if you have working comms though as we have seen most things over the years and can cope with them. Your start point therefore, is Teamspeak.
If anybody else is keen on applied flying with a higher mental workload and has FSX, the main group to which I am affiliated has some cracking stuff coming up this Wednesday and if you want some radio nav,mental arithmetic and good flying, PAR approaches in marginal weather, etc. and all with live ATC let me know. Sadly, my own FSX is down at present and I am going to miss it myself.
Had a go following the route this morning and scenery is spectacular. Tried to touch and go a couple of runways but not a good enough pilot for them atm. Ended up crashing as wanted to see where I’d just been in external view and hit the deck. Looking forward to doing some trips with others.
Had a really good chat and flight with @Magic6420 tonight. He was very patient with me, especially when I kept losing him (I’m new to the Hawk and following another plane). Really good area to fly in and learnt lots. Thank you.
Hello everyone. We are looking tight this week, I am afraid that life has been a bit hectic this last ten days, including a loss of broadband during the storm on Saturday but worry not. We will come up with a session date as soon as possible and on Sat/Sun/Mon afternoon, I will be flying hopefully and will invite anybody around to join, if they are not already committed.
Regards to all,
Magic.
Edit… And now, we have video driver issues and with being dragged by the ear to do Christmas shopping type things, the weekend may be a washout. We will see.
It is almost Christmas eve and I think it safe to say that sadly, we won’t be doing any formal sessions before the new year. Calendars, commitments and timetables are all conspiring against us, something made even more galling if you have seen the festive TV schedules, probably wherever you live.
Worry not, as there is a massive list of things we can do and will do in 2022. I am hoping to retire my old PC in January and it will take a fair few days to integrate the new one, but there are some potentially exciting things happening in the first quarter of next year and I will keep you all abreast of things as they develop.
For now, let me wish you all a happy, safe and peaceful holiday break along with a prosperous new year.
Well, the new PC is here and it is a rocket, the caveat being that it doesn’t currently work with MSFS, which is a bit galling. I am trying to nail it down and the instant that I find the culprit, I will be posting something here to celebrate and get us back in the air. My apologies for the delay, but in the last seven days, I have covered maybe seven miles due to CTDs. Worry not, it will be cured shortly, I am sure.
Looks very possible that the new machine is going to have to go back for a rebuild and I am pretty fed up with it to be honest. Never mind! I still have the old one and if the new one goes back, the old one will get recalled from retirement so that we can go flying. Will take a week to ten days, but we can do this
Still setting up, but getting there now. Week after next is looking promising with an afternoon practice session likely at the weekend. Will advise on this a bit later.
Other really interesting things are happening with the group to whom I am most affiliated and I want to pass it on. UK317 now have a JoinFS hub working and it works a treat! Multiplayer now works well and across platforms too, including FS2020, P3D and XP. There is also an innovative comms solution as well, based on Teamspeak. If you have the free unlicensed version of FSUIPC, there is a plugin which works with Teamspeak. This will let you tune the comms frequency in your aircraft and providing that this channel is set within Teamspeak (it will be, because you can’t run a good ATC service without comms which will be set up for the session) your radio stack will work seamlessly and voila! You have comms.
The group does a lot of sessions with a major in professional ATC, group flights and other organised sessions with some well qualified real life fliers and controllers too, so they know their stuff and more importantly, are excellent hosts that welcome all experience levels and have a sense of fun, so while they take things seriously, they still have a laugh. I urge you to give it a shot and you can even bring your Hawk, though other aircraft may be more suitable. Come and have a look and join us on Wednesday nights from 1930GMT if you can manage it. It is another dimension and an enjoyable one too. Further info is available at the UK317 website.
I haven’t been able to fly fully yet within these sessions and am as I said earlier, still setting up the new PC. It will go back for a rebuild, maybe in March or April, but at least it is running and fairly well too. A 12900K is one hell of a lot faster than the old i7 2700K and it is going to be a great machine for Alpine Magic sessions along with just about everything else. I really look forward to us getting together again soon. I have really missed it.
Hi All, with another Alpine Magic Session hopefully around the corner a couple of bits to consider…
Firstly Just flight Hawk for MSFS is now on V0.1.4 make sure you have the latest version to really reap the benefits.
Secondly, JoinFS often has version updates and at the time writing we are on V 3.17 which now means you get a client specifically for each sim. This was in response to MSFS/JoinFS bugs which have been rectified! Make sure you’re on the latest version for the same reason as before!
Lastly, The UK317 Discord server which is accommodating Alpine Magic can be accessed at UK317 & Western Air Virtual
It has a whole set of channels dedicated to Alpine Magic so make sure you click the Alpine symbol in the rules channel if you want to be auto-roled for Alpine Magic and receive the latest news, events and gossip!
. I was in VR so no screenshots from me but needless to say, the scenery was stunning, the JF Hawk was a joy to fly and it was great to fly with new friends. Now I just need to brush up on my formation skills and banish my cat from the computer room - he likes to lay on the keyboard for some reason, causing all kinds of chaos when I’m flying in VR. 
