I have EXCLUSIVELY flown with traditional cockpits IRL. In fact my to-go aircraft is a 1977 Beech Sundowner with almost completely original avionics. Bendix King VOR and Radio, old audio switch panel, no GPS. Only the second radio and transponder are new.
The closest I ever came to a glass cockpit was a 1973 Skyhawk with a single Garmin G5. Of course I use an EFB on a tablet for navigation, weather, etc. But sometimes it’s also fun just to follow rivers, rail and roads to your destination.
Not living behind the moon, I do appreciate the advantages of modern glass cockpits and if I ever get the chance to fly cross country in a G1000 Cherokee etc. with AP I’d relish the comfort and safety.
But putting a glass cockpit into a T-33 simply isn’t the way to do it IMHO. If you own a T-33, I believe you should at least partly fly it like it was done in the day. It’s part of what makes flying such an old bird worthwhile. Just like driving an old car without any electronic assistants, ESP or ABS can be more rewarding than driving a modern sports car.
Also there are less radical ways of updating avionics to a more modern standard, like the Garmin GI 275.
Decided to give myself a break from the T-33 and took the AzurPoly Fouga Magister up for the first time in a long while. Not really a fair comparison - they’re very different aircraft, and the simulated versions are at very different points in their lifecycle. So I’m not trying to use the Fouga as a stick to beat up the T-33. I don’t and shouldn’t expect the T-33 to be anywhere near as docile, or to have the Fouga’s pretty good vintage ergonomics (a few years made quite a difference in cockpit design). But I hope the T-33 eventually acquires the level of polish that the Fouga has now, and that it winds up feeling like a physical object moving in an air mass - which is AzurPoly’s most notable accomplishment.
Absolutely. It depends on HOW you want to use it. I personally normally wouldn’t use a vintage car for sitting in rush hour traffic to the office, or driving long distance on the motorway (unless maybe it’s a 1965 Mercedes 600) And I most likely wouldn’t use a T-33 for a 500nm business flight from A to B in highly congested airspace.
The main thing that’s off is that the stall speeds are much too high - so at the moment, you can’t fly approaches by the book. The developer is looking into it. Also, there’s a lot of pitch instability. That may be characteristic of the airplane - but the elevator trim feels a bit coarse, so it’s hard to trim out.
I haven’t tried the flight model mod - waiting to see how quickly iniBuilds can patch some of the behavior.
Painters are upset about the use of mirrored textures, and there are issues with how bare metal is rendered. The dev is looking into that, too.
There are some quality-of-life things that could use attention - my personal gripe is that the period nav radios are very difficult to set. But none of them are dealbreakers.
Overall, it’s really very good - an extremely promising release and once it gets a little polishing, I think it’s going to be a keeper.
Right now I’d say it’s a judgment call about whether to jump in now and start getting a feel for the airplane, or waiting for a patch or two.
Ok, that explains why I have had such hard time to do landings in the T-33.
I dont really care about liveries (wish there could be more of the of course) myself, but I can understand the issue with that. What i do feel, is that the cockpit is not very sharp (more blurred than other cockpits), and some other things as well. No solid wall between the seats, meaning you could click buttons in the front cockpit “thru” the wall, from the back. I have also seen some other things. I was also very…no…VERY embarr…sorry, dissapointed over the “EFB”. The “” needs to be there, cause I would not call it EFB.
=D I have not given up on Inibuilds yet for this release, and i hope they are in mood really trying to work things out. Its not the cheapest mod Ive bought, and Im not interested in it as it “is” at the moment. It’s a 1.0, but the problems we see should have been fixed before release. But thats only my thoughs… Things do have bugs, thats life. (even I hav my bugs) =P
Ini has acknowledged the speed and mirroring issues in their official forum and said the art team is looking into how they can address the mirroring.
Meanwhile, repaints are coming. @TimHendrik’s silver bird is beautiful, and there’s an RCAF livery now, though it looks like the roundels had to be creatively placed due to the mirroring issue.
Did somebody manage to get a GS displayed on the RMI if an ILS frequency is dialed in ? Tracking the correct course is working. I messed around with the controls on NAV section (VOR/ILS/…) on the right side which has modeled knobs and switches, but without success.
So much negativity for naught, the T-33 is excellent to fly and this update cements that. If you enjoy vintage jet aviation or simply a speedy view of the World, you’ll miss out if you avoid this one.
You mean a brand new bug has been added with the update? I was thinking of getting this aircraft but will hold fire if this is the case. What is the new bug?
