I was looking to get one of the JF PA-28s when next discounted but then the Carenado Dakota dropped for free — as someone who mainly does airliners but enjoys a fair bit of GA, am I likely to notice any major difference for my £21 (current offer price)?
Is the JF PA-38 perhaps a better choice?
Thanks.
As airliners are your thing, why not save your money and enjoy the free Dakota? It’s really good and I think only the hard core GA pilots will want something different in a fixed gear Piper.
This is exactly what I’m thinking but if the JF Pipers are much better, it might be worth nabbing one at a discounted price. Some people slate the Carenado (I suspect simply because they can) while others reckon it’s actually pretty accurate. Never flown one so I wouldn’t know!
Have you got the Comanche yet, Jak?
No — but it’s not 2024-native and is significantly more than the JF PA-28s (and infinitely more than the Carenado!). I probably do 20% GA flying so don’t want to splurge too much. If the Carenado is accurate enough, I’m more than happy to stick with it.
It’s on sale from their site at the moment so it’s about £28. Not that much more really. I’d say if you don’t fly GA often, when you do, you should treat yourself! No better way than with the Comanche. It’s way WAAY better than it looks! I think you’d really enjoy it. It’s like a different sim with that, really.
Also the latest version is a solid 2024 compatibility one. It has its own walk around anyway so not sure what you mean by “native”?
EDIT: £28! 
bargain
I haven’t flown any of the JF suite since the Dakota appeared in my hangar. It just looks so good compared to the JF’s and that’s important to me in such a basic, bread and butter GA aircraft like this.
Thanks for the advice but I have a few JF points (making it about £20-21) and that really is about my limit for a GA plane. I’d actually rather go for the Tomahawk, which might differ enough from the PA-28 to warrant its price. But obviously if the Carenado PA-28 does a convincing job, I’ll save the money!
I believe the JF’s real advantages are ‘under the hood?’
I love the Tomahawk 
If you want a Piper that has a more realistic flight behavior, go with JF. As you are not ok with spending 8 dollars more for the Comanche, maybe you should just go with Carenado. IMO the difference between JF and Carenado is not worth 20 Dollars, in comparison to what you get more with the Comanche.
I personally would always go for the Comanche.
If you have to ask whether you will notice enough difference to justify buying the Just Flight Arrow, the answer is probably no. If you like flying default aircraft, the answer is no.
Just Flight is trying to accurately simulate real aircraft, as are A2A, Milviz and Black Square. Those developers have access to the actual aircraft and they build their products accordingly. Some of those developers also fly the aircraft that they are building. Carenado doesn’t aim for high fidelity (nor do they claim to). Their aircraft look good and have enough systems implemented to enjoy the aircraft. If all you want is a nice GA experience, Carenado will fit the bill well.
OTOH, if you want something that actually flies like the real deal and has fully implemented systems, do your research and pick other developers (and pay accordingly). Keep in mind that many popular streamers are not pilots, so their reviews aren’t going to provide useful information on fidelity. Even real pilots will have limited ability to comment on realism if they don’t have any time in type. A good starting point is whether the sim performance is close to the Pilot’s Operating Handbook (POH) performance, but the stuff that really matters are the power, attitude and configuration settings (PAC’s) for various phases of flight and you can only get those by flying the real thing.
As an example, when you drop the gear on the Black Square Duke, you get a massive descent rate which has to be arrested with a significant pitch change that requires considerable retrimming. None of the sim streamers have commented on that behavior, but I’m skeptical that is correct as I can’t believe that a Beechcraft would fly that way. In a real Bonanza or a Baron when you are trimmed for level flight with approach flaps and the correct power settings, extending the gear starts a descent that corresponds to the (3 degree) glide path; no retrimming or other control inputs are necessary. The real Cessna 310 has similar behavior which is accurately simulated by the Milviz Cessna 310.
Anyway, that should give you some idea of the level of detail that some developers are pursuing in the sim and whether such detail matters to you.
Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good enough.
The free one could be off for all I know, or it might be spot on. I have no personal frame of reference. I don’t put the level of effort of cross referencing published manuals to what I see in-sim.
I say get the free one. It looks really nice in VR on my system . If it’s not your jam, then you haven’t lost anything but your time. You may like it and save yourself $20. You may decide you want more out of it, and get the payware one. Or decide you want neither.
Thanks for that. It’s not easy to gauge how realistically an aircraft flies when you’re not a real-world pilot. It is somewhat easier, however, if you’re familiar with physics, as you can at least recognise behaviour that defies the science.
Far be it from be to kick the hornet’s nest, but I actually prefer the Dakota to a lot of other models. Will leave it at that for now. Good shopping!
I echo the sentiments of others in this thread: if you already have access to a decent free PA-28 but are interested in spending more on a better GA experience, go big or go home and grab the Comanche. Discounting the difference in quality between the Carenado and JF offerings, there’s just not enough different (for an average user) between the way the various PA-28s operate to be worth it, in my opinion. The cockpits will look and feel very similar, and the capabilities will be too. The Comanche (a PA-24) is a whole different beast and modeled at the highest possible level (with its full 2020 functionality in 2024 too - don’t be afraid of it being non-native).
I already have the free Carenado PA-28 and it seems good enough. But if the JF is way more accurate, I’d probably like to get it with a view to spending more time doing GA. The JF Tomahawk is actually becoming more appealing, I think — it apparently very accurately represents the real aircraft (an awkward and unforgiving bird!) and the bubble cabin likely makes it more fun for VFR. It’s also a less complex decision since there’s only one PA-38 available.
I got my PPL in Pipers (PA28-140, Warrior, Archer, Arrow for high performance endorsement). I think the Dakota is great. I like the JF Arrows a lot, but wouldn’t pay $20 more for the JF’s at this point. The Dakota’s got the same DNA for free and flies beautifully in my opinion.
The Turbo Arrow might be worth your while if you do a lot of mountain flying and need the extra altitude performance, plus you also get the T tail variant. The Warrior is too similar to the Dakota to justify and the Tomahawk, while very good, also doesn’t have great performance as it’s a trainer more than a cruiser, although the flight model is very good.
Okay the Comanche has my attention. How dos it compare to Just Flight’s work, which itself is always excellent?
A2A is much better.