I’ve seen talk there is something bad going on with ground handling in MSFS. I just landed in a 10 knot crosswind, maximum is supposed to be 17. The approach was perfect but as soon as the wheels were down I took a hard turn into the wind that I couldn’t counter with full rudder. I ran off into the grass near perpendicular to the runway.
Is this the broken handling I’ve seen mentioned? Should I point the nose at the other side of the runway before touchdown?
Personal Comments
The moment nose wheel hits, I start pulse braking as well as take the power completely off - seems to help? I’ve landed in up to 20+ kts x-wind. Definitely not easy.
I had cut power just before the flare. It probably didn’t help I kicked over my pedals I was pushing so hard. I had applied some rudder to straighten out for the landing.
The turn into the wind just seemed unnaturally sudden given momentum, like there would have been skidding tires. I was 100% counter with the opposite brake locked in.
There’s a reason I don’t fly if there’s a 10 knot direct cross-wind in real life; it takes a lot of skill and practice to get right, even in real life where, well, the flight dynamics are pretty close to life-like.
Here, where there’s still a lot of work to do, and a lot of the simulation is kind of stuck in between higher fidelity and low fidelity simulation of the past, you don’t have much chance of succeeding when trying to take on outside of the envelope situations.
Just because the “book limit” is 17 knots, does not in any way make an endorsement for anybody to try that. That’s the limit for an expert pilot who knows exactly what he’s doing and is in complete control of the plane. And, technically, a limit on the plane is NOT the limit the pilot is capable of, absolutely zero offense intended, as noted above.
And, yes, in real life there can be quite a bit of skidding tires in a direct 10 knot cross-wind if you don’t touch down just right, have the wing dipped into the wind just right and the perfect amount of rudder… which, technically, this sim is not really capable of modeling fully yet because tire friction modeling isn’t finished yet, and they’re still working on the effect of wind on the surfaces of the plane at the transition between flying and on the ground.
I’m not knocking the sim in this regard, I’m super psyched they’re actively working on solving these issues.
They delved into ground handling in some of the recent dev chats and the gist is that it’s all so very basic and legacy code still. There’s a hard transition from flight to ground and the wheels all have a single contact point rather than a “patch” of surface area. Good news is they’ve shared these details because that’s all been analyzed internally and on the shortlist for improvements later this year/early next year
That should definitely not be required when landing within crosswind limits. I never needed to use differential braking to keep an aircraft on the runway within crosswind limits.
What crosswind technique did you use? Did you “kick” the aircraft straight with the runway before touchdown with upwind wing low to counter drift? The nose should be aligned with the runway centerline when you touchdown. If you landed in a crab then your findings are not usual.
It works for me so far. I have no Assists on other than the Taxi Ribbon. Landings = T/Os to date. Someday I can even get it slowed down so fast that I can take the first turnoff.
Did you have the aileron facing the wind full “up” to prevent the wind from lifting that wing?
What cross wind landing technique were you using? Crabbing or Wing Low? I really prefer wing low to prevent the wind from lifting me off the runway during landing and right after.
Ok, but this shouldn’t be necessary and certainly not to be done in real life. Especially because most small GA aircraft do not have anti-skid. Tracking centerline with rudder while keeping the ailerons into the wind, no brakes should be required. Ailerons need to be deployed fully into the wind at beginning of take-off roll, slowly reducing towards center during take-off roll in order to keep wings level, the amount of upwind aileron remaining at rotation is depending on crosswind. Vice versa for landing.
Well, I’m sure I did something wrong. I’m not an actual pilot. Just trying to learn.
I basically came in with good alignment and the nose into the wind. Then did a rudder adjustment to bring the nose on the centerline and flaired. Didn’t do anything with the ailerons. I suppose that’s a new skill to work on. Dip the wing into the wind?
But the turning action felt all like it was in the x plane of motion. Stuck the ground flat then went into roughly a 45 degree turn with full rudder and brake.
Thanks, going to experiment. In a sim we likely lack some feedback that would make it more natural doing it for real.
Well if you kick the aircraft straight to align the nose with the centerline, the aircraft will start to drift so you need to lower the upwind wing a little to not drift laterally from the centerline. Other method (not preferred on small GA aircraft) is to kick the aircraft straight just prior touchdown while keeping wings level, this requires quite a lot of coordination. Ailerons should be applied as in the above post.
What you could do is fly level over the runway, apply some power to keep approach speed, then kick the aircraft straight, lower the upwind wing and fly in this configuration from start to end, then go-around. Normally during landing you are only flying cross controlled for a few seconds during flare, its better to get a feel for it when flying the full runway length cross controlled.
Before I got rudder pedals, I had “auto-rudder” assist enabled, and never had any problems veering off the runway in crosswinds…a little right or left stick would correct it (aileron or twist-rudder). I generally fly either the CJ4 Working Title, the TBM, or the Longitude.
But now with rudder pedals, “Auto-rudder” disabled, planes seem to drift quite a bit on takeoff and landing even without a crosswind, requiring a fair amount of rudder or left/right toe braking to correct…often I overcorrect and get real squirrely.
So, not sure if the simulation is being very realistic, or if the modelling is way off. It could also be that my feet aren’t neutral…it’s hard to feel neutral on the pedals, plus my size 13 feet might also be inadvertently touching the brakes unevenly. I do have a fairly large dead zone set for them, which helps keeping neutral but also makes it easy to overcorrect as well, so it’s a double-edged sword.
If we are talking about single engine prop planes veering to the left during take-off (right rudder required), that’s normal. Differential braking should not be required and would be bad operating technique in real life.
To clarify, I get the takeoff drift for the Citation CJ4 and Longitude jets. (And also with the TBM, which is understandably expected.)
Also to clarify, I wouldn’t use differential braking on takeoff, just landing. 
Later this week I’m going to spend an evening experimenting with a few different factors - aircraft, wind, rudder pedals on/off, autorudder on/off, etc., and see if I can get a clearer picture of what’s going on.
The CJ4 should track straight as long as rudder is centered, thrust is equal and no wind.
Still bad operating technique 
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I landed at S50, Auburn Muni yesterday with the sim showing winds 210@16. I was coming in to 16 and the windsock was correctly showing the direction and wind strength. My 172 however, was being pushed to the west, completely opposite of expected behavior. I know the 180 windsock issue was corrected, just wondering if others have experienced this.
Is that a default airport, or did you download a addon for it?
While there was a fix for windsocks, I believe it’s possible for them to still be poorly constructed and backwards. But, if it’s a default airport and you say it matched the METAR then you’re probably correct that the windsock is good.
I believe ATIS still reports wind in m/s or f/s, not knots, and I don’t know that I’d really trust ATIS at this time anyway. Actually, I still don’t trust anything about MSFS’s winds system at this time. Still.