I will buy it right now but will have to wait until tonight to review it… Have to pick up my daughter soon. This will be interesting.
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Just so you know… I am TERRIFIED of this. I just went to that website of theirs and their website is so broken… using 2 different browsers, I still had trouble viewing their available products.
Their Forums are abandoned and the last communication from this developer was this:
Greetings,
The lack of support regarding updating our stuffs are due to the reason that the programmer who could revise/fix/correct the problematic aspects of the products is not interested in investing more time into this work for now due to lack of general interest from wider audience.
I can and I do answer emails when with problems regarding technical stuffs such as installation issues and download problems, supplying missing files or general advice about how to attempt fixing things but I’m not in the capability of redoing coding or any parts of programming that would fix core systems, FD tweaks or gauges, sound issues and such.
As making helicopter ad-dons for FS/P3D is not very lucrative business it is almost impossible to find another encoder/programmer who would pick up the task for the money I’m able to offer for such work.
For the above reason all I can say for such inquiry is that the customer support will be re-established from only generic solutions for generic problems to standard level when the mentioned position will be fulfilled by someone.
Regards,
Tamas Nemeth
Downloading now… Will have about 15 minutes to install. Just looking through the manual - there isn’t much, it’s 1 page long in the smallest possible font. 
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OK, it just installed. Unfortunately, the review and flying it will have to wait until tonight - gotta leave in 5 to pick up my daughter and won’t be able to fly it until she goes to bed. But… I should have something for you all by 9 pm Central time, so those holding off on this… give me about 4 hours and I will have screenshots and a review up.
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The emergency gear extension functions in the Yak-nice!.
Guys (and gals)… this is REALLY GOOD.
Count me surprised!
GRAPHICS:
Everything looks GREAT. Very much on MSFS level, I don’t see any issues with either external or internal work on this. It’s GREAT to look at. I’d say pretty close to Carenado. My BIGGEST gripe is that I don’t see a way to hide the yokes. And they obscure A LOT. All of your lower switches are obscured (well, the labels are) as well as the instrument on the very left of the panel (which is not labeled in the manual as to what it is, and there are NO tooltips for those dials). I speak fluent Russian, but the abbreviations in aviation don’t mean anything to me because I know all those in English, so if you abbreviate Russian words (technical aviation ones) I have no idea what they mean. So I don’t know what it does. It MAY be some sort of primitive autopilot, but I am not sure. Haven’t messed with it yet. The other thing is the primer switch requires a mouse wheel roll to switch positions and a click to activate, well… the rotation is VERY touchy and doesn’t seem to respond to the rolls sometimes, and when it does, it rolls RIGHT PAST the neutral position which takes a minute to get it to stop where I want it. But these are small things. I’d LOVE for them to fix the un-hideable yokes though. Night instrument illumination is sufficient.
SOUND: Everything sounds great to my ears. The engine sounds REALLY nice. I haven’t used headphones for this one and the laptop speakers aren’t the best, so I am gonna fire it up later with headphones to see what it REALLY sounds like, but so far, everything is good to my ear.
SYSTEMS:
There is an in-sim checklist that’s pretty in-depth. Everything is modeled REALLY nice - all the gauges work and reflect what is supposed to be happening. Carb heat definitely affects temps and so do the cowl flaps and oil cooler. From the limited amount of time I was inside it, the simulation appears to be fairly deep here. I am impressed. This is definitely one of the nicer GA aircraft so far in terms of that. Again, I have to spend more time with it to get into the details of JUST how well everything is working, but as I said - for a “first impressions” flight, it’s solid!
GROUND HANDLING:
It’s a little twitchy on turns - a bit sensitive. The brakes aren’t the best (but PLENTY GOOD) - just don’t expect momentary stopping like you do with some default aircraft. Everything is pretty real. I managed to accidentally tip her over by braking while turning. I wasn’t even going too fast, but… just be careful. It kinda rolls and shakes a bit - VERY realistic feeling, I love it.
FLYING:
Along with the FlySimWare Grumman and JustFlight Arrows, it’s one of the BEST GA birds to fly - trims out PERFECT. As far as performance, everything looks pretty good according to the numbers in the PDF sheet supplied with it. It definitely feels ALIVE and has A LOT of character. I brought her in close to the runway for landing and was pretty much ready to land and then realized I haven’t tested the stalls. Did a nice power-on stall, all behaviour was solid, did a power-off stall and unfortunately was a little too close to the ground and entered a spin and overcorrected a bit which caused me to enter a roll I couldn’t recover from.
OVERALL:
I wouldn’t wait to get it. Even if NOTHING was improved further, this is good enough to be a VERY fun and pleasurable steam gauge aircraft. I AM hopeful that a few things get straightened out, but my initial impression is VERY positive, I really enjoyed it and can’t wait to spend more time with it!
Cheers, and thank you for your patience!
25 Likes
thats a rather glowing endorsement.
I was gonna get it unless something huge was found lacking
for me, this has a number of things i look for in an aircraft:
something that differentiates itself from the rest, makes it unusual or different
no GPS!!! yay!
its a russian aircraft, we have a russian airliner in the works, and the an2 on the way, but not much else thats russian. i really enjoy the russian fighters&helos in DCS…IL2 as well, when i play it
fortunately, one good thing about russian birds is once you get used to one, the gauges to the others pretty much match…for example, the fuel gauge is almost universally the one with the big orange dot in the middle. some of them are pretty obvious, like the VSI, so theyre not that different
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Radial engine. I have to confirm that it sounds right before getting this plane. But after @BostonJeremy77 first impression, i am sold. I have to see just one youtube video to really committ tho.
I love piaggio/fw and this seems to be that style of an aircraft.
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the piaggio is a good plane
this is a russian channel, but they fly the yak 18 and yak 52 extensively here. both planes use the same engine, if anyone needs a basis of comparison
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Great review as always, I’ll wait for it to hit the simmarket.
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It flies well and engine sound is nice but the big issue I have is that the flaps and landing gear have electronic sounds when operated and the real aircraft all those systems are air operated. Even the starter is air operated. I’m also pretty sure that the flaps only have the one position for landing as they are a split flap that drops from the bottom of the rear of the wing. If those things could be fixed for accuracy i would be happy.
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I wish these guys’ website wasn’t a dumpster fire. And their forum wasn’t a wasteland of disappointment. Considering they aren’t on here, it’s hard to communicate this with them. I will try posting on their FB where they have a post with the announcement of this release.
Edit: I sent them an e-mail.
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It needs to be less sensitive to tip over on the ground. We used to have 3 Yak18T’s at my home field and they wouldn’t tip over during a turn a t relatively low speed taxi.
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Yeah, I thought my speed was too low to tip over… it’s not a dealbreaker for me, just have to be careful…
The base aircraft is pretty good, I would just like to see the air operated systems over the electric and a few other fixes to bring a bit more realism to what should be a great aircraft.
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Have we figured out what that thing on the left is? Behind the yoke with the dials?
My guess would be some sort of Autopilot with the heading dial there
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I am delighted that devs that made a bad first impression with their first MSFS contribution do much better with their second. What is Bredok3d up to next? 
I found this unofficial PO:
http://beardsell.com/flying/yak/Yak_18T_Pilot_Operating_Handbook.pdf
According to this, the mysterious instrument is a compass system control Panel.
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Sovietski kompass. It always indicates the way to the nearest goulag’s camp, so you never forgot the rules.
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This would sound great if said in a heavy Russian accent. I don’t have an accent, but I am able to do a REALLY good one. I love poking fun my people. Spent too much time in USSR when it was a thing and am VERY familiar with a Russian mindset.
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