[RELEASED] Discus-2c | Got Friends

Just downloaded it 2 hours ago. Two words: Love it!
To all that haven’t downloaded it yet, make sure you do.
As mentioned before, I have quite some hours in real life on the gliders.
When I was soaring in the meantime on the pc I used to have condor 1, and version 2 later.
Altough I never flew the discus in real life, the soaring trough the alps I did today, felt great and will give a lot of joy in the time to come. Its a great way to experience glider flying, for the advanced as well as the beginner pilot. Especially with the magnificent scenery from MSFS.
Well done Gotfriends!
Thanks for this beauty and a happy new year

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I just had my 30 minutes flight. Really awesome!

I don’t know much about soaring. So I did read a little and watched some YT videos. I was not able to find information on the water ballast. What is it for? How you should handle it? When to empty the water tanks?

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Hey! Thank you for the support. Higher Ballast weight increase speed but decrease lift ability. A lot of individuals like to drop Ballast to around 75% weight prior to flight (either with the handle or weight loadout menu). This is completely based on your preference, weather conditions, flight plan and pilot weight.

Once your flight is nearing its end, you’ll need to open your Ballast valve and dump all water weight. This takes around 6.5 minutes and will ease your landing, decrease your roll distance, slow you down, and (in real life) prevent any unnecessary damage caused by landing with full weight.

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I just tried the Discus-2c glider/gliding today for the first time. Had a lot of fun, way more than I expected over the Swiss Alps. I ended up with a smooth but too fast landing that had the glider pivoting around after using the wheel brake too much while trying to slow down and I was thinking I had missed something, and didn’t know about ballast aspect. I did find the spoilers very useful though!
Lovely glider, and thank you for your the hard work producing it. Everyone should be giving it a try out, it’s a lot of fun. :+1:


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Anybody got some good guides on how to read the electronic variometer and it’s different modes? I get the general concept but what do the red and blue arrows indicate?

Also presume the second one is just a mechanical backup though I’m puzzled at what the adjustable ‘speed’ ring does?

Also what is that little tassel thing on the canopy supposed to be for?

It would be great if there was a little more description in the flight manual for beginner glider pilots about the instruments and some basic tips on gliding.

Just a fantastic effort all around though! I really enjoyed the few flights I had even with my wonky winch launches…

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Just tried an aerotow with kinetic assistant from Innsbruck. worked brilliant! I picked a random plane that was about to take off, while the poor fellow probably didnt even noticed i was tailgating him with a piece of rope. Only downside that he took me to some deserted valley to do some sightseeing instead of towing me to the 1200th floor.
So if anyone need a taxiride up, Iam more than happy to provide you you a lift as a towplane. just sent me a DM and I will give you my discordname where we can exchange the details off the tow (when where etc)

Aerotow pilot needed? - Fly Together / Find a Friend - Microsoft Flight Simulator Forums

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The Schleicher sailplane on FSX was very enjoyable and had the same superb full glass canopy view as the F-16. Not many planes can make one feel like sitting or more riding on an airplane, the Discus 2 can.

I have downloaded it and will test it soon :slight_smile:

My personal preference is having an engine (or at least a small electric engine many sailplanes nowadays have) because that gives the freedom of making as much landings and touch and go around as I want, a pure sailplane is fully dependand on thermals and winds.

I love it. I just wanted to have a quick look for 10 minutes and it turned into 2 hours. This peace, this relaxation and then the view in the MSFS, just terrific. I am a big fan of the Condor Soaring Simulator, but there I don’t have the beautiful scenery. Many thanks to the team.

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Hello and Happy new year! :slight_smile:
On Discus 2c you have the winch launch control that help you making one after the other landing. In my opinion, not complicated Glider is better than complicated! :slight_smile:

This plane is really nice. I was Happy I learned to fly Gliders at 14, then did Solo in Cessna 150 Aerobat at 15. Helped me really get landings down in power planes after only having one shot at it in the glider. Even seemed to help with the lighter touch needed when I got my Helicopter rating.

This Glider is super fun, and MS/ Asobo has put in glider conditions for ridge soaring… so find a good mountain to fly at, and check the pull downs in the weather window.

Wowww! :slight_smile: Nice to meet you. Have you tried the presetting weather for soaring? That’s wonderful too. In general, flying with Discus2c is relaxing.

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Fantastic work! Thank you Got Friends team.

Just took a flight in VR along the Schwabische Alps this evening to test it out and shared a couple of thermals with another Discus who happened to be in the area. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of this aircraft in the skies shortly.

Aerotows with Kinetic Assist worked really well too when I found the switch on the panel!

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Best thing to do yet in the sim ! Soaring !! Encoutered one Weird bug when m’y plane did sudden backflip for no reason , hapenned 3 Time in a row , any Idea ? Ive emptied Weight on ground then it hapenned in the air

Sorry but I can’t help out so much on the electronic variometer but you’re correct regarding the mechanical backup.

The ring around the edge is called a “Macready Ring” that helps to work out the speed to fly to your next thermal. Wikipedia and other sources explain it far better but if I remember correctly you set it to based on what you expect your average climb rate to be when you arrive at the next thermal. It helps to balance the trade off between losing height by flying faster to the next thermal or flying slowly but suffering less of a loss of height. It’s not essential to use this and is more related to competition or really long cross country flights.

The tassel thing is the cheapest but probably the most sensitive instrument on a glider! Its a piece of string or wool called the “Yaw String” and simply tells you if you are flying with the rudder and ailerons in balance (It’s the same as the “Ball” instrument on other aircraft to show yaw/slip). If it is to one side it means you aren’t cutting a clean straight line through the air which is pretty important in a glider.

It may help to think that you “Pull” the string back to the middle with your feet/the rudder… So string to the left means you should push your right foot forward/apply right rudder to pull it back to the middle. It’s important in when flying turns to try to keep the string in the middle and stay balanced (not easy though in the sim unless you have rudder pedals). Don’t focus on it too much though (or on the other instruments) the best place to be looking is out of the window!

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Really fun experience with this. I took the Discus out of Meribel in the French Alps (near Corcheval) knowing virtually nothing about how to propery operate a glider, and my first flight was just a comedy of errors. Screwed up the winch pull and got auto-released about ten seconds in; had a bad preset (a thermals-only no-wind one) for the terrain, got too low, trimmed too aggressively and stalled/spun a few times before I said “this ain’t working.”

Flight #2, same location. Much better preset – the winter Alps one. Paid attention to the bullseye on the winch page and got a good release at about 6000’. And… wow. Everything just worked. I managed to fly the ■■■■ thing all the way to Albertville, and I had too much altitude to work with (managed to gain 2000’ or so off of what I assume were thermals in the valleys). Landing was near-perfect - 71fpm – even without knowing I was supposed to dump ballast. And I even had enough residual energy to taxi to the parking area (across the lawn, mind you, but still…) Wow. Just wow. Such a great experience. And I still don’t have much of a clue what the instruments actually do. (The variometer is sort of intuitive, at least on a basic level… but what are the three modes used for? I assume “FLARM” is the German word for “beep at me angrily when I’m sort of heading towards a mountain”, too.)

Sign me up for the premium version!

p.s. I will say that this is sort of relaxing to fly. It isn’t very difficult to keep it airborne and to figure out when you’re rising on a thermal, etc., but it’s not something you can trim up and walk away from to refill your drink. It’s not stressful, but you need to pay attention and monitor your flight situation, as it can change rapidly. It’s a good kind of challenge – and I felt like I had actually accomplished something when I set down at Albertville. Can’t ask for more than that.

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Absolutely phantasmagorical!

So far the most fun FLYING I have had in the sim.
Really beautiful modelling exterior and even better interior.
As far as I can tell superb flightmodel, lightyears above FSX where I did enjoy soaring as well but this…this is different.
If you sometimes miss a purpose in flying, here it is every second, and to me highly realistic.
THANKS to Got Friends for a superb effort and in a freeware plane. Had i paid 40€ i would have thoroughly satisfied. Will buy paid version on day one.

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One question?

Is there any way of mapping the launch button to something in msfs.

There is so much going in clicking in the screen is not easy.

Also if someone have got a link to the Discos 2c poh (not the electric variant) that would be really nice, or any other source of glider how to.

We are working hard on updating the Winch Launch to be more accurate. Hopefully all goes well in the Beta! I’m working on getting a better flight Manual out for 1.0.1. As well.

As far as official PoH, we simply just Googled them and found a few.

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Phew, although I learned how to fly gliders when I was 17 (long time ago!, almost 60 now) I had a rough time flying in the alps. You have nice updrafts but also aggressive downdrafts. Normaly I never crash any plane in msfs but now crashed and burned two times in a row…

Question. What are good altitude airfields in the alps to spawn? I tried Courchevel and La Salette but they have sloped runways so the plane starts sliding right after spawning.

Try the Alps Summer weather preset as well. I’m usually flying out if LOKL. Great little hotspot.

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