So, the question may be – Were the Aircraft .cfg files updated/changed in this update — and how ? (not a small task to check & compare any differences !!)
Noticed the same in the 172 yesterday. Looks like ground effect is massive now
Online there are tools to compare differences between two files, if you have a copy of the old one and the new one its an easy task.
There’s a thread on it to vote World Update 3 has broken flight dynamics, exhibit A - #55 by Rev20105189
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So far today I’ve flown a Cub and the TBM and have experienced what you describe when I’ve come in hot. In the Cub I had made a last minute decision to land in a field and was far too fast. In the past I would have been able to pull it off but after the update things are far more slippy and unforgiving if you try an unrealistic manoeuvre.
In the TBM I was flying an ILS into Blackpool EGNH. The approach via the BPL transition was hopelessly bugged not allowing you to safely catch the glidescope, but that’s a whole different issue that I’ve been banging on about for months, I decided to take her in manually with a far steeper descent than was either normal or safe and experienced such ballooning that I’ve never seen in the TBM before. As I said before in the past I may have been able to pull this off but in this instance even when I got her down I couldn’t stop. There was no speed reduction either by prop reversal or applying the brakes. It ended in a black screen.
I’m comfortable with Asobo making landings more realistic regarding approach speeds however I think the penalties are perhaps a tiny bit over stated
The update has made some adjustments to both modelling and ground effect. I would expect there to be an adjustment period.
- Improved flaps system of aircraft: Aircraft creators can now move the wing surface’s position and camber with each flap system at each flap level
- Improved ground effect wing to ground interaction system to avoid pitch dip at rotation on some aircraft
TBH I have not had time to get the update done and so have not had a chance to test the outcome of the changes. Perhaps someone with some “real world” experience could wade in here to help us make sense of the difference. NOT a comparison with other sims. We are not shooting for something that feels like a previous sim, or feels ‘right’ but something that feels REAL.
If that is aimed vaguely in my direction, I took up flight sim and eventually developing after I had to give up “real world” flying. Also, if you look up this thread not too far there are a few names who have already contributed a large amount to other discussions on the flight model within these forums and are also real world pilots.
The likelihood of creating something that feels real in a sim is zero, the only way you will get that is to go out there and do it for real. While we are dealing with a desktop sim, comparisons with other desktop sims are perfectly valid.
I believe that we are moving away from the ability to ‘build the illusion of flight’ every time we move away from calculated aerodynamic coefficients, because they are a fundamental basic feature of real world flight. They do not create perfect flight models on their own, but as the foundation they are a solid base on which to work, to add in the ‘feel’. As a developer, that is my view. As a former real world pilot, I love a lot about this sim but find it the least convincing in terms of fidelity / realism / feel of all the ‘recent’ sims when you have a well-built aircraft (X-Plane, P3D or DCS).
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It’s now been locked so can’t vote on it, i hope it’s been forwarded onto the Devs for urgent attention.
Olie has reopened it.
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The OP’s problem is one I experienced first flight with MSFS months ago, and fixed up right away. The standard edition planes, and all 3rd party planes I have purchased have accessible flight_model.cfg files. Moving the station_loadx forward (changing the numbers in the .cfg station_loadx lines in the .cfg file for that plane) moves the center of gravity forward and then problem went away. You have to do it for every plane (they all have different flight_model.cfg files). And every Asobo update over writes the files back to the original.
The file search tools in windows ■■■■, so I use a 3rd party filesearch which instantly in 2 seconds shows me every single flight_model.cfg file on my computer, and the name of the file tells me which plane that file is for. And in developers mode you can click 3 menu items and then the effects of your .cfg file editing can be seen on the fly (see the effects of the changes without closing down and rebooting MSFS).
This floating while landing of the stock MSFS planes and many 3rd party planes IS a center of gravity issue. The c.o.g. needs to be scooted forward a little bit and then the problem goes away. (That is to say the planes now land closer to how they do it real life), i.e. they drop faster and don’t unrealistically float like a feather.
What this sim needs is a center of gravity slider in the overhead screen menu. Changing weights of pilots and fuel amounts is a clumsy substitute. A center of gravity slider would easily allow for making the planes land realistically.
In one of the sim updates, Asobo added more sliders which allowed for better controlling of controller sensitivity settings (toning down ‘effectiveness’). Before that I was editing flight_model.cfg ‘effectiveness’ numbers for every single plane in order to make the controls seem like real life.
With those new sliders all that necessary (for me) ■■■■ went away: beautiful!
Now what we need from Asobo (in my opinion) is a c.o.g. slider! Preferably on the overhead menu.
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Not aimed, even vaguely. Merely an observation, from many hours on this forum, that we often have non pilots, using questionable technique, offering technical aerodynamics evaluations. As I mentioned, I have not had the chance to test the change myself yet and so was asking for an opinion about the accuracy or lack there-of of the new changes. I have, in other posts, encountered qualified opinions that the adjustment actually ‘felt’ better than before. Obviously I will undoubtedly form my own determination when the opportunity arises. Was simply asking for other ‘qualified’ impressions.
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Does the forward CG fix the slow deceleration? Sounds like another workaround to me. We should be able to expect normal flight behaviour across the whole CG envelope from Asobo? Certainly in real life forward versus aft CG (within the certified envelope) doesn’t have a similar effect.
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I’m stuck on a very slow internet, so haven’t managed to get the update downloaded yet to comment on it.
We just appeared to cross paths on many of the points made - inevitable, I suppose!
Any plane simulated or real will drop faster when nose heavy as opposed to tail heavy. One of the first thing I noticed on Youtube reviews back in September of the new MSFS sim was that landings (compared to real life) were tail heavy in a wide variety (maybe all) of the MS airplanes. In other words these youtubers were saying that planes wanted to continue on and float rather than drop downwards, as compared to real life.
It had bothered me also on my first landing attempt back then in a little Cessna (I forget which).
Moving c.o.g. forward will make the plane want to drop instead of sail, just like putting a heavier forward tip on a dart and throwing it at a cork target.
Or you could bend the tail feathers so the dart side-slips toward the target.
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So with drop you mean a nose down pitching moment, got it now. In real life being “nose heavy” might create a little more nose down pitch in ground effect but it won’t be much since the aircraft will be in trim anyway crossing the threshold.
In the aircraft I’m currently flying (and operated before) I can’t really tell what the CG position is during flare (nor during take-off as the take-off trim compensates for it), it feels the same to me, the aircraft weight has a larger effect. You do feel the effect of CG very well during de-rotation though.
An aircraft with a forward CG, but otherwise same conditions, theoretically does experience more trim + induced drag so might decelerate faster, and has a higher angle of attack and therefore higher stalling speed. It probably has some effect in real life but not very noticeable.
Don’t know how good FS2020 actually simulates those things but considering your post not very realistically it seems.
You can do this in game. Go to the Fuel window and then drag the right edge of that window to the right of your screen and you can alter the COG. I also didn’t notice this until recently. You have to make that fuel window bigger. Hope that helps.
-Joe
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If the glide ratio bothers you, you’re really not going to like sailplanes (i.e. DG-808). Seriously though, planes don’t “fall out of the sky” when power is cut like they do in cartoons and bad movies. This is one of several stories about how planes can be flown.
Also, you’re completely wrong about “all the Cubs”. Which number would you like me to on, or would you prefer the threshold, or the apron, or maybe the helipad?
Edit: Here’s a better list of planes that shouldn’t glide but did, though unsuccessfully in some cases.
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Sure, but still the glide ratio on most planes is way, way too high. Planes are too “slippery” and prop planes are completely missing propeller drag. Since the update planes float for miles in ground effect with hardly any deceleration and aircraft flying unrealistically slow. What the OP is describing is a legitimate problem which has plagued FS2020 from the beginning.
I once tested the glide ratio of the TBM from a few thousand feet down to ground level using best glide range speed in ISA and no wind, the resulting glide range is hideous for a propeller aircraft. Flying a jet at FL300 or higher you probably have half an hour roughly, so there is some time, close to the ground its quickly over though.
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