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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

I will try it now and let you know my progress. I'll also check out if the performance heli patch made any difference.

I am honestly a little disappointed that the expansion pack took so long to come out, and when it does, it only has a limited number of models (some of which are already included or available online) and there is no new terrain, flying modes, engine updates, etc etc... seems like a very light expansion. But you know what? A light expansion is ok... no one says it has to be revolutionary. So, charge a light price for it. $19.99 seems much closer to value. The primary reasons I would get the expansion pack:

T-Rex 450
CP Pro

... ya. Also, maybe a new soundtrack and an ability to continuously shuffle the songs as you're flying. : ) I hope more models from different manufacturers are featured and I hope they see the light-- as in, it's hugely beneficial to have your product featured in the most cutting-edge simulator out there. Believe it or not, it's a great marketing tool. It gives you the availability to test-fly models you're interested in without having to spend any cash... and if you like it (most likely you already liked it, that's why you're investing time trying it), you'll go on to buy it. I think the emphasis of simulator software has shifted from training tool, then added a fun factor, and now, adding a marketing tool angle.

Still an FS One fan,

- K

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

Reviews of the Performance Heli patch (10/11/07):

Install was flawless and I did not experience any other extraneous files or dialog boxes. When I started it up after patch, it asked if the patch came from a trusted source, I clicked 'yes'. It seems the patch modified the heli models exclusively without touching anything else in the simulator, but upon further examination, there are other systemic changes at least to helis. I have spent numerous hours on all the helis pre-patch but only own a CX2 in RL. I have invested so many countless hours not only to gain skill when I do purchase a CP heli next month, but also in helping decide what flight characteristics I like. I've even gone as far as thinking about getting a Voyager E based on how FS One represents its characteristics (too bad it's discontinued) I use the TacCon controller. Here are my impressions:

General:

- Calibration: whoa... completely different protocol than before. It asks me just to move all the controls until the one that triggers the on-screen response is triggered. Interesting.
- Knob: it no longer triggers throttle like an exponential trim on the E-flite Blade Helis. Good move.

Blade CP (Stock): the sound is changed, it no longer has a huge bass portion to the motor's sound. The idle-up mode allows for much less power in the negative collective direction. Holding an inverted hover is now possible, but only at full throttle or close. Overall maneuverability is down and is much less finicky than before... feels like what would happen if you moved servo clevises in a hole on the servo horn. I am having problems holding the tail. I am constantly trimming it on the controller. Overall much more pleasurable to fly than before.

Blade CP (Upgraded): This version has symmetrical blades and a LiPo battery pack instead according to the notes. Just as finicky as before, like a mosquito on crack. It feels like it does not have an HH gyro as part of the "upgrades" ... the tail is all over the place compared to before.

Blade CX: Completely changed the way it flies. It feels more realistic and unrealistic at the same time. They got the co-axial stability right... it no longer acts like a CP heli that can dive itself into the ground. Where it comes across totally wrong is: 1) It can move quite a bit faster than in the simulator... right now it moves at a snail's pace forward and back and sideways. In RL, it can at least maintain human walking speed. 2) Did not simulate flybar's forces on the top rotor. The CX2 has a natural tendency to see-saw to resist any change in vector. The simulated model just continues to move forward like an RC Car going through the air... this part is unbearable. It feels like a car, not a helicopter the way it holds speed and is so steady. 3) It does not properly simulate the loss of lift when you do a sudden change in cyclic control. This is a key characteristic of the CX2. This lost of lift also happens when you hit the rudder hard left or right. If anything, this would be the most helpful to simulate if you're training on this thing as it's a top cause of crashes in the RL model.

JR Voyager E: Wonderful. The hated ghost-rudder bug has been rectified. Before, if you push rudder right slightly, the heli will turn left slightly before starting to rotate right no matter how many times you calibrate it. Now it flies steady and solid. The sound-throttle bug was fixed too where it used to drop throttle or increase it for no reason, and sometimes you would hear the throttle drop/increase but there was no change to flight behavior. Nicely done. Too bad this chopper is discontinued... great beginner CP heli to train on.

JR Voyager 50: Beautiful ... except for the occasional seizures. The heli will sometimes go into a vertigo-psychotic state of mind and start spinning hard left rudder... like extremely hard. It looks like a centrifuge and there is no way to stop it. Right full rudder does nothing. It disappears on its own and continues to fly normally after (unless it crashes). Resetting it will sometimes reproduce this effect, sometimes not. Trimming the control sometimes gets rid of it. Sometimes not. Overall, it flies great and pretty similarly to before, feels steadier and heavier.

JR Vigor: Flies fine, has a slight ghost-in-the-throttle effect where it would give it more or less gas for no reason for a second or so. Sweet flight.

Do you guys have any input and feedback on this patch? How about those of you who own the actual helis they updated besides for the CX2?

Enjoy!

- K

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ORIGINAL: malcolmm

Here is my brief review of the heli patch, based on only about one hour of use.

Overall I'm very pleased with the patch. I mostly fly the Voyager 50, which was improved a moderate amount. The Voyager seems more responsive, not that it really needed it.

A friend who owns a Blade CP Pro often comes over to improve his skills. We were both very impressed with the new Blade CP physics. This is the basic model, not the modified one. Before the patch my friend found FS One to not be that useful, now he really finds it helpful. The new physics result in a much less hyper heli, and one that is closer to real world performance.

I was very glad to read that the T-Rex 450SA is in the expansion pack, since that is my real life heli. I guess I will be buying the expansion pack.

Malcolm

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ORIGINAL: FrankFuss

I have an Edge 350 aerodynamic question.

I assume there is an aerodynamic explanation for what I am seeing with the Hanger 9 Edge 350 33% in FS One.

When flying the Edge 350 33% straght and level, left rudder will produce a yaw without much, if any, pitch or roll. However, right rudder will produce a slight pitch up and a significant roll to the right. Why is there a significant difference between the effect of left and right rudder with this aircraft?

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ORIGINAL: FrankFuss

I have an Edge 350 aerodynamic question.

I assume there is an aerodynamic explanation for what I am seeing with the Hanger 9 Edge 350 33% in FS One.

When flying the Edge 350 33% straght and level, left rudder will produce a yaw without much, if any, pitch or roll. However, right rudder will produce a slight pitch up and a significant roll to the right. Why is there a significant difference between the effect of left and right rudder with this aircraft?

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

... hey wait a minute. This is the same thing I've been calling 'ghost-in-the-rudder' effect when flying the heli's. I rolled out of bed right now as I realized this and had to post it. When you give left rudder on a heli, you get a pure left turn, no pitch effects. But when you give right rudder, it does seem to pull the nose of the heli up in the air a bit as well as turn the head left a bit before turning right. I believe this is what FrankFuss noticed but the symptoms act out differently on a plane. I didn't notice this effect any more after the heli performance patch on the TacCon controller but as soon as I plugged in my DX7 and used one of the emulator controller templates, the same effect returned. Hope this helps you get to the root of the problem..., or maybe I just need some sleep. : )

- K

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

Well look like all this messing around with settings has not paid off. FS One is completely grounded. I tried restoring everything to stock, as in, deleted the .cal files and reinstalled the heli patch. Still didn't work... here is my current problem:

When I load up any plane or any heli now, the simulator is effectively pressing the reset button on its own like mad and the aircraft start up but stay on the ground. With a heli, you can spin up the rotors and see that cyclic controls is in fact tilting the rotor angles but the heli sits on the ground as it 'jitters' and the reset text flashes in the top left of the screen. A plane sits on the ground with its engine roaring and graphically jittering while it sits there. I think I'm spending way too much time trying to fix FS One versus enjoying it.. : (

I am pretty sure it's not the TacCon as I disconnected it from the interface and it's still doing it. DX7 is shelved for FS One purposes for now until this thing is working again.

- K

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

Brian,

Thank you for the response and looking into it. I first documented this effect a while ago using the TacCon, before the heli patch. I thought it was the calibration, but I did the calibration over 15 times that night to no avail. Then over the next couple days, I thought it was my TacCon controller hardware itself. I tried a lot of different fixes in messing with the configs and noticed this effect happened more on the Blade CP and the Voyager E than the others. But after the heli performance patch, that ghost-rudder problem went away on all the helis. I could not reproduce this bug no matter what post-patch. So that was great. : )

It is only when I got the DX7 yesterday that I saw this effect again. I followed the instructions quite literally and attempted several times to calibrate it perfectly. It didn't help. I think it has to do with some kind of interaction with the 'old' controller configs. I am not sure how to make the DX7 work properly like the TacCon does even though it binds and appears to work in some capacity. I followed the instructions on the InertiaSoft FAQ as well as from the documents from the FS One and Spektrum sites. I think the old configs are messing up in conjunction with the DX7 and with the actual simulated models. Unfortunately I don't have much more technical insight (nor ability to describe these things accurately with technical terms) as my RL skill set is in finance, not engineering. : ) But I will continue to attack the problem and report in from the application and symptomatic angle.

Or you can make it really easy for me (and thousands of your other DX7 customers) and just release a patch where I can select "Spektrum DX7 Controller," and be done! The JR emulators don't let me use the throttle hold nor the Aux 2 functions properly on the DX7 with FS One. Thank you for your dedication, you guys have some great products that will expand the industry to many more noobs like me. : )

- K

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

Hmm... it also appears that when this effect happens a right rudder input not only gives left rudder but also up elevator. Hmm...

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

Thank you for the input, Brian. I ended up doing some more legwork and these are my results. I ended up uninstalling and re-installing. Then I did the following:

1) Loaded the simulator up after patching it to the current patch, then just clicked Fly on the default Alpha 40 trainer and did the old calibration where it lists a control for you to move, then you move it. Working so far.

2) Then I loaded the Voyager E Helicopter up and calibrated that control. It went nuts with the rest and gyration bug.

3) I loaded up the Alpha 40 trainer and did the calibration on that controller, then switched to the Voyager aircraft (and it auto-loaded the controller). Problem went away.

4) Reproduced the error, and then tried your fix, problem also went away. :) So, the reset-crazy phenomenon is now solved.

Regarding the ghost-rudder problem, I don't think it's DX7 related because this behavior also happens on the TacCon. In fact, I noticed it on the TacCon before I even purcahsed a DX7 and hoped that would solve the problem if the TacCon was just loose inside or something. I do have the DX7 set to a blank airplane model I named "FS One." I also tried using a heli model and as you've documented, mixed CCPM signals makes FS One do humorous things. : ) I also checked the individual slider movements in the transmitter window as you've suggested, as well as loading up the servo screen on the Tx itself to verify no mixing was going on whatsoever.

In the mean time, I will continue to experiment with the DX7 and what settings work and what doesn't work and try out variations of your suggestions. I think that clearly the DX7 is working with FS One in some capacity, but I cannot get certain channels to correspond to the right things or behave correctly without triggering the ghost-rudder effect. Thanks for showing continued support to the customers and hopefully this dialog is a testament to the interactive level of support this product will have in the future (i.e., all you people looking for a simulator, support should be ranked as high as graphics and realism!).

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ORIGINAL: Khatsalano

I am retrying the DX7 (Heli version) setup tonight. <snip>

- K

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ORIGINAL: FrankFuss

I don't know if what Khatsalano calls the 'ghost-in-the-rudder' effect and what I am seeing is the same, but here is a way to get a more pronounced effect with the Edge 350.

1. My setup is the stock Hanger 9 Edge 350 33%, stock JR 8-Ch Emu, a fresh calibration (my JR XP8103 was also reset) and using Low Rates.

2. Fly straight and level at about 2/3 throttle.

3. Apply full left rudder and the aircraft will fly in a circle at the same altitude with only very little pressure on right aileron to keep the wings level.

4. Apply full right rudder and the aircraft will pitch up and roll significantly to the right, but if left aileron is used to keep the wings level, the aircraft will pitch up significantly and climb at an angle of 45% and more.

There has to be an explanation with such a pronounced difference left versus right.

Frank

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