Performance Settings

[John T.]

Few quick observations on the NA:

1) Flap extension - while on autopilot, the plane aggressively pitches up and the plane fails to hold altitude.

2). Power settings - plane requires more power than necessary in real life.   ~40% power setting should hold about 120 knots.   When deploying 50% flaps, same ~40% power should hold about 100 knots.  When descending via the glide scope to maintain 100 knots, should only need about ~20% power.   

3). RNAV - active vectors to final.  Having some issues where the glide path does not automatically populate on the PFD.   

Edited July 28, 2020 by John T.

[Aedui]

Re point 1 John, if you watch Citationmax1’s stream of this plane https://www.twitch.tv/videos/687677938 (he has 1000 hours in the real Cirrus sr22, I believe) just before it was released he talks about how realistic this pitch up with flaps application is.  He mentions an increase of 50’. I tried it and that’s exactly what I got - 50’ increase. Needs some aggressive trimming but I can get it stabilized quickly enough. From your post it sounds as though you also have real world experience of this plane, so it’s an interesting point.  

JP

 

[John T.]

Yes - in the real plane when you deploy flaps you need to add some aggressive forward pressure / trim to keep the plane from ballooning up.   When on autopilot, the plane usually does a great job at holding altitude with flap changes.    In the Torquesim, I am ballooning ~300-400 feet when deploying flaps.

 

 

Quote

 

Re point 1 John, if you watch Citationmax1’s stream of this plane https://www.twitch.tv/videos/687677938 (he has 1000 hours in the real Cirrus sr22, I believe) just before it was released he talks about how realistic this pitch up with flaps application is.  He mentions an increase of 50’. I tried it and that’s exactly what I got - 50’ increase. Needs some aggressive trimming but I can get it stabilized quickly enough. From your post it sounds as though you also have real world experience of this plane, so it’s an interesting point.  

JP

 

 

Edited July 29, 2020 by John T.

[Aedui]

Wow that’s a bit excessive ! 

[Attitude]

@John T. Which flight model are you using? Experimental?

[John T.]

If that's in reference to Gizmo - I did select the beta one in the install if I remember correctly.  Let me know if there is somewhere I can check a setting.

I am using 11.50 X-plane

[Oso1986]

I think @Attitude is asking if you have Experimental Flight Model selected in settings. 

 

[John T.]

I was using experimental mode.  I just tried with it unchecked and still having same issue.

[John T.]

I have spent some more time flying instrument procedures.

ILS seems to sync appropriately - e.g. GPS will fly to FAF and then switch to ILS/Nav as well as load the GS.

However, if you select an RNAV procedure, and then click vectors to final, the GP does not load on the PFD.

This usually works on the standard Laminar G1000.

[John T.]

On 7/31/2020 at 4:21 PM, John T. said:

I have spent some more time flying instrument procedures.

ILS seems to sync appropriately - e.g. GPS will fly to FAF and then switch to ILS/Nav as well as load the GS.

However, if you select an RNAV procedure, and then click vectors to final, the GP does not load on the PFD.

This usually works on the standard Laminar G1000.

I've also tried under version 1.0.1 with and without experimental flight model.   Still seems to have an issue holding altitude on autopilot when deploying/retracting flaps.  Is anyone else having this challenge?

[Aedui]

I haven’t tried under 1.0.1 but in v 1.0 the plane does balloon, however the autopilot gets it back on to the correct GS quickly enough. 

[John T.]

22 hours ago, Aedui said:

I haven’t tried under 1.0.1 but in v 1.0 the plane does balloon, however the autopilot gets it back on to the correct GS quickly enough. 

I think the issue may be that the trim seems to take to long to adjust.   Is there a setting somewhere in the airplane config that can be adjusted to perhaps speed up the trim?  e.g. rather than one mouse click equate to [1] click of the trim wheel, it accomplishes perhaps [3-4] clicks?

 

 

[Coop]

3 hours ago, John T. said:

I think the issue may be that the trim seems to take to long to adjust.   Is there a setting somewhere in the airplane config that can be adjusted to perhaps speed up the trim?  e.g. rather than one mouse click equate to [1] click of the trim wheel, it accomplishes perhaps [3-4] clicks?

 

 

I'll take a look at it, the config is in plane maker under Control Surfaces -> Trim I believe. I will see if I can get it tuned a bit tighter.

[taildraggin68]

25 minutes ago, Coop said:

I'll take a look at it, the config is in plane maker under Control Surfaces -> Trim I believe. I will see if I can get it tuned a bit tighter.

I feel the trim speed is quite right in the SR22. The Cirrus will balloon when flaps deploy as well as the reverse when flaps retract. On my set up (your set up may vary) the ballooning is very controllable. I think if anything were to be adjusted is maybe the pitch moment. I prefer the fine trim ability as it is set now. Also in the sim, we trim to the neutral center of the controller and not trim out excessive forces. That actually tends to lead to over trimming. If in level flight and a stable power setting, you trim for level flight, even as much as leaning for cruise will require more trim to counteract the aircraft decending due to a reduced power setting, all the while trimming the aircraft for the center of your controller. This can lead to an excessive nose up trim when further power is reduced for decent and the flaps deployed will exaggerate the nose high pitch trim with ballooning. Your controller will be at neutral, while the aircraft is trimmed pitch high requiring even more pressure on your controller to overcome. 

Enough of my soap box. Trim in the sim can be very subjective. 

[John T.]

39 minutes ago, taildraggin68 said:

I feel the trim speed is quite right in the SR22. The Cirrus will balloon when flaps deploy as well as the reverse when flaps retract. On my set up (your set up may vary) the ballooning is very controllable. I think if anything were to be adjusted is maybe the pitch moment. I prefer the fine trim ability as it is set now. Also in the sim, we trim to the neutral center of the controller and not trim out excessive forces. That actually tends to lead to over trimming. If in level flight and a stable power setting, you trim for level flight, even as much as leaning for cruise will require more trim to counteract the aircraft decending due to a reduced power setting, all the while trimming the aircraft for the center of your controller. This can lead to an excessive nose up trim when further power is reduced for decent and the flaps deployed will exaggerate the nose high pitch trim with ballooning. Your controller will be at neutral, while the aircraft is trimmed pitch high requiring even more pressure on your controller to overcome. 

Enough of my soap box. Trim in the sim can be very subjective. 

I know we are all friends here.   I've got about 100 hours in the SR22 in the last year so I've got a somewhat decent feel for the aircraft.  The only thing I am pointing out is that the autopilot will not hold altitude when deploying / retracting flaps.  That unequivocally does not happen in the real aircraft.   

I was experimenting and even if you increase yoke pressure forward (while on AP) to prevent plane from ballooning for ~5-7 seconds, the plane will still balloon the second you release pressure.  If you at the same time manually adjust the trim, it seems to alleviate the issue.

Hence, my not so very scientific conclusion that the underlying issue may be how the AP interacts with the trim.  I know the early B58 Laminar G1000's had a similar issue and it was fixable by editing a few settings in the plane maker.  For some reason I can't get that application to load anymore and apologies but lost my notes on what you had to adjust on the B58 to fix this issue!

The other thing I would highlight is just around the power settings.  The NA plane often seems to need about ~10% more power than real life during instrument procedures / patterns.   Per the Cirrus book (at least for G5/G6 NA I am not as familiar with G3), in level flight 37-40% power will get you about 120 knots and 30% power will get you around 100 knots.   40% power with 50% flaps gets you around 100 knots.   May just be the G3 vs. G5/G6 airframe differences, but wasn't sure if perhaps there were other drag type settings that perhaps could be tweaked to get this as close to real life performance as possible.  Look at page 3-61 as an example in the official cirrus flight operations manual - http://whycirrus.com/safety/23020-002_RA_Std_FOM.pdf

Last comment - the throttle in the NA also seems a little jumpy in mid level settings.  It's just not smooth when fine tuning.   Both using joystrick throttle and more precise keyboard shortcuts.  

p.s.  This is all in the spirit of making what is already awesome even better.   I have been waiting for a proper Cirrus for years!  Finally can have the Cirrus functionality as well as pop-up windows, switch control, etc.   Great work.  Always willing to help test out adjustments as well.  Will soon be pairing this with the realsimgear equipment.

 

 

Edited August 6, 2020 by John T.