Friction, friction, where is the friction?

Question

From what I have seen on google a LOT of people have complained about ground friction in X-plane. I guess I'm no different, but I don't think it's just ground friction. I like GA planes, and one of the things that I notice is that there is not enough air friction either. Been flying Flight Simulators for 10+ years as well as flying in RL for three. While I don't expect a simulator to be spot on (or I wouldn't have been using FSX and P3D) I do expect it to at least be a close approximation.

Reduce power to start my descent and virtually nothing happens. Planes stay in the air WAY below their stall speeds and even twin engine planes pull way to hard to the left in takeoff.

Can we please take a look at this? People have been begging for years.

Answer 1

Likewise have used both FSX and P3D - have been with X-Plane since v8. In X-Plane I fly the Laminar C172 pretty much exclusively. With a dry runway, I find the braking adequate / realistic - and, yeah, with snow the coefficient of friction does seem to go to near zero (so I don't fly in snow).

As for the flight characteristics you question, I don't see this at all. The model for the C172 seems quite realistic, crabbing, side / forward slips, stalls, etc., all are close to the real plane - however, with any serious cross winds, the plane does has a slight over-tendency to weather vane. Just a student pilot here with slightly over thirty hours.

Comments

Not sure what is realistic about a C172 rolling at 0.3 knots GS at idle with weather completely turned off. Not to mention there is no way you would have any rudder control at that speed. Add a 5 knot crosswind and the plane weather veins into the wind as soon as you release the parking break. The biggest part of the problem is that it makes rudder corrections quite over exaggerated and far more difficult to control planes on the ground. What's that you say 3% rudder? Squeel the tires and skid out of controll!!!

Didn't really mean that to sound mean at all In fact I was laughing when I typed it. but the fact is Friction is farther out of what at the moment than FSX.

Any student pilot should be familiar with the phrase "push to go, pull to woah". You actually have to get those rpm's up a fair bit to get the plane rolling, and if you are rolling down the taxiway at a reasonable speed you don't need to use your brakes at all to stop... just pull the throttle back out.

Bao