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Alabeo C207Cera Sim UH60LA2A C172 + Accu SimCaptain Sim 767 Military

Interview With

Carenado

Your Favourite, i8 September/October 2014

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Editor’s LetterHere we have lined up for you another exciting issue of FlightSim Magazine; Flight simulation’s favourite free-2-read bi-monthly publication!

Inside this issue we have tons of great reviews, including add-ons from Cera Sim, Captain Sim, A2A, and Alabeo. Inside we also have an exclusive interview with add-on publisher Carenado.

Hope you enjoy!

Nicholas R.Editor, FlightSim Magazine

info@flightsimmag.comComments or Questions

InsideAlabeo C207-7Interview With Carenado-13Cera Sim UH60L-20Captain Sim 767 Expansion-27A2A 172-31

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ALABEO C207A variant of the Cessna 206, the 7-8 seat Cessna 207 was a stretched version of the aircraft, featuring 7 and later on 8 eight seats. Known as the “minivan of aircraft” the 207 is know for it’s high rate of reliability. The Cessna 207 variant was originally introduced in 1969. Early on the 207’s were known as “Skywagon”, but later on became the “Stationair 7”. When the 8th seat was added in 1980 the aircraft became the “Stationair 8” named for it’s 8 seats. Production of Cessna 207 Stationair’s was completed in 1984 with a total number of 626 built.

In my total time flying the Alabeo model C207, I found it to be a really fun, and a really fun aircraft to just jump in and fly! I have nothing but good things to say about her!

I have always enjoyed the look of the Cessna 207, and the beautiful extended nose, and I really think that Alabeo has captured this look perfectly with their new add-on! The add-on features two different models; regular and bush versions, along with great textures that come together with the amazing job they have done modelling the add-on to make for an absolutely amazing flight experience!

AMAZING EXTERIOR

STUNNING INTERIORAs with the exterior, the interior of Alabeo’s 207 is stunning, featuring some true highly detailed modelling, and amazing textures coming together to create the ultimate Alabeo add-on yet. The Alabeo 207 interior features opening door/window animations, and a stunning, fully functioning virtual cockpit. The effort that Alabeo has put in the modelling/texturing of this add-on is a real treat and makes for a great experience.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS-Windows Vista/7/8 (32 or 64 bits)-Microsoft Flight Simulator FSX or P3D-Pentium V/2GHz or similar – 2GB RAM – 512MB graphics card.-550MB available hard disk space.

Overall I found this add-on to be a real treat to fly, and an amazing example of what the team at Alabeo can do! The add-on was amazing on frame rates, and even on a slower, older PC I still had little to no lag at all running the add-on, I would highly recommend this to anyone interested in smaller general aviation planes, or is just getting into to world of payware add-ons.

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US $29.95

INTERVIEW WITH

CARENADOI recently had the extreme pleasure of doing an interview with one of the guys responsible for the company that we all now know and love as Carenado. Our discussion ranged from the development of Carenado add-ons to the future of the company. Enjoy!

How long does the development of a Carenado add-on usually take from initial concept to a release ready model?-FSMIt takes about 8 months since we decided the aircraft and it is released. This doesn´t mean that the total time is 8 months, because we are developing many aircraft at the same time, and sometimes we stop producing one for finish other. But if you consider from start to finish it is around 8 months. That means that we already have decided 2015 releases!!-CARENADO

CARENADO CARAVAN EX

We’ve been seeing a lot more larger aircraft from you lately. Can we still expect to see some smaller aircraft from you (i.e. Piston Singles)?-FSMYes, we will continue the development of those kind of aircraft, but we definitely are moving to the regional and jet aircraft in the mid term. Our brother company “Alabeo” has started to enter the niche were Carenado was some years ago. So, that company will start developing piston, singles engines soon.-CARENADO

How do you develop your add-on’s? Do you get all specs and dimensions off “paper” or do you “visit” the real thing?-FSMIn most of the cases we need to “touch” the aircraft, that mean at least one large photo session and several conver-sations with real pilot of each aircraft. If we can flight it, much better. We use the blueprints and all the information we can gather. The process of collecting information at the beginning is the tougher one. Sometimes we have had to drop a project because we don´t have enough information and if we don´t have enough material we don´t develop it.-CARENADO

CARENADO PC 12

How is it that Carenado can release an add-on pretty much every other-month while keeping the quality standard that we have come to recognize from Carenado?-FSMWe are a team of 15 people dedicated full time to this; plus, and probably the most important is, we have defined a procedure for developing aircraft. The process is divided in several stages with clear responsibilities and we have software for controlling each project. Order, control and continue improving on procedures and techniques are keys for this business.-CARENADO

CARENADO B1900D

CARENADO PHENOM 100

How do you decide which aircraft to develop?-FSMThere are several “dimensions” for deciding each aircraft such as popularity, range, type of aircraft, size and the most important one: if it is economically feasible (revenue minus cost). We have more than 10 year in the industry so we have a pretty good “feeling” of how each aircraft would perform.-CARENADO

How exactly does Alabeo “tie-in” with Carenado as a company?-FSMWe saw that the low-end market was not well served. Cheap products were and still are very bad in term of quality. We wanted to put a brand (Alabeo) in that niche providing simple, good quality and affordable products (aircraft).

In time Carenado has been upgrading to a more sophisti-cated aircraft entering the regional and jet niche. Because of this, Alabeo has started to enter the niche were \Carenado was some years ago.-CARENADO

CARENADO CESSNA 152 II

We have also lately been seeing a lot of jets from Carenado. Do you have any plans to develop larger jets, main-line airliners such as the 737 etc.?-FSMNo, we don´t have plans for that (at least in the mid term).-CARENADO

How do you develop which paints to use on you add-on’s? Are they all inspired by actual planes?-FSMYes, they are all real. We try to add at least a default one and also the most popular ones.-CARENADO

CARENADO CESSNA 152 II

CARENADO CT210M

CARENADO SR22GTS

This interview was not edited in anyway, other than text fromat. If you’d like to see an interview with a specific flight sim company/organization, please feel free to write us via email; info@flightsimmag.com

I’d also like to thank Fernando from Carenado for agreeing to do this interview with FlightSim Magazine.

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Cera Sim

UH60L

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS-FSX + Acceleration Pack or FSX Gold

US $34.99

EXTERIORTo be honest I’m not much of a helicopter fan, I’ve always been more into fixed wing aircraft, however I must say that this add-on from Cera Simulations absolutely exceeded my expectations, and I’m seriously considering purchasing more!

The exterior model of this add-on is great, and I’d say easily competes with most other top-quality add-ons that I’ve flown in the past. Overall the texture work is nice, and I certanily don’t mind the total look of the aircraft. If I were to give the add-on exterior a rating, on a scal of one to ten, I’d have to give it an 8 or 8.5.

EXTERIOR INTERIORNot going too far off the path of tone set by the exterior, the interior of this model is also modelled to a rather high quality standard, this is the portion of the add-on that really exceeded my expectations, expecially since I’d never heard of Cera Sim before, nor had I ever really flown a helicopter, so I really had no idea what to expect, luckily I was pleasantly suprised by the level of detail, and “craftsmanship” that was put into this model, the virtual cockpit on this add-on easily competes with the level of detail, quality, and functionality of any flight simulator add-on that I’ve flown. Ever.

THOUGHTSOverall I really only have good things to say about the Cera Sim UH60L, how-ever the one thing that I must say I wasn’t a fan of was the manuals, maybe it was just me, but I found them rather hard to navigate, and very un-informative.

CAPTAINSIM767 EX

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Over the past couple issues of FlightSim Magazine we’ve been taking a look at some of Captain Sim’s 767 expansion models, so if you’re new to our magazine I strongly encourage you to go back and enjoy those previous reviews before reading this one. This will be our last review of a Captain Sim 767 expansion, we’ll be looking at the 767 military variants, the “AWACS” and the “Fuel Tanker” Boeing 767 expansions from Captain Sim.

KC767Throughout the past couple of issues we’ve already discussed Captain Sim 767 virtual cockpit and models/textures, so in this article we’ll be looking more at the details that seperate the KC 767 and E 767 from the regular variant(s). First-off the obvious feature of the KC 767 Tanker is the refueling boom. Real nice to look at, but not very functional on the add-on, obvously we are confined to the limitations of FSX with this one, however it’d be nice if it served some actual function rather than juts to look pretty.

E 767Not too different than the KC 767, the E 767 AWACS add-on features the obvious large radar “dome” on the top of the fuselage, however again this feature doesn’t really serve too much of a function other than just to look nice on the top of the aircraft, and make you feel like you’re flying something different than the stock Captain Sim 767, or 767 freighter.

I would recommend this expansion if you really feel like you need to feel like your flying an air-2-air refueling tanker, or an AWACS 767, however if you’re looking for an add-on that is 100% fully functioning (don’t get me wrong the Captain Sim 767 model does have some awesome features, and functions) then I probably couldn’t recommend that you should go out and purchase this expansion.

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A2A172+ Accu Sim

My personal favourite add-on, the A2A Simulations Cessna 172 + Accu Sim is the ultimate addition to your flight simulation fleet. This add-on features tons of great features, from a great “maintenance hangar” to the amazing flight experience of Accu Sim.

In truth, who doesn’t love at least the prospect of these features; walk-around, virtual maintenance hanger/flight hour tracking, Accu Sim? Even if you haven’t heard of the A2A 172 before, I’m sure your starting to drool over some of these amazing features. Every little detail (right down to the fabrics of the rug) count to A2A, and it really shows in their 172.

FEATURES

EXTERIORAs I said before, the attention to detail that A2A put into every one of their add-ons really shows in their 172, every little aspect is (at least what I’d call) perfect. Everything from the sun glare, to the paint marks, to the bolts, screws, and the rivets. The attention to detail really makes for a great in-flight experience and makes the A2A model stand out from the rest of the 172 models out there.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS-FSX

US $49.99

INTERIORI really think that the interior of the A2A 172 really “stepped up to the plate” here when faced with the challenge of living up to the exterior of the add-on.The modelling and texuring that A2A has done here is absolutely superb, flawless work in my personal opinion. One of my favourite features is that there are several different cockpit layouts to choose, three to be exact, each featuring a slightly different layout than the other, making for a much more realistic experience (not everyone can afford a beautiful Garmin GPS).

Overall I thought that the A2A 172 was exceptional, and I would certainly recommend her, and her sister product the Cherokee 180 + Accu Sim to any and all simmers out there.