FSX Steam Edition: North American XB-70 Valkyrie™ Add-On DLC

This add on is an absoulute disappointment. It is so broken I wouldn't even even set it on fire and after the fire has finished, destroy what it left with an Excavator to set it on fire again. There have been a handful of times where I would end up in a stall with zero-60 Airspeed and still find myself headed into orbit in a uncontrolable spin (makes sense, right?) Do not get this add on it is a waste of time, waste of a download, money and effort. DO NOT BUY THIS!!!!!

fast mildly controllable and might do uncontrolled loops for 7 hours on end if you let it

It's not pretty, but it's a fun toy. Get it on sale, go spy on the Russians, and come home. BUT, READ THE MANUAL before you knock it. It's got to be flown properly to fly fast. My only complaint: I can't get the damn thing to mach 3. I'll be leveled off at altitude, accelerate to mach 3, but at 2.95-ish It starts over correcting itself. This steadily gets worse until I lose control. It cruises fine at 2.90, but is anyone else having this problem? Next, do NOT rush the decent. Start it early, and do it steady. I'm talking -3,000fpm TOPS. If you do it too fast, you'll be so overspeed, you'll blank out your canard, and helplessly dive into the dirt.

Not bad at all, gauges work but autopilot has an issue in that after a short while it sends the aircraft into a 60 degree climb so it stalls and then you've had it.

This plane is very bittersweet. The higher you go in altitude, the more you have to gamble that you don't turn into a magnetar, and the more you pull your hair out because the manual didn't tell you anything about climbing. I can only describe this plane simply as: "All these altitudes are yours, except 60,000 feet or higher, attempt no flight there." I once made it up to flight level 650 before going spin mode. Some kind of stars aligned that day. PS: The autopilot acts like it's never been programmed how to fly. If you engage the autopilot, you are guaranteed to be sorry. Happy spinning! Edit: Once you take off, don't expect to come back down. There is 0 visibility of the runway.

This plane doesnt get enough credit. Its a very unique aircraft that has a very unique set of flight characteristics that are easily missunderstood. Its not easy to fly at its highest speeds and altitudes, but it can be done with little practice. Before take off (be sure to use a long runway at least 8000 feet +. Set the canard to its downward position. Set these basic parameters on the A/P prior to take off. Alt 70,000, set speed to Mach .90, Climb rate to +3000 FPM, do not turn AP on yet. Apply about 2/3 throttle and rotate 10 degrees at 170KTS and hold until airborn. Bring gear up once airborne and while holding pitch as close as possible to 10 degrees (not AOA) during the initial climb phase & turn on the auto pilot. Now return forward canards to up position and let the aircraft climb at Mach .90, 3000FPM, until 30,000 feet. At FL300 reduce climb rate to +500FPm and set speed to Mach 1.1. at Mach 1. apply 1/2 flaps setting. Continue to climb at Mach 1.1 then apply full flaps the rest of the way as long as your speed goes no lower than M1.1 Increase Climb rate gently to about 1000 to 2000 FPM. Once past FL400 the speed can start to be increased as you climb to FL 610 or higher. Mach 1.25 up to FL420. Mach 1.5 At FL 500, Mach 1.75 At FL 550, Mach 2. and above at Min FL 600+. This is how I safely transition from take to sub sonic and on to Super Sonic up tp FL 750 M3.1 max. Use A/P for all course and altitude adjustments while in super sonic flight for best results, after a little practice flying by hand can be done. Its just a matter of understanding the unique flight characteristics, flight envelope etc to really enjoy this amazing aircraft. Its worth the effort and minimal practice.

Everyone who is complaining just doesnt know how to fly the aircraft. When I first tried this out, I thought this was like the F-18 and the afterburners started automatically, but I WAS WRONG (like i always am), and you have to wait. There is a complete checklist that will guide you on how to fly it correctly, so stop your complaining and get a life if you hate this aircraft because of your stupidity. 10/10 would buy again (P.S. dont fly over FL800, you'll regret it)

This is a REALLY cool plane to have in your hangar once you get it figured out!!! It took a while ( and a lot of structural failures) to figure out the flight envelope of the B-70. I finally found the information listed in " details" in the select plane menu helpful in learning the aircrafts envelope which helped immensely. You will find this menu when you select your aircraft in the "free flight" option when creating you flight planner. Click on the plane and look for the "Details" link on the bottom right of the window Newbies, **always** watch the for the overspeed indicator on the lower right of your 2D screen. It will light up Red when you've exceed the speed envelope. At this point you have approximately a 10 knot cushion before aircraft structural failure. Also, this screen is where most of the gauge functionality is. If you prefer the 3D cockpits for looking around and outside of the aircraft you can cycle thru the views. Altitude autopilot speed set is all on the 2D cockpit. As the altitude increases so does the allowable airspeed before exceeding and over stressing the aircraft. At about 45,000 ft lower the first stage of the rear (canards? Airfoil) and increase speed. At I believe 48,000 ft you can push to Mach 1 and should also lower the final stage of the airfoils using " / " or it might be the F8 key. ( sorry, its been a few weeks since flying it) I've had the plane up to Mach 2.9 - 3.1 and 70,000 ft before it starts to exceed the aircraft speed and flight envelope. I believe I've managed 80,000 before failure, but the aircaft even in auto pilot eventually becomes uncontrollable,.... but recoverable at about 70,000ft. With autopilot engaged at 69,000 ft and speed set at Mach 2.9 its incredible to watch the world go by you at that altitude. Keep an eye on your AOA ( angle of attack ) It says do not exceed 17 degrees positive AOA Try flying west, taking off at 4 am (dark) and catch up with the sun. It takes me about 40 minutes or so with ATC flight following to reach max cruising speed and altitude to do this but is pretty cool and the sky color is awesome and earths horizon / curvature is quite noticeable. Pretty cool to see the stars above you in mid day also. Just out of curiosity I flew the old SR-71 routes from Okinawa over Vietnam at altitude and back. I chose Hanoi and then turned south down the Cambodian boarder using the map to stay in Vietnam airspace,, south down the Ho Chi Mihn trail to southern Vietnam, then East out to sea and for fun to Clark Airforce base Philippines. It was a really interesting perspective of what those pilots must have seen. This bomber has surprisingly long legs / range, but unfortunately since FSX does not have an inflight refueling sim, I manually refueled south of Japan ( as I would assume the SR-71 pilots did before entering hostile airspace) using the Change Fuel and Load option in the task bar FSX menu. NOTE- when at cruising altitude I've found it best to use the Nav adjust knob for course corrections, although manual correction is possible too. I prefer speed and altitude adjustments this way as well until ATC starts guiding you to final approach. I would assume most navigation by these pilots was done this way one at cruising altitude as well. Another really cool thing that I experienced, just as the SR-71 flight from LA to England was overshooting the airport because I didn't start to descend from 69,0000 feet or begin slow down until I was about 200 miles out. Trust me, this plane likes to go fast and stay there! ~~~ Hope this helps.

Cruise mach 3.75 at 77000 ft. Went from Charlotte NC to Tokoyo Japan in 3 hours. Leave at night and watch the sun rise on the way. This plane is alot of fun to fly. Nothing on FSX steam edition is remotely as fast as this plane. Obviously I have my realism settings tweeked so I dont have structural failure from overspeeding, but if you're into that, it will cruise mach 3.1 @ 70000ft without overspeed. The physics in regards to aerodynamic drag are very realistic so you can't break the sound barrier under 25000ft or you will crash. A breif documentary on youtube will educate you on the way this plane flies, alot more interesting than reading through the virtual booklet thing. TEN!!!

WOW when you make a mistake at mach 3 you really make a mistake. 10/10 would crash from 75K ft again Don't listen to these bafoons, read the manual, learn how to fly this thing, Have fun flying near the edge of space. It handles like you would expect a super sonic, high altitude bomber would handle....Set cruise at 30k ft, pick a target city in range, Point it in the general direction, Break the sound barrier, CLIMB LIKE A MOTHER FER and PUNCH IT. Just go straight and fast, like a muscle car. They cant turn for crap, put they can go fast in a straight line.