FSX Steam Edition: Beechcraft® Duchess 76 Add-On DLC

This DLC is well worth it, every thing seems to work. GPS works fine some one posted there is no GPS but there is. You can use this aircraft with GPS its the GPS button under the RPM dial! The Garmin GPS 500 pops up if you press the WPT on the COM/VLOC screen ? The Graphics in the cockpit are a bit low but for £6.49 in sale you could'nt go wrong. It flies really well.

Ok first things first the ap works fine you have to remove the yoke to see the master ap switch which is underneath the yoke it climbs well and making fine tunes to the thottle even under ap is a dream to fly setting courses with you nav is pretty easy. The only two problem i ran into is west 270 on readout dosent fly straight west about 265 and strobe lights arnent working I fly with the flight model on medium and its nice for me..

Don't let the fact that this plane is normally touted as a trainer dissuade you. Despite the twin blade, non-turbo engines, this thing really scoots up to it's cruising speed. She is such a sweet plane; a real pleasure to fly. Save a game cold and dark (tip ";" will allow you to save). Hit Shift-F10, and follow the start-up check list. It's a very enjoyable startup process. Very interactive cockpit. Autopilot DOES work, but you must activate the toggle switch on the lower dash panel to the left of the yolk (click the yolk to hide it), then click the "on" button on the AP. Got it on sale and I'm very please with it.

My early impressions of this plane and add on are highly favorable. I think that it will be an excellent introduction and transition into twin engine flying. This plane is or was apparently quite favored at flight schools for that very reason. I have the autopilot working in its most basic and important form using traditional FSX keyboard commands : Z turns off and on(no illumination seen), CTRL H (toggle) makes the heading bug active (AP panel light will illuminate) and CTRL Z (toggle) will enable altitude hold(panel switch illuminates). I am not having luck yet with direct control of the AP panel switches, but the above takes care of the most pressing needs; others may have that more fully figured out. I learned how to tailor the sound volumes since the engine was too loud for my taste - this is a big plus in a general way for all sustained flying now. Also recommend downloading the manual from this page, I think it will be answering most of the questions that are coming up. Since I am wanting to learn about actual flying protocols and flight models vs. trying to automate the process as much as possible, this looks like a great match for me. Wonderful to experience the performance improvements of twin engine over singe engine planes if you are at that level of flight study. Definitely an engaging plane and recommended from my side (also an affordable entry into twins), hope you find the same. PS From the manual I did later find the AP on/off switch, and it now illuminates the AP power switch properly; I anticipate this should enable full functioning of the AP. ******************************** POSTSCRIPT JUL 03 2020: This remains my favorite plane in my flight training, vying for position with the Piper Comanche(a very hard plane to find, by the way - Eaglesoft Development Group has it). There is an interesting evolution that has taken place in my acquistion of these two aircraft: I was ready to write a critical review on the Duchess as I had almost come to the point of abandoning it. The problem was with the field of view. I was never able to see sideways out of the cockpit when I had things set up for the front view without lots of hassles and adjustments while flying. This was a critical flaw in the design of this airplane for me, or so I thought. That led me to the Comanche, which does not have this problem. The performance specs of these two planes are very similar, and hence my equal interest in both of them. At this point of abandonment of the Duchess, I decided to investigate any point of view adjustments that can be made within FSX. THERE IS A GREAT AND SIMPLE SOLUTION here that has radically improved the use of FSX in all respects, so I wish to share it. This is the link, offered by Steam no less: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=367422210 This has changed everything in FSX to the better, and now the Duchess is again at the top of my list. I would highly recommend considering making this change in the config file for FSX. It was a simple fix (I back up the original file just in case) and all aircraft are dramatically better now. You can see properly for traffic pattern work and general viewing and safety in flight. The Duchess and Comanche are two wonderful planes if you are involved with the flying of twins. Still highly recommended, but CONDITIONAL upon setting the view to WideViewAspect=True per the link above. Incidentally, autopilot works fine in all respects once you learn where the switches for control are. Additional note : Learning how to control the zoom of the external view from the aircraft also becomes important here. This is done with the + and - keys. Combination of wide angle view and zoom factor will make a big difference with all aircraft, not just the Duchess. Best regards, CEC

Not nearly the quality as other payware, not worth the money, bad cockpit textures and materials, would not recommend

This is a little beauty twin, good for short flights, realistic gauges that all work, fly's very nice, amazing sounds. if you like bush flying and around the mountain areas this is ideal. nice deal in steam sale, recommended. much better than most other twins.

nice to fly handles like a dream 90% of the guages are useable only issue i have with the plane are the lights the beacons dont work nor do the strobe lights

This aircraft, of course, isn't top-notch quality, but it's pretty dang good anyways. The VC, while not best quality, is really well built and all the gauages worked. The flight dynamics are pretty good too. The fact that I was able to flare this without bouncing, unlike other aircraft I've tried out, says something. The flight dynamics are just right, and it feels really good in air and on land. I also like how you can click to open the doors, and how there are other people modelled in the plane. The exterior is well-built too, and the Duchess 76 is a really stylish plane. Just Flight accomplished that stylish look. The autopilot is a bit strange and I had to read another review to find out how to make it work, but in the end, this aircraft is [b] Worth a Buy! [/b]

This plane is very much so worth the buy. -HOWEVER- Only if you are interest in some nice casual VFR-no auto pilot- flying. If you want a plane that you want to load a flight plan into and hit those auto pilot buttons to deal with most of the work en route to where ever it is you choose to go, this is not your plane. For that you are better off with commercial airliners. It is nice detail wise, interior and exterior. Not as good as those high end payware addons like PMDG and Aerosoft....but for the price on here this is good. Don't buy this expecting the full nine yards of realism. It's a light aircraft, really meant for hand flying and enjoying yourself in FSX. If that's what you want, than get it. You can almost never go wrong buying small prop planes on Steam, it's the high end payware aircraft that you would want to save your pennies for and get directly from their websites for the full "real-deal" experience". My apologies if this review didn't help you much. The main thing I wanted to stress is that yes, it's worth it. No, it's not as real as it gets. But most times that'll be the case with Steam sold aircraft add-ons. Worth it? YES. Only if you are down for homing in your hand flying skillz. Ya know?

Excellent addon, performs well, has a good guide and is very authentic. For those who say this has no autopilot function, I don't know what you are on about. It does have one, but has to be switched on manually with a button in front of the flight yoke. And as this is an authentic beechcraft addon you can't just dial in the altitude with the AP and let the aircraft do all the rest for you as is the case with the non authentic default fsx AP. You will have to climb to your altitude first manually and then click on the altitude button on the autopilot on the left side and it will then keep the aircraft in place at the desired height. There are also navigation functions etc on the autopilot as well. Overall I am pleased with the money I spent on this and my ratings are as follows. 9/10 Authenticity 8/10 Sounds 8/10 Functionality/Useabilty (Only thing I didn't like was the lack of an easy accessible Gps. The addon uses the default Fsx one and was very awkward when trying to bring up the Gps also when flying manually) Apart from this issue with the GPS everything else was fine. Overall rating 9/10 If anyone has any questions feel free to message me and I will try to be of assistance. Enjoy and Happy Flying :)