Simviation Forums

Hi guys i have been working through the lessons in fsx, but i still seem to have a problem when it comes to triming the aircraft, i cant seem to adjust the wheel enough or sometimes to much. any help would be a bouns cheers.

I get this problem in FS9 too, It's annoying because I can't cruise, I'm always told to decend and climb.
I lose points on Airliner Pilot because of it,

Try trimming the aircraft a bit, then leaving it for a minute to settle down instead of 'chasing the needle', then continue to fine tune your trim, each time letting the aircraft settle before trimming again. - also, once you have the aircraft trimmed quite well, try using slight adjustments in your throttle/airspeed to fine tune the 'trim' instead of using the trim wheel.

Cheers,

TSC.

While you're learning this stuff.. use the learning method...

Yes, just a quick word to suppport Brett.  You get the plane stabilised in the attitude you want - cruise, climb or descent, than you trim the load out.  Using the trim rather than the control column has you chasing around the sky.

However being a sim, the loads and trim rates are not always accurate.  In some cases playing with the null zone in the controls, settings area works.  However, some simmers do the scary think and alter the aircraft config file.

And in truth the only airplane that you are learning to fly is a simulated aircraft - real world planes will be different, different loads make them different, different rigging makes them different - so its pitch power trim in whatever aircraft you fly, simulated or real.

The pitch trim is pretty coarse in FS. It has been since I've been flying the sim (FS200+). The best method I've found is what TSC recommends. Trim a little and wait for the airplane to settle down then trim a little more. It's even harder without physical sensation. In a real airplane you can feel the yoke and the pressure on that and that's why you trim, to take pressure off the yoke. I've even tried Force Feedback and that doesn't help either. FF technology just isn't that refined yet. Flying in FS is sort of like being numb from the neck down with tunnel vision and that's what I find makes it even harder than the real thing.

Yeah.. such is the limitations of the sim... but it's still good practice to at least get close by  "pitch, power, trim"...  it's part of the piloting state of mind.

In a real plane that you fly A LOT... you can pretty much do it without thinking. When I'm climbing in one of the C172s that I fly frequently.. it's all one motion when I get to my altitude..  I'll shoot for 100 or so feet high and then I'll spin the trim wheel, pull the power back and lean, almost all at once and it will settle pretty darn close  :)

And I know that people hate us oldies correcting spelling and grammar, but

It is trimming - two 'm's.

Does it matter, no not really, but because it is an interesting thread it is a bit irritating looking at a word that I automatically pronounce like 'timing' with only the one 'm'.

P.S. Yeah, I've been known to adjust a .cfg file once in a while. Turning down the "elevator_trim_effectiveness" scalar under "[flight_tuning]" in the .cfg can help on an airplane with really coarse trim. The scalar is by default set to 1.0. You can try setting it to something like .80 or so and see if that helps. Just remember to back up the .cfg just in case.

@Brett

Same here. In a real airplane you have infinite adjustment on the trim. In a sim each click moves the trim wheel so far. If the trim is too coarse then one click up may be too far up and one click down is too much down. Also I've yet to see the day you can trim a real airplane and take a nap while the airplane is flying. Many expect that in the sim and with clear weather and a good .air file you can do it but in RL it seldom happens. There are bumps in the air.  ;)

And your fuel load lightens... and the density-altitude change... and so on..

What ever happened to my best friend the freeware copilot download and teh autopilot. Just a thought a pilots best friend till the scream for ages abotu something you know about e.g. too low terrain on final approach.