Stephen Posted October 15, 2021 Report Share Posted October 15, 2021 Aircraft Update : PZL 104 Wilga 2000 Dynamic Generation Series v1.1 by Thranda Whoa! That was seriously quick... usually the time from the initial release to the nice little extras is around two to three months, but weeks! Thank You very much, I'll take that one! And nice little extras they are as well. The Polish PZL 104 Wilga now comes with both a Float and Amphibious version of the aircraft. X-PlaneReviews covered the huge feature list and the details in our exclusive review here: Aircraft Review : PZL-104 Wilga 2000 by Thranda Design. Download this v1.1 update and install (replace?) the release version in your aircraft folder, and you will now get two (.acf) versions of the Wilga... One selection is the original wheeled "Wilga PZL 104", and the second is the new variant of the "Wilga PZL 104 Seaplane". Amphibious version There are two options with the "Seaplane", one is the "Amphibious" version and the other is the "Floats" version. We will look at the Amphibious version first. The land based Amphibious version, is excellent... if you have already most Thranda aircraft (DHC-2 Beaver, Pilatus PC-6 Turbo Porter) you would know the sort of design and quality that you would get with this option on the aircraft... the detail of the Floats and gear is of the usual high quality from Thranda... the days of front sticks and bland rudders are now well and truly behind us. Detail is right down to components and even the nuts and bolts of the detailing, plus the springs and screw levers set out on the rudder boards, and all the required and detailed (Warning) signage... they are really very well professionally modeled to perfection, right down to even the perfect riveting of the pontoons. Raising and lowering of both the undercarriage and the twin rudders is via controls in the cockpit. The Rudders are lowered and raised by a pulley system situated on the left window screen pillar, touch the ring and the pulleys goes down to the lower hook and that action lowers the rudders.... very simple but very effective. You can also raise and lower the Rudders via the pop-out MENU/MISC that is situated on the tab on the far left centre of your screen. Notable here, is that it is the same Menu option point to switch from the "Amphibious version" to the non-wheeled "Float version" lower left box. The undercarriage is retracted and lowered via a panel set centre instrument panel... the panel's lights can also be set to be bright or DIM, if flying at night. On the water the floats... "well float nice". You are certainly (obviously) sitting far higher up than in the wheeled version, but this aspect is more noticeable in such a small aircraft... the other point to make is power... ... the Wilga 2000 Textron Lycoming IO-540-K1D5 naturally-aspirated rated engine at 290 horsepower at 2,575 RPM is a powerful powerplant for an aircraft of it's size, but you are now also weighting it down with a huge platform and the pontoons sitting below you, so it takes out a lot of your speed and drag, both in the water and in the air... the Wilga is not sluggish by any means, but you more than feel the extra load you are carrying around. So the usual is required, a bit of flap (not too much because of flap drag), keep the nose up (heaven's... you don't want that pontoons to go under nose first), and at around 50 knts you should clear the water... once up retract the flaps and rudders for more forward and climb speed. In the air the Wilga looks really good, even and if actually better proportioned than with those usual bendy wheels out front. Floats version Like noted, you switch over to the clean float version via the MENU/MISC selection... again even without the undercarriage it shows off the nice lines of the floats, the high quality textures and built in PBR (Physical Based Rendering) looks and also gives you some very natural and nice reflections. Slew Mode With the Float and Amphibious versions now available, it also allows you to use the Thranda feature "Slew Mode"... this feature over-rides the X-Plane positioning and movement dynamics. It is accessed again on the MENU/AUDIO-SLEW panel far right. Basically you can control the heading (Delta) in degrees, and move the aircraft in any 2d direction via a cross-hair control... It is a cool little tool that is mostly used to dock or manoeuvre the aircraft into jetties or docking areas. But remember however to turn the Slew feature off when going back to X-Plane or using the replay mode... if not then you can then find yourself in Space! Elon Musk would be jealous... Liveries The Floats are all matched up to the same liveries as on the aircraft, giving the aircraft a completeness... no grey standardised pontoons here. Two other updates areas with the release of v1.1 includes : -Fixed strobe lights and improved nav light visualizations -Touched up some PBR graphics ________________ Summary Very quickly after their release of the Polish PZL 104 Wilga 2000 from Thranda Design, now comes the additions of both a Float and Amphibious versions of the aircraft. Usually released months later, these great new features have come at a quick clip to expand out the versatility of this great little aircraft, this also brings in the use of the great "Slew" tool that allows you to manoeuvre the aircraft into jetties or docking areas. Detail and quality is guaranteed, with top rate modeling and clever aircraft detail which is also and as usually totally excellent, and you can (again) also dynamically change the Dirt, Grunge, scratches and nicks externally and internally on the fly, so this lovely aircraft can be as clean or as dirty as you want. This Wilga is also part of the "Dynamic Generation Series", that allows a customised 3D instrument panels with 50 options, (Including Aspen EFD 1000, and support for RealityXP GTN750) and you can also "Create" your own liveries and the package includes the advanced custom flight dynamics tool "DynaFeel" This new feature option of Floats and and Amphibious version is also free! So all you have to do is redownload the aircraft from the X-Plane.OrgStore, or use the provided Skunkworks updater tool. If you are a regular user of Thranda Design aircraft, then you know already what a great deal and that the huge list of features provided are both excellent, for everyone else the PZL 104 Wilga 2000 comes obviously... Highly Recommended. ______________________________ Yes! the PZL-104 Wilga 2000 v1.1 by Thranda Design is NOW available from the X-Plane.Org Store here : Wilga PZL 104 Dynamic Generation Series Price is US$39.95 Now priced at US$34.95 Requirements X-Plane 11 Windows, Mac or Linux 4 GB VRAM Minimum. 8 GB+ VRAM Recommended Download Size: 1.3 GB Current and Update Review version 1.1 (October 13th 2021) The plane comes with an auto-updater _____________________ Update Review by Stephen Dutton 15th October 2021 Copyright©2021: X-Plane Reviews (Disclaimer. All images and text in this review are the work and property of X-PlaneReviews, no sharing or copy of the content is allowed without consent from the author as per copyright conditions) All Rights Reserved Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olderndirt Posted October 16, 2021 Report Share Posted October 16, 2021 Lift the water rudders before you start takeoff run 🙂. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Posted October 18, 2021 Author Report Share Posted October 18, 2021 Damn... I did it again, didn't I 😫 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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