And not because I don't own it either. It spins to the right even on take off. Let the autopilot get it off the ground and as soon as I turn off autopilot it spins to the right every time. I can fly every other plane fine so it is not my joystick settings. What am I doing wrong?

On a side note: they should have made padlock a toggle because that only requires one button mapping instead of two.

It's a pig to fly till it has built up a bit of speed.
Don't try to climb with pitch - keep her level and let her gain some speed.
No more than a few degrees nose up to get her climbing slowly.
She slows and stalls easy if you try to climb too fast.
Keep her above 120 else she will stall and drop that wing and spin in.

Great, thanks. Only thing is the autopilot was flying it fine so must have had enough speed to avoid stalling when I took over, guess I made the pitch too high as soon as I took over from the AI.

Hearing your description makes me wonder if you have all the keys properly mapped. Are you sure you have all engines mapped to your throttle? Might want to double check things in your options to see. Good luck!

I have all that set to auto, or thought I did anyway. You mean I have to press more than just E to turn on both engines? I'm pretty sure both were running maxed but will check again to make sure.

Because it's a twin engined plane and has separate controls you might want to make sure that everything is actually mapped the way you want it to be. Hearing that your plane immediately dives to the right after disengaging autopilot or that you can't take off because you keep going to the right indicates that power may not be increased to your right engine (#2 I believe) so it can't hurt to check it all out.

Be aware that if you use lots of aileron deflection (left right wing roll) then the aileron input gets reversed at about 50% travel. Keep your aileron movement low and always use the rudder, in fact use the rudder more than roll to turn and you'll be OK.

For landing don't cut the throttle completely ot you'll plummet to the ground, the Gotha is seriously underpowered. Set about 50% throttle and let her settle onto the ground, its almost like flying on to the airfield rather than landing.

You really can't yank and bank this one, I like it

Just got back from checking and turned on simple controls so I could use the gauges to make sure both engines were running properly and it was fine. I applied the suggestions posted here on how to fly it and finally got her up in the air, she's a tough bird to fly, that is for sure. This was purely a case of me manhandling the controls and not enough speed causing stalls and crashes on takeoff. Thanks for the input from all.

mutt - check out first few pages of this thread - I was very glad I saw that thread (on ROF boards) before my first attempt with the Gotha!

It really helped me.

Glad you got it figured out! Yes, she's a beast of a plane and takes a bit to figure out how to fly her well, properly. I'm still learning...

OK, thx for the link. I've had this sim since only a couple of months after release and still haven't played it much at all yet. I started a campaing once and was killed on the first mission so just went back to flying the free flights to learn it better and am still in that mode. One day I will take off the training wheels.

While on the take off roll, specially at the beginning, reverse ailerons keep her straight (more so than rudder alone), very gradual throttle advance to disipate torque effect, don't try to force tail up by applying down elevator, it's best to let her do it on her own, once it does, keep her there until enough airspeed for take off is achieved (around 100-105), keep the nose below the horizon, low altitude stalls are deadly as you've found out, on landings, fly her in, as mentioned above or it will stall and nose over, three point landings are best. Don't think I'm an expert, have a few broken bones myself!

Hi walter,

First let me preface this with I certainly have had more than my share of broken bones from the Gotha as well....

...but I suspect you may be making more work for yourself as well.

Your advice is all good except for one point:



Actually, do push that stick forward and get that tail up immediatly! This will give you MUCH more rudder authority as you make your way down the field... She'll leap right up before ya know it.

S!

Hey Brian, I've tried that method, which is by the way, the correct way when taking off on a tail dragger, I've found out that in my case (could be because joysticks are setup differently) does not work as well as letting the tail wheel almost come up on its own. I've 35 years experience flying large radio control model airplanes and love to fly taildraggers, and getting that tail up as soon as possible is the best way of keeping that airplane on a straight line on the ground until it reaches enough airspeed, but it does not work as well on the Gotha, for me personally, anyway, one of the issues with this design is the location of the landing gear, in which, the entire wheel is behind the leading edge of the wing when looking at it from the side, and the other is that it is so underpowered, the closer those wheels are to the Center of Gravity, the more pronounced the tendency to nose over and being so underpowered increases the pendulum effect, can't fix that, as from viewing pictures and 3 views from the real one, this model has the scale location of the landing gear, certainly, would not want to be a nose gunner on this one! Having a good head wind would certainly help, but there's hardly any wind at all to help on take offs, I'm going to bring my garage fan and set it on the side of the screen, might help, who knows!

That's weird. I read the thread you linked to above and was surprised to see that this advice was common. I've gotten in the habit of pulling back on the stick to keep the tail down as I found it easier to control and the few times she did start to wander I just use my throttle (Warthog here so it's dual) to compensate and it works wonderfully well. I was surprised how easy it was to take off compared to all the complaints to the opposite. Landing, on the other hand, is a whole different ball of wax.

1. Don't ever et the speed get under 110. It stalls between 100 and 110 and I have never managed to recover.
2. Pitch must be kept level. Climb is very slow. Be patient.
3. I find that the tail rises on its own on takeoff. I use much less forward stick than I do with scouts. After I have it level on the takeoff roll I let it build up speed and get off the ground on its own.

Oh .. and I am really bad at flying this thing so take all of the above as you will

Yeah, perhaps it is as watler suggests - a joystick config thing, not sure. Leaving the tail on the ground makes me have to cross control the ailerons along with working the throttles to keep her strait...it's a lot less work to just get that tail up and leave the throttles and ailerons alone...for me at least.

...and agreed...landing?...a whole different ball game.

(to which I'll not comment)

1. I found stall was closer to 90 but it depends on what maneuvers you are trying.
2. Agree.
3. Agree. Use opposite aileron on the ground to steer. If you've mapped individual throttles you can use these to turn as well.

Another tip for landing is to remember to switch from using rudder to ailerons when the rudder becomes unresponsive.
Biggest tip is to make sure your landing strip is flat. Even small bumps always end in tears.

Works for me:


View from the pit:

Maybe I wasn't very clear on my earlier statement, I do not force the tailwheel to stay down by applying up elevator, but just keep the elevator sort of neutral, as enough airspeed is achieved she will very slowly raise it and when speed gets around 110, then a smidgeon of up elevator will help her brake ground. The Gotha goth us!

Walter, I think you were quite clear, just discussing a different angle on it is all. For me, when I pull up on the elevators and dig that tail into the ground it seems to help keep it straighter due to the drag (could just be my imagination as I have no idea if it's modeled in game) of the tail digging into the ground as you move along. Once I get up to about 70-80kph I let go and the tail comes up and shortly thereafter she starts to lift off the ground. Last night I tried the scenario that comes with it again and was able to take out the railroad! And then when getting home I landed it. It was a bit iffy because I hit two friggin' bumps that popped me back up into the air and my left wing almost dipped into the ground both times as I frantically tried to avoid that. Thank god for my split throttles as that was the only thing that saved me. So I've now managed 2 out of 5 successful landing attempts! K-Style, you're so right about needing a flat area to land on, it's worth its' weight in gold!