X-Plane - First flight

This is a very basic, complete non-technical, how-to guide for your first flight in X-Plane.

I am a newbie myself, and long struggled finding a basic guide for landing, and especially stopping, the plane. The following guide assumes standard key setup (v9.45).

Take-off

I assume you've already managed this, but anyway: Press [B] to turn off the breaks. Engage thrust by pressing [F2] repeatedly. Control the plane with your controller, or your mouse (click on the white cross in the middle of the screen, and keep your mouse pointer within the square that appeared.)

You can apply flaps for better lift by pressing [2], once. When you are air borne, press [G] to bring your wheels up, and [1] to retract your flaps all the way up, to flying position.

Landing

Not as straight forward, but even more crucial if you first managed to take-off. :) Even positioning yourself correctly before the landing strip is not all that easy in the beginning. Take the short cut: 'Location' - 'Select Global Airport' - 'Innsbruck Kranebitten' and click on [3 nm] to be position air born 3 nautical miles ahead of the air strip. (Either RWY 08 og RWY 22, which means the runway heading at the direction of 80° and 220°, respectively. Thus, the same runway, but from opposing directions.) Then:

1. Get control over your plane
2. Flaps - Press [2] until maximum flaps (max lift, and max drag)
3. Gear down - Press [Ctrl-D] to bring down your wheels
4. Get control over your plane again
5. Slow down - Press [F1] to slow down ("as slow as you can"*, just don't stall)
6. Aim for the beginning of the runway
7. Nose up
8. Touch down
9. Speed flaps - Press [4] to maximum air breaks (if available)
10. Breaks - Press [V] for max wheel breaks
11. Reverse thrust - First, press Period [.], then engage thrust by [F2] to break using your engine (if available)

[The order of breaking might not be optimal, so please tell me what is better.]

Piece of cake, isn't it?

This way, you should be able to stop the plane before you jump the river, the infinity and beyond.

Not all breaking tools are available on all planes (see below).

* See "How slow" further down...

Difficulties aiming for the air strip?

Semi transparent panels might help (on some air crafts). Press semi colon [;]

Tilt you head down by pressing [S] (back by [W]).

View the plane from behind [A].

Although not that easy to land, the fighter FA-22 Raptor gives you nice visual, green "3D" guide lines in the air, of the path that you were supposed to have followed. ;-) Makes it easier to practice finding the airport, and the direction of the air strip.

Before take-off: Look at the flaps

Press [A] to view the plane from behind. Use Arrow keys, Minus [-] and Equal [=] to get a good view of the wings, and try the flaps.

'Normal flaps' - [1] and [2]; Look closely, the flaps take a while to extend fully

And if your selected plane has got them:

'Speed flaps' - [3] and [4] for extra speed breaks

The Cessna doesn't have speed flaps, while the fighter FA-22 Raptor, and heavy metal Boings do.

Also, press [W] to familiarise yourself with the inside of the cockpit. Toggle flaps quickly pressing 1-2-1-2-... and 3-4-3-4-... to see if any levers move. Use Up or Down arrow to look around the cockpit.

Count the number of notches from none to fully extended flaps for the air craft you've chosen.

Before take-off: Backing out; or speed breaking

You can use the reverse thrust stop the plane after landing, or to "taxi" out from the gate (or download the Pushback plugin). I took me awhile to figure out the reverse thrust. First of all, not all planes have that possibility. Secondly, I got the key-sequence wrong.

Press [W] to view the cockpit (possibly Down arrow) to view the thrust controller. Add some thrust [F1 and F2] to see the lever move. Bring the thrust all the way down. If your now press Period [.] and apply thrust, the lever should move downward if your plane has reverse thrust. (the Cessna doesn't, while the King Air B200 has).

Landing: How slow?

[Maybe we should delete this? Or move it to somewhere else???]

So how slow should I go? With maximum flaps, you can go quite slow. The Cessna has got colour markers in the Air speed instrument to indicate speed ranges:

White - flaps and gear down

Yellow - flaps and gear up.

[I should have some pictures or good references here]