Editer

To be fair, that's an MSFS design flaw, nothing to do with the T-33.... Maybe 2024 will improve that with its new aircraft management.

This looks fantastic! And so many possibilities with the RCAF, given the number of CT-133 schemes they used over the years. Love the bright day-glo on this one! And classic RCAF (my Canadian grandfather forbade me from removing the "R" when I was building a CF-104 model, when I had thoughts of "modernizing" the decals)... Plus all the fun variations since they used it so long, like the ET-133 and CE-133 in the low-vis gray. (Though I'm more a natural-metal-and-day-glo fan!)

The standard engine is a Rolls Royce Nene, as fitted to the Canadair T-33/CT-133. The alternative engine is the original Allison J33-A35 fitted to US-built T-33s. The biggest difference is that the Allison has a significant delay in thrust response when you advance the throttle (up to 15 seconds to spool completely up), making it more challenging to manage power during approaches. Overall thrust is similar (5,200 lbs for the Nene, 5,400 with water injection for the Allison) and the spool-up response is the biggest operational difference. Interesting side-note: The Nene was built under license by Pratt & Whitney as the J42, which powered the Grumman Panther, and was reverse engineered by the Soviets who used a modified illegal copy to power the MiG-15.

Really minor but noticeable issue (since it's right next to you)... If you fly into rain, the rain effects appear not just on the glass, but also under the frame, where the glass overlaps the canopy frame. In the attached shots, you can see it under the frame on the left. The lighter shot, if you look closely, it's also under the front windscreen frame on the right. It's way more obvious "live" -- just start on the runway in the rain and watch the drops both while the plane is still and when flying.

Looks awesome, Marcel! Just a note -- your metallic updates also affect the Greek and German liveries, replacing the gray there with silver. They must share the same base gray textures. Not sure if there's a way around that... I'll just not fly those in order to have the "proper" Thunderbirds look!

Thanks for acknowledging the reports, @richboy2307! Great to know these are on Ini's radar. A few cool repaints out already. Bare metal is doable and the stuff out there already looks great, but the initial RCAF livery had to take some strong liberties in fuselage placement as the mirrored insignia cause issues with the text next to the roundel on Canadian T-33s.

So I think the reason I wasn't seeing my back seat pilot was because... he's a cat. Just too low in the cockpit. Ooops. User error. Thanks a lot, Got Friends. 🙂 Disappointing to hear all the frustration from the repaint crowd on how the liveries are set up. How can someone create such a beautiful model and structure the textures in such a way that contributors like Jankees go running the other direction? Given the lack of regular-service and bare metal schemes, I hope they're able to restructure things when the paintkit is released to make things more workable.

Very glad to hear there's going to be a paintkit. (And hopefully along with it a fix for the wing/tail mirroring that some repainters have reported.) I'm super-pleased with the aircraft model, the amazingly good audio, and (most important) the feel of the plane. But I'm really, really disappointed that there are zero natural metal liveries included, given how common they were when the plane was in service and how good they look. No "regular" USAF or RCAF liveries, and the Thunderbird plane is incorrectly painted gray when in fact they were silver/metal in color... Ini: Photo actual 1950's Thunderbirds T-33 (the restored examples are even shinier natural metal): Also, anyone find a way to make the rear-seat pilot visible?

Super-excited for this! Hope to see some natural-metal finishes, especially an RCAF CT-133 given my grandfather's history with them.

Absolutely stunning scenery! Looks fantastic on my system, and runs smoothly on my admittedly monster system (13900K, 4090). Just one suggestion if you do any updates: Every time I've flown into PHNL, there are a bunch of C-17s in the military area of the airport, along with the C-130s and KC-135s you've nicely placed there. It'd be nice to have those represented as they're definitely fixtures there. Some pics from a recent trip...