Again, much like the exterior of the aircraft, Rotate has done a great job here in making it feel ‘well used’.ĭirt on the screens is well modelled, the yoke and floor area have decades of wear on them and the little details within the large cockpit space provide a good sense of these aircraft plying their routes over many years. Appearance-wise, the cockpit is an incredibly functional area and could only be from the 1980s.Įven the fonts used on the displays have a retro feel to them (not unlike the text on a handheld gaming system from the era) and the buttons and switches are clunky, functional and durable in their feel and operation. The MD-11 cockpit is a spacious environment to work in.Īlthough not entirely unfamiliar to a modern-day Airbus or Boeing pilot, McDonnell Douglas’s own system behaviour has been excellently modelled by Rotate and much like the MD-80, it pays to spend a bit of time getting to know the specific logic, language and terminology used. The business end as we prepare to depart. Rotate has managed to model this with great effect in the sim and the MD-11 has a certain presence on the tarmac that demands attention. Its appearance, design and lines are recognisable to most people as ‘different’ and of course the distinctive tri-jet configuration confirms a different approach to airliner design altogether. It’s immediately apparent that it is cut from a different cloth to other aircraft. Load the sim up in X-Plane and the distinctive appearance of the aircraft hits you instantly. The MD-11F is the launch model from Rotate for X-Plane 11, with the developer aiming to simulate the hard-wearing, rugged life a typical MD-11 lives plying trade routes with the world’s largest cargo haulers such as UPS and FedEx. Plagued by performance issues, which never lived up to the airline’s expectations, the aircraft found a new and distinctive home in aviation as a successful and highly regarded freighter. This had a definitive bearing on the performance and success of the MD-11 as a whole but more on that later.Īlthough the MD-11 started out life as a passenger aircraft, the reality is that it was never as popular as it could have been in this guise. Vying for more profits and a greater share of the market, the corporation’s tactics became more aggressive and the MD-11’s design, production and testing phases were all met with a degree of difficulty and the background of a poor economic climate and bad decision-making.
The background to McDonnell Douglas and in fact the aviation industry in general at this time was that staying in business was a struggle. Approaching the cruise and settling in for the long-haul to London Stansted.
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