707 Professional

If you've been "simming" for awhile, and have been online, visiting various Flight Sim Websites, the odds are good that you've seen the name "Captain Sim". No, this is not someone's user name that fly’s for a Virtual Airline! Captain Sim is the name of the company that provides fantastically realistic aircraft add ons for MSFS 2004. Captain Sim has joined forces with another well known, highly respected add on company, Just Flight. Just Flight has provided not only quality aircraft add ons, but also excellent add on utilities, such as Traffic 2005.

Captain Sim and Just Flight have teamed up to bring you 707 Professional, representing the Boeing 707 in all its glory!

The initial ideas for the 707 began when the company started research into turbojet or turboprop powered versions of the military C97 Stratofreighter, which in itself was derived from the B29 Superfortress. With no interest from outsiders, Boeing took the bold step in August of 1952, and put up 16 million dollars to build a prototype of a completely new turbojet powered civil transport. For reasons of secrecy, the project was designated Model 367-80, commonly referred to as the "Dash 80". Due to the cost of the project, Boeing knew that it would be tough to produce a line of civil transport aircraft from the start, so they developed the initial design as a high speed military transport, or in -flight refueling tanker, banking on the proceeds from these government contracts to fund the production of a first class civil airliner. Flown for the first time on July 15, 1954, the prototype was constructed to sell first as a military-tanker transport; it had few windows and no seats, but had two large cargo doors. A week after its first flight, the Air Force ordered 29 tanker versions, the KC-135. The commercial version, the 707, however, faced tough competition from the Douglas DC-8. Boeing salespeople directed their efforts to Pan American, World Airways, Trans World Airlines and large European airlines. On Oct 14, Pan Am ordered 20 707s. At the same time, Pan Am ordered 25 DC-8s. As a side note here, Discovery Channel "Wings" had a short clip of an interview with the son of the pilot who had flown the demonstration flight of the Dash 80. It had clips of the aircraft doing not one, but two barrel roles! Unbelievable! When I first saw this, my jaw dropped to the ground! It was stated that this was not a planned maneuver, but a spontaneous act. Wow!!!

At first glance, you may think that this is going to be a complex aircraft to fly. You're right. But after I had looked through the well organized and easily understood manual that comes with the package, it was not as intimidating as I first thought. When I loaded the aircraft up, after "glancing" at the manual, (guess who doesn't read the instructions on ANYTHING first!), I proceeded to open up the various sub panels, such as the overhead, and second officers panels, of which there are two. What I first thought was "oh-oh", then I thought "all these buttons and switches must be for looks", and then, upon finding out that everything worked and was functional, I once again thought "oh-oh"! So, like I have done on so many other occasions, I went back to the manual and gave it a good looking over! I was surprised at how understandable and user friendly the 707 really is. What this aircraft has to offer is the basics in avionics of what the early "civil heavies” were

equipped with. In other words, no FMC (Flight Mission Computer) or other "high Tech" gadgets. There is a GPS provided, however, but that's as "state-of-the-art" as you're going to get! In the figure to the right is a shot of the overhead panel. See the yellow "X"? Right above it is a switch that has its cover flipped up from the mouse passing over it. Each of those switches that you see in the figure is functional. Did I say something about a high degree of realism?

Let’s start off with what this package has to offer:

19 liveries beautiffuly rendered liveries are included plus access to 101 repaints on their website:

B707-320 ADV                B707-320B
South African                  TWA
Lufthansa
Air France                       B707-300 Cargo
British airways                 Varig
Braniff                             BOAC
Continental
Equitoriana                      VC-137C
Luftwaffe                          Air Force One
British Midland
Olympic                        E-3A
Pan Am                          White Standard
Qantas                            NATO 50
Spanish AF

The 2D cockpit is beautifully rendered. The detail is extraordinary! What you have here is a fully functional flight deck that offers the user an opportunity to actually get the feel of what it is like to manage a Boeing 707. Gauges and labels are very detailed, with a convenient option to display the readings in decimal readouts that are displayed in a small box at the bottom of each gauge. Even with the detailed gauges, for us folks with eyes that aren’t what they used to be, this is a very nice feature!

Getting around in the cockpit is made easy by the use of a tool bar that is on the lower left of the screen, and is visible in each of the various views. On this bar, you will have access to functions such as views, panels, i.e., Overhead Panel, Second Officer Panels, Radio Stack, GPS, and a few things that you may not have seen before, such as the Announcements Panel, Radar, Fuel Dump, etc. We'll go over some of these in detail a bit later. The figure to the right displays one of the Second Officer Panels, which is fully functional. Now, you may be thinking already, that this is going to require a degree in avionics, but you have help. Your crew! You, as Pilot Flying, have what is called "CRIT's", which stands for Critical Items. These are the things that you would be responsible for, while preparing for flight, in flight, and approach. The manual covers this area

of responsibility in fine, understandable detail. Just to name a few of these "CRIT's", they are lights, setting airspeed bugs, flaps, radios, radar, etc. It actually is quite a load off your mind knowing that your "crew" is taking care of the other important items that make these big birds fly! Sitting to the right of you, by the way, is your Co-pilot. He can be seen only in the 2D view. He's trying to look busy going over some paperwork, but for the life of me, I can't believe it took him the entire flight from Frankfurt to Amsterdam to read that one page! The co-pilot is a photorealistic picture of a person sitting in the CP chair. The Second Officer is probably back flirting with the stewardesses!

The Virtual Cockpit is just as detailed as the 2D panels, and makes for easy flying if you prefer to cruise along using only the VC. Here again, just about everything is functional, except for the overhead panel, where only the light switches are workable. My guess here is that with the convenient overhead pop up panel ready for use, the need for the overhead is not required in the VC mode. However, if you turn to the right and face the Second Officers Panel, back behind your co-pilot, you will find these panels are usable in the VC mode. You can hit the "+" key to get a closer look if you need to. In both the 2D and VC mode, most functions of the cockpit are workable to a degree that will at first overwhelm, the amaze you. The pilots’ window can be opened by clicking on it in both views. Just for the heck of it, I wanted to see if I would

The Autopilot was a little different from what I've been used to in most default and other add on aircraft. The 707 uses the Speery SP-50 Autopilot. Though it was different than what I've used in the past, it was easy to figure out, using the manual. In the figure below, the Autopilot is in the upper left corner of the screen, and can be enlarged to make viewing easier. Pitch and roll are controlled by clicking the knob that is second from the left on the AP panel. The first knob is your mode switch. By either clicking top or bottom of the pitch/roll control, you adjust the climb or descent rate. By clicking on the left or right of the knob, you control the roll of the aircraft. When either function is used, the respective AP engagement switch is shut off until you

click and engage them back on. The only thing I found here that was a bit touchy was that you have to be sure in your placement of the mouse over the control knob, being careful not to click roll instead of pitch. Enlarging the AP is a good way to avoid this. Just drag the sides and bottom to the size that you like. The modes available on the AP are; Manual, NAV/LOC, Auto glide Slope, and Manual Glide Slope. Using this autopilot reminded me of the old remotes for the TV's way back when, click, click! The use of the AP was easy and handled the aircraft in a smooth manner. For most of my IFR flights, if I needed to do a heading change, I would use the Heading Adjustment Bug on the HSI. This kept my heading AP engaged.

But that's what makes being a "Test Pilot" (and I use the term very loosely!) for Flight Sim Products so much fun! With one click, you're back giving it another go! Not so steep, fast and reckless flying the second time around! The last piece of interesting avionics is the Weather Radar which gives you a peek at what's out there +60 degrees horizontally and +15 degrees vertically. I haven't seen this feature in too many other add ons that I have personally reviewed, so I thought this was a rather neat feature. It is also capable of detecting traffic from 20 to 150 nautical miles. I was not that surprised to see it actually work in this aircraft, since I had clicked, twisted and turned just about every knob, switch, and button available on the panels, and found them all to be functional. The same applied to the radar. To sum up the avionics in this craft, I am very impressed! Lots of gadgets that work!!! There are a few other pop up panels that you have access to, such as the Radio Stack, APU Panel, Second Officer (SO) Aux 1 Panel, accessed by "shift + 5", and the SO Aux 2 Panel, which is not accessed by "shift + 5" as the manual states, but is accessed by "shift + 6" (a typo in the manual). The authenticity of these panels even includes "wear and tear", as in worn paint, etc.

Another handy piece of avionics wizardry, a Traffic Collision Avoidance System or TCAS for short, is part of the 707 system. The TCAS is coupled with the ATC Transponder and is controlled with a mode selector, which includes four modes of operation, ranging from standby to full aural warnings with visual aids on the VSI as to what you need to do to avoid a collision. A Ground Proximity Warning System is also a part of the safety package for the 707. Here's where the daredevil, test pilot came out in me! To put this piece of avionic gear through its paces, I did some "dangerous" flying. What the GPWS does is warns you with visual and aural indications of either impending terrain impact or deviation below the glide slope, and it did exactly that, to perfection! It's just too bad I was too steep, too fast, and too reckless!

Attention to detail surrounds this aircraft, not only inside the aircraft, but the exterior as well, with all control surfaces looking, sounding, and acting with authenticity you have to see to believe. If you've read any of my other reviews, you'll know that I like to check out the landing gear, to see just how much detail went into the little things. Check out the screen shot below to get a look for yourself. Note the detail of not only the gear and wheels, but of the engine nacelles also. Note also the detailed leading edge flaps.

The exterior modeling of the aircraft is so detailed that it's as if you're looking at the real thing. Detailed almost to the point of fanaticism! The aircraft modeling is superbly done, as is the liveries that come with the package (see above list of liveries). Once again, as I remind all of you that I am NOT a licensed pilot, YET, all I have to base the flight characteristics of this aircraft on is the comparison to other products in its category. They all fly like big Cadillac’s, but there are sometimes subtle and sometimes not so subtle differences. This is the only "payware" 707 that I have flown so far. I have checked out many of the wonderful freeware 707's that are out there, some of which claim that the flight dynamics are as close to real as they can get. As far as 707 Professional goes, I would have to say that if I had the opportunity to sit in the front seat of one of these bad boys, I would expect

that the similarities in flight dynamics are exceptionally close! "The add-on was designed by professional jet pilots and engineers and consulted by the 707 rated pilots and technicians", is what the quote from the website says, and I can surely tell that someone who knew about these birds had their hand in it!

Along with the aircraft, you also get a Texture and Configuration Editor. This is standard with all Captain Sim products. This utility enables you to adjust fuel, number of passengers, nationality of the crew, cabin configuration and more. It is also used for adding new 707 variations to your hanger, download liveries or create new ones. Creating your own liveries is done by accessing the "Repaint Kit" that is provided in the files. Of course you'll need some type of paint program such as Photoshop, or Paint Pro.

The Manual is 64 pages of concise, to the point information concerning the 707. All systems are explained in a manner that a beginner would be able to work through, after some practice of course. It's not as complicated as you may think! For the experienced simmer, the manual provides data that makes it easier to manage the 707 in all phases of flight. The diagrams of the panels are fantastic and are labeled in a way that you don't have to go back and forth between pages to see what "Number 5 switch" is. It’s all right there, and quite clear both literally and visually! They take you through a normal procedures situation, explaining everything from start up to landing. Flight diagrams depicting Take Off and Departure, Approach, Missed Approach, and Visual Approach situations are also provided in the manual. Big time points for the printed manual gang!

Before we head outdoors to take a look at the externals, there's one more really neat item I need to tell you about. The aircraft comes with a Voice Package, accessible through the tool bar on the lower left of the screen. Click the appropriate button, and a panel pops into view with two rows of switches. Each of the first rows switches represents a different message from the Captain, and the second row is messages from the Flight Attendant. The messages cover everything from welcome aboard to buckle up back there (not exactly phrased as such!). I first thought, "Hmmm, a neat but probably, seldom used feature", but I actually found myself using it quite often. The voices are in English and English with a German accent. The audio qualities of the voices are also very authentic. It has that "intercom" quality that you hear when on an actual aircraft. While on the subject of audio quality, I again must say that the sounds of control surfaces, clicks, etc., are of top notch quality. The whine of the engines spooling up could give the hairs on the back of your neck a reason to stand up!

System Requirements are, for the most part, the same for any of today's quality third party add ons. They recommend a PC with a 1.7 GHz processor or faster with 256 Mb of RAM, a 64 Mb 3D graphics card and a sound card. The obvious of course, is that you'll need MSFS2004 installed. This product needs at leas 700 Mb of free Hard Disc space. My system is an HP a420n, 2.16 GHz AMD Athlon XP Processor, with 512 Mb of RAM 160 Gb Hard Drive, with an external 160 Gb Hard Drive. My graphics card is an ATI Radeon 9600 with 128 Mb of memory, an oldie but a goodie. It's a pretty hefty set up, but there are "bigger and badder" set ups out there, but this rig has done the job very nicely for me handling these add ons!

Installation was a snap and didn't take long at all. It is available in a boxed set from Just Flight, or downloadable and ready to fly from the "General Store". Updates can be had at www.justflight.com, and technical support can be found in the forum at the same site. I have found that "forum support" is a pretty good idea as far as handling technical issues, for you're able to have an ongoing dialogue, with, usually, at least one person, maybe more, so the help is consistent and you're not having to repeat your problem over and over again for numerous techs. I have not had the pleasure of utilizing this forum, for I've had no problems! I guess I could have made one up, just as a test...no, I don't think so! Everything just happens to be running great!

The product disc has loads of goodies on it also, like a free Spitfire Mk1A, from the "Spitfire" package for MSFS2004. This is a little taste of the 42 different variations of the Spitfire in that package. There's also some demo versions of Airliner Pilot and Flying Club, some screen savers and an intro to the team that brings you these fine products! Videos of their products are also included on the disc, and were kind of fun to watch. The disc is worthy of exploration!

The cost of this product is £ 29.99 / € 44.95 / $ 44.99, which isn't exactly inexpensive, but with what you get in this product; quality, realism, downloadable liveries, and so much more, I think it is well worth the price. This is one of those "top shelf" items.

So, once again it comes down to letting the screenshots do the rest of the talking! For more information you can visit www.justflight.com,