5.15 How do you control the taildraggers, and how well does FS98 handle it?

From FlightSim

By the 30's, wheels were common, virtually all aircraft from WW II and later had either steerable tailwheels, or free castoring tailwheels and a tailwheel lock for takeoff and landing. The P-51 had a very unusual arrangement -- tailwheel lock was controlled by stick position. Most with locks used a separate lever.

Virtually all of the Beech/Cessna/Piper/WWII fighter types I've seen for FS98 do it wrong. With experience in everything from Champs and J-3s to Stearmans, I am very disappointed in FS98 in that particular aspect. You should be able to use tailwheel steering on most aircraft to get a mild turn (without blasting the rudder with power), and a quick pounce on the brake for one wheel (at the same time that you have full rudder applied) should break the tailwheel loose and allow it to become a full-swivel, usually after something like about a 25-30 degree turning angle has been exceeded. Differential braking is all you have left then, UNTIL you get the tailwheel roughly straightened out, at which point the steering mechanism locks and you again have steering. One other item: Unlike Piper tri-gear aircraft, and somewhat like Cessna tri-gears, the steering of tailwheels is through a spring, not a direct connection.

Larry N.