What's going on with Sim Skunk Works?
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Thread: What's going on with Sim Skunk Works?

  1. #1

    What's going on with Sim Skunk Works?

    Hi,
    I purchased their Thunderstreak a couple of months back, finally got around to loading it.

    Took me forever to figure out how to start it and close the hatch, wouldn't have without the help of a thread here that explained it.

    Supposedly, they offer the Flight Manual with the plane. I saw a note that it was available in the forum. But no sign of it there.

    Every time I try to log into the site or submit a ticket, I get a 500 Error web page.

    I couldn't find a way to contact them through their Facebook page either. Obviously they're still around. Do they have any idea there are issues with their (new?) website.

    I have some other issues with the plane, too.
    How do you get rid of that green banner. I've launched their key as admin several times, the plane never times out on me, it just keeps saying "Unprotected Copy"... What the heck does that mean?
    The pylon button doesn't seem to work all the time. I got it to work once, but hasn't worked since.
    I noticed, too, while flying, the outer pylons disappeared, even though the tanks were still there. That might have been a graphical issue, though. I think I had heard some bings before it.

    The plane sure is a graphics hog. I'm running it on FSX:SE with an RTX-2070 Super and 16 GB of memory, and definitely have issues with this plane. I'm going to try the Ubuntu model, and maybe reduce the textures to 2048 from 4096. I wasn't flying in a very intense area, KBAF in MA, but I do have my settings rather high. But no issues with other planes like this.

    Flies nice, but it is pretty hard to trim to level flight. But I'm assuming I'm not set up properly (that's why I'm looking for the flight manual).

  2. #2
    SOH-CM-2024 WarHorse47's Avatar
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    Go to your F-84 aircraft folder. Look for the "docs" subfolder.

    Unfortunately, the docs are not the best. So...

    When all else fails, I go to Youtube and do a search.
    -- WH

    If at first you don't succeed, try, try,try again. ... or go read the manual.

  3. #3
    Quote Originally Posted by WarHorse47 View Post
    Go to your F-84 aircraft folder. Look for the "docs" subfolder.

    Unfortunately, the docs are not the best. So...

    When all else fails, I go to Youtube and do a search.
    Everywhere it says they offer the full flight manual. Those are just some excerpts. They do offer the full flight manual for the F-104.

    I have the flight manual for the G, but that's the straightwing. I do have a SAC for the -7 engine, but I don't know which engine they've modeled.

    They've responded to me by email before (I had issues setting up a login and they fixed it, the broken site seems new), so I shot them an email.

    If I feel like it, I might make a quick manual for them from excerpts I've seen on forums around. I guess they're not too into it given they're Italian it seems? Damn English speakers!

    The Ubuntu model fixed my OOM stuff it seems. I don't really notice a difference between it and the solo models.

    Oh, another issue I have is the parachute sometimes shows up out of nowhere when I'm starting up. Disappears once I start moving.

    For some reason I like flying it, though

  4. #4
    Anyone have a fix for Red Panda not exiting when I exit FSX? I have to kill it before I can start FSX again.

  5. #5
    Did you try this website; it's their new one ever since they stopped selling directly:

    http://94.177.167.28/public/simskunkworks/wp/

    I don't know how active they still are. You may have to wait awhile, maybe a few days, for a reply.
    I hope they haven't gone under.

    RobM

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by RobM View Post
    Did you try this website; it's their new one ever since they stopped selling directly:

    http://94.177.167.28/public/simskunkworks/wp/

    I don't know how active they still are. You may have to wait awhile, maybe a few days, for a reply.
    I hope they haven't gone under.

    RobM
    Yes, that's the site I'm talking about. Their security stuff is broken, so I can't sign in or send them a ticket.

    I sent them an email in response to a previous ticket I had opened with them when I had trouble creating a login to begin with way back. They did fix that.

  7. #7

  8. #8
    Quote Originally Posted by Sieggie View Post
    What worked for you?

    I can get to the website fine. My problem is, to post a comment in the forums, it brings you to a log in page. When I enter my name and password and hit ok, I get a 500 - Internal server error. Both here at work and from my network at home.

    If I select to submit a ticket, again, I get a 500 - Internal server error

    At work, we have pretty hefty security. At home I rely on Windows Defender and my wits.

  9. #9
    Sorry, misunderstood. I can't get in anymore either. They keep changing their web page and not reloading user/password info.

    Dave

  10. #10
    Try resetting your password, if you do look out for a red box that pops up in the top RH corner. Mine says "Unaproved_User" and that's why I'm unable to log any support tickets or access the latest downloads etc...

    After about a month and half of emailing the email addresses I have for them I have finally had a reply on Info@ so if your having issues try emailing them on this email.

  11. #11
    Quote Originally Posted by chrissykes View Post
    Try resetting your password, if you do look out for a red box that pops up in the top RH corner. Mine says "Unaproved_User" and that's why I'm unable to log any support tickets or access the latest downloads etc...

    After about a month and half of emailing the email addresses I have for them I have finally had a reply on Info@ so if your having issues try emailing them on this email.
    They did get back to me. I haven't responded back to their email again. I want to do some more testing so I'm not wasting any more of their time.

    He didn't answer my question directly, but apparently, despite what it says in their sales info, they do not really offer the full flight manual for the F-84F like they do for the F-104G according to his response (all the information you need is in docs). Admittedly, there is more information there than I realized. But I'd still like the actual flight manual for the plane like they offer with F-104G (still searching for it). The information that is there in their manual is useful if you know what you're doing. And they do have the pictures of the cockpit with descriptions. I missed that. Would have been nice if it was up front in the manual where I needed it.

    I have GB'd of flight manuals for tons of planes, just not the F-84F... sigh.

    Also, the answer about the green banner is - "It's benign". Apparently they don't care it's ugly, destroys immersion, and wrecks a lot of good screenshot moments.

    Last night I created an Ubuntu version of the paint I like, and took it a little further by also creating a 2048 version of the fuselage.common directory as well, so now none of the textures are larger than 2048. I still managed to get a CTD after 8 minutes of flight, with the occasional beep leading up to the crash (but no actual message). I'd been assuming they were graphics memory CTD's but now I'm not so sure, especially since this time I timed it and it was an 8 minute flight. So now I'm wondering if the "Unprotected Copy" is actually benign. Or is it just a graphics memory thing and I still need to turn down my graphics settings to get it to work? I don't get graphics warnings with other planes unless I'm flying over something like Aerosoft New York or Boston with a very complex plane flying fast, and this is the first to actually CTD. I could also make the plane smaller by making the spec and bump maps 1024, reduce those by another factor of 4.

    But next test will be to use a generic FSX.cfg and see what happens. Find out if it's a graphics CTD or their anti-piracy stuff.

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