Engines in Microsoft Flight Simulator Tips

Video Transcript

"DIXON GILLETTE: Welcome back to Expert Village, my name is Dixon Gillette and let's continue our tutorial on Microsoft Flight Simulator X. All right, let's talk a little bit about proper engine control. Now, here in the engine control station in our Mooney Bravo, we see we have three push-pull levers. The first one here is our throttle control. You essentially will control your throttle by pushing it in to increase the amount of fuel being fed to your cylinders and consequently, to decrease throttle, you will pull it out towards you. All right. Our next lever here is our propeller control. Now, if your aircraft is equipped with a constant speed propeller like this Mooney Bravo is, then you'll have a propeller control. You'll essentially be governing the RPM's that your propeller is rotating in relation to the RPM's of your engine. This works in a similar fashion as the gears in your car do. You actually--you're going to make more efficient use of your propeller by pulling it out and essentially making more use out of less power, similar to what you do in a higher gear setting in your vehicle. All right. Our last control here is our mixture control switch. This is essentially going to work the same way, it's a push and pull out. But when you push in the mixture control, this is essentially going to send more fuel to those cylinders, thus richening the mixture. You would have your mixture settings at full rich when you are at sea level. And consequently, when you gain altitude, the air decreases in its density, and you going to want to lean out your fuel mixture, thus making the most efficient fuel-air mixture for your engine. And this is typically the way to keep your engine very cool and not burn itself up as well."