PARAGLIDING SIMULATOR HELP & F.A.Q.

WHY A PARAGLIDING SIMULATOR ?

- For Fun! :)
- For virtually explore places where we are going to fly really.
- For planning a real Cross Country flight.
- For beginners, to understand better the "mathematic" of flight : speed, wind, sink rate, efficiency and visualization of the landing circuit.

HOW ARE AIR MOVEMENTS GENERATED ?

Developing this simulator we try to do the very best in reproducing realistic air movements!
Lifts, downdrafts and turbulences are generated according to the sun position in the sky, height on terrain, inclination of terrain, wind speed and direction. According to all these parameters and also many others ;) we calculate the power of the mountain dynamic wind , the power of the turbulence and the probability (never certainty!) of find a thermal.

DO THERMALS HAVE A CORE ?

Yes! As in reality of flight each thermal has a stronger lift point in the center named "core", use the variometer sound and value to stay closer to this point and gain altitude faster. Of course the core is not static, depending on the power of turbulence and wind it moves around making difficult to hold it!

DO CLOUDS GENERATE LIFTS ?

Yes! Clouds have a complete life cycle, they born , grow and disappear. Under the clouds the probability to find a thermal increase significantly, of course you have to fly close to the cloud base.

AT WHAT ALTITUDE THE THERMICAL INVERSION IS PLACED ?

Thermical inversion is placed at a certain altitude above the take off, it increases during the day, reaching the maximum in central hours, and then decreases in the afternoon.

WHY I AM LIMITED TO 30 MINUTES OF FLIGHT ?

On this website there is only a demo of the simulator, you can find the full version on XCSIM.COM !

HOW TO CONTROL THE PARAGLIDER ?

Paraglider is controlled by the mouse position (finger on touchscreen devices) in the command area, put the mouse at the upper center for a neutral position and trim speed. Moving the mouse on the right or left the paraglider will turn to that side. Moving the mouse to the lower side will reduce speed.



HOW TO CONTROL THE SCENARIO GRAPHICAL RESOLUTION ?

By pressing the "+" key on the numeric keypad the graphical resolution will be increased (more detail, less rendering performance). By pressing the "-" key the graphical resolution will be decreased (less detail, more rendering performance). We suggest to use a graphical resolution that allows you to see a fluid movement of the paraglider.

IS IT POSSIBLE TO SAVE THE FLIGHT IN THE BROWSER AND CONTINUE IT LATER ?

Yes but not on this website, you can find the full version of the simulator with the ability to save the flight on XCSIM.COM !

PLEASE NOTICE! This feature works only if the browser is not in PRIVATE MODE. In this mode the browser is not allowed to write data on the device and the flight will not be saved.

HOW TO CONTROL SOUNDS ?

By pressing the "v" key the variometer sound will be enabled/disabled, by pressing the "b" key air movement sounds will be enabled/disabled.

HOW TO TURN THE HEAD ?

Using the head rotation increases significantly the quality of the simulation, during the flight is possible to turn the head to better view in some direction.

To do this there are three ways :

- by keyboard : "A" turn left, "D" turn right, "W" turn up, "Z" turn down.
- by mouse : click and drag on the scenery view (not on commands area!).
- (ON TOUCHSCREEN DEVICES) by touch : drag the finger on the scenery view (not on commands area!).

This symbol "" on the right indicates that the head is rotated!

To reset the head view to a central position simply "double click" on the scenery with mouse, or press "CTRL" (or "S") key in the keyboard.

To reset the head view on TOUCHSCREEN DEVICES "double tap" on the scenery.

On some Apple devices double tap could not work, so to reset the head position simply TAP one time on the red "" at the top right corner.

Of course, moving the head has not effect on the flight direction.




HOW TO USE THE SPEEDBAR ?

During the flight is possible to use the speedbar by pressing the key "space" on keyboard (Press the "speed bar" button at the bottom/left corner on mobile devices).

HOW TO DISABLE SHADOWS ?

Shadows require powerfull devices, to have a better framerate on slower devices is possible to disable shadows by pressing the "c" key.

ARE SUNLIGHT AND SHADOWS SIMULATED ?

Yes, thanks to the power of the 3D engine we use, during the flight the scenery is drawed with realistic sunlight and shadows, also the air movements are calculated according to the sun position and wind direction.

WHAT IS "GUEST MODE" ?

On this website there is only a demo of the simulator, you can find the full version on XCSIM.COM !

WHAT DEVICE I NEED TO USE THE SIMULATOR AND WHAT BROWSER?

Due to the WEBGL technology we use, should be possible to run the simulator in any Web Browser on any (RECENT!) device.
Anyway for a best flying experience we strongly recommend Google Chrome or Brave on Windows, Linux and Android.

Chrome or Safari browser on Apple devices.

I HAVE A SLOW OLD DEVICE, HOW TO REDUCE THE CPU USAGE AND PREVENT EXCESS HEATING?

There is a little trick for this, simply add in the simulator address bar at the end of line "&framerate=15" , it will limit the frame generation to 15 for second, or use the value you prefer.


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Paragliding Simulator