Chris McGonegle

On March 3, 1969, the United States Navy established an elite school for the top one percent of its pilots. Its purpose was to teach the lost art of aerial combat and to ensure that the handful of men who graduated were the best fighter pilots in the world. They succeeded. Today, the Navy calls it Fighter Weapons School. The flyers call it: TOP GUN. Luckily for us non-naval aviators, we still have a few options to look the part. Here is a list of our fighter pilot products that'll get you better prepared to buzz the tower. 

As Jack Nicholson taught us 40 years ago, all work and no play makes for an unhappy situation. For that reason the flight sim department at Sporty’s wanted to rate the current Logitech brand of flight simulator sticks available to the community and give our feedback on how best to complement today’s digital fighter aircraft with hardware. 

At the conclusion of every quarter, we like to reflect on some of the more notable products that joined Sporty’s offering. Here are the top ten new products we’re excited to offer to our customers from the first three months of 2022.  

The purpose of this three part blog is to grade Microsoft Flight Simulator versus X-Plane on a wide range of features. Each program has its strengths as well as its weaknesses and it’s worth researching those before financially committing to a software trainer. Edition two covers your first five minutes in both programs, weight and balance, failures, and designing a flight plan.

Assuming you've got the simulator up and running, and you're proficient in planning a flight, the question naturally comes up: what do you do with it? In this article, we'll cover some scenarios to try, from fun flights to VFR maneuvers to instrument procedures and even emergencies.

The Honeycomb Bravo throttle is an amazingly capable hardware piece that, once configured correctly, leads the pack in flight sim throttle options. The downside of all these options is that it can be intimidating to program all the commands and levers to operate as we would like. For that reason, the flight simulation department at Sporty’s put together a configuration map for running the Honeycomb Bravo with X-Plane 11. We cover how to configure the throttle for single engine GA, single engine GA complex, multi-engine GA, two-engine jet, and four-engine jet aircraft.

While Microsoft Flight Simulator enjoys the notoriety of being the most popular title and X-Plane has been called the most realistic simulation platform, Prepar3D is being used by home simmers for some of the most precise, in-depth simulation that’s happening—alongside its government, military, and commercial flight training applications. In this article, we’ll look at Prepar3D’s history, its role in the home flight simulation market, and the effect it is having on military, government, and civilian flight training.

The purpose of this three part blog is to grade Microsoft Flight Simulator versus X-Plane on a wide range of features. Each program has its strengths as well as its weaknesses and it’s worth researching those before financially committing to a software trainer. Edition one of this blog will focus on the differences you need to know before buying either program. 

As we close out one of the busiest years for flight simulation in a long time, it’s easy to get lost in the continuously expanding universe of options for an at-home simulator. There’s thousands of hours of video recorded online, a couple hundred live streaming personalities that have made a name for themselves within the digital flight world, and dozens of retailers offering the latest and greatest desk hardware to construct your preferred simulator. We decided to create a buyer's guide to assist the early stage flight sim enthusiast or gift buyer. 

Microsoft Flight Simulator has reinvigorated the flight sim world, with stunning graphics and a growing community. Now it's available on Xbox, but not every control system is compatible. Join Sporty's flight sim expert Chris McGonegle as he explains the options.