In keeping with their usual release cycle, Cockspur has released the Tipsy B for Microsoft Flight Simulator – just a little over a week after it was first revealed to be in development.
The company similarly first teased their PH100 business jet for the sim just days before it became available for purchase.
However simmers are in for a totally different experience with the Tipsy B, which represents a blast from the past to the early days of aviation.
For those unfamiliar, the Tipsy B was a 2-seat sports plane designed by Ernest Oscar Tips in the mid 1930s. The airplane was manufactured in the UK and Belgium, with a total of 42 aircraft produced and the last aircraft taking its maiden flight in 1948 – a full 76 years ago.
Most of Ernest Tips’ aircraft have been lost to history or consigned to museums, but a few Tipsy B’s are still flying today. Cockspur’s rendition for Microsoft Flight Simulator hopes to breathe new life into this vintage icon, with 5 real-world liveries included in the package.
The aircraft cruises at around 92 kts and features the most basic of avionics: a speed gauge in miles per hour, oil pressure gauge, bank and slip indicator, RPM gauge and altimeter. That’s all you’ve got, so dead reckoning is going to be your best friend unless you decide to fly with an iPad.
Out of interest’s sake I did some digging online to establish the status of the 5 liveries’ real-world counterparts. Included with the package on sale from Cockspur’s website are:
- G-AFRV (crashed on short final into powerlines in 2022, damage too significant to warrant repair or restoration)
- G-AFWT (seemingly still flying to this day, based in the UK)
- SE-AGP (housed at the Svedinos Bil- och Flygmuseum in Ugglarp, Sweden)
- G-AISA (seemingly still flying to this day, based in the UK)
- OO-EOT (still flying to this day, based in Belgium)
The team at Cockspur describes the product as “meticulously crafted” and “exceptionally detailed”. Users can expect to find high-resolution textures for the polished wood finish in the cockpit, as well as a old-school clipboard EFB with options to toggle a compass and/or radio, ground equipment and a passenger.
Additionally, the aircraft’s flight model takes advantage of MSFS’ new computational fluid dynamics (CFD) added in more recent sim updates. The real-world aircraft is known to be susceptible to gusts and unforgiving at low speeds, so users ought to be wary of stalls and changeable conditions.
Simmers looking to take a truly vintage relic from a bygone era out for a spin can pick up the Tipsy B from Cockspur’s store now for €16.99 right now.
