In the counterpoint to an earlier post about desktop pilots being able to land a real 737, how many real pilots could land Flight Simulator? :)I have a pilot friend who is type-rated on the 737NG (although he has never used MSFS2004) and he flew my PMDG and CRASHED on landing several times. Nor could he seem to hold altitude and airspeed, trim the aircraft, ect. His excuse - "the real aircraft is easier to fly, it's much more stable and you have feedback on the controls".Not sure what this means, lol. So if one of us had an emergency, say we had to go answer the phone or doorbell while on a approach to landing - could a real pilot sit down at our desks and take over? LOL!!!! From my experience I'm going to strap on a parachute to my desk chair just in case. Ok, now I'll hush. :(

:-xxrotflmao Most of the real pilots can't do it... it's entirely different. And that's one of the big reasons to why sim pilots would face the same destiny with a real aircraft :).bw,Tero

I started taking flight lessons six months ago and on my first lesson I was a bit nervous because I had flown GA planes in FS and I found them quite difficult to fly, but up in the air, I was suprised how easy it was to controll the airplane. Much more stable than in FS.

You would be suprised! There are a number of NG drivers on Avsim and more than a couple on the PMDG beta team. Now for someone who never has used flight simulator then that might be an issue but I can recall one NG pilot who NEVER touched flight sim before fly this plane without any problems and was in fact blown away by the realism to what he flys.Best Wishes,[h4]Randy J. Smith[/h4]http://www.rawbw.com/~bdoolin/shinault/Animation1.gifCaution! Not a real pilot, but do play one on TV ;-)AMD 64 3200+ | ASUS KV8 DELUXE | GFORCE 5700 ULTRA @535/1000 | Maxtor 6Y080M0 SATA 80 GIG | 512 DDR 400 | Windows Xp Pro | Windows Xp Pro 64 |

I think part of the problem that real pilots have flying most sims is the setup of the Sim they are trying out. I try and set my control sensitivty so that it mimics a real aircraft, in other words, very little sensitivity. I have flown other people's sim rigs where they have a DC10 set up so it responds like a Pitts Special at full throttle. I do wish Microsoft would allow more adjustment in the sensitivity in the minimum direction. I find that I have to run most of the sliders at minimum to get a realistic control response. The PMDG is the best handling Sim plane I have flown on a PC, and to me it seems real, as far as the way it handles.

Consider, sim person on a PC. You have control of their legs, arms, torso, neck muscles, all X thousand of them.Lets assume you can get the thing to stand by using a body suit of switches and so on.Now. If I walk over to it in the virtual world and push it. It will fall over. You wont be able to react quick enough.Yet if you walk over to me now and push me, I will take a step one way and rebalance, without even heating up too many brain cells.Why?Motion and balance perception. A non motion Sim can't do it (even motion ones can barely emulate normal conditions), the eye is not the tool here, but the skin, internal nerves, muscles and of course the inner ear.We think that the way we react to sight and sound and can process those inputs is amazing, but just think what amount of processing and reaction is going on just to stand up, ride a bike, not to mention ice skate, do gymnasics or fly a biplane.Food for thought?

Well, not sure about your statement "(even motion ones can barely emulate normal conditions)" or you level of full simulator experience.Having played "you bet your job" more than a couple times in the box I can say a full-motion sim now does a very good job of "fooling" the senses into feeling "heave" and acceleration. This is done by isolating the crew from real world reference. Taking the "eyes" off that point of reference.For example, the sensation of acceleration/decelration is a nifty trick. That is done with the tilt or pitch of the entire box. With the box tilted back at 30 degrees against the "real world" you feel weight transfer to the back or your seat. Inside the instruments and visual display show your eyes that you are level yet you "feel" pressed back in your chair like you are accerating. Pitch the box fwd you hang in your belts like deceleration. Your eyes see a runway and level ground but the box you are pitched down. As you "slow" on the runway the box pitches back up to "normal" so you feel the tranfer back to normal "seat of your pants" feeling.If you have a chance, atch a row of full motion simulators do thier things. If you didn't "know" why they were pitchingd yawing so drasticky you' would conclude pilots were the worse in the world at coordinated flight. Tim__757

Oh....we have a girl in the game!!! :( :) ;)

Bob has it right---The way the PC Sim responds differes greatly from the RW. To be honest having flown different PC's they vary greatly from one to another due to CPU speeds, "tweaking", keyboard mapping, control mapping, and visual cues. Steep learning curve in a hot-seat situation.OK, now lets take the original question-should a RW 737NG driver be able to "land" a PC version...He should IF he knew the setup for a CATIII and the VC was 100% (i.e. if he could navigate the system and program the sim without too much keyboard or control add on work).Changing the rules and limiting the hapless driver to a visual with no feel for the controls and a lack of fidelity to the RW737 feel, I doubt it....he'll hit the runway or float it. Given a few tries to get the feel he should get it down reasonably well after that.If you ever watch the real inputs into the yoke on a larger aircraft you will see the pilots apply very abrupt, positive, quick movements in response to what we see/feel. Watch a video where the crew is fighting a good cross-wind and you will see them "pumping, humping and dumping" the yoke to counter-act the external forces acting on the plane. These aren't "random" but a measured and expected response that may look quite drastic but in fact arrests the trend smoothly and efficiently. We call it "being a good stick" since we "feel" and know what the plane is doing. It doesn't translate well to the PC.Just my humble opinon...(Of course if he was a SLC-DELTA pilot he was just "ham-fisted")....Tim__757

You talking about me????

>Oh....we have a girl in the game!!! :( :) ;)I was wondering how long it would take. :D

Lol.:-lolMike F.

RE: Tim and the full motion simulatorsAmen. A Level D is more than accurate enough for my taste. And moving from the box, after initial, into the real airplane was actually a welcome relief. The real plane is MUCH easier to fly. But, ignoring that for the moment, when the fire bell goes (or the master caution or whatever other dastardly thing the guy in the back has up his sleeve), you don't think, even for a second, that you have the option of just giving up and letting him push the stop button. It feels, for all the world, like the only way you get to have a beer at the end of the day is to get it back on the ground. There is no suspension of disbelief involved.

Tim:He's talking about the original poster of this thread.

This is all very interesting. To be sure, I believe sims such as the PMDG and PIC amounst others are more a procedure training aid. For instance, if you push CMD at point A you can expect it to replicate the rw system or should expect it to. As Tim stated, feeling is and will always be what is missing in the dasktop sims. Take a guy like me, who although knows what pushing-setting etc should do, if I was in the rw aircraft, chances are I would freeze up or hyperventlate just knowing I was in control of my life and 100s of others and don't think I would like that thought very much. Last month I was taking pictures on a 800 NG on takeoff and even there felt that feeling of awe mixed with sheer fear. Stress managment is one area that I tip my hat to the real pilots flying these incredible machines in the sky... Best Wishes,[h4]Randy J. Smith[/h4]http://www.rawbw.com/~bdoolin/shinault/Animation1.gifCaution! Not a real pilot, but do play one on TV ;-)AMD 64 3200+ | ASUS KV8 DELUXE | GFORCE 5700 ULTRA @535/1000 | Maxtor 6Y080M0 SATA 80 GIG | 512 DDR 400 | Windows Xp Pro | Windows Xp Pro 64 |