visit Level CG Fokker 50 sim @ CAE

[Guest PoRrEkE]

Hi folks,I had a great holiday-week. I was invited again to visit CAE in Hoofddorp near Schiphol Amsterdam. Last time around all they had there was a static trainer (no motion system and no visuals out the windows). This time the 2 motion simulators had been moved from Maastricht to Hoofddorp.You can find some pictures here:http://porzone.spaces.live.com/photos/My girlfriend and I first were welcomed and I received a AOM and a quick reference guide (to keep :) )Then we visited the static trainer. A nice introduction to simulation for my girlfriend (whom never before showed any interest and showed little support or enthousiasm for my hobby) and a good exercise for me. My sim has been in boxes for more than a year now so it's been a while since I last sat in the sim.After that we teamed up with a friend of the instructor working for CAE. The friend has a PPL and is going to start his type rating soon. Then we went off for some 2 and a half hour in the sim. First we had a small demonstration of the visuals in a Fokker 100 sim but were kicked out of there because a guy had to do some maintenance.In the F50 sim I was seated on the right side with the PPL-friend next to me. The instructor took the instructor-station and there were 2 seats left for my girlfriend to chose from.The PPL-guy was allowed to do the checks and the engine starts (which I had done before in the static trainer). Then I was handed controls for takeoff. First thing I noticed is the heavy loads you feel on the controls. Man .. if there were no trims, you'd have to be a body-builder to fly these things !!! Then we got a nr2 engine flame-out (again the trim is crutial !!) And after a recovery we turned around for a landing. It took me by surprise again that it needs so much force to flare that I took my hands of the power levers and thus forgot to reduce thrust from 30% to idle ... resulting in a bit of a glide aprox. 10ft above the runway. The PPL-guy closed the throttles for me and we set down with a bump. Not bad for a first try he said :DAfter that we changed seats and the instructor took control with my girlfriend next to him. He took off and illustrated a barrel roll :( and the possibility to select reverse in the period of 16 seconds after lift-off. (that's an absolute "don't try this in real" :()After that we had a little break and when back in the sim I teamed up with the instructor behind the controls. He set take-off power (so I assumed he had controls) and I sat back and watched. Once the plane reached aprox 400ft I noticed the plane banking weird to the left and heard the instructor saying "well ? who's flying the plane now ??" *lol* Ok, so I was supposed to do that :(Then we had a both engine flameout and while the instructor did the procedures I had to keep 140kts on a slow descent. After that the instructor asked the PPL-guy to give us anything. That was fun :) First we got some fog on approach. After takeoff again we got a weird noise with nothing else. After a while we noticed some Nh drop or something and asked what he had given us. Propeller blade failure or something. Weird. Climbed to 8000 and tried to do a stall, which eventually worked. Now I know how that feels too. I suppose it's comparable as driving a car on ice and starting to slide .. ain't nothing much you can do with your controls then either. Then tried to descent for a hot approach but while aiming for the threshold we never got the speed below the max of 250kts so no gear, no flaps .. that's a no-go for landing B)Quick turn around, with flaps and gear this time for a second atempt. Rather nice landing though with a bump.Then on the runway the instructor made me select reverse and after a few seconds hit the brakes. Tailstrike is the obvious result :( (simulator didn't like it so the motion system shut off B) )That was the end of the simulation period. The instructor took us to his house to visit his Fokker27 static trainer he has bought and is trying to re-assemble and I got 3 real F50 panels to take home (airco, fuel and electric).A day never to forget !

[tigert 0]

Awesome! :-)//T

[Guest PoRrEkE]

It sure was ;)

[tigert 0]

>It sure was ;)Be sure to check my photos from our little sim builders meet in Finland too (the other thread) - should be similarly interesting.. the Bonanza sim was pretty nifty - the control loading especially: when the plane wasnt moving, the yoke got pulled forward due to the weight of the elevator. As you taxied faster, or against the wind, it would center itself after enough wind went past the control surfaces..It just made it more obvious to me that the elevator trim is one of the more important things in a light plane simulator.//T