How realistic is FSX ?

[craiggaudreau 0]

In the virtual airline I fly with, there are a couple members who are real life simulator techs for the same major carrier we emulate.They sometimes allow some of us to travel there and fly the big simulators. For the most part all these guys have managed to set up and fly their respective approaches to an acceptable landing. Some of them are teens. There are other members I notice who have 400 or more hours on Vatsim and get on the board and ask: "whats a VOR radial?" We have 13 year olds who get on the board and whine when they mess up flying a perfect DME arc. We have 30 year olds who have been flying sims for years and auger in consistantly. So, would we all be successful landing a real world heavy jet, absolutely not. Would some of us be successful, absolutely.I guess my point is...the sim is what it is and can be very "realistic". Its us who are the wildcard. And in the end remember this:NEVER trade luck for skill!CraigG

[CFIJose 5,485]

FS9 & FSX are exceptional tools for IFR training. Once you're IFR rated, nothing beats FSX because you don't have to leave the comfort of your home.I love it. When I get on the real plane, I feel way ahead of the airplane.JoseCFII

[Brett_Henderson 5]

Can't argue with much of what you've said, Rick. But I will (just a little) *grin*The average simmer has a little too much, "Instant Airline Captain" in him... and not enough discipline. He's joysticking big jets around, sometimes managing to get them onto a runway in one piece; before being able to fly a C172 by instruments.Not long ago, I helped a pilot who's been flying for a living for over a decade. He's one of those guys who just kept puting off getting his instrument rating until the job required it. He was your classic, "seat of the pants" pilot for so long, that even though I'd trust him more than anyone I know, to get a type he'd never flown, down on a runway intact, he couldn't get a handle on disciplined, precision, instrument flight. I tried to relate to him, a technique that worked for me.. "Constant airspeed flying". This can be done quite effectively in FSX. Take the C172, and after takeoff, establish a 90knot cruise-climb at exactly 500fpm. Fly around for an hour, NEVER deviating from 90kias. Climb, descend, level flight, level turns, climbing turns, desending turns.. and then an approach ALL at 90kias. After mastering this.. set up a good ILS scenario.. one mile visibility. You'll be surprised how much easier all the other stuff is.. especially flying the ILS, after forcing yourself to use, pitch/power, tach/ASI to go through an entire flight at one airspeed. We did this over a period of time using FSX, multi-player, shared-cockpit. It helped him a lot.My point is.. I think a sim pilot could be trained to fly a 747 IF he approached it with discipline and good instruction. Not in any sort of way that wouldn't scare pax into never flying again (which is how most simmers fly jets), but in a consistantly, surviveable way. Altitude is altitude.. airspeed is airspeed, vertical-speed is vertical-speed..and if you drill your brain on how to manage those with a throttle and yoke, I think you could pull it off. I've seen several examples of dedicated simmers flying full-moton, corporate jet training simulators quite well. Experienced jet pilots had a devil of a time with the 727 when it first came out. They had to force themselves to ignore the seat of the pants stuff.. and fly it by the numbers. FSX, for all its short-comings, can teach you to fly by the numbers. Now, of course, I wouldn't wanna be a passenger for this experiment.. I'm just focusing on what IS realistic about FSX. This drill I mentioned aint easy. In its own little way, it would set aside the simmer who didn't already have the attention-span, interest and aptitude needed. Even though the sim works in a 2D world.. it takes 3D thinking, planning, knowledge and awareness to execute "Constant Airspeed Flying".

[FalconAF 213]

Brett,Totally agree with everything you said. But I still have to point out one major "item" in it. Your pilot already had over a decade of real-world flying experience, as you stated. Even though it may have been difficult for him to initially fly those 90-knot exercises in FSX, he had the real-world experience to "relate" to what was happening in FSX. It undoubtably made his learning experience more productive in FSX, and he could take what he learned using FSX and apply it BACK to his previous real-world experiences and flying the actual aircraft.That's why a 737 Captain with a decade of flying experience could reasonably be expected to get certified in a 767 by simulation-only training. But for anyone who has no previous real-world flying experience, it just won't work. You can't take a brand new Student Pilot and train them to fly even a Cessna 152 efficiently enough with "simulation only" training, and expect to be able to turn them loose in the real world with no real-world experience based training. Simulation-only training won't work in that case, as far as producing a trained (or even marginally capable) pilot. In any case, regardless of an individual's views about the topic of this thread (which surfaces at least a couple times a year), the discussions are always interesting and informative. It's kinda fun to play the "What if I was on an airliner and the whole crew dropped dead...." scenario. I hope it never happens to me, but I think if it did, the discussion with ATC might go something like this....Me: "Center, Airbucks 123. Be advised, the flight crew is dead. Seems they all ate the same contaminated chicken for lunch. But don't worry...I'm a passenger on board and can land this aircraft."Center: "Uh, roger. What type of flying experience do you have?"Me: "Well, I've been flying single engine Cessnas for over 35 years. No turbine experience, but I learned how to fly this 767 in Flight Simulator X."Center: "Say WHAT ????"Me: "Yeah, I know...just connect me with the Airbucks' Chief Instructor Pilot on this radio, and he can talk me down."Center: "Uh...OK...Stand by...."Airbucks' Chief Instructor Pilot, after Center tells him what is happening: "Say WHAT ?????????????? Well, OK. But evacuate every living thing within a five-mile radius of the airport. He might "land" it, but it's gonna come to a STOP "somewhere" in that circle!"(posted with a big grin also...no animosity intended!) 8-)Rick

[Brett_Henderson 5]

Oh geez.. lol .. it's easy to get your point lost in these threads.. but they ARE fun..ANYway.. I'd never profess that FSX alone could teach piloting on ANY level.. I'm just highlighting (per this thread's original question), that though it's easy enough to "poo-poo" FSX for its shortcomings, it (for what it is supposed to do), IS realistic. Moreso than it gets credit for... along the lines of old-school instructors who still scoff at students even using it at all... while "new" instructors are using it for actual logged instrument training**** Yes.. FSX has been approved for simulated instrument training, ala 'On Top' and 'X-Plane'.. with proper hardware and CFII oversight. It's even being used on a high-end simulator in a club at my home airport.

[BlakeWilliams 6]

RickI quite disagree with you. I have found that flying in real life is far easier than flying the simulator. You have more spatial awareness, you can "feel" inputs into the controls, and so so much more.