This comes up a lot, and it's always a contentious debate.

 

Honestly, it depends on the situation and it depends on the person.

 

I always use myself as an example:

-I got my PPL at 41 hours (part 61), and I attribute a lot of that to Flight Sim as the average is a lot higher.

-Instrument flight was a walk in the park because in Flight Sim, trusting your instruments is all you really can do, as you don't have the tactile sense.

 

The problem is this:

-It depends on the person.  As mentioned earlier in this thread, physically being in the situation could be too much for a good number of people.

-It depends on the situation.  Handling the plane itself would be fine, but add in ATC, bad weather, or a failure and it would likely be too much for them.

 

Plus, as a simmer, if you walked up to a real pilot and said "I know how to fly this," they'd think a couple things:

-They probably wouldn't believe you.

-They'd probably think you're just some kid who's trying to talk big game just to sound intelligent.

 

In aviation, a lot of life is unspoken.  You either have experience or you don't.  Those who talk about all the experience they have (outside of telling hangar tales) usually don't have the experience they should.  What I mean by that, is the person who just randomly walks up to you and says "oh yeah, I can fly one of these" usually has, but doesn't have much experience with it.  I mean, I've flown a Piper Malibu a couple times, but I'm not going to walk up to some random guy preflighting one and say "hey, I can fly one of these, too!"

 

"Great, kid...good for you!"

(Thinking: *go back to your little boy 172 and keep dreaming...*)

Those who brag, can't. 

 

IMO.

Yes and No.

 

Yes - you will be familiar with the systems, configurations and the autopilot

 

No - you won't be able to fly the thing without the autopilot, you'll overfly control it and move the throttles way too much. Only experience and confidence after flying an aircraft for a few hundred hours will give you the confidence in setting your power and leaving it there, especially for an approach.

 

I've flown a number of OEI Simulator exercises and it's quite hard to do by hand at night in marginal weather to the minima. Recently I was out on a shakedown flight and we simulated zero thrust on one engine. The aircraft flew nothing like the sim - nothing at all, the rudder input required was minimal compared to that required in the sim and it held speed much better. I would almost say it was fine to fly on 'one engine'. So if the Sim built by the same people that made the plane can't get it 100% surely a private company has a slim chance. All they can do is give us an insight and the excitement of flying heavy metal from home. I still enjoy it though, and a lot of other people do, which is why we keep PMDG in business

As said by others above. Short answer is, in a real airplane, no you can't. I'll tell you why.

 

You, as a sim pilot, are in no way prepared to deal with the physical effects of flight. Not just stress, but g-forces, the effects of altitude and basically, the struggle of your brain to adapt to being in a place where you've never been before (despite the fact that you sort of know what you're looking at) and in conditions you've never been before (nevermind flying as a pax, that doesn't count). Once you sit in the cockpit, you will SORT of know where everything is, but it will take you a while to actually figure the whole cockpit out, just because you're seeing the cockpit in a real airplane in a different angle and different ergonomics (this is especially true when most of us used to fly on 2D panels).

 

After you're done with that, you will have to fight the psychological effect of acknowledging that you are effectively flying an airplane (big or small). When flying an airplane for the first time, much of the experience (if not almost all of it), the "wow factor" is omnipresent. Moving a throttle and feeling the aircraft accelerate or slowing down, moving the yoke and feeling the aircraft move about; it is staggering for you, because you've done it in the sim, and you have wished to do it for a while, and getting the chance to do it and feel everything in the airplane is at first just about everything your brain can handle. This "wow factor" will be bigger as the airplane gets bigger, because the physical effects are bigger too, they are more noticeable to you. Think of when you started to drive (even more if you learned on a car with a manual gearbox): You could have played realistic car games all you like, but when you got to do it on the real machine, your brain was too busy coping with the sensorial data it was getting. This will distract you, it will make life difficult for you, it will make you nervous when the airplane/car reacts a bit more vigorously than what you expect (again, the bigger the airplane/car, the bigger the sensorial overload)

 

FS does help you with some things (IFR flying is one of them, helps you LOTS!) and in some ways also how handle the airplane under different conditions, but since your airplane in the PC is a screen, your brain will have to work overtime when you're on an airplane because now your airplane is not just on a screen, it's all around you, you're wrapped in it and this a scenario you know nothing about. That being said, the task of *manually* landing an airplane for the first time it's a complete mental overload, you sort of know the theory, but the reality may have a couple of aces to throw at you; nothing too serious, a couple of knots increase in wind velocity in a real airplane will be somewhat more difficult than in the sim and it will take you longer to react and to re-accomodate the airplane on the proper path, just as you drove slowly the first couple of times you got to drive a car. It's just because you're doing something for the first time. It's in our nature to proceed cautiosly when in an unknown scenario.

 

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, an airplane doesn't stop completely on its own. Well, it can if it has autobrakes, but do remember that autopilots don't work when on the ground, so you still have to steer the airplane on the runway and about 8 or 9 times out of 10, you will need to apply some correction after touching down, because the set of laws of physics that make an airplane fly are different to those that said airplane encounters when it is on the ground. Even harder still, given that an airplane is not a land vehicle. Most likely you will overdo the pedal inputs to keep the airplane centered on the runway (because it is a feeling like no other) and no, PC pedals will not help you much as they lack feedback (unless they do have force feedback! LOL) and the pedal inputs while on the ground aren't well modelled in the sim, so still, you're likely to make mistakes. And while you technically can stop without using the thrust reversers (performance data for airplanes is done with the use of wheel brakes only, at least in dry runways), temptation to stop will be great and you will want to pop the reversers up to help you to stop (because that's what you used to do on the sim), but bear with me on this one, they will scare you! Especially if it is a turboprop plane. The reason why they will scare you (or scared me at least!) is because they are noisy, most likely they will not go into reverse at the same time (unless both engines are brand new) so the airplane will steer away from the centerline, and basically because it's just a complete different feel of how it is on the sim. If you're a keen simmer then you will know that you can harm the engines if you use full reverse for too much/too slow, or in airplanes without computers in the way of you and the airplane, you can over-torque/over-boost an engine, so it is a possibility that you use too little reverse or too much that will scare you and will make you feel tempted to put the power back to idle and start over.

 

So you see, while the sim does help you understand systems and what this and that does, actually getting to fly the plane without real experience is a very demanding task for your brain, because you're out of your environment and your brain will try its best to get the most it can from the new scenario and basically taking your focus away from the theory you know. Bear in mind this is with a completely functional airplane; the name of the game will change 100% if things go south, mechanically speaking.

 

I hope I made some sense, because English isn't my first language, so I might need to repeat myself a couple of times

 

Regards,

You have made very good sense, Ed.

 

I myself am of the opinion - that it is possible for a simmer to land an airplane - as long as he does not succumb to the temptation of AP Disconnect button. Provided that the autoland will work - this should be basically quite possible, especially if it includes rollout mode. If it does not, like most 737s - now we do have a bit of a problem on our hands, but still much better to runoff than to crash, I would say.

 

Worst case, leaving the airplane to touchdown without flare, even that should be survivable, but it is quite hard still.

 

Now without advanced AFDS, with autothrottle/autothrust systems, chances are much worse... I would not want to be in a Dash or an ATR without at least one pilot with recent experience on type...

Thinking about it. I also find it kinda weird that I think I would feel more comfortable in the 737, at least copilot than being in the JS4100, and I can fly that one pretty darn good. Lol. I wouldn't want to even try starting the JS4100 IRL, but I at least think I could get the 737 started. Not fly Her, but at Lear give Her light. Haha.

 

 

Sent from my Apple communications device.