Which PMDG aircraft?

[mikeglaz 0]

Which PMDG aircraft is the most popular and the easiest to learn?  I.e. which has the best manuals and the most tutorials?

[PMDG777 231]

3 minutes ago, mikeglaz said:

Which PMDG aircraft is the most popular and the easiest to learn?  I.e. which has the best manuals and the most tutorials?

Probably the 777 since it has the most automated systems, so a lot of it's systems are controlled automatically. 747 and 737 are a bit more archaic and require manual system intervention.

[zludwick92 5]

Popular, probably the 747. Easiest, 777. Most manuals, who knows. It's PMDG, whatever you buy is going to be great. As I assume you a newcomer to PMDG, I would get the 747. 

Zach Ludwick

[Mike777 163]

The 737NGX comes with two tutorials.  The 777 comes with one, but there is a second tutorial called Tutorial 1.5 available on the PMDG web site and in the PMDG forums.  The 747 comes with one tutorial, but there are four type rating tutorials for their earlier 747 available on the PMDG web site.  These should be applicable to flying the new 747, since they are written for the same type of aircraft.

In most respects the 777 is the easiest to fly, but it is a heavy jet so you need to plan ahead more, since it is less maneuverable and harder to slow down than the 737.

Mike

 

 

[mcbellette 145]

If you want to get in and just fly, then either the 737, 777 or 747 will allow you to do that. If you're referring to FS9 products, then there was the B1900 that came out a long time ago and is very easy to fly with minimal systems. If you want to do a flight in FSX from one airport to another using waypoints, then probably the 777 is simplest. But really, I think the 737, 777 and 747 are all pretty easy to master to the point where you can do a straight forward flight from one airport to the next and utilise SIDS and STARS. The FMC in each aircraft will even help you calculate weights and centre of gravity and so on, taking a lot of the guesswork out of the equation. In the end, I think it really comes down to which aircraft you're most interested in and starting off simple and gradually getting more complicated as you learn more about the aircraft. In a nutshell - pick your favourite aircraft and start off simple with it.

[Luis_KMIA 242]

I'm an unapologetic Boeing enthusiast and think each one has their charm and ease of use.  I do a rotation of all three to stay sharp with each and it also helps me appreciate the systems commonality and differences.  

Cheers!

[Chock 17,769]

That is unquestionably the PMDG Boeing 737 NG. In fact it has a good claim to being perhaps the most well-loved flight simulator add-on of all time. You will find that since the 737 is designed to make shorter flights than either the 747 and 777, it is a more popular aircraft with flight simmers, since it does not require many hours to simulate a realistic flight. This is not to say the PMDG 777 and 747 are not good, they are awesome and the 747 is particularly good value too, given the number of variants you get included with it, but there is no denying that the 737 is the one which the vast majority of flight simmers will own.

As a result, the 737 has (by a considerable margin) the most official and unofficial tutorials out there with everything from payware add-on tutorials to youtube videos, and not least by virtue of the fact that the real Boeing 737 is the most popular jet airliner ever built, with well over 9,500 of them having rolled off the production line in comparison to the approximately similar numbers of  747s and 777s built (both around the 1,500 mark), so you will find more info out there about the real thing as well, since there are by definition, more pilots qualified to fly the thing for real than there are for either the 747 or the 777. As far as as all Boeing aircraft go, I suspect only the Boeing B17 Flying Fortress has enjoyed more qualified pilots for it than the 737, since Boeing (with help from Lockheed and Vega) made nearly 13,000 of those things lol

Being a lot more basic than either the 747 or 777, since it was originally designed to operate from basic airports and rough fields (it can actually take off from a grass or gravel strip) and the fact that it was one of the first airliners designed to be operated by a crew of two, the 737 is a simpler aircraft to learn and its size means it is a bit easier to handle too of course.

They are all worth having, but if you want the one which most other people have, then it's the 737.

[Mike777 163]

Sorry guys, I can't agree with either of these pieces of advice:

 

4 minutes ago, Chock said:

Being a lot more basic than either the 747 or 777, since it was originally designed to operate from basic airports and rough fields (it can actually take off from a grass or gravel strip) and the fact that it was one of the first airliners designed to be operated by a crew of two, the 737 is a simpler aircraft to learn and its size means it is a bit easier to handle too of course.

Yes in a sense the NGX is more basic than the other two, and your description of the versatility and ubiquity of the NGX is right on the mark.  But to me the more "basic" quality of the NGX makes it more difficult to fly.  Manual tuning of ILS radios, more complicated engine startup than the 777, greater attention to things like cabin pressure, involve additional learning and care.   The 777 and 747 autotune VORs and the selected ILS approach, the 777 pretty much auto-starts its engines.

 

25 minutes ago, mcbellette said:

If you want to get in and just fly, then either the 737, 777 or 747 will allow you to do that.

I don't recommend any of these aircraft for just jumping in and flying.  None of them will follow an FSX-created flight plan; they don't have the default GPS for doing so.  I suppose you could fly them like general aviation aircraft or use minimal autopilot functions (altitude, heading, speed, vertical speed), but why not just fly one of the default aircraft then?  Setting weights, entering the flight plan, learning startup procedures, including SIDs and STARs, coming to understand the FMCs, VNAV and LNAV, as well as alternative kinds of approach, dealing with failures, that's what makes these aircraft worth owning and learning to fly.  Time and again I've seen new users of these aircraft post about problems they have run into because, clearly, they hadn't done the basic tutorial and had very little idea of how their aircraft was supposed to work.

Mike

[Chock 17,769]

32 minutes ago, Mike777 said:

Sorry guys, I can't agree with either of these pieces of advice:

Yes in a sense the NGX is more basic than the other two, and your description of the versatility and ubiquity of the NGX is right on the mark.  But to me the more "basic" quality of the NGX makes it more difficult to fly.  Manual tuning of ILS radios, more complicated engine startup than the 777, greater attention to things like cabin pressure, involve additional learning and care.   The 777 and 747 autotune VORs and the selected ILS approach, the 777 pretty much auto-starts its engines.

Mike

I'd take the view that since the original question was which is easier to learn, not which was easier to operate, that by virtue of manually tuning nav radios and manually selecting the correct buses and bleeds, the aircraft becomes easier to learn, as in, understanding what it is doing and why it is doing it. The systems are are visible, which makes them understandable, rather than being hidden away on a page of a CDU and happening in the background whether you want them to or not.

So yes, it's great when a 747 or 777 can automatically tune an ILS frequency for those of us who are familiar with that process and what underlies it, but it's not conducive to understanding the process itself, and to have it do that you have to have the arrival airport's data and such in the FMC, so you still have to learn that additional process in order to have the aircraft carry out that automated tuning, thus it isn't really automatic at all, you are just putting the necessary info in at a different stage of the flight and a different place in the cockpit (and one which you have to press a few keys on the CDU in order to get to). Whereas on a 737 you could have a discontinuity in your FMC's flight plan, or even no flight plan in the FMC at all, in fact your FMC could even be switched off, and that still won't prevent you from making an automated ILS approach; you pop a frequency into the nav radios, dial in both course windows on the MCP and Bob's yer uncle, done, and these things are not hidden on the page of a CDU, they are right there in plain sight in the cockpit.

Of course you can do all that manually in a 747 too, but that's exactly what you should know how to do, and certainly before you start relying on automatic or semi-automatic systems to do that stuff without you understanding the concepts behind that automation. It's that kind of thing which had pilots crashing Airbuses all over the shop before the CAA and FAA etc started insisting on them knowing how to do stuff manually as well.

[Mike777 163]

4 minutes ago, Chock said:

I'd take the view that since the original question was which is easier to learn, not which was easier to operate, that by virtue of manually tuning nav radios and manually selecting the correct buses and bleeds, the aircraft becomes easier to learn. The systems are are visible, which makes them understandable, rather than being hidden away on a page of a CDU and happening in the background whether you want them to or not.

So yes, it's great when a 747 or 777 can automatically tune an ILS, but to have it do that you have to have the arrival airport's data and such in the FMC, so you have to learn that process in order to achieve that, whereas on a 737 you could have a discontinuity in your FMC's flight plan, or even no flight plan in the FMC at all, and that still won't prevent you from making an automated ILS approach;  you pop two frequencies into the nav radios and dial in both course windows on the MCP and Bob's yer uncle, done, and these things are not hidden on the page of a CDU, they are right there in plain sight in the cockpit.

I agree about the ILS (and VOR) frequencies -- coming from a default aircraft one would already know how to enter them and the dials are right there on the glare shield.  Not so sure about all the buses and bleeds though. (Pretty sure that, with no approach or even flight plan, you could tune the ILS manually on the 777 or 747 NAV/RAD page and it would allow an ILS landing, but of course you would have to know where to look for the Parked line and what it meant.)  I see your point about everything being hidden in the 747 and even more so in the 777.  But in the latter two, the 777 most of all, there is less to learn to manage.  One could probably fly it well without knowing that there are buses and bleeds - just leave all the switches in the on position and the various systems will switch themselves on at appropriate times.

My own first experience flying the NGX, (after years of flying the 777 and the Level-D 767), was that an alarm went off as I climbed -- turned out to be a cabin pressure warning, but this was not easy to figure out.  No synoptic display (or I think even clear warning message anywhere) to figure out the problem.  So I did find the NGX somewhat harder to learn.

Mike

 

 

[joelpacheco 9]

I own them all but find myself enjoying the J41 (FSX here) the most. After you learn how not to set the engines on fire. Because it keeps you busy. The 777 is a beautiful model but I find it boring being so automated. But everyone has

[mcbellette 145]

31 minutes ago, Mike777 said:

I don't recommend any of these aircraft for just jumping in and flying.  None of them will follow an FSX-created flight plan; they don't have the default GPS for doing so.  I suppose you could fly them like general aviation aircraft or use minimal autopilot functions (altitude, heading, speed, vertical speed), but why not just fly one of the default aircraft then?  Setting weights, entering the flight plan, learning startup procedures, including SIDs and STARs, coming to understand the FMCs, VNAV and LNAV, as well as alternative kinds of approach, dealing with failures, that's what makes these aircraft worth owning and learning to fly.  Time and again I've seen new users of these aircraft post about problems they have run into because, clearly, they hadn't done the basic tutorial and had very little idea of how their aircraft was supposed to work.

Mike

You can get in and fly and get a feel for how it handles - to get used to the aircraft. Then move on to learning how to operate the FMC, create a flight plan, then move on to setting failures and learning how to deal with them. That's what I did at first.

[Mike777 163]

3 minutes ago, mcbellette said:

You can get in and fly and get a feel for how it handles - to get used to the aircraft. Then move on to learning how to operate the FMC, create a flight plan, then move on to setting failures and learning how to deal with them. That's what I did at first.

Not in fact a bad approach.  My own experience is that first I learned the systems and then learned to hand fly (except of course manual takeoff was from the beginning). But I had flown less sophisticated heavy jet simulations for awhile.  

Not having hands-on experience is a real problem in RW automated jet flying, not just flight simulation.  In real life, automated aircraft have an annoying habit of disconnecting when there is a serious problem, and dumping it on rather surprised pilots.  At least that contributed to the crash of AF 447, and excessive reliance on the autothrottle was a key factor in the crash of Asiana 214.  But I'm not sure how far off the ground I would have gotten without starting with the tutorial(s).

Mike

 

[Captain Kevin 586]

1 hour ago, mcbellette said:

If you're referring to FS9 products

If he's trying to decide which one to buy (and he hasn't indicated as such, so I don't know), he'd have a hard time finding FS9 products.

1 hour ago, Chock said:

Being a lot more basic than either the 747 or 777, since it was originally designed to operate from basic airports and rough fields (it can actually take off from a grass or gravel strip) and the fact that it was one of the first airliners designed to be operated by a crew of two, the 737 is a simpler aircraft to learn and its size means it is a bit easier to handle too of course.

I know the 737-200 had this capability with the gravel kit, but can the 737NG do this?

[Patco Lch 1,464]

I agree with Chock. None of them are easy to a novice but the NGX is a much more versatile learning tool. If real world routes are important to you you will find so much more in the737. They are all complex study sims, and if you have a low tolerance level for frustration as you learn, the defaults might be best.

Bottom line, if it's a PMDG product no matter which, there is nothing better.