2 hours ago, TravelRunner404 said:

A force feedback yoke that accurately simulates the feel of the plane is the single biggest thing missing from simulators. The yoke in real life is your biggest connection to how the plane feels. No matter what you tell yourself about honeycomb or saitek or yoko it’s a Y shaped Xbox controller/joystick. You can yank it and pull it however you please no matter the situation and the plane takes the input. You are trying to manipulate the plane using sensitivity settings and curves not forces. I am still convinced this is the biggest reason so many people internet rage about the flight model. Sebastian has even eluded to this. 

I agree with this.

I once took off w/o removing the pitot cover on my Cardinal. This was taking off from a small airfield in Northern Maine. Stupid I know. But we all have bad days. I became much more aware during preflight walkarounds after this. I had become complacent I guess.

Well I quickly realized something was wrong on the T/O roll, no airspeed indicated. But I had to take off anyway as I was out of runway to land. So I looked over and sure enough the plastic cover was still on the pitot tube, but the flag attached to it was gone. This is probably why I missed it. I don't know if someone played a joke on me or if it just blew off.

Anyway I decided not to land back at the small airstrip only 1200' long with trees at both ends. I flew on towards my home airport and on the way I was to fly close to Berlin Airport with a 6000' runway, so I decided to land there. And I did, no problem.

So why tell this story here. Well, the only way I knew my airspeed was by the feel of the yoke, as you approach stall the yoke becomes very mushy w/o much effect, flying fast it is actually hard to move. I had practiced doing stalls and landings with no airspeed indicator during my training many years earlier, stalls under the hood and unusual attitude recoveries with partial instruments. 

This is something you can't practice in a no feedback simulator.

But a lot of flying is very possible to practice, like IFR procedures and hand flying holding patterns with 0 visibility and windy gusty conditions and partial instruments, like you would hope you never need to do. 

But mostly I use the sims I have used in the last 30 years or more just for fun and for challenges I would hope to never encounter.

Everyone have a safe simming year.

4 hours ago, TravelRunner404 said:

A force feedback yoke that accurately simulates the feel of the plane is the single biggest thing missing from simulators. The yoke in real life is your biggest connection to how the plane feels. No matter what you tell yourself about honeycomb or saitek or yoko it’s a Y shaped Xbox controller/joystick. You can yank it and pull it however you please no matter the situation and the plane takes the input. You are trying to manipulate the plane using sensitivity settings and curves not forces. I am still convinced this is the biggest reason so many people internet rage about the flight model. Sebastian has even eluded to this. 

Agreed. For me it is most noticed in go arounds, you really have to put some big amount of force to prevent the nose from sky rocketing.

This and smooth VR.

I have been flightsimming for 30 years and have never one heard anyone suggest that sitting in a chair in front of a computer on the ground could accurately mimic the feel of flying a real aircraft. Of course it can't, and who has ever said otherwise? This strikes me as a debate without an issue.

6 hours ago, MrFuzzy said:

LOL it's very easy to land even the heaviest airliners even with "ultra" realism.

But that's OK, at the end of the day it was made to be fun and to reach the largest possible audience. 

There's nothing easier to land than an airliner.  They're designed specifically to require less stick-and-rudder skill to fly than just about anything else. 

This doesn't mean being an airline pilot is easy, or that pilots aren't worth what they're paid.  We just earn our paychecks in other areas.  But there's no reason to pretend that airliners are some kind of measure of stick and rudder ability... nothing will make you a lazier pilot quicker than an airliner.  😉

Regarding the original point: does a desktop sim fly like an airplane? No. Multi million dollar level D sims don't *really* fly like an airplane either; sure they get closer, but they aren't right.  Anyone who spends more time in the airplane than the sim will quickly feel differences; the same is true for sim instructors who occasionally fly the line.  There's a noticeable difference.  So, probably a limit to the standard you want to try to hold desktop software to. 

That said, is the desktop software fun? Heck yes. Can it be a learning tool? Absolutely. Does it feel familiar enough to create a "suspension of disbelief" for someone simming a kind of flying they've done in reality? Yep.  And all of that is a pretty amazing accomplishment for a desktop computer. 

I very much agree with force feedback too. One of the biggest eye openers in my flight learning is that the yoke is so live with ever changing pressure when you fly. It feels like a direct almost physical connection to the plane while flying, a sense that is completely missing in the current sims. Of course, this is not MSFS' fault at all, but I really hope there will be a new generations of serious force feedback controllers available for PC. 

Yeah, speaking from experience with HP G2 + 3090, we're probably two steps away from near perfect VR (2x resolution + 5x powerful video card). Maybe in five years that near perfect+smooth VR day will come.

Edited January 5, 20224 yr by FlyIce

3 hours ago, 109Sqn said:

The original post video isn't an example of MSFS being a game, it's an example of MSFS being used as a game. Big difference.

Splitting hairs...so funny.

 

6 hours ago, TravelRunner404 said:

A force feedback yoke that accurately simulates the feel of the plane is the single biggest thing missing from simulators.

I’ve been curious about why there aren’t any (?) FF yokes recently; I’m sure I had one in the late 90s / early 2000s and can’t imagine modern technology is unable to replicate a few small servos at the base of the stick. 

52 minutes ago, Stearmandriver said:

That said, is the desktop software fun? Heck yes. Can it be a learning tool? Absolutely. Does it feel familiar enough to create a "suspension of disbelief" for someone simming a kind of flying they've done in reality? Yep.  And all of that is a pretty amazing accomplishment for a desktop computer. 

This is incredibly well said and true.  In the end, that’s what flight simming is all about.

17 minutes ago, scotchegg said:

I’ve been curious about why there aren’t any (?) FF yokes recently; I’m sure I had one in the late 90s / early 2000s and can’t imagine modern technology is unable to replicate a few small servos at the base of the stick. 

You can get them, I have a Bruner yoke.  It’s expensive (though not much more than a Yoko) and requires some fiddling outside the sim to get it feeling good but it does add a lot of the immersion.

But yes, it is unfortunate that there’s not more consumer grade FFB flightsim equipment and native FFB support in the sim to go with it like in racing sims.

27 minutes ago, tpete61 said:

3 hours ago, 109Sqn said:

The original post video isn't an example of MSFS being a game, it's an example of MSFS being used as a game. Big difference.

Splitting hairs...so funny.

It isn't splitting hairs, its a very important distinction.  I bet you full motions sims have been used to do something game like for amusement - does this mean they are not simulators? 

I practiced many of my real flights in MSFS while going through the UK PPL.  Used exactly the same documentation, followed the same procedures and flew over satellite imagery.  The simulated flight were close to the real ones, minus the feel of the aircraft.

All serious desktop  simulators are not pure games, but they can be used as such if the user so desires.

9 minutes ago, MrBitstFlyer said:

It isn't splitting hairs, its a very important distinction.  I bet you full motions sims have been used to do something game like for amusement - does this mean they are not simulators? 

At my first airline, we used to challenge each other to fly inverted ILSs in the sim.  Had to disable motion of course, and this was before all airline sims were required to have an accurate flight model throughout the whole envelope; I doubt an Embraer would actually sustain stable inverted flight 😉.

Using a multi-million dollar training device to have fun? Heresy!  😁

25 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

 

I'm not sure why that matters to anyone using MSFS ... is there some sort of ego/monetary reward for using something that has been "simulator" certified?  Extra discussion leverage points? 😉 

 

 

My theory is it helps justify the expense to your partner or parents.

As a case in point, I was banned from flight simulators during my early training due to all the normal bad habits people pick up flying on a PC (not looking outside, chasing the instruments, lining up the runway with the prop not the yoke, poor feel for unco-ordinated flight, tendency to not pull back enough in flare and even push stick forward on occasion etc etc) .  If you are learning to fly make sure your instructor is aware you have been flying on a PC and your PC flight simulation is supervised.

Edited January 5, 20224 yr by Glenn Fitzpatrick

4 hours ago, 177B said:

I agree with this.

I once took off w/o removing the pitot cover on my Cardinal. This was taking off from a small airfield in Northern Maine. Stupid I know. But we all have bad days. I became much more aware during preflight walkarounds after this. I had become complacent I guess.

Well I quickly realized something was wrong on the T/O roll, no airspeed indicated. But I had to take off anyway as I was out of runway to land. So I looked over and sure enough the plastic cover was still on the pitot tube, but the flag attached to it was gone. This is probably why I missed it. I don't know if someone played a joke on me or if it just blew off.

 

You should have noticed airspeed was not alive in plenty of time to abort takeoff, like 40 knots. 

36 minutes ago, Bobsk8 said:

You should have noticed airspeed was not alive in plenty of time to abort takeoff, like 40 knots. 

I did this same thing once in a Cherokee 140.  Short strip, nice day, I was an instructor in the right seat.  The owner probably noticed around 40kts.  I called the continue.  Sure we *could* have aborted, but why put the airplane through a max-effort stop?  At night or going into IMC, certainly. But in good visual conditions, it's simple to fly pitch and power and judge the aircraft's energy state by feel (what folks have pointed out is missing in the sim.)  GA wings are typically plenty forgiving. 

We hammer this home at the airlines too - an abort is often riskier than going flying.  It's always a judgement call in the moment though. 

It's also a great reason every aircraft should have an AoA indicator.  Airspeed shouldn't even be a primary performance instrument.

8 minutes ago, Rob_Ainscough said:

Hmmm ... not so sure about that ... I never expected forgiving in any of the rentals I flew with my instructor.

WARNING this might be disturbing to watch:

Rob.

Obviously any wing will depart - eventually.  But the straight, fat, flat-bottomed airfoils on most GA aircraft are extremely forgiving, and if you make one depart, you've done so either through concerted effort or very, VERY poor airmanship - ie, ignoring several very obvious warnings (assuming good visual conditions.  Disorientation with no horizon would be a different matter.)