44 minutes ago, ShawnG said:

Oh sure you can, literally the first thing I do with any new airplane. (For the record, these are study level planes I buy)  I puzzle out how to get it going from c&d and then I fly it around like a big piper cub for a bit.  Then I look at the manual,  maybe.

Totally. Same for me, except I don't bother with the cold and dark bit. Start hot on the runway and away I go. Done that with every aitrcraft I've bought (bar one snooty little thing) and I've bought dozens of them. Sometimes I've had to do a bit of fiddling (like finding out how to turn off the engine failures in the Spitfire), but mostly they'll all let me fly them around as I please. Which is as it should be.

1 hour ago, Bobsk8 said:

and skip ads.

You gotta pay for that, well here in the U.K. anyways. 

On 6/26/2023 at 12:48 PM, Ianrivaldosmith said:

It would be handy if they released manuals, whilst increasing the complexity of these aircraft. Unless they did and I missed it? 

https://www.flightsimulator.com/aircraft-manuals/

There are now PDF flight manuals to get you started, including the updated 787 & 747.

I think implementing assistances is better than dumbing down the flight model or the physics. Even PMDG implemented some kind of an assistance on the dc-6 (the flight engineer).

The flight engineer (including the one with the A2A Connie) is such a great tool. Every large aircraft should have either a co-pilot and/or an engineer. These aren’t single pilot aircraft in the real world so having that duplicated in the sim would be very welcome..

I get both sides of this discussion.  We're at a point where the airliners are very complex  ...which is understandable considering we're simulating airliners.  I've never wanted to be a pilot but have an admiration and fascination for aviation.  Simming is just one of many hobbies, but it's been a consistant part of my life since Bruce Artwick put it in the hands of average people.  While this forum attracts a lot of serious simmers and professional pilots, I suspect there are a large number of people that simply love aviation and flight, while appreciating the level of detail in our current sim.

 

For example, I remember following the paper tutorials and taking countless flights in the Level-D 767 and the (was it Just Flight?) Lite series of Airbus.  I also bought the PDMG paper manuals many years ago.  Before that, Flight Assignment: ATP by subLOGIC was a fantastic airline sim.  Nothing compared to what we have now, but years ahead of its time in immersion.

 

I've tried getting started with the newer generation of airliners many times, but inevitably get to fuel and flight planning and run into a discontinuity, a problem with a transition/approach/departure or miss a step starting cold and dark.  Frankly, as I'm getting on the old side, keeping the brain at attention for hours gets to be a bigger and bigger task.

 

I remember hearing somewhere, an IRL 747 captain state that his prep time was a minimum of 2 hours before the flight, regardless of whether it was a domestic connection, international or a simple aircraft re-position hop. Of course, he also has a crew to help in the flight deck, a team of meteorologists and coordinator/planners at the company and gets his flight plan/assignment data sent automatically to the FMS.  I'm not sure about others, but I rarely have a large block of time for proper preflight, aircraft config and the following flight.  We're getting close, but how about a way to completely save all the parameters in the sim and come back when time allows, whether that's a day, week or month later?

 

The "solution" may be sticking to bush flying in a piston, or brushing up on Island hopping in a turbo-prop.  I also find the Visionjet and Hjet to be very light workload and system management flyers while maintaining (I think) a good amount of simming fidelity.  Dumbing down the sim wouldn't really help anyone, but there is a huge market for future AI add-ons that assist a simmer much like a real co-pilot, flight engineer and company ops center.  I don't want a real or virtual airline (whew), but would happily welcome a proficient co-pilot and ready-to-go flight plans with aircraft configs that can be loaded in an instant.  How about a true captain and crew simulation that allows me to be a spectator on the flight deck?  Not always, but that could be fun, especially as a learning tool more advanced than YouTube.  I am aware of the current assists in the sim.  They are a great start, but a lot more work is needed in that area.

 

All the best!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 27, 20232 yr by markmco

On 6/26/2023 at 12:48 PM, Ianrivaldosmith said:

It would be handy if they released manuals, whilst increasing the complexity of these aircraft. Unless they did and I missed it? 

They did..

 

On 6/27/2023 at 6:06 PM, markmco said:

m not sure about others, but I rarely have a large block of time for proper preflight, aircraft config and the following flight.  We're getting close, but how about a way to completely save all the parameters in the sim and come back when time allows, whether that's a day, week or month later?

Not quite what you're asking for, but here's my method for getting an airliner from A - B

 

1. Decide which plane I want to fly, and the departure and arrival cities. Say, the 787 from KAUS to CYYZ

2. Go to Simbrief.com, enter Departure and Arrival cities, and plane type. These are the only mandatory choices, you don't need to do any of the other things if you dont' want to

3. Hit "Generate Flight "

This creates the flight plan. Steps 2-3 (once I know where I want to go, and in which plane, which is all up to me of course), take about 1-2 min. I also usually enter the Airline name (Air Canada) and flight number (221) but that's not needed.

4. The SimBrief Downloader downloads the flight plan and places it in the correct directory. 

5. Start the sim. 

6. Choose the plane and livery.

7. Hit the Spacebar and load the downloaded flight plan.

8. Move the aircraft from the active runway to a departure gate.

9. Load the game

Steps 4-8 take about 2 min (once MSFS has loaded, of course, not counting that)

10. Start the aircraft from cold and dark, setup the FMS etc - how fast you can do this depends entirely on how detailed you want to get, how familiar you are with the aircraft and so on. The flight plan is already loaded so that saves a lot of time entering it in - I just have to do the Perf Init and a few other things (set departure airport, etc) It usually takes me ~10 min to go from cold and dark to pushback.

I don't do ALL the things airline pilots do (I don't set up a secondary flight plan, alternates, etc), but enough so that I have fun feeling like I'm actually setting up the plane. That's a personal choice, you could of course spend a lot more time, check the weather, start the FMS completely blank and what not. I do what's fun for me

11. Fly.

From start to finish, I can go from thinking "Hmm, I want to fly a 787 from KAUS to CYYZ" in about 15-20 min, not including sim loading time. Add another 5-8 minutes if you want to include that.
 

 

 

Edited June 29, 20232 yr by JonathanC

5 hours ago, JonathanC said:

Not quite what you're asking for, but here's my method for getting an airliner from A - B

 

1. Decide which plane I want to fly, and the departure and arrival cities. Say, the 787 from KAUS to CYYZ

2. Go to Simbrief.com, enter Departure and Arrival cities, and plane type. These are the only mandatory choices, you don't need to do any of the other things if you dont' want to

3. Hit "Generate Flight "

This creates the flight plan. Steps 2-3 (once I know where I want to go, and in which plane, which is all up to me of course), take about 1-2 min. I also usually enter the Airline name (Air Canada) and flight number (221) but that's not needed.

4. The SimBrief Downloader downloads the flight plan and places it in the correct directory. 

5. Start the sim. 

6. Choose the plane and livery.

7. Hit the Spacebar and load the downloaded flight plan.

8. Move the aircraft from the active runway to a departure gate.

9. Load the game

Steps 4-8 take about 2 min (once MSFS has loaded, of course, not counting that)

10. Start the aircraft from cold and dark, setup the FMS etc - how fast you can do this depends entirely on how detailed you want to get, how familiar you are with the aircraft and so on. The flight plan is already loaded so that saves a lot of time entering it in - I just have to do the Perf Init and a few other things (set departure airport, etc) It usually takes me ~10 min to go from cold and dark to pushback.

I don't do ALL the things airline pilots do (I don't set up a secondary flight plan, alternates, etc), but enough so that I have fun feeling like I'm actually setting up the plane. That's a personal choice, you could of course spend a lot more time, check the weather, start the FMS completely blank and what not. I do what's fun for me

11. Fly.

From start to finish, I can go from thinking "Hmm, I want to fly a 787 from KAUS to CYYZ" in about 15-20 min, not including sim loading time. Add another 5-8 minutes if you want to include that.
 

 

 

I agree. Nothing in the sim is particularly complex. As long as you dont have failures enabled it's just a matter of learning to press buttons and move levers in the right order. It's learning by rote. (Just like real world pilots do!😀)

4 hours ago, jarmstro said:

As long as you dont have failures enabled

Wait, we can enable that? Where? 

On 6/30/2023 at 5:42 AM, Ianrivaldosmith said:

Wait, we can enable that? Where? 

You can do this when setting up your flight.  When you choose an aircraft, you choose what will fail.  It isn't as extensive as with FSX or P3D.

I may be speaking out of turn here and for that I apologise in advance...

 

I am of the opinion that the far more complex jet aircraft are very popular with those that get pleasure from the planning, setting up, all switches and dials etc...sometimes taking a long time to prepare and then taking off. Once airborne and at a certain height the AP takes over then it is systems monitoring for a few hours until the landing phase.

 

I like the more simplar approach, following a real world checklist and procedures but mostly VFR and the off IFR which I have yet to master.

 

Dave

10 hours ago, davenicoll said:

I am of the opinion that the far more complex jet aircraft are very popular with those that get pleasure from the planning, setting up, all switches and dials etc...sometimes taking a long time to prepare and then taking off. Once airborne and at a certain height the AP takes over then it is systems monitoring for a few hours until the landing phase.

 

I like the more simplar approach, following a real world checklist and procedures but mostly VFR and the off IFR which I have yet to master.

 

Dave

Past surveys have shown that Avsim simmers are roughly 50% GA and 50% airliners...

Either category can be challenging if you are truly flying "by the book".. 😉

43 minutes ago, Bert Pieke said:

Past surveys have shown that Avsim simmers are roughly 50% GA and 50% airliners...

Either category can be challenging if you are truly flying "by the book".. 😉

The entire fun of flying a sim, for me, is flying by the book. Otherwise, it's boring. 

Interesting thread here with a lot of viewpoints all of which have merit.

Ultimately there is no right or wrong way to use this platform.

 

Personally there are times when I want to do ultra realistic long-haul widebody flights and will spend hours at the PC and other times where I jump in a helo and go land in the middle of a road.

The sim offers something for everyone and harnessing that really what it's all about.