I am finally seeing a lot of simmers realizing they sit too low, and so many "default" views are wrong. Left over from 2d panel days. yea, i real life I am sitting too high to stare at the PFD or the guages, in flying and perfecting landings I have noticed at the center ball gizmo or slightlly above the balls work best for scanning runway environment etc.. and making the perfect flare and butter landings that I am used to over 20 years flying bizjets. Old guys love to sit low and often slam it on. When you're too low you hit hard. I used to fly with a 70+ year old captain and he sat so low.... like a little old lady from Pasedena .... ugh. 

 

 

I used to fly Boeings in real life and always tended to sit high. 

My line of site view has always been just over the glare shield, so I can look down the slope toward the nose of the aircraft. There is no additional advantage going higher than that.

Edited March 29Mar 29 by Mike_CFII_MEL

Just a fun fact: all pilots I knew had a different way they like to seat! Some prefer to seat higher some prefer to sit lower, some shorter pilot use cushion! LOL Basically in the end it all comes down to personal preference. Note some airplane you won't be able to sit to you liking. Mooney M20J come first to mind. You seat on the "floor" in sport car like style. Not much wiggle room and you ending up watching over long cowling of you airplane which initially cold be drenching (unill you get to use to it) ! LOL 

Height is the least concern… that chair smell … eeew … like sitting in a taxi drivers 30 year old Yugo

I don’t know anyone who sits in the 787 the way Boeing tell you to in the flight crew training manual, it’s way too close and high, a bit like you might see pilots sitting in a 1950’s film while excessively moving the yoke from side to side.

The idea is it aligns you with the HUD , but everyone sits lower and further back and sacrifices seeing the compass rose on the bottom of the HUD.

The 747 has markers to help your eye, and therefore seat position be in the correct location. That’s so you are looking down the runway at the correct angle in low viz ops.Its quite important on that aircraft because you sit so high up any change in seat height has a dramatic effect on how far or rather how near you can see down the runway. 

yes I sat in a real 747 cockpit once and you can see the wipers, down to the runway very clearly. Can you see the guages and PFD? Not from that angle...

3 minutes ago, JETPETER2 said:

yes I sat in a real 747 cockpit once and you can see the wipers, down to the runway very clearly. Can you see the guages and PFD? Not from that angle...

Thanks Peter this is one of the best advice I've got being a sim pilot. Always wonder how I should be sitting in the left seat.

I probably sit about half way from what most would consider real life position.

It is just to hard to view the gages otherwise without giving me whiplash.

Big difference between a real airplane and looking at a monitor. 

So about 57 % to 60% in the height box of Msfs.

Realistic for me would be closer to 65%

Or if you prefer just a tiny bit lower then Ryan's position in his screenshots

 

I have not actually changed my seat position in the MSFS versions of the PMDG 737 and 777F. Prior to that, I always had to drag myself backwards quite a bit (in the FSX and P3D versions of those aircraft).

In the HJET on approach I translate / zoom / move forward a bit to read the speed better and get a nice view over the dash.

The default height is fine.

dd

Edited March 29Mar 29 by Sky_Pilot071

I also find the default view often too low and sometimes angled down instead of straight ahead. I think developers set it to include certain instruments in the view instead of a realistic position. Although it raises the question of where is the viewpoint on the monitor? Is it in the centre or higher?

I find as a test to show a co pilot and then rotate the view to the left and see where the viewpoint lands. I often find it seems to be level with the the co pilots jaw. This means it is several inches too low. 

Although rotating the view is also a test and sometimes when the view is angled down then when rotating the view it rises through the rotation until when looking to the rear the viewpoint is looking at the ceiling instead of straight back down the aircraft. The Cessna 207 LL is very bad for this but there are others.

It's mainly because our beltline approaches our armpits with age.

if you fly in VR you're always fixing the eyepoint to the realistic position in 3d space.

7 hours ago, kdfw__ said:

if you fly in VR you're always fixing the eyepoint to the realistic position in 3d space.

It has to be reset as well. Some default viewpoints are so far back that the backrest of the seat basicall sits in your spine.