Real vs Virtual

By Steve Armstrong

As a real world student pilot (I am starting to prepare for my upcoming written exam and checkride), and I have mixed feelings about flight simulation compared to the real deal. But I would like to put an end to the nonsense I hear when sim only pilots claim that they know enough to pilot a real airline. You know the story, some sim pilot is on a plane and over the intercom they hear, "Are there any pilots onboard" and then this sim pilot stands up and rescues everyone because they've flown a PC desktop flight simulator.

But before I start slamming flight simulation, I likely would not have decided to pursue my real life flying without it and my experience in the virtual cockpit as well as some aerodynamic flight knowledge made finding my way around the real airplane easier. So because of this, I take my hat off to flight simulation in that it got me into the real skies.

However, flight simulation lacks in numerous areas which didn't help me as I transition to the real world. First off, the obvious physical and visual deficiencies of flight simulation really hinder us and a person with thousands of hours of simulation time but no real world time is, I'm sorry to say, not a pilot. Flying a real airplane and pretending to fly at your computer is like comparing apples and oranges. Secondly, flight simulation has the potential for people to pick up bad habits and these habits can be challenging to overcome in the real world cockpit. I had to learn all over from scratch how to land an airplane when I started my real world lessons despite having several hundred hours of flight simulation time. A bounced landing in the real world has a way of humbling you like you've never been humbled and who cares if you screw up in a flight simulator. You just reset or pause everything. I've yet to find the reset or pause key in the real cockpit. Can someone tell me where they are?

So now this brings me to think that what up and coming new Microsoft FS2002 really needs is some sort of virtual CFI add-on to help newbies learn the appropriate aircraft control procedures. I believe Abacus has come out with just this sort of product, but is it good and will people use it?

How many people out there in the virtual flying world use power to control airspeed and pitch to control descent. Come on fess up folks. I'd say about 99% of the people who haven't been taught how to fly are doing it wrong in their flight simulators (I know I was). One of the reasons I believe newbies do this is because it's easy to do in the simulator and we control the speed in our cars with the throttle so one would naturally think that this is how it's done in an airplane. Right? Also, in my humble opinion, the simulator does a really poor job of controlling speed with pitch and rate of descent with power, yet this is how you control a real airplane. So this leads the simulation only pilots into some bad habits.

OK, if you've thought I've flamed the simulator enough, you ain't (said in a sarcastic voice) seen nothing yet. Flight simulation is pretty useless for emulating the three axis control feelings (the ailerons with my CH-Products yoke is close, but the elevator and rudder control sensations are a joke), the stall and spin characterisitcs are unrealistic, there is poor cross-wind landing emulation, poor pilotage visual checkpoints, poor weather emulation, virtually zero weight and balance characteristics, zero density altitude parameters, a real lack of a dynamic flight environment with poor ATC. And to top it off, one of my worst pet peeves is that most aircraft flight modeling I have flown in flight simulation just don't behave like the real deal. It frustrates me when I take off in a single engine flight simulator airplane in a high power, high drag, slow airspeed configuration and I hardly need to apply any rudder pressure.

Now so far I've been kind of negative to flight simulation (compared to the joys of flying in the real world skies), but I do see some value in the simulator. This really depends on whether or not the virtual aircraft you use is modelled correctly after the performance specs of the real aircraft, but flight simulator is good for practicing your dead reckoning and radio navigation skills and can be useful for trying to develop a good instrument scan to enhance your IFR skills. It's also fun to fly some cross-country trips and see parts of the world/country to give you a rough idea what it may look like in the real world. I can't wait for when I can do this in the real world, but one of my favorite flight simulation cross-country trips is to take off from my real world home airport of Jeffco (KBJC) in suburban Denver, Colorado and fly into the Rocky Mountains and land at the challenging airport of Aspen, Colorado (KASE). Another simulation flight I like to do (not legal in the real world), is to take a Piper Cub into the Grand Canyon.

Ok, it's almost time to get off of the soap box. But sometimes I worry that my simulation peers are more interested in using flight simulation as a way to dream that they know how to fly the big iron and are also more concerned about looking at scenery than thinking about whether or not they have a tool which can help them develop their flying skills. It makes me sad when I hear people asking Microsoft for more eye candy when we should really be asking for a piece of software which does a better job at modeling flight. I guess I could run out and build myself a professional flight simulator (the kind that the FAA allows you to log IFR time with), but I'd much rather spend that money on my real world flying.

Happy flying...

Steve Armstrong
sarmstro@pcisys.net

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