Land a PA28 only having flown MS Flight Sim !

[noblues]

Did anyone see 'The Gadget Show' (CH4 this Monday), they got a Flight Sim fanatic who had never been at the controls of a real aeroplane to see if he could land a PA28 (at Elstree, LSF, Cabair).

He practiced on his PC before hand using a PA28 setup on MS FS, complete with yoke, rudders, two screens etc ...

On this occasion the instructor did the flare for him, but he flew the rest ...

I must say, chaps who come along for trail lessons who have played around on a serious basis with PC flight sims do seem awfully good ..... although they tend to fly by instruments .....

Anyone got a zero houred chap/chappess to land on ex 4.1 ??

[IRRenewal]

On this occasion the instructor did the flare for him, but he flew the rest ...

Eh, doesn't that mean he didn't land himself?

[tonker]

I had a student on a trial lesson at Cranfield a few years ago who was either naturaly talented or a CAA inspector.

Not only was i happy him doing lots of the take off he landed the thing too! All in EX3

Now the blind chap i flew with on EX3, well that would be telling! Makes it all worth while.

regards Tonker:ok:

[MLS-12D]

On this occasion the instructor did the flare for him, but he flew the rest ...Not exactly difficult to believe for a PA28 ... actually many people could do this (without any advance MS FS play-time), provided only that they had a good instructor coaching them.

chaps who come along for trial lessons who have played around on a serious basis with PC flight sims do seem awfully good ..... although they tend to fly by instruments .....Which is exactly why MS FS is a bad idea for most people: it teaches them to look inside rather than out. You might try covering the ASI and altimeter, that should break them of this terrible habit.

[shortstripper]

In the past there have been cases where passengers of incapacitated pilots have been "talked down" successfully, even where they have had no flying experience whatsoever! ... So would some Sim time help in such a position? possibly, but I think a good instructor and a cool head would help far, far more!

SS

[Capt. Manuvar]

I'm a flight sim fanatic and i'm proof that MSFS can be a very useful tool. I finished my PPL with only 25hrs dual instruction. After about 30 hrs total (24 dual) my instructor told me to go and book my skills test and was suprised whe i told him how many hours i had flown. I attribute this to CONSTRUCTIVE use of flight sim software.
FIs in the UK seem to have something against flight sims. In the US there are a few schools that offer a copy of MSFS as part of the groundschool kit. And so does the USAF.

[mstram]

>On this occasion the instructor did the flare for him

That *is* the landing IMO, and was the hardest thing for me to learn.

I didn't see the program, might have neat if the instructor had at least let him try the flare, and "saved it" if necessary.

>FIs in the UK seem to have something against flight sims.

Don't think it's only the UK, seems like 2/3 of instructors I've talked to our club (Canada), think sims are "games" only. Many pilots seem to think the same way.

I used MSFS while during my ppl. Even used it "fly" my x-c, it was great practice.

Still fire it up now and then. No hobbs meter charges on it :)

Mike

[mad_jock]

Well i am rubbish at flying MSFS. And the aspect of the flare on the computer screen is so far away from real life it would be more than luck than judgment for the student to pull it off without the instructor pattering.

Yes I have talked ex3 down without touching the controls. But if i hadn't said anything we would have pranged it.

Had one kid (14) though who turned up in crap wx and insisted that he wanted to go flying. ONly thing which was an option was circuits. So told him. Eyes opened wide and he said yes that the bit he liked anyway.

So though fair enough and went for it. He asked me to demonstrate 1 circuit with him following through, ok i thought. Pattered it and did a stop and go.

Kid took the second one. And repeated the patter exactly and did everything i had done including the RT. Little sod plonked it onto the deck the first time but steadly improved over the next 6. To be honest at the end of the hour apart from the emergency training his landings were up to solo standard.

MJ

[noblues]

I've had kids like that on trial lessons ..... its sickening !
But be rest assured, a career in aviation for people like that is out the question - They will find no challange in flying !!

[bigflyingrob]

Some people are just talented. We had one guy who soloed at 4.5 hours and did his licence at the legal minimum followed by his AFI rating ditto.
At a deadstick spot landing competition a few years later he asked which wheel they were measuring from as the mains were about 6 feet apart! Sadly this was not a wind up as his total error from 4 landing was 2 feet!
Never seen to wash his plane never mind wax it he was just good at what he did.
GIT!

[2close]

I remember sitting in the back of an Archer whilst my 13 yr old son went on his Trial Lesson. He took over just after wheels up and flew a pretty impressive hour including 60 degree banked turns with virtually no height loss or gain, rejoined and flew a spot on circuit right down to the flare and the instructor only took over for the hold off, which I reckon he could have done on to the tarmac.

Proud father - definitely! But a tad green with envy, maybe?????

Oh, for the eye to hand coordination and vestibular senses of the teenager.

On the downside though, now he's into his structured lessons, he's doing very well but he's not too keen on the RT work - he can yap for Britain for hours on X-Box Live but ask him to talk to ATC...oh, my Gawd! Is this a common trait with young flyers?

[mad_jock]

The kids usually do really well in the hand eye stuff.

When it comes to the nav there attention span comes into effect.

They can usually hold it together for about 10-30mins then they get bored. But it all sorts its self out as they get older.

MJ

[john_tullamarine]

Some years ago I took two colleagues along on a 733 sim ride for a treat. Both were aviation maintenance people but neither had any flying or previous exposure to a serious box .. but both were mad keen FS fanatics.

I gave each a go in the box (motion off) and each flew very creditable I/F stick and rudder work, including an ILS and landing. Certainly enough to impress me ....

.. and both of these chaps were in their 40s ...

[Speed Twelve]

As with Mad Jock I have had a few trial flight punters land the aeroplane because they had enough co-ordination and spare capacity to listen and do exactly what I was telling them and when.

Once the aeroplane is in a stable approach it's just a case of saying 'raise the nose. stop. move the throttle forward. stop.' or whatever until they've got it in the flare. Some get the flare right, most don't. Fair enough considering most don't know what they're looking for. The difficult part with students learning to land unprompted is the development of judgement and rate of control and throttle movement relative to rates of descent and speed change close in to the runway. I've seen loads of people pick-up the first 4 or 5 hours of flying training very readily and then get bogged-down for hours trying to get the approach and flare right.

As far as natural talent is concerned, I've seen 40 year-old housewives with excellent co-ordination and spacial awareness who had no idea they had it, as well as a few driving instructors who couldn't even begin to grasp the concept of finesse with throttle and brakes while taxying. Talent is a random thing...

Back to the flight sim thing. I feel that it is best to go into flying training without too many preconceived ideas. Those that have several thousand hours in front of their PCs tend to have instrument fixation, poor lookout, and can be difficult to teach the fundamentals to. I do agree that it can be a valuable learning tool if used properly in a structured way, preferably after a student has done some real flying.

I once had the Mother of a 14 year-old boy complain to the flying school that I had not allowed him to land the aircraft on a trial flight, "even though he can do it on his computer at home"!

ST

[caramel]

Best thing about it is that he's selling all his sim kit to put towards real flying lessons.

Great doing it in the virtual world; even better in the real world

[ACW 335]

I took a 14 year old Flight sim addict for his first Air Experience in the Air Cadets; one of the best first timers i have flown! He would make an excellent pilot in IMC!

I can't fly flight sim - using my fingers to input rudder on the joy stick really is totally unrealistic...just like i can't race cars using the game pad on the X-Box!

[mstram]

> using my fingers to input rudder on the joy stick really is totally unrealistic...

Maybe more "unfamiliar" to you than "unrealistic".

The pa28 at my flight club has hand controls for the rudder, and a nearby glider club also has hand controls for the rudder. Both to accomodate disabled pilots.

Mike