I have recently found out that I passed the SIM so am now in the hold pool and have taken a life jacket or two with me.
Some general points re the sim:
1.You cannot do enough prep, if you are familar on the day with where everything is and how it works it gives you soooo much more capacity. Flight sim, or internet info on 74 try: meriweather.com/747, and if you can afford it a real practise.
2. Look at all the UK plates and also brussels, they seem to be the airports of choice, LGW DVR8M into a STN ABBOT arrival seem to be the hardest of work especially if you are kept below tranistion (thus no a/p) Also NCL proceedural look very carefully at what navaid it is all based off.
From people I know how have been recently here are some routes:
-LGW to STN DIV to BHX rv ILS followed by BHX MAN proc VOR
-HLR to STN then as above
-EDI to NCL Proc ILS then fails and is VOR approach followed by NCL toMAN emergency so straight for a rv ILS
-STN to BHX div MAN rv ILS followed by MAN to LHR div LGW
Other favourite airports, East Mids, Glasgow,
3. The questions, some seem to get them and some don't, examples
-if you're climbing at 2500fpm how long from 17,000 to 35,000
-how many miles will you need to descent from 39,000 to 5,000
-at 370kts how long to do 16 miles, at 330kts how long to do 18miles(groundspeed)
-if you burn 1.2tons an hour what is your endurance with 8tons
Get practising those, my partner and I got asked 4 questions, 1 when PM and 3 when PF. They will hurry you for an answer, and you cannot write it down. Just make sure you concerntrate on the flying first!
4. Look at the uk airway charts as some of the plogs have a sid airway and star, as you will be raw data you will need to find the VOR and the Radial you need to interceptto get on the airway.(it wasnt on the plog)
5.Keep talking, communicate what you are thinking, and what you will need next ie: weather, navaids,MSA, terrain, speaking with Cabin crew or calling company, plus the more silence the more question time there will be!
Congratulations to those waiting to go in the sim, I wish you all the luck. It took me a few years to finally crack the BA nut so I know how important it is to you all.
By the way my sim partner got in too and I do believe that there is a strong link, good CRM help each other the guy in the back seat doesnt want to see you letting the PF do something wrong. (But I do know of a few people who did get in on their own -but mostly though its been non or both) Its not a competion-we call all drawn together!!!
Hope this has been of some use, just thought it was my time to give something back to this amazing tread of invaluable knowledge on pprune.
Thank you to all who have posted,
Evian