real-world pilot

Im a Student Pilot now, but about 3 flights away from my Privates.

I don't think I'll ever pursue real-world flight.

I'm interested in helicopter lessons.
Unfortunately, I've lost all interest for flying airplanes. I can't remember the last time I took an FS flight. Now that I'm into repainting, that's mostly all I use the sim for - to look at my work.

Sad, but true.

Helicopters are harder to fly than fixed-winged aircraft I'd think. SamIntel and I were just talking about that.

I always wanted to learn how to fly when I was a teenager but real life responsibilities and no $ stopped that idea.
Now I enjoy the flight sim, it's as close as I'm going to get to the real thing.
If you can go for it, do it. You won't be sorry, good luck to you potential pilots.

My goal after paying off student loans (should only take another 20-30 years) is to start puting money away so that by the time I retire, I can afford a nice cessna 182 or piper archer or something (mooney would be my dream), and get myself my pilots liscence! Unfortunatly, by the time that fund ever gets sizable, I'm sure I'll have kids going to college to eat a hole in it!

I guess you could call me a student pilot, its not offical though.

I flew with an instructor for 5 hours last year, but spent all the time doing climb descend turning kind of things. so i think I can practice this with FS2004, dont really need to fool around in the air, and most of all, save big bucks........i think if I have flown 400 hours in the sim, i will only need 40 hours in the air to pass the checkride......dont u think so? the principles are all the same.....so i fly sim seriously

nottobe wrote:

I flew with an instructor for 5 hours last year, but spent all the time doing climb descend turning kind of things. so i think I can practice this with FS2004, dont really need to fool around in the air, and most of all, save big bucks........i think if I have flown 400 hours in the sim, i will only need 40 hours in the air to pass the checkride......dont u think so? the principles are all the same.....so i fly sim seriously

You would think.... Real-World flying is so different from Sim Flying its really strange. The best thing you can do is get a general understanding of the intruments. Other than that, it is totally different. At the moment, I have about 48 hours.

I've had my license for 8 years!!

It would be a dream come true!!Its just so much money I better start saving up now.

Hopefully soon i will be a pilot........
My parents have hinted at a couple of flying lesons for my next birthday so who knows...?

It is a very rewarding and exciting hobby as anyone who's ever taken the controls of an airplane with tell you.

However, it can be very demanding and if not taken seriously down right deadly. Two years ago the aircraft I frequently rented from the local FBo crashed and killed the pilot. I had flown that plane 1 week before it crashed on a trip with a friend, we even have pictures of us standing in front of it before we left and almost exactly 1 week later it was on the front page of the news paper in a pile of metal and smoke. Then, in Feb. my flight instructor and long time friend was killed in a plane crash. He had logged almost 12,000 flight hours throughout his 40 years in aviation. He was one of the most experienced pilots I have ever flown with and something went so wrong that they virtually dropped from 7000 feet to the ground in less than 30 seconds and hit the ground at close to 450 miles per hour.

I guess what I am trying to say is that aviation, despite the rewards, and excitment is still a serious hobby. It takes time, dedication, and yes money to do it enough to remain safe. If you do not have any one of these resources you are better off waiting or you could find yourself in a compromising situation, and let me say, a compromising situation at 5000 feet and 150 miles per hour with no pause button is no place I want to be. Take it seriously and enjoy every minute of it.

nottobe wrote: "I flew with an instructor for 5 hours last year, but spent all the time doing climb descend turning kind of things. so i think I can practice this with FS2004, dont really need to fool around in the air, and most of all, save big bucks........i think if I have flown 400 hours in the sim, i will only need 40 hours in the air to pass the checkride......dont u think so? the principles are all the same.....so i fly sim seriously".

I would guess it will be just the other way around. It may actually take you longer to get your license than if you had not previously flown sim. The reason is that you will have to unlearn many bad habits. When you start in sim, even if you take the imbedded lessons, no one is teaching you to fly correctly, safely, and precisely. They are teaching you to use sim.

Actual flying requires a tremendous body of knowledge and skills you do not obtain in sim and do not even know you are missing (unless you have other exposure to aviation). Flying is like a number of other skilled tasks-it is usually easier to teach a novice the correct way than it is to teach someone who thinks they know what they are doing but do not. Question: what is the difference in flying technique you must use to make normal landings, short field landings, and soft field landings?

This is not intended as a slam against either sim or sim pilots. It is simply a reflection that when you fly sim and make a mistake, there is usually no one there looking over your shoulder to correct that mistake so you won't make it again and that sim encourages only a limited set of flying skills.

I have a challenge for sim pilots who don't believe this is true. Pick an easy airplane (Cessna 172?), set winds to be variable (as they are in the real world), take it up to 1,500' (500m) AGL, pick a point out on the ground, then circle that point using no more than 20 degrees of bank and keeping the aircraft a constant distance from the point on the ground. That is just one of the skills a student pilot must master before his/her instructor will even allow solo flight.

Once you have learned to fly well, it may be easier to pick up IFR skills and ratings because of your sim experience.

FL050 wrote:

nottobe wrote:

I flew with an instructor for 5 hours last year, but spent all the time doing climb descend turning kind of things. so i think I can practice this with FS2004, dont really need to fool around in the air, and most of all, save big bucks........i think if I have flown 400 hours in the sim, i will only need 40 hours in the air to pass the checkride......dont u think so? the principles are all the same.....so i fly sim seriously

You would think.... Real-World flying is so different from Sim Flying its really strange. The best thing you can do is get a general understanding of the intruments. Other than that, it is totally different. At the moment, I have about 48 hours.

Can you be more specific on the difference? From my 3 hour (I dont know why I typed 5, sorry typo i guess) experience, the handling of a plane in the sim is even more difficult than that of the real world plane. i am sure there are a bunch of real world pilots here in this forum, so I make it clear that its just my personal feeling from this limited experience. The vision limitation is probably the hardest thing to deal with. the second toughest thing in a sim plane is that there is no sense of motion and orientation. the 3rd is the handling if the joke. in a real plane, after you trim you can fly hands off for a while, but in the sim you have to constantly watch your AI to make sure its going level and straight. but the scary part in a real plane is that you know the consequences if you dont do it right, and when getting into some turbulence, it makes you (at least me) worry about if the wings are really gonna sustain the bumps, coz a cessna is so small and looks fragile, its all psychological of course, but it really makes a difference.....
even the instructor says he sometimes flies sim too, and very helpful doing this

Don Wood wrote:

nottobe wrote: "I flew with an instructor for 5 hours last year, but spent all the time doing climb descend turning kind of things. so i think I can practice this with FS2004, dont really need to fool around in the air, and most of all, save big bucks........i think if I have flown 400 hours in the sim, i will only need 40 hours in the air to pass the checkride......dont u think so? the principles are all the same.....so i fly sim seriously".

I would guess it will be just the other way around. It may actually take you longer to get your license than if you had not previously flown sim. The reason is that you will have to unlearn many bad habits. When you start in sim, even if you take the imbedded lessons, no one is teaching you to fly correctly, safely, and precisely. They are teaching you to use sim.

Actual flying requires a tremendous body of knowledge and skills you do not obtain in sim and do not even know you are missing (unless you have other exposure to aviation). Flying is like a number of other skilled tasks-it is usually easier to teach a novice the correct way than it is to teach someone who thinks they know what they are doing but do not. Question: what is the difference in flying technique you must use to make normal landings, short field landings, and soft field landings?

This is not intended as a slam against either sim or sim pilots. It is simply a reflection that when you fly sim and make a mistake, there is usually no one there looking over your shoulder to correct that mistake so you won't make it again and that sim encourages only a limited set of flying skills.

I have a challenge for sim pilots who don't believe this is true. Pick an easy airplane (Cessna 172?), set winds to be variable (as they are in the real world), take it up to 1,500' (500m) AGL, pick a point out on the ground, then circle that point using no more than 20 degrees of bank and keeping the aircraft a constant distance from the point on the ground. That is just one of the skills a student pilot must master before his/her instructor will even allow solo flight.

Once you have learned to fly well, it may be easier to pick up IFR skills and ratings because of your sim experience.

I totally agree, your comment made perfect sense to me. But skill is one thing, habit is another. A skillful driver may not have good driving habits, and a driver with perfect drving habits maynot be a good driver. I know a woman who follows all the driving rules written on book, but keeps bumping around making all kinds of troubles on the road. Possessing both skills and good habits is certainly wonderful, but if you have to be either, which one you would like to be?
I am not saying that good habits are unimportant, but I think a skillfil pilot with bad habits are better than a lousy pilot with all standard habits.....

Barge wrote:

Hopefully soon i will be a pilot........
My parents have hinted at a couple of flying lesons for my next birthday so who knows...?

How old are you?

I have to agree with nottobe. First of all turns around a point and S-turns were the most difficult for me and after 8 years of being a pilot I probably couldn't do them today. In real life the aircraft are much more stable than the sim. However, in real life the tollerances for error are much less, but that is what training is for and if you can committe the resources necessary to be a safe pilot you should have no problem at all. Most importantly never take anything for granted in aviation, especially safety.

I honestly think it would be very difficult for an individual with no real flight experience to hop into a 172 and succesfully complete a flight. They may even have a hard time getting the engine started. They don't always just start up like the sim, sometimes they take some attention to get going, especially if the engine is warm, or its a cold day. There are many more variables that must be taken into consideration than in the sim...especially weather, convection, ground effect, and aerodynamics. That's what training is for though and I honestly beleive anyone can do it with the proper training.

for real world experience. You cannot understand the real world flight dynamics of turbulence when trying to maintain an assigned altitude, a crosswind landing on a runway that you were told to land on when a different runway would have been better for the wind direction, and a power-on stall with your instructor while sitting at a static desk with a yoke or joystick, possibly rudder pedals, and a monitor. Oh, and that includes those of us that were lucky enough while learning how to fly early on in the syllabus to experience what "VFR on top" means with an instructor next to you while you climb out in IFR conditions as a 20-hour post-solo student pilot. 😎