Flight Sims are they really as real as actually flying?

Ad: This forum contains affiliate links to products on Amazon and eBay. More information in Terms and rules

syscom3 said:
All it needs to know is how much intensity and what duration you want to simulate.
That the whole point, in the real world it can't be predicted - if you spent more time in an aircraft you would know that....

Syscom,

This whole time you left out the most important thing about flying into windshear,

Any Gusses?!?
 
Because you can't predict the intensity and duration - you cannot predict the amount of airspeed that is going to be lost, this is extremely critical on final especially if you're about 100' AGL. +/- 10 knots might not mean much to a B737, but it may mean certain death to a Cessna 150 - at the same time you could have continued wind shear that would give you downdrafts of 200 FPM that suddenly go to 1000 FPM then dissipate.

When windshear is reported to ATC the first thing they ask for is airspeed gain/ loss....
 
You can set up parameters for anything you want. Direcection of wind, the velocity, whether its an up or down draft, length of time, any turbulent flow thats in it, etc, etc.

Nothing that cant be modeled.

All you need to simulate it is have the proper software installed, and pick the variables.

Then that can be factored into the flight model of what plane youre flying.
 
They are still good for having fun. Also in the real world of Airline Pilots large scale big buck simulators are used to simulate conditions pilots may hope never to encounter in real life but still need to encounter. They give the pilot the ability to test out different approaches to dealing with severe thunderstorms training on what to do when there are absolutely no engines etc. Useful knowledge which can then be applied in real life when there are 100s of passengers on the airliner in question. It is often said that a combination of theory and practice are the only ways to prepare for real life emergencies. Admittedly though, the PC based simulations are designed more for fun rather than realism, although some like that game Lock-On as well as Apache Longbow Anthology can get quite complex and realistic in the higher levels of difficulty.
 
No one is argueing that they are not fun HealzDevo and we all know that the full motion sims are about as accurate as you are going to get. But the PC sims that syscom is talking about are just that: games and nothing more.

Apache Longbow Anthology is no where close to realistic. Trust me I know from experience.
 

I think you need to fly a few more times to understand what you are saying will never be accomplished synthetically - especially if you really fly through windshear



Well put HealzDevo
 
I know they are not accurate. With the corporate simulations like the ones from Boeing etc. while they may not totally recreate the dangerous situation at least they provide a basis for understanding dangerous situations and solutions to those problems. PC Flight-sims while not entirely accurate some of the better ones like FS2002/2004 might be able to be used for familarization of new pilots with the air routes they have to fly in terms of landmarks and visual navigation. Some of the add-on packs you can get make this use very probable in terms of giving rough visual navigation training for a particular air route. Of course this is no substitute for having someone who has flown that air route before and is experienced in the conditions expected along that air route go along with the pilot on their first flight. All I was saying was that at the higher levels some games come closer to simulating the experience of flying the helicopter or plane. I know that it would probably be very different actually flying the plane or helicopter itself, but that realism sometimes would scare people away from buying the simulation. Therefore a lot of PC Simulations are aiming for a balance between realism and fun. You can have a totally realistic flight simulator but then the question is how many people would actually find it fun. By the way anyone know of any ways of getting Longbow Anthology working under XP? I have been having problems where it gets to loading a mission and then it just quits. I have tried adjusting the settings, running it in compability mod, running it in the dos prompt, but I just haven't been able to get past the mission load screen. Any bright ideas? I really love that game, but haven't been able to play it in a while as my Windows 98 Laptop has a dead screen
 
PC Flight sims are excellent for doing instrument work. My instrument rating was made a lot easier because of using a PC sim. The only down side I found was because of the sensitivity of the PC sim, the first few minutes "under the hood" in a real aircraft, I tended to be real "jerky" on the controls. After a few minutes I got used to flying "the real thing" and everything worked out perfectly. There you have a scenario where the PC is more sensitive than the real thing....
 
Glider said:
Syscom
If you cannot predict the intensity, the variables or the effect how can you design the software or pick the variables.

All the variables can be modeled and fitted into an equation. This is not a part of science noone knows about and has never studied.

All turbulence and shear are winds. They can be quantified. You can make them random, or simulate it for different intensities.
 
DerAdlerIstGelandet said:
You really dont get it do you Syscom?

Whatabout Updrafts and Downdrafts? Cant really model that to the real extent either.

Up and down drafts are easily modeled as they effect lift. Nothing complicated about it.
 
Currently in the UK there are 2 ex training flight simulators that are open to the public for hire one is a Boeing 737-200 and the other is a F4 Phantom.
 

Yeah and you little computer chair moves up and down to simulate that too right?
 
[quote="DerAdlerIstGelandet]
Yeah and you little computer chair moves up and down to simulate that too right? [/quote]

And swivel side to side
 
FLYBOYJ said:
[quote="DerAdlerIstGelandet]
Yeah and you little computer chair moves up and down to simulate that too right?

And swivel side to side [/quote]


Only when im playing with my joystick!

ummmm.................. I cant believe I said that

 

Users who are viewing this thread