Real Life Flight Experience Poll...

[Guest deleted@50488]

Have you? What do you think?...

Edited December 31, 2015 by JCOMM

[coconut]

I'm not a pilot, so I can't answer the second question, and the forum forces me to. Can you add an "Not relevant" answer?

[Guest deleted@50488]

Done

[BMA_FlyingShark]

I'm not a pilot IRL but I guess the flight dynamics are ok in BoS.

 

[II./JG77_Manu*]

i can't check anything there. I don't have the license yet, but i had 30 hours of practise PPL, and also took control over at more powerful aircraft (1000PS), or two-engined

[Guest deleted@50488]

i can't check anything there. I don't have the license yet, but i had 30 hours of practise PPL, and also took control over at more powerful aircraft (1000PS), or two-engined

You can, on the "Not relevant..."

[Fidelity]

He is already flying solo as 40 hours is the point at which you can be released to test for the PPL. This poll is bad statistically. Your agenda is very clear in what answers you are trying to push out of it.

[Lusekofte]

This is not a simulator meant to simulate flight. It is a game with pretty good simulated physics and ok FM but balanced and meant for a very broad public . 

There was no intention to simulate real flight, it simply irrelevant. It is meant to give you a easy realistic feel to it. Like Arma 3 . It do not make you a Navy seal being good with a mouse in Arma 3, and it do not make you a pilot fingertip maneuvering a plane in bos

Edited January 13, 2016 by EG14_LuseKofte

[II./JG77_Manu*]

This is not a simulator meant to simulate flight. It is a game with pretty good simulated physics and ok FM but balanced and meant for a very broad public . 

There was no intention to simulate real flight, it simply irrelevant. It is meant to give you a easy realistic feel to it. Like Arma 3 . It do not make you a Navy seal being good with a mouse in Arma 3, and it do not make you a pilot fingertip maneuvering a plane in bos

I remember my first flight with the instructor. Beforehand he asked me, if i have any experience with flying so far. I told him not with real aircraft, but a lot of time in home simulator. He laughed at me, and said "That's worth nothing concerning flying in real life, steering a model aircraft is worth more". When he let me take control, i immediately pulled 3G turns, went into a parabolic flight, and turned the aircraft at critical stall speed (not too hard with the modern planes, the wings start whistling). After that i made some specified angle turns (i was flying a certain direction, he told me a number, e.g. 275°, i should turn towards that angle without correction and altitude change). I made it within a few degrees, number of times. He stopped laughing at that point. He didn't believe me, that i was never flying before. It took me quite a while to persuade him, that this comes from simulators. At that point he asked me about the names of the sims i fly, and the gear i use like "damn, i have to buy the same stuff".

Frankly, BoS pretty much nails the feel of flight. It feels so similar to flying a real airplane. The wiggling around of the wings, the "free" feeling (compared to other sims who feel like flying on rails). It's so real. Put an Oculus and real g-force onto, and you are flying the real thing. 

And it definitely is great practice for real life flying.

After all, all the fighter pilots of the world pretty much learn their trade mostly in simulators.

[SCG_Space_Ghost]

-snip-

 

It feels so similar to flying a real airplane.

 

-snip-

 

 

I disagree. It doesn't feel like anything.

[Crump]

 

 

After all, all the fighter pilots of the world pretty much learn their trade mostly in simulators.

 

They learn procedures...not flight. 

[Guest deleted@50488]

He is already flying solo as 40 hours is the point at which you can be released to test for the PPL. This poll is bad statistically. Your agenda is very clear in what answers you are trying to push out of it.

 

Wow :-)   Agenda ?  You must be kidding, right ?

 

Also, it was not meant to be statistically sound - could never, the way it is organized... 

 

What I was trying to find out was the general opinion of the users, willing to cast their votes, and some info about users that happen to be owners of a private or professional pilot license.

 

FYI I am a glider pilot, for more than 34 yrs. Only flew gliders, since the age of 16.

 

I have started using combat flight simulators by the hand of DCS World, in 2012, because of the p51d module, but what really started me playing this kind of games was il2-BoS, where I spend most of my simmer time :-)

 

I am a RL pilot ( gliders only ) and I think il-2 BoS is VERY GOOD at replicating the feel of flight, not only because of the plausible flight dynamics, but also because of graphics and weather modeling, and, of course, damage modeling, immersive scenery and so on...

Edited January 14, 2016 by Herr_Target

[6./ZG26_5tuka]

I remember my first flight with the instructor...

Interesting. Still remember how I got into real flight. Before that I had only limited sim expirience (most of it based on the very dated FSX, FS2004 and CF2 and some 2-channel rc toy planes). When I firts got to steer the plane myself my instructor asked me whether I was a "virtual pilot". He laughted when I said yea and told me he noticed it due to my very "mechanical" controll inputs and overreactions I made.

 

I indeed had issues finding the right ammount of movement nessecary to roll or pitch the aircraft in a desired pace due to different envirounment, different stick forces ect. So even though I've known the basics quite well it was difficult to get the "feel" for a real aircraft.

 

Fortunately that cured out over time. Usually a glider pilot always gets checked every next season in spring if he still "has it". That's not always natural considering you basicly have a hlaf year break between seasons. Before my virtual flying shifted to RoF and BoS I as a flight student noticed setbacks every next season I had to overcome. Now, spending my winter time flying in BoS, I don't quite feel that setback anymore. Infact, last season, after just finishing my checkflight, I could jump straight into a single seater and go straight for a 2 hr flight.

 

I wouldn't say BoS by any means substitudes real flight training but it probably is the closest expirience you can get currently (even though there are FM issues, engine limitations and all that). 

Edited January 14, 2016 by Stab/JG26_5tuka

[Guest deleted@50488]

There's indeed something Magic about BoS :-)

[Lusekofte]

I remember my first flight with the instructor. Beforehand he asked me, if i have any experience with flying so far. I told him not with real aircraft, but a lot of time in home simulator. He laughed at me, and said "That's worth nothing concerning flying in real life, steering a model aircraft is worth more". When he let me take control, i immediately pulled 3G turns, went into a parabolic flight, and turned the aircraft at critical stall speed (not too hard with the modern planes, the wings start whistling). After that i made some specified angle turns (i was flying a certain direction, he told me a number, e.g. 275°, i should turn towards that angle without correction and altitude change). I made it within a few degrees, number of times. He stopped laughing at that point. He didn't believe me, that i was never flying before. It took me quite a while to persuade him, that this comes from simulators. At that point he asked me about the names of the sims i fly, and the gear i use like "damn, i have to buy the same stuff".

Frankly, BoS pretty much nails the feel of flight. It feels so similar to flying a real airplane. The wiggling around of the wings, the "free" feeling (compared to other sims who feel like flying on rails). It's so real. Put an Oculus and real g-force onto, and you are flying the real thing. 

And it definitely is great practice for real life flying.

After all, all the fighter pilots of the world pretty much learn their trade mostly in simulators.

 

You are absolutely right. but that do not mean this is a simulator . A simulator would scare away 98% of the players here just for the pre check . But it give you a pretty good idea how it works. Going into a stall and die at every landing is what happened if this was as difficult as the real thing

[6./ZG26_5tuka]

This sounds much overdone. Stalls and spins are often displayed worse than they actually were described by pilots. The bf-109 for example was referred to as having "pleasent" spin characteristics and would exit a full developed spin ith minimal effort.

 

Also spins don't come out of sudden. Most aircraft give a very good indication of what's about to happen and a good pilot recognizes and acts according to those signs. Expirienced pilots (in particularflying Bf-109s) used spins effectively as combat manouvers.

 

That being said I've already had the opporutnity to spin in an aircraft in reality. It was really not as breathtaking as I expected as the plane rotated slowly at an 30° dive angle. Only when exiting the rotation the nose would drop and required to be "catched" before gaining to high airspeed.

Edited January 14, 2016 by Stab/JG26_5tuka

[II./JG77_Manu*]

You are absolutely right. but that do not mean this is a simulator . A simulator would scare away 98% of the players here just for the pre check . But it give you a pretty good idea how it works. Going into a stall and die at every landing is what happened if this was as difficult as the real thing

I never landed a tail-dragger in real life, and even if i would be allowed to, i would never dare (without sufficient training). However i needed around 100 hours, to safely land aircraft in Sims. It still happens, although very rarely, that i [Edited] up a landing, especially when flying a new plane/sim. After around 1000 hours of Simulator. If landing in real life would have been any harder, i am pretty sure most of the pilots would have died while landing. After all, they were 18 year old boys, who surely had not more then 100 hours of practice, before they were allowed to land themselves. I think, landing was even easier, because of the 3D vision you have/had in real life. At least that's what i experience with planes like the aero AT-3 (which of course is way easier to land then a taildragger). This will get solved with Oculus Rift, by then i guess landing the real plane, or the plane in BoS/DCS will be pretty much on par. 

Edited January 15, 2016 by Bearcat

[BeastyBaiter]

Flown plenty of large RC model aircraft (2m+ wingspan) including many free wheeling tail draggers. I've generally found BoS's flight dynamics plausible with a few minor issues. The control authority strikes me as a bit questionable, it's a little too much like a model airplane in that regard but I wouldn't know since I've never flown a full scale manned version of one of these planes. I also find the landing gears too bouncy in general and the ground looping tendency heavily exaggerated on some planes.

[wtornado]

I am not a pilot or a Aerospace engineer

[Dave]

They learn procedures...not flight.

I have a few dozen hours in a Honeywell F/A-18 static simulator. We used it for training in ACM as well actually.

[Dave]

I never landed a tail-dragger in real life, and even if i would be allowed to, i would never dare (without sufficient training). However i needed around 100 hours, to safely land aircraft in Sims. It still happens, although very rarely, that i [Edited] up a landing, especially when flying a new plane/sim. After around 1000 hours of Simulator. If landing in real life would have been any harder, i am pretty sure most of the pilots would have died while landing. After all, they were 18 year old boys, who surely had not more then 100 hours of practice, before they were allowed to land themselves. I think, landing was even easier, because of the 3D vision you have/had in real life. At least that's what i experience with planes like the aero AT-3 (which of course is way easier to land then a taildragger). This will get solved with Oculus Rift, by then i guess landing the real plane, or the plane in BoS/DCS will be pretty much on par.

While taxiing/takeoff/landing tail-draggers requires more finesse and is less forgiving of errors than tricycle gear it is probably not as frightening as you think. My instructor spent some time with cautions and technique before my first and I was a bit apprehensive but it wasn't nearly as difficult as I expected. I didn't have any preconceptions to overcome though - flight "sims" back in the 80s were infantile. You basically have your tap shoes on the whole time you're on the ground. My first tail-dragged was a Cap10-B. You should definitely give it a shot with a good instructor - mine was a Korean War Mustang pilot.

[CF-105]

While I'm not yet licensed to fly, I must say that BoS nails a good 40% of the experience of flying, based on the few aircraft I have been fortunate enough to take control of.  The other 60% is the lack of G forces, or actually sitting in the aircraft, but it's unreasonable to expect that in these times.

[KoN_]

Had a few hours in cesna and prop gliders , nothing to write home about . 

[ShamrockOneFive]

I had the lucky opportunity to very briefly get some hands on experience with a Cessna 172. I loved the whole experience from being involved with the start up prep and checklists to the actual flying around. What an experience! My very brief encounter with the controls suggest to me that the latest sims (IL-2 BoS/BoM for sure) have something special worked into the mix that do a great job of giving me the feeling of flight despite the fact that I'm sitting in my office with my feet very firmly planted on the ground.

 

Obviously, I'm not going to take off with a plane tomorrow. But it definitely helps.

[Crump]

 

 

We used it for training in ACM as well actually.

 

Which is procedures and not flight.   

Just like we use it for stall, V1 cuts, and steep turns.  We learn the procedures.  The aircraft handles differently but the procedures are the same.

[traeapodaca]

Got my licence back in 2001 with the help of my friend who is a Bail Bond. In the past couple years I've been spending all my time restoring an old boat with an old outboard but when that is finished I plan to book a check ride and brush up on RL flying again.

• 0

[Lusekofte]

Always wanted a pilot license , but it so expensive to get in Norway, and to hold . So not needing one I figure it is not worth getting , just for flying circles around the city. 

I really really really would like a chopper experience. I have been a passenger in different Bell choppers and had really low flying fun in them

[Mekanikol]

I am an aircraft mechanic with over a decade in the career. I've worked on C-130, P3, Cirrus aircraft, Beechcraft T-34B, Bell Jet Rangers, Polish PZL M28, and Pilatus PC12.  I've got 23 hours of flight time and achieved my solo, so nothing outstanding in that department.  What I DO bring to the table when I'm talking in the forums here is a real-world understanding of damage, stress, and mechanical ability of aircraft as well as an intimate understanding of how much trouble a "faulty stick actuator" (pilot) can cause. 

 

But seriously, sometimes I'll read the forums and wonder if folks actually understand aircraft or if they are just making stuff up.  Usually the people here seem to be quite knowledgeable about the history of things but not the actual workings of things.  Regardless, it's all fun and games here, so I'll see you all in the servers!

[Crump]

I am an aircraft mechanic with over a decade in the career. I've worked on C-130, P3, Cirrus aircraft, Beechcraft T-34B, Bell Jet Rangers, Polish PZL M28, and Pilatus PC12.  I've got 23 hours of flight time and achieved my solo, so nothing outstanding in that department.  What I DO bring to the table when I'm talking in the forums here is a real-world understanding of damage, stress, and mechanical ability of aircraft as well as an intimate understanding of how much trouble a "faulty stick actuator" (pilot) can cause. 

 

But seriously, sometimes I'll read the forums and wonder if folks actually understand aircraft or if they are just making stuff up.  Usually the people here seem to be quite knowledgeable about the history of things but not the actual workings of things.  Regardless, it's all fun and games here, so I'll see you all in the servers!

 

 

Your observation is spot on. Try having a conversation about specified fuels......lol

[19//Moach]

I got a few but memorable hours of real life stick time logged on an assortment of gliders, motorgliders and such light G/A (alas, not rich enough to fly yet)  -- as far as I can tell, there is no other simulator out there that captures the "feel of flying" as thoroughly as this does

 

 

as for closer scrutiny - I do estimate I have well in excess of 20k flight hours on desktop simulators of all shapes and sizes since the latter 1990s - more recently these have been comprehensively enhanced by the addition of some very excellent stuff by DCS and the outstanding FSX addons of A2A simulations (who will go to extreme lengths to ensure that every last rivet is being simulated)  

 

 

on that experience, I find the flight simulation here is most certainly above average, about a full order of magnitude better than the popular "fly and shoot" titles out there (you know the one) - and definitely up to a degree of accuracy that is only contested by the two sources mentioned above

 

and perhaps, there can be some comparison against CloD, (with TF mods) and '1946 (with HSFX, SAS and whatnot) - though the former lacks similar types, and the latter cannot be taken as valid data without a VERY carefully selected installation of mods, which can only be identified by those with actual experience in any given type (my 1946 modset is chiefly selected on grounds of user feedback and whether or not it can live happily with the other mods - it's not MP friendly, obviously)

 

 

it is thus very difficult to tell if there's any disparity in aircraft handling and whether that's caused by simulation limitations or by the constraints of user end hardware

 

with an x55 and pedals, I do find that the stick movements are MUCH more abrupt and thus imprecise due to the less-than-half wide deflection on the stick (an extension might help) - also, there is the lack of the proper weight to the controls, which can only be truly achieved with a non-trivial array of servo motors

 

that coupled with the deprivation of inner ear accelerometry as well as the many other senses that make for the full experience of flying makes it hard to identify any perceived "quirks" in handling and what may be causing them - I reckon the much debated "wobbling" issue is largely due to PC input constraints (it gets far better if you increase the joystick noise filter setting, though too high a setting messes up trackIR)

 

 

anyway - the very fact that we cannot really, even from almost-kinda-like-it experience, is itself an indication of how thorough this simulation is and the depth of the flight model at hand -- any inaccuracies are almost all very minor with only a few more relevant exceptions (which I hear are being worked on)

 

 

this is a VERY good simulator -- it cannot be fairly judged without similarly good hardware and experience to go by

[SCG_motoadve]

Real pilot, flown tail draggers, a bit of aerobatics, lots of backcountry flying.

I find the feeling of flight in BOS, much better than Flight simulator, Prepar 3D or X Plane.

For a WWII game sim its pretty good,and better than the civilian sims.

Spin entry and stalls behave might be a bit on the too much end, but not having flown WWI airplanes I cannot tell for sure.

There have been many accidents with WWII planes at airshows so they must be a lot harder to fly than the regular civilian planes (high wing loading)

 

I Remember my first flying hr when I landed with the instructor's help,(I have flown flight simulator for years) I thought Flight Simulator is a total crap and not even close to real flying , and specially landing.

 

BOS is better than those simulators.

COD has a no wind world that feel like the plane is on rails to me.

DCS I have not tried it.

[Falco_Peregrinus]

I am a ULM pilot, and own my own plane (A Storm 400, Rotax 912 100hp powered, which is quite a little aerobatic falcon).
Flying a quite light aircraft is quite challenging when there is some decent wind around.
I agree that flight simulators really can help a lot, in some aspects of flying at least..

 

I was astonished though when I first soloed and found the final and  "after touch down" behaviour of the plane totally different and difficult to replicate in a flight sim.

The uneven field, a small bump, a small gust of wind in final, all are really really hard to replicate.

 

But all in all, I have NEVER experienced such a realistic feeling like BoS has: I always considered the other sims before like flying on "rails", as people already wrote here.

Edited January 14, 2017 by Falco-Peregrinus