Flight Sim to Real Flight Experiment

[Chill31]

I need experimental test subjects...?

 

I want people who have NEVER controlled a real airplane, BUT have extensive flight sim experience to come fly with me to evaluate the effectiveness of home flight sim/combat flight experience on actual ability to fly an airplane.

 

This not a sanctioned/funded experiment, just something to satisfy my curiosity. 

 

If you live near GA in the USA and would like like to go fly, let me know.

 

Merey Christmas and Happy New Year!

[Chief_Mouser]

Wow! There's a great offer ?. Unfortunately for me I've flown before and live over 4,000 miles away...

 

[unlikely_spider]

Oh, man. This sounds awesome. I'm in the DC area. Sounds like I'm a great candidate except for my tendency to develop motion sickness ☹️

 

Although I trained myself out of it in VR at least. Not sure how that translates to general aviation ?

Edited December 28, 2021 by unlikely_spider

[Chill31]

4 hours ago, unlikely_spider said:

Oh, man. This sounds awesome. I'm in the DC area. Sounds like I'm a great candidate except for my tendency to develop motion sickness ☹️

 

Although I trained myself out of it in VR at least. Not sure how that translates to general aviation ?

One way to find out!  Any plans to be in the atlanta area? No time frame required...just lwt me know, even if it is a year from now.

[SCG_motoadve]

8 hours ago, Chill31 said:

I want people who have NEVER controlled a real airplane, BUT have extensive flight sim experience to come fly with me to evaluate the effectiveness of home flight sim/combat flight experience on actual ability to fly an airplane.

Fun experiment, you will see sim pilots will be able to fly the plane, make turns etc.

I was a sim pilot before a real pilot, and was able to fly the plane on my Discovery flight, only got some help by the instructor on the take off and landing.

What do you fly?

[J2_Nedo]

Google:

The route from "Home (Germany)" to "Georgia, USA" could not be calculated.

dang! ?

[Chill31]

10 minutes ago, SCG_motoadve said:

Fun experiment, you will see sim pilots will be able to fly the plane, make turns etc.

I was a sim pilot before a real pilot, and was able to fly the plane on my Discovery flight, only got some help by the instructor on the take off and landing.

What do you fly?

That is very cool!  I suspect thay should be the case too.  We will fly in a J-3 Cub.

 

How much sim time did you have before your first real flight?

[SCG_motoadve]

8 minutes ago, Chill31 said:

That is very cool!  I suspect thay should be the case too.  We will fly in a J-3 Cub.

 

How much sim time did you have before your first real flight?

J3 its awesome, great fun to fly, very light on the controls, I had about 10 years of sim time, IL2, EAW. Janes WWII Fighters, FSX, remember at being so disappointed at how unrealistic are landings and take offs in simulators compared to real life.

[BMA_Hellbender]

In my experience real flying (GA) is easy even to people who have never flown sims, having taken up quite a few first-timers. Sim flying to real flying is just as easy, though you may have picked up certain bad habits that will take a while to unlearn. In my case that was waaay too much rudder use. Typically the only thing holding someone back at first will be fear, task overload and possibly motion sickness, as you are not used to feeling the plane. It's closer to a motorboat/motorcycle than to a car.

 

To anyone here hesitating: do it! Get your PPL, LAPL or even glider license. You will very quickly find out whether it's flying that you love or mostly the combat aspect. I can only describe it as blissful boredom whilst in total control of yourself. Pure Zen. I haven't flown in a few months (damn Belgian weather) and am getting withdrawal symptoms.

[Cynic_Al]

10 hours ago, Chill31 said:

to evaluate the effectiveness of home flight sim/combat flight experience on actual ability to fly an airplane.

 

A selected experienced sim pilot might have difficulty relating to the conditions of real-world flying, whereas someone with no simming experience could be a natural.

To arrive at a firm conclusion from such an experiment, I suspect you would need an impractically-large number of candidates, and even then the results could be questionable. 

 

 

[II/JG17_HerrMurf]

I’m guessing a sim pilot will do well in the air but will be ground shy like almost every rookie real world pilot starts out.

[Todt_Von_Oben]

There are Youtube videos showing helicopter sim pilots being able to take off, hover, fly, and land a Robinson R-22 helicopter first time out with no prior instruction.  But the sim experience was gained on a Pro Flight Trainer; a good representation of the R-22 flight controls.  

 

I think you'll get favorable results if your sim pilots fly a stick, rudder pedals, and throttle similar to the J-3. 

 

Those who fly a twiststick probably won't do as well in most cases because real planes don't work like that.

 

I'd be concerned about insurance and the Feds, too.  Might help if the PIC is a CFI.  

 

 

[Dornil]

You know, if you are an inexperinced pilot, there is a great difference between flying an airplane with a skilled pilot, who seats next to you, and flying the same plane, being totally on your own. Few years back I found myself alone in a cockpit of a Quicksilver ultralight, having zero flight experience in airplanes, but some in deltatrikes and extensive in flight sims and paramotors. It did not end well:) I had all the knowledge on how to make it right, but did not have the skill, to do everything properly in a rapidly changing situation.

[ITAF_Airone1989]

10 hours ago, II/JG17_HerrMurf said:

I’m guessing a sim pilot will do well in the air but will be ground shy like almost every rookie real world pilot starts out.

That's was exactly me.

 

Without even saw a cockpit before, had no problem to do some (almost) coordinated flat turns.

But I'm happy I didn't do the take off or the landing ?.

 

Btw, in USA some time ago a young student pilot manage to land itself at the first flight (instructor passed out)

There is the voice record on YT.

But still, he was a student with some knowledge (and ATC support during the approach)

[Zooropa_Fly]

1 hour ago, Dornil said:

You know, if you are an inexperinced pilot, there is a great difference between flying an airplane with a skilled pilot, who seats next to you, and flying the same plane, being totally on your own. Few years back I found myself alone in a cockpit of a Quicksilver ultralight, having zero flight experience in airplanes, but some in deltatrikes and extensive in flight sims and paramotors. It did not end well:) I had all the knowledge on how to make it right, but did not have the skill, to do everything properly in a rapidly changing situation.

 

 

Are you communicating this to us from Heaven ?

 

[BMA_Hellbender]

10 minutes ago, Zooropa_Fly said:

Are you communicating this to us from Heaven ?

 

Don't be so quick to assume. He could be also be in Hell.

[Dornil]

8 minutes ago, Zooropa_Fly said:

Are you communicating this to us from Heaven ?

It wasn't THAT bad, just a few bent pipes and rods. For some reason I am very lucky when it comes to flying accidents:)

BTW, I had another interesting occasion last month: a friend - experienced paramotor pilot - visited me recently, so I gave him a try in La-5 in BoS. He has never flown any airplanes in RL, or had any experience with flight sims or joysticks. Yet, he managed to land that La-5 quite intact, just bent a prop as a result of horrific pitch oscillations before the touch down. I suspect, that the real La-5 would not have been so much forgiving.

[BMA_West]

Remembers me reading about that kid knowing his MS Flight Simulator that got into nicking small planes from the tarmac while taking care to deliver them on a next airfield mostly slightly damaged from the wear.
Always escaped for a next ride until he landed on this first Island where the FBI netted him;

[SCG_motoadve]

I have had the opposite, a real pilot friend Vietnam pilot vet, who used to fly and own P47, P51, P40 and flew and won the Reno air races.(He still flies and owns planes but not the warbirds anymore).

He came to stay over for a weekend, I showed him Il2 in VR, he was able to take off, land do maneuvers and was totally blown away to experience this specially in VR, I could not get him off my computer he wanted to keep flying IL2 the whole weekend.

[=IRFC=kotori87]

If I hadn't JUST moved to the wrong side of the continent, I would definitely take you up on the offer. I'll probably be back on the east coast in four years, if you don't mind waiting.

 

Gascan and I have done a couple of individual lessons in a Cessna. Just one-offs, several years apart. In both cases, the flight instructor was impressed with our knowledge of flight mechanics, and I did pretty good in the air. I struggled on the ground, however, because the Cessna's control yoke, tricycle landing gear, and push-knob throttle felt very different from the joystick and tail-dragger I usually fly online. And don't get me started on the comms. My day job is handling communications in a submarine engine room. Very formal, very busy, and lots of detailed rules about word choice and pronunciation to ensure first-time successful communication. Aviation radio chatter is nigh-incomprehensible, in comparison.

[migmadmarine]

I flew flight sims for a number of years (at least since middle school) before I started learning on gliders at 14, and it certainly felt like it helped, to have basic concepts down before beginning rather than starting entirely at zero. 

[masterofCFIT]

Just to add another couple of cents to this, I've been flight simming since I was probably around 14, all the normal sims like MSFS2004, X, Il2 '46 etc.

I started learning to fly in my early 20's and got to first solo in 4 hrs in a Tecnam P92.

 

I do think the sim experience helped with knowing what was in-front of me as far as instrumentation was and also having the core concepts of stalls, turns and the importance of airspeed and coordination.

[Chill31]

On 5/16/2022 at 3:19 AM, masterofCFIT said:

Just to add another couple of cents to this, I've been flight simming since I was probably around 14, all the normal sims like MSFS2004, X, Il2 '46 etc.

I started learning to fly in my early 20's and got to first solo in 4 hrs in a Tecnam P92.

 

I do think the sim experience helped with knowing what was in-front of me as far as instrumentation was and also having the core concepts of stalls, turns and the importance of airspeed and coordination.

4 hours is pretty quick for a first solo.  It sounds like the sim experience helped! very cool. thanks for sharing