Is Flight Simulator a recommended teaching tool for an actual pilot's license?

Question

I recently purchased FSX and was impressed by the depth of the "lessons" included with the program. The computerized learning program offers a number of articles on various aviation subjects, along with tutorials and the like.

With that being said, I know that Microsoft Flight Simulator has its limitations; the actual education one can glean from it is rather shallow, and the "flight" experience is artificial, at best.

Assuming that I would go on to an actual ground school and learn from a real instructor, would you recommend Microsoft Flight simulator as an introductory teaching aid for aspiring pilots?

Answer 1

I have done the same thing, began actual lessons after learning FSX.  Essentially, things are the same.  Learning the instruments, speeds, and general regulations in FSX certainly helps, but an actual plane controls differently.  It did, however, help me a lot.

Answer 2

It helps a lot more than it hurts.

Desktop simulators have physical limitations that constrain the realism of the simulation.  They have one small screen, instead of the wraparound windows that a real aircraft has.  They have very primitive controls, although this can be improved somewhat by adding a yoke, throttle quadrant, rudder pedals, etc. (all of which are readily available for desktop simulators).  And of course, they don't move.  These limitations are important mainly for flight under visual flight rules, which depends a lot on visual cues.  VFR flight also tends to make more use of "feel," both for the movement of the aircraft and the use of controls.

For IFR flight, desktop simulators do much, much better.  It's easy to simulate the look of real instruments with extremely high accuracy, and in the case of instrument flight, the lack of visual cues outside the windows and the lack of movement force greater concentration on the instruments, which is the whole idea of instrument flight.  So desktop simulation can be very useful for practicing instrument flight.

Overall, a simulator might give you a few habits that could cause brief confusion when you first step into a real aircraft, but the accuracies of the simulator are far greater than the inaccuracies, and simulation resembles real flight a lot more than it differs from real flight.

So, in summary, Flight Simulator is a great tool for the aspiring pilot, and it has the advantage of being very accessible and affordable.  You can't really learn to fly using a desktop simulator alone, but you can certainly get a significant head start.  A person who has other forms of instruction plus Flight Simulator has a great advantage over someone who has the same other forms of instruction but no Flight Simulator.

Answer 3

No, you will learn bad habits that you will have to pay your instructor to "unlearn". Get the real training FIRST

Answer 4

It's pretty awesome for learning instrument skills, but for VFR you can toss out FSX imo

Answer 5

If you want a little better experience with a flight sim, try X-plane. Its kind of the b*****d child of the flight sim world, but it feels a whole lot better than FSX.

Many of my CFI friends are having a better time teaching someone that has used the simulator than one that hasn't.

Answer 6

Absolutely not.

Answer 7

There's nothing wrong with using flight simulators like FSX before touching the real thing.  You're not going to develop magical bad habits that will jinx you for life.  Practically, every guy under the age of 35-40 grew up playing video games.  For many of us, that included flight simulators like FSX (or at least the very first versions for me) and we turned out fine.

That being said, FSX won't really help you learn the basics of flying a plane.  It will help you get familiar with the instruments of the plane and how some avionics may workbut that's about it at this point.  It is especially useless when learning to fly VFR (visually).

When going for an instrument rating, simulators like FSX can be very helpful.  Since it takes away the seat-of-the-pants feel, it forces you to fly just by reference to the instruments.  Simulators also tend to be less stable than the real thing, so it sometimes helps you develop a better, quicker instrument scan.

Simulators are also very helpful for working on procedures.  That's how they are used in the airlines.  Go ahead and play around with FSX if you want.  Just don't take the lessons that teach you how to actually maneuver the airplane too seriously.