The significance of trainer aircraft in DCS

[Dragon1-1]

You seem to be specifically talking about a prop driven GA aircraft with minimum flight instrumentation. What you say is not true in general, for instance in the Tomcat, for instance, you can barely hear the engines running, they're drowned out by the ECS fan. In an airliner, you don't listen to the engines, either, they're deliberately made to be quiet, after all, not to mention they're far away. I think you're making a bigger deal of those small details than they actually are. Larger aircraft (or fancier GA ones) aren't flown by "flying sensation", they're flown by looking at the flight instruments, something that'll be familiar to a simmer.

In fact, I've heard actual pilots caution against relying too much on the seat of pants feeling, and on cues that you mention. In fact, trusting the seat of pants over the dials had killed a few pilots, mostly GA, but at least one airliner, too. Assuming they aren't confused by the seat of pants feeling existing in the real plane, a simmer will have a correct instinct to start scanning the gauges and adjust controls based on that. More than that, a sim does teach you how to read those gauges in first place, which isn't necessarily obvious.

1 hour ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

You actually don't know to land properly from a sim, you aren't used to see the terrain getting close to you and at what speed, you aren't used to the bouncing of the aeroplane, etc,

Why not? Other than the fact we fly fighters in DCS, which are very different animals to something like a Cessna, we landing properly is an essential skill. You can learn the proper sight picture if you fly in VR, the bouncing requires a motion platform, but applying proper landing technique is very useful in the sim. Likewise, proper climbing, diving and banking is very much something you can learn in a sim. You can't learn how it feels (though a motion platform can help you practice getting coordinated), but you can sure see how it looks from the cockpit, and again, on the instruments. 

DCS is not WT, while you're not required to use proper techniques outside certain training missions, learning and applying them pays off. We should, I think, distinguish between "take off from taxiway and turn the jet straight to the front line" kind of DCS player from one who actually bothers to learn proper flying. A competent simmer will learn RL techniques for flying aircraft, because those techniques exist for a reason. Besides, there are aircraft in the sim, like the Spitfire, that will punish lousy flying (especially TO and landing) technique hard.

Also worth noting, single engine GA aircraft are harder to fly than an airliner, or a modern fighter for that matter. Significantly so, in fact. The very fact of having a piston engine to manage (forgot carb heat when descending? Too bad, you're now a glider), as well as prop effects to deal with, give them challenges that larger jets don't suffer from, and turboprops suffer much less. Also, tricycle versus taildraggers, put a real pilot in the latter who only flew the former, and there will be pain (and possibly a shredded prop). BTW, this particular issue will be familiar to any longtime jet player dipping his toe in warbirds for the first time. So it's also a good question, what exactly is the non-pilot trying to land, and just what did he fly in the sim.

Edited March 13 by Dragon1-1

[CRUD]

The yak 52 should be a free mod that comes with the game.

[Beirut]

15 hours ago, CRUD said:

The yak 52 should be a free mod that comes with the game.

 

I'd prefer the upcoming C-130 is free and comes with the game. And the FF MIg-29. And a beer. 

[SharpeXB]

With the free trial, every aircraft in this game is free. 

[Ala13_ManOWar]

19 hours ago, Dragon1-1 said:

You seem to be specifically talking about a prop driven GA aircraft with minimum flight instrumentation. What you say is not true in general, for instance in the Tomcat, for instance, you can barely hear the engines running, they're drowned out by the ECS fan. In an airliner, you don't listen to the engines, either, they're deliberately made to be quiet, after all, not to mention they're far away. I think you're making a bigger deal of those small details than they actually are. Larger aircraft (or fancier GA ones) aren't flown by "flying sensation",

.

.

.

Uff, you're mixing here lots of different things, too much to talk about, and even some of them far beyond my knowledge, I'm just a PPL pilot, remember. But I'll try to address some of them,

 

Yes, obviously I'm talking here about GA and piston engines, of course I am. Because you asked about the using the Yak-52 as a training platform, remember?

Airliners, which I'm only acquainted to being a passenger myself, are a very different kettle of fish, but we weren't talking about those in the first place, were we? Of course many pilots have died for trying to fly by the seat of their pants when they shouldn't have been doing that. But no worries here, if you're a passenger either in a GA or airliner aircraft and you have to take control to land without being yourself an experienced pilot in the type you're mostly already dead no matter how skilled in a flight sim you are, Ok? But that wasn't your first question. Then again, the sentence you've heard about means you shouldn't fly by the seat of your pants in situations where you aren't supposed to, and those are mostly IFR ones, specially real IFR ones meaning IFR in IMC conditions because you know airliners do fly IFR all the time no matter how weather is. And, while flying IFR you must rely on instruments no matter what because, used to it or not, your body sensations lie to you (which you study in the health subject in you PPL or CPL), your ear lies to you, your gravity feeling (proprioception)  lies to you, whenever you don't see a thing you feel lots of things and all of those are mostly fake sensations your body tells you because you don't see a thing, so you must rely on instruments no matter what your body tells you. Yes, that's a thing. No, that wasn't what we were talking about, nor my advice if you ever are in that situation mate... XD


Not to make this too long. Yes, airliners can be easier "to fly" than piston single engine. No, still you won't land those easier than the GA aircraft without previous experience, there're too much to handle there without experience mate, really a lot. I wouldn't even dare to try myself unless there is absolutely nobody else to do it.


About your last question, why not? Because you aren't used to that feeling at all, it's not a game there and no matter the plane, even in a small slow prop plane, you haven't seen and felt the ground coming to you, ever, and you don't know how you'll respond and feel until you find yourself in the situation. I've taken squadmates to fly and they, even being very good and skilled pilots in the sim, wouldn't dare to almost touch the controls despite me telling them to do it and showing how it is. They take the controls and try to move them millimetres like they were in their home joysticks thinking the plane response would be huge, turns out it's not and they don't expect that. On top of that, think the bumps, the shake, the vibration, even the smells, all of them are real there and without previous experience you don't know them and how you as a person will react. It could be fine, or it would be horrible, and you won't know until the time comes. Watching the ground come to you, the feel of a slide like (yes, a toboggan to make me clear) when you're crossing the threshold and pulling to flare, that's a lot for a first time experience and with only sim experience it's hard to cope with. It's not the sim doesn't help a lot in knowing so many aspects of the aviation operation in before hand, but those you'll get to know only when you do it by yourself, not in the sim nor even because I try to explain to you how it is, you have to feel it in person to know. Until that, you don't really know what to expect in that regard.

Edited March 14 by Ala13_ManOWar

[Dragon1-1]

1 hour ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

But no worries here, if you're a passenger either in a GA or airliner aircraft and you have to take control to land without being yourself an experienced pilot in the type you're mostly already dead no matter how skilled in a flight sim you are, Ok?

Given that there are examples of people with no experience managing to take down GA aircraft and survive (with ATC guidance), I'm willing to say you're exaggerating the issue again. Mythbusters managed to land a professional airliner sim with ATC talkdown. If you actually make an attempt to learn proper flying technique, as opposed to just jumping in and flying around, then sim experience could probably make a difference here. You know, questions such as "where to find the gear lever". 

Yes, the sensations matter. Sim training is not a guarantee that you won't freeze or do something dumb in the real thing. However, it might be used to familiarize yourself with basic concepts that you need to survive a landing. 

I'm not claiming you can learn real flying only by jumping into the sim and fooling around until you can sort-of fly. I'm claiming that you can use it to practice procedures, familiarize yourself with the physics, and with how to read the instruments. That's more or less what sims are used for in professional training, but it requires a healthy dose of RTFM and reading up on theory, or at least flying proper training missions that explain how to properly execute the maneuvers.

1 hour ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

Yes, that's a thing. No, that wasn't what we were talking about, nor my advice if you ever are in that situation mate... XD

The point is, being able to read instruments and fly using them, as you typically do in a sim, can compensate for not being able to fly with your backside. Just because it's nice and sunny outside doesn't mean you can't use the variometer to judge your rate of descent instead of eyeballing it.

1 hour ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

Yes, obviously I'm talking here about GA and piston engines, of course I am. Because you asked about the using the Yak-52 as a training platform, remember?

I wasn't the one asking about it (and besides, I have my doubts about that module being much good for anything), but it can be used to teach basic principles of flight. I don't know if it's got all the peculiarities of props modeled (the WWII fighters do), but I think we need to clarify whether you're arguing about simulation in general (which also includes other sims) or about the Yak-52 specifically, which is a much lower bar, and not even representative of other props in DCS.

Also, the Yak-52 has a nasty trap in it: the AH is an old Soviet type that indicates pitch in reverse. I wouldn't recommend anyone fly that when also learning a real plane (unless the real one also has that type of AH). It shouldn't be a problem in VFR, but in IFR, learning this kind of thing wrong can kill you. Also, the cockpit is metric, which can also be confusing, especially if your charts are in feet and knots (the L-39 can switch between metric and imperial instruments, not sure if the Yak can).

Edited March 14 by Dragon1-1

[Ala13_ManOWar]

Emm, you didn't read my whole answer. I said you're dead in an IFR IMC condition. No, you won't "get used" to feelings and paying attention only to instruments despite sim experience, what you feel in that situation is too overwhelming for a first time.

[Dragon1-1]

9 hours ago, Ala13_ManOWar said:

what you feel in that situation is too overwhelming for a first time.

Try doing that in VR, then. "Overwhelming" is exactly how I'd describe my first foray into IFR while flying VR. I guess I didn't have my sense of balance BSing me, but the disorientation, claustrophobia and nerves were recreated pretty damn well for me. And no, that it's not real doesn't matter much for the monkey part of the brain that's responsible for those sensations. In fact, the experience was very much like real pilots describe entering IMC, complete with having to fight the urge to fly "by feel" (despite sitting in a chair!) in order to focus exclusively on instruments.

While I figure the real thing is even worse (can't take off the googles if things get too hairy, for one), if you remember the procedures and manage not to panic, your chances of survival would go up. For what it's worth, you can learn procedures in the sim. As far as how much experiencing it in VR helps with not panicking part, I don't know, but it might help some.

On topic of trainers, the L-39 has an IFR hood that can be deployed in order to practice that. The training mission makes even you fly a route using only some beacons and a compass using it. Not easy, but does build confidence if you can figure it out.

Edited March 15 by Dragon1-1