PROFILECLIMB,

The most important part of IFR flying is having a good scan. The problem with using something like Microsoft FlightSim is that it teaches you to use a bad scan. Like another CFI wrote above, if you use something like Microsoft FlightSim to practice IFR procedures, you run the risk of having to unlearn a bad scan and learn a good scan. This can be a huge problem for an IFR student.

Make sure the instrument config is the same as the plane you train in. And, again, only use a PC device to practice and re-inforce procedures you already learned in the plane/sim.

Call it a dildo for all I care. If used properly it can be of great help in training. What rickair said is 100% accurate. Make sure you use the same config to what you are training and do follow up sessions at home to reinforce what you are learning.

I don't think you give it enough credit. X-Plane actually models the physical aircraft and applies aerodynamic formulas to that model. They then tweak the output for known aircraft performance. That is VERY similar to at least one level D simulator I have experience with.

Older simulators actual have very "prehistoric" code. That is why they don't actually simulate what happens when you get beyond the stick shaker. They are also worthless when they get in the flare... kind of like a consumer simulator game

What really differentiates a simulator from a game is the atmosphere. If you have a structured training program with solid instruction from a knowledgeable instructor, it really doesn't matter if one is in a certified simulator, or an FTD with X-Plane or FSX installed. If will get them 90% of the way there, but they will still need actual instruction in the plane.

I give it no credit. It's a game.

It is not a level D simulator, and bears no relation to a level D simulator. It's not a simulator. It's a computer game.

That some millennial types can't fathom life without a computer and that they've grown up playing whatever the modern version of donkey kong is (x-plane) and Clash of Twits, does not alter the fact. It's an entertainment device.

To be sure, I've actually seen resumes a few times in which some idiot actually put down experience on a "virtual airline" playing with such games...one of those serious types that puts on a uniform, sits in his armchair and "flies" a scheduled "route" on his computer, along with hundreds of other game-players around the globe, each imagining that they're actually flying or in a "simulator." Neither is true, yet I've seen some of these challenged souls actually send a resume claiming airline experience on some mythical company machine (which does not exist but on their screen and in their head).

The little laptop simulation of your favorite airplane allows things that a simulator will not do, but a simulator does a lot of things that x-plane cannot. Move, for example. Simulate. Re-create. x-plane is little more than a 2D laptop game that you can manipulate with a mouse or joystick or saita yoke and pretend...it is not a simulator and as a simulator I do understand it, know what it is, and give zero credit.

I've instructed in big and small, and in simulators, too. I've fielded thousands of questions from hopeful millennials who want to use their laptops to become the next scott crossfield or miracle above the hudson. Some who want to do all their training in one, on one...but it's still a game, still a sim, and still not something I'd use or recommend used for attempting to learn to fly.

There may just be a reason that the FAA doesn't have a proviso allowing a certain number of hours of x-plane toward a pilot certificate. Then again, with the ongoing dumbinig down of the regulation, it may yet be coming in our spiral to the bottom.

You hate millennials, or you're extremely jealous (probably both)

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Neither. Certainly not jealous. Your comments, however, are irrelevant to the thread and contribute nothing, and do not change the fact.

Computer games like xplane might have better graphics than older games, yet are still games, none the less.

Jealous of what? Children playing games? Really??

Could he disprove these charges by giving you only that advice which ratifies what you already want to do? Many schools and salesmen will do that, if you pay them.

Eh... ignore him, he's one of those. I've read enough posts from this guy elsewhere to know he isn't worth your time.

I have jumped on X Plane 11 to help grasp the logic (or lack thereof) and functions of an FMS. Many add-on planes have fully-functional flight management systems. If monkeying with an X-Plane FMS is a game then it is the most boring, mind-numbing game I have ever played!