subject: Instrument Flight Simulator - Federal Aviation Administration Approves of Flight Simulators For Credit Toward Instrument Flight Rating [print this page] Instrument Flight Simulator - Federal Aviation Administration Approves of Flight Simulators For Credit Toward Instrument Flight Rating
If you are a private pilot who is seeking to add an Instrument Rating to your ticket, then you might already be informed of the fact that the Federal Aviation Administration permits you to commit up to a maximum of 20 hours of instruction training in an instrument flight simulator to be used as credit towards your instrument rating.
Of course you may spend more than 20 hours training using a simulator, but only the initial 20 hours will apply, and each of those 20 has to be spent with an instructor and not by yourself, using an FAA approved flight simulation program. (You are of course free to devote as much time as you want on a home-based simulator for the PC to maximize the amount of time you get to practice and perfect your techniques.)
There are several reasons why the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) encourages you to use a flight simulator to log instrument training time in lieu of time spent operating an actual airplane.
Among those reasons is because instrument flight simulator software is able to imitate the behavior and performance of an actual airplane down to the minutest detail. Therefore, training for instrument flight in a simulator is practically the same experience as training for instrument flight in an actual airplane under the hood.
The primary difference between the two experiences of simulated versus actual flight (with respect to instrument training) is that you will not be able to experience the sensations of movement that could otherwise fool you, causing spatial disorientation, during certain maneuvers in flight such as climbs, turns, and descents.
With regard to all of the advancements in computer programming technology that we have available at our disposal in this day and age, in the twenty-first century, one of the greatest and most essential resources that every pilot, without regard to whether he or she happens to be a newbie pilot or an experienced pilot, must have at his or her disposal, is a reliable flight simulator.
A flight simulator can help to bridge the gap during those inevitable periods of indeterminate downtime in between flights.
It could even assist you to touch up on your skills, help you maintain proficiency, and could even enable you to get some additional experience in those areas in which you could use some improvement.
Flight simulator software can help you become a safer pilot.
They can even help you to save money, as well as time, on unnecessary training or unnecessarily having to repeat flying the same practice maneuvers over and over again.
The good news is, flight simulation software is so sophisticated, that flying a simulator is almost every bit as realistic as flying the real deal. The instrument panel is identical. The control inputs are identical. The world "map" built into the simulation is based on real life cartographic information. The way the aircraft performs to various internal (weight and balance, fuel, aircraft performance) as well as external (weather phenomena, air temperature) forces is intended to mimic real life scenarios.
For many people, a flight simulator is nothing more than a really high-tech video game. And in many respects, it can be enjoyed as such. After all, you'll never have to worry about crashing the airplane in a simulation!
But for many others, a flight simulator is a heavy duty learning tool, and for counltess professional pilots, it is an integral part of one's aviation career.
