IFR Lesson #1
My instructor for the IFR training at the Calgary Flying Club is Jason. He’s done all my checkouts here at the club (on the Warrior and the 182) and will now be responsible for guiding me through the months ahead. Lesson #1 is actually supposed to be all classroom talking about the way the course is set up, expectations, required resources and books, etc. But since talking to the CFI a couple months ago I’ve already done that so we jumped right into the training.
Today’s lesson was an introduction to CFC’s simulator. CFC has a brand new PFC-MFD 2-person crew setup that can run either Elite or X-Plane. With the Elite software the LCD panels on the simulator display about an inch of “windscreen” and the remainder contains all the instruments. With X-Plane, the LCD panels display instruments only and the outside environment is displayed on a screen in front of the simulator flight deck via a projector. Both programs are very slick, especially combined with the accessibility of all instrument controls via the MFD’s setup.
Since X-Plane has yet to be certified, we will be using Elite. We took off from CYBW and did some basic maneuvers: straight and level flight, climbs, descents, turns to various headings, etc. It was all rather simple but the idea was to simply get comfortable with the simulator, where all the controls are located and how everything works.
Overall, I found the simulator quite good. The entire flight deck is enclosed like you were sitting in a spacious Piper (or other similar low wing) which helps with the realism. The only problem I would note is that I find the simulator very touchy when it comes to altitude. If you’ve ever flown a Cessna 182P, you’ll know that once the aircraft is trimmed out, all the plane wants to do is fly level. And trimming the real C-182 takes perhaps 10 seconds at most. Not so in the simulator; instead you seem to porpoise along in a sort of sine wave over the assigned altitude.
Sim Time: 1.0 hrs
