I'm currently using Realflight G4 with my Futaba 6EX transmitter and I was wondering if I clock up enough hours with the simulator whether or not I would be able to start flying for real with a mid-wing plane appose to a basic trainer.

Cheers Ian

Providing you have an instructor and a buddy box, yes.

I had the G3.5 cracked unfortunately because i didn't had the money, and i was controlling the planes with a gamer joystick. Well, it help a lot i can tell. I went througharound 15-20 hours of that simulation. Then i flew without a problem. The basic is to keep your plane close to you enough so you can see what are you doing I'm tryiong for a G4, but unfortunately my PC can't hold up this beast

Oh yes, good that you remind me. If it wasn't for the buddy the first day i went for flying, my plane might be at the garbage place right now They can also help you taking off your plane if the ground is not suitable for flying.

If the ground is "not suitable for flying", then why are you there?

I'm here because i flew already. We can't take off our planes there we are going untill someone comes and clear the field. We don't have problems while we landing though because we are waiting untill the fuel goes off and the plane coming slowly slowly in a part of the place we are in and we are landing there. We don't have big fiels as USA and other countries have. Here the terrain is ****** (better not telling).

It would seem he is in Cyprus - I imagine there are not a lot of flying clubs there.

Hi there Osirisf16, I can respond you the question because I was just in your case. I started buying the Real Flight G4. I flew for 2 months, doing landings, takeoffs, stalls, etc. After 2 months I thought I was ready because I could dominate every plane in the simulator (even the F39). I brought a trainer from Miami. It was the Hangar 9 Alpha 40 RTF. It is a great trainer for begginers like you and me. I started flying for the first time with an instructor and I did pretty good; no errors. He landed the plane. The following weekend we met again and started flying. He was astonished because of the way I was flying. He showed me some exercises in the air which I did without a problem and he finally told me "Land the plane". I was pretty nervous but I did it. That same day I landed the plane for about 4 times without a problem. Everyone gave me a beer shower. I took 2 weekends to land the plane. From that moment on I started flying all by myself. No problems with my Alpha 40 yet. My first landing was about 1 month ago. This is all thanks to the practice and the experience I gained in my Rela Flight G4. It is a pedagogical instrument for begginers. It is the right way to start without spending hundreds of dollars in crashed planes. I recomend it to everyone that´s going to get started.
I suggest you start with a good trainer, not a low-mid wing plane because they are much more unstable and faster. Trainers, as the name says, are to train. It is a neccessay step that you should go through. Don´t subestimate how easy a plane can crash and it costs you a lot of money. In the simulator you don´t get scared but in the first real flying it is pretty scary, even if you have a great dominium with the simulator. Believe me, ist´s not a joke. I´ve experienced all that I just wrote here. I hope this could help. Bye Osirisf16.

The simulators can be of great help and may even get you to a mid-level plane. I learned on a sim myself and bought a trainer (avistar). I also did my solo on the first day without an instructor or buddy box. Now that I have flown the trainer a few times (20 flights), I do think I should have gotten a little more advanced plate than a trainer (maybe 2nd plane as my first). But I do like my avistar, it's a great trainer with ability to do some stuff that basic trainers cannot do. Again, I mostly learned from the simulators.
I'm in the process of getting a 2nd plane already because I feel that I'm ready. Ofcourse your mileage may vary but a good trainer will help you a lot in REAL WORLD flying. Look into getting something like an avistar, alpha 40 or other upper lever trainers.
I'd still try to avoid a low wing plane as I think you really need to get the basics on a high wing first. The sims gives you a good indication on basic flight, orientation, control adjustments and what not. But it cannot emulate mother nature, real flying condition and your flying area. Those will all vary.
Trainers are still a good start, and I've seen a lot of veterans still fly trainers. They're easy, fun and cost is low.

I put in about 3 months of a solid hour+ sim time per day. I fly right on the sim and practiced the things an instructor would have you do. I got talked into buying a trainer by the guys at the field after they found out I bought a wildhare edge 540 for my first plane I didnt even think about getting a normal second (pulse, 4*) plane as a trainer instead of an all out trainer though (wish I would of). I listened and bought an alpha 60 RTF setup and took it to the field to give it a fly. No one was there and me being a new member I didnt know the combo to open the gate. Not wanting to go home empty handed I stoped by my sisters, she lives about a mile from the rc field and has a big field behind her house. I put 3 flights on it that night with no troubles. The next day I got out to the real field and talked to the guys a bit. I told them I put 3 flights on it the day before and asked them if they wanted to buddy box or w/e and help me fly it (I was unsure about being alloud to fly solo after reading about some of the clubs rules on here for new pilots). They were like well you flew it yesterday and its still in one peice so go ahead and fly it. I took off and was flying a bit and the guy watching me took it and trimmed it out for me and handed it back. I landed it np and have been flying solo ever since That was only my second day flying the alpha and they were already recomending second planes for me. I picked up a pulse 60xt this weekend after only flying 1 gal of fuel in the alpha. I only put one flight on the pulse last night and 4 or 5 tonight. My last flight of the night one of the members that flys a 50cc extra showed up. After talkin to him a bit I told him that I had a 25% wildhare at home I was just waiting to fly it till I was ready for it. After watching me fly the pulse he thought I was ready for the wildhare already. I am gonna fly the pulse for a bit before I bust out the wildhare though, not because I dont believe him just because I am really liking the pulse right now and it will do everything I want a plane to do for the next month or so. If you really have flying down on the sim, I meen to the point where you never need to think about which way to move the sticks and are in control of the plane at all times instead of reacting to it all the time the I think you could skip the pure trainer and go with something like the pulse for sure. Get an instructor and a budy box to help you at first though. While I think the pulse is easer to fly and land then the alpha was everything happens much faster with the pulse. If you do something dumb without a budy box with the pulse there wont be time to save it. Maybe someone has a trainer they will let you put a couple flights on at your club so you can get a feel for how ready you think you are before spending the money. Im not mad that I bought the alpha it definatly made me feal confident enough to just go out and fly it and that is one of the most important things but I feel like I could of saved the 400 for sure and went right to the pulse.

*Disclammer I am just stating what my expierence was. Obviously everyone learns at a different pace.

Good to know that you had good experiences, but there is a bit more down there.
The sim does not teach how to trim a plane in its very first flight, they all come already tested and easily fliables.
I would recommend to every one who is getting started in the hobby to find a flying field and a qualified instructor, with the help of the sim you may need the instructor just ocasionally but in your first flight I would say that it is mandatory.

I have to say Yes or NO to the original question.
Why? Because everyone is different and none of us can judge your ability.
I have seen people spend some time on a simulator and could handle more than a standard trainer very soon but I have also seen the opposite, many hours on a sim only to struggle with a real trainer plane.
Before you jump to a mid wing plane (which would typically be a 3rd plane or more for most beginners) find someone that will take you up on a buddy box with a trainer and then decide what you want to do.

the sim does help alot for flying and keeping in tune with your "skills" of flying,what the sim doesn't do is teach proper engine tuning,and the always necessary trimming.

here's a test for the beginner when you go to calibrate the transmitter detune the trim levers off to one side,or the other randomly,press OK without looking at the transmitter,and set the trim levers to neutral then take the plane off and try to trim it for strait and level flight and find out how hard it is to keep flying and adjust the trim levers at the same time its not easy without crashing,also every plane is different so the amount of trim adjustment is also.

then there's engine tuning which is a whole other bag of worms.

having said all that I went to the field having not flown for a couple of months,except for the sim and it was like I never left, so would I recomend a sim for a beginner or any one who flys RC of course,its a revolutionary tool for flying RC aircraft and very helpfull as long as you keep a perspective on it, and get some help learning the intangables the sim doesn't cover.

The title of the thread is simulation instead of trainer. The answer to that is no. The simulator, first of all, doesn't make your knees shake and your palms sweat (they will!), it doesn't make you panic when you tried to get in the air without enough power and your plane tip stalls, so you give it throttle, and it's aimed right at the guys in the pits. It doesn't teach you any safety lessons, and it probably is actually teaching you bad habits that you don't even know about. Like I said, taking off and landing are especially different in real life.

I have recent experience with this.

I flew a decent amount on a simulator, then went to the field and flew a trainer with an instructor on a buddy box. Taking off and landing is a lot different (harder) than it is on the simulator, even if you do have the wind turned on. I have been flying a lot the past week; I'm off the buddy box, but still have my hands full taking off and landing, especially in cross winds, with a trainer. While I have actually flown a low-wing plane in the sky (on a buddy box) I know that I wouldn't be able to take off and land as well as I can on the trainer.

I would suggest something like the Hobbico Avistar, or a trainer with a semi-symmetrical airfoil, or a trainer that has little to no dihedral if there are any. These will let you have some fun with the skills you have learned on the sim when you are in the sky, but will land slower and more stable to help teach you how to land.

FatKat speaks the truth. Things like the moment in a turn where the plane would end up pointing right at me, even only for a fraction of a second freaked me out for a while. There is lots of distractions at the field too, people starting engines, flying at the same time, showing up to the field, talking to you or you can hear them talking about your flight LOTS of things, you have to tune most of this out and concentrate on what your doing at all times when flying. Plus you now have people watching what your doing while your still trying to learn. The first time I took my trainer out to the field in the middle of the day (when all the old timers are there that I didnt know at all yet) I was very nervous. They didnt know me and for all they new it was my first time out ever so I felt like they were all gonna be watching everything I did.

TBH I needed much more help with things like getting my engines started/tuned and build issues and faulty install jobs on my part then I did with the actual flying part. I even commented at the field yesterday to bad they dont have a sim to teach how to setup engines and build the planes as I was asking for help getting my new saito 100 started the first time, turns out they wont start when the highspeed needle is turned all the way in I thought they came preset for break in like most others but they dont..

And Deathbunny brings up a good point: the sim doesn't teach you a thing about starting and tuning an engine. I'm a mechanical guy, and thought after reading all the instructions and posts about starting and tuning engines it would be a breeze. Well, it wasn't! It was hard to get started, and when it did (and ROARED at me) it was much harder to tune than I had expected. Sure enough, the next day a guy at the field had it started and tuned in a minute, and showed me what I was doing wrong.

Also what he said about people: yesterday someone said something to me, and I looked at them, and got snapped at! Never look away from your plane, and don't even look at the trims when you're flying! Sim didn't teach me this.

Last thing, good practice is to fly on the opposite side of the landing strip, never fly over your head or the pit. Take off, turn away from you, and circle around flying over the strip or just across the strip from you. Sim didn't teach me that, either.

Sounds like the old "scary" days . Everything you said, i done it exactly as you describe it. Now i don't scare anymore of course

Yeah, simulator's aircrafts are perfectly trimmed. That's the bad of the sim, but is ok anyway. You just MUST have a guy in your first day to keep up If it wasn't for the guy in my first day, my plane it would be stuck in the ground

Well, i disagree a little with that you said in first lines. With the sim, you can do some movements that in real life you scared to do because of damages. Of course, flying in the sim and then go to real life ALONE, that's bad. You must have an instructor near you, in case of "oh my God, i can't see the plane, please help me" the guy you have near you since he has a lot more experience, take the radio, laugh and land the plane

Can't tell you how many guys have shown up for instruction at the fields I have belonged to with the ailerons reversed. I would guess as high as 10% of first timers. If they were on their own the first flight would have been short and unpleasant.

An instructor can "check you out" and in 20 minutes relate enough tips and suggestions that you couldn't pick up in 50 flights on your own (If you made that many) as well as balance and trim the model so you have good chances of success. Simulators just don't have the impatience, bravado (with an audience), nerves, cranky engine, low battery, warped wing settings, high grass, bumpy runway, flukey winds and overly lean/rich engine problems worked out to simulate a real trip to the field.

I think simulator is an amazing tool in learning to fly; I used one and was off the buddy cord in 7 flights. I really don't think it's a substitution for a trainer though, and I'm sure that's a consensus among most pilots here. Doing crazy things on the trainer has definitely taught me how to recover a plane in real life, but there's too much it didn't teach me to say you can use it instead of a trainer.

I for one am absolutely against students trying to use a simulator to teach themselves to fly. Or even worse, trying to "get ahead" before they come see an instructor. Simulators are great tools......... if they are used properly. When used properly they will enforce the training that is received and develop good habits, but used inproperly they will just develop bad habits that have to be "un-taught" before the student can properly learn to fly. I've had students that have come to me with "tons of time" on the simulator saying that they were ready to fly because of their simulator time, but in reality it took longer to teach them because I had to un-teach them the bad habits they picked up on a simulator.

Here's a list of some of the "bad" habits one can develop:
1) Failing to keep the plane straight during takeoff run.
2) Climbing out too steep.
3) Not maintaining a constant altitude while turning.
4) Turns that aren't smooth, too sharp, etc.
5) Forgetting that there is a left stick.
6) Not lining up with the runway during landing approach.
7) Using ailerons instead of rudder to make course corrections when landing.
8) Using the elevator to extend the landing when you realize you're short.
9) Failure to learn the signs that a plane is about to stall, and what to do to avoid it, or recover from it.


The sim is NOT:
[ul][*]Going to teach you how to tune your engine [*]Going to teach you how to correct fuel system problems [*]Going to teach you how to set up your linkages [*]Going to show you about lateral inbalance and surface warp [*]Going to locate errors in assembly [*]Going to teach you how to maiden a plane [*]Going to trim out your plane [*]Going to simulate other flyers at the field [*]Going to blow a hard gust of air at your plane at just the wrong time [*]Going to simulate that hard sink thermal just off the runway threshold, though doable in G4 [*]Going to have a bird come out and attack your plane in the air [*]Going to give you the weak knees you'll get the first time you fly [*]Going to throw a bug in your face and the sun glare in your eyes at the wrong time
[/ul]

As I said above, when used properly simulators are great tools. They should be used for a student to practice what they learn every week at the field, and when used this way they will drastically reduce the time it takes to solo. But the should NEVER be used as the primary teaching tool to learn to fly with.

Look at it this way, I can use Microsoft Flight Simulator and fly a 747 from New York to LA. But I doubt anybody here would get in a real Jumbo Jet with me at the controls!!!

Tools used properly are very useful, tools used improperly can do damage and harm.

Ken

No. Simulators are good tools, but there's just too much a simulator can't teach you.

PS: Ken, I would get on the 747. Why? Because I'm confident you wouldn't even be able to start the thing up let alone set the Inertial Reference System (IRS) for navigation and complete the other required tasks before leaving the ramp.

Thanks for all the replies guys. I think ignorance is a beginners worst enemy. Fortunately I'm one of those people who do their homework before going out and buying/doing something.

Just reading some of the replies has already taught me a thing or two. YouTube has also taught me a lot, meaning not what to do Has anyone Youtubed RC plane crash? Damn, you can just feel their pain!

I have a friend at work who's been flying for over 20 years so I'll also pick his brains. He currently has a 1/4 Tiger Moth, although he hasn't flown it for over a year. I think he's lost his bottle to fly it as it took him forever to build from scratch, and he doesn't believe in simulators, even though he's never used one (Techphobe)

As for the simulation, I seem to get on well with flying the 300 Extra, and Hanger 9's ShowTime 50 kind of catches my eye. I'm wondering if light throw set-up with 900 flights on a buddy box would get me use to flying a 3D plane for real

Cheers Ian

I find that most people are a little impatient and I don't think anyone will want to buddy box with you for more than about 500 or so flights