Flight simulator

In past regulations, it referred specifically to devices which can closely mimic the behavior of aircraft throughout various procedures and flight conditions.

The Link Trainer was a basic metal frame flight simulator usually painted in its well-known blue color.

Some of these early war era flight simulators still exist, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to find working examples.

His design had a pneumatic motion platform driven by inflatable bellows which provided pitch and roll cues.

Link flew in to meet them at Newark Field in New Jersey, and they were impressed by his ability to arrive on a day with poor visibility, due to practice on his training device.

The result was that the USAAF purchased six Link Trainers, and this can be said to mark the start of the world flight simulation industry.

[7] In 1954 United Airlines bought four flight simulators at a cost of $3 million from Curtiss-Wright that were similar to the earlier models, with the addition of visuals, sound and movement.

[13] The simulator manufacturers are consolidating and integrate vertically as training offers double-digit growth: CAE forecast 255,000 new airline pilots from 2017 to 2027 (70 a day), and 180,000 first officers evolving to captains.

Crawley-based L3 CTS entered the market in 2012 by acquiring Thales Training & Simulation's manufacturing plant near Gatwick Airport where it assembles up to 30 devices a year, then UK CTC training school in 2015, Aerosim in Sanford, Florida in 2016, and Portuguese academy G Air in October 2017.

Airbus and Boeing have invested in their own training centres, aiming for higher margins than aircraft manufacturing like MRO, competing with their suppliers CAE and L3.

Such "engineering flight simulators" can provide a fast way to find errors, reducing both the risks and the cost of development significantly.

[21] Additionally, this allows use of extra measurement equipment that might be too large or otherwise impractical to include during onboard a real aircraft.

[29] The actual procedure accepted by all CAAs (Civil Aviation Authorities) around the world is to propose 30 days prior qualification date (40 days for CAAC) a MQTG document (Master Qualification Test Guide), which is proper to a unique simulator device and will live along the device itself, containing objective, and functional and subjective tests to demonstrate the representativeness of the simulator compare to the airplane.

From perspective of the device, the inputs are primary flight controls, instrument panel buttons and switches and the instructor's station, if present.

[22]: 16  The forces for motion are calculated from aerodynamical models, which in turn depend on state of control surfaces, driven by specific systems, with their avionics, etc.

As an example, instead of simulating flow over the wings, lift coefficient may be defined in terms of motion parameters like angle of attack.

To achieve good transfer of skills, there are very specific requirements in the flight simulator regulations[16] that determine how closely they must match the real aircraft.

These requirements in case of full flight simulators are so detailed, that it may be cost-effective to use the real part certified to fly, rather than manufacture a dedicated replica.

Vibration actuators may also be included, either due to helicopter simulation requirements, or for aircraft equipped with a stick shaker.

The necessity for a physical copy of a cockpit contributes to the cost of simulator construction, and ties the hardware to a specific aircraft type.

Because of these reasons, there is ongoing research on interactions in virtual reality, however lack of tactile feedback negatively affects users' performance when using this technology.

However, some types of craft, e.g. fighter aircraft, require a very large field of view, preferably almost full sphere, due to the manoeuvres that are performed during air combat.

[52] Combined with the need to pair virtual synthesis with military level training requirements, graphics technologies applied in flight simulation were often years ahead of what would have been available in commercial products.

Advances in algorithms and electronics in flight simulator visual systems and CGI in the 1970s and 1980s influenced many technologies still used in modern graphics.

Over time CGI systems were able to superimpose texture over the surfaces and transition from one level of image detail to the next one in a smooth manner.

For example, the Singer Link Digital Image Generator (DIG) created in 1978 was considered one of the worlds first CGI system.

After the invention of Stewart platform[55] simultaneous operation of all actuators became the preferred choice, with some FFS regulations specifically requiring "synergistic" 6 degrees of freedom motion.

That especially affects the ability to simulate sustained accelerations, and requires a separate model to approximate the cues to the human vestibular system within the given constraints.

Recent scientific studies have shown that the use of technology such as vibration or dynamic seats within flight simulators can be equally effective in the delivery of training as large and expensive 6-DOF FFS devices.

The heave system supports a horizontal beam on which are mounted 40 ft rails, allowing lateral movement of a simulator cab of +/- 20 feet.