Grounded Pilot

I read an article from AOPA’s Flight Training magazine talking about the checklist of seven basic skills to master as a pilot:

Rudder control
Pitch control
Ground track
Altitude control
Planning ahead
Aileron control

All of these skills are covered in the book Microsoft Flight Simulator X For Real World Pilots, which I discussed in my last post.  Prior to reading the book, I could never figure out why I could not properly align my airplane with runway when flying with real world weather (crosswinds).  Nor did I know how to correct my flight path to compensate for this problem (slips).  Something else I noticed when flying with the realism settings turned up was that the airplane would have a tendency of drifting to a heading left of my desired heading.  This was caused by P-Factor, and can be corrected by using a little rudder.  Also, I was always wondering why the aircraft would start drifting to the left of the runway during takeoff.  Again this can be corrected with a little rudder.

So if you have a chance, check out the article, there’s a lot in there to learn that will help your simulator flying.