NoHeat
Final Approach
A week ago, I got a chance to fly "mixed-reality" simulators for the T-6 and T-38 trainers. You wear a virtual-reality headset, which gives you a 360-degree look around. The setup is shown in the photo below. It's made for the Air Force by FlightSafety.
I found that the T-6 was very easy for me, as a single-engine piston pilot, to fly. The software engineer (not a CFI) started me on a three-mile final to Seattle-Tacoma. I did a touch-and go, a pattern, another touch-and-go, and then on the downwind I did a couple of perfect barrel-rolls! That was the first time I've ever done a barrel-roll. I landed without any mishap, and then I was shown to the T-38 trainer, which had a similar setup.
I found that the T-38 was a lot harder for me to fly. Very little input to the stick resulted in a lot of response. I tried a barrel-roll again, and immediately went into an unrecoverable nose dive. Luckily, before I "died", the software engineer told me to pause the simulation (by pulling what looks like a gun trigger on the stick) and he reset the sim so that I was once again on a three-mile final to land at Boeing Field. I landed just a few feet short of the runway, and the plane wouldn't taxi after that, because I apparently had more-or-less crashed. Bummer. And my two minutes were up. Overall, the T-38 is way harder than the T-6, when you've got only two minutes of sim time to learn what to do.
I was told that there's a base (in Wichita Falls ?) where the Air Force uses these trainers. It's possible to train for formation flying, with multiple sims flying together, and it's possible to train for refueling as well.
One limitation of this mixed-reality approach -- I found that the picture you see in the headset is a bit blurry -- I could not read the airspeed or altimeter on the panel, so I ended up just doing seat-of-the-pants flying.
I found that the T-6 was very easy for me, as a single-engine piston pilot, to fly. The software engineer (not a CFI) started me on a three-mile final to Seattle-Tacoma. I did a touch-and go, a pattern, another touch-and-go, and then on the downwind I did a couple of perfect barrel-rolls! That was the first time I've ever done a barrel-roll. I landed without any mishap, and then I was shown to the T-38 trainer, which had a similar setup.
I found that the T-38 was a lot harder for me to fly. Very little input to the stick resulted in a lot of response. I tried a barrel-roll again, and immediately went into an unrecoverable nose dive. Luckily, before I "died", the software engineer told me to pause the simulation (by pulling what looks like a gun trigger on the stick) and he reset the sim so that I was once again on a three-mile final to land at Boeing Field. I landed just a few feet short of the runway, and the plane wouldn't taxi after that, because I apparently had more-or-less crashed. Bummer. And my two minutes were up. Overall, the T-38 is way harder than the T-6, when you've got only two minutes of sim time to learn what to do.
I was told that there's a base (in Wichita Falls ?) where the Air Force uses these trainers. It's possible to train for formation flying, with multiple sims flying together, and it's possible to train for refueling as well.
One limitation of this mixed-reality approach -- I found that the picture you see in the headset is a bit blurry -- I could not read the airspeed or altimeter on the panel, so I ended up just doing seat-of-the-pants flying.
