It is my opinion and experience that you both have the right idea here. With almost four decades with the airlines, we did all of our "heavy duty" training in the simulator- V1 engine fails, rejected takeoffs, engine out approaches, landings and go arounds. I can't imagine the exposure doing that stuff in the real airplane. Shortly before I was on the scene, they *did* do some of that stuff in real aircraft, with a lot of unnecessary drama, or at worst, simulated training emergencies turned into real ones, up to, and including, hull losses and fatalities.
With technological advancement, the realism and fidelity of the hardware and software have resulted in the entire training process being conducted in the simulators; the first time a trainee touches a real aircraft is on a revenue flight (of course with a training pilot in the other seat).
With that inspiration, I built a replica of the Cirrus cockpit in my wife's office (she is a gift from heaven). The simulator started out as a 172 (my son was training on that). Over time, I converted the sim to a conversion-capable platform, and I fabricated this bolt-on Cirrus panel. Much of the realism of this version is made possible by purchased modules from
RealSimGearThey make common panel components that are physically and functionally accurate (in this case, the Garmin avionics, the Avidyne MFD and PFD, DFC-90 autopilot, and Cirrus switch panel, sidestick and throttle quadrant). Compare the simulation hardware to the image of our actual airplane- I succeeded in duplicating the instrument and control geometry to within ¼” (important for muscle memory development in training and practice). The Instructor Panel is seen at the right side of the area and is a monitor with touch screen format.
Your posts are coincidental in that in the past year we have added a Seneca III to our “fleet” and I am just rolling up my sleeves to build a Seneca representation. In our case, we just performed a wholesale facelift of the aircraft- with an entirely new panel with Garmin glass- so we will lean heavily on RealSimGear as a primary supplier. If there is interest here, I would be happy to share progress and outcome here going forward.
Some assorted observations:
If you are able, try to set up your control placement (geometry, distance) as close to your Seneca as possible (particularly your reach angle and distance to the throttle quadrant). You don’t want negative training in terms of automatic physical response in a future emergency
If your Seneca II is a six pack, you can set up a dedicated instrument panel (known as a 2-D- two dimensional panel) with an additional, inexpensive computer monitor. In the case of the Cirrus sim shown here, they are the “steam power” back up primary flight instruments below the main pilot panel. I used a program called “Panel Builder” that interfaces with X-Plane and builds and displays these gauges. I have been experimenting with building a Seneca panel, and without much of a learning curve, it will work.
Panel BuilderJust keep in mind that as you add screens you might run out of video outputs (most video cards have four, and I believe you are up to 3 screens now). Even if you add another video card you should consider that X-Plane is CPU limited (it doesn’t make optimal use of the extra cores on the CPU) and thus your frame rates will start to decline. Luckily, with flight simulation, the bar for realism is pretty low. My tired old eyes and senses do OK all the way down to 20-30 FPS. Keep in mind that theatrical format is 24 FPS; don’t be discouraged by sports or action gamers insisting that you need 60-120 FPS or else. You will be off to the races, however, if you are in my situation having to add three or four screens for all of the glass avionics units. In the end, I ended up without the right and left peripheral external views- the training and procedure displays are more important for my mission. Besides, most of my rehearsals involve squinting straight ahead at Decision Height and ½ mile!
I was experimenting with the same program you mentioned (the Iceman Seneca variation). It flew great with an important exception- with my hardware I did not have sufficient rudder authority for engine out conditions at higher power settings. It is entirely possible that this can be resolved with hardware and or software tweaking. If push comes to shove, I can fly this program for two engine realism, and just fly the native X-Plane Baron for the scary stuff (engine out).
One thing is certain- I would much rather be punishing the airplane with engine shutdowns and the like on a simulator and not our aircraft. When the instructor was (re) checking me out on a Seneca after my 40 year separation from the model, I wanted to cry when he demoed a full feather with restart. The stress on the airplane and avionics was brutal.
