ELITE or ON TOP for IFR training?

I wonder why there is no third-party lesson package for MSFS? The Rod
Machado lessons are helpful, but limited in scope.

Amore complete package of pre-configured flights would be a useful IFR
training accessory. Such a package would be like the Machado lessons in
MSFS, only much more extensive, say 40 hours worth. It would follow a
logical sequence to step you through all the various types and
configurations of procedures, with instructor voice over and some sort of
graphics in the flight analysis view. The package would come with all
required graphics, charts, and plates in printable form. The entire thing
could be sold or distributed as an internet download, and could probably be
done quite cheaply, say $30.

I know MSFS isn't the best flight model, but there are some big economic
advantages to using it. Everyone and their brother owns MSFS already, so
most folks would only have to buy the preconfigured flight package. The
developer would be free to concentrate on the lessons and documentation.
MSFS is relatively bug free, has extensive documentation and support, is
updated and upgraded every year, and interoperability with new versions of
Windows will never be an issue. There's a huge community of add-on planes
and panels out there, so it would be easy to match your mount. The
integrated ATC is well done.

Speaking as a new IFR student just starting out, I don't really want to use
a computer to learn to fly by reference to instruments. I'd rather do that
in an airplane. What I want help with is learning all the procedural stuff
and developing my situational awareness, so I'm not trying to learn how to
interpret a pair of VORs and NDB at $130 an hour. I don't think the lower
flight model quality is an issue there. The integrated Garmin GPS is
another plus.

Anyone familiar with the MSFS SDK? How hard would this be?

"'Vejita' S. Cousin" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Flying the lessons with IPT is challenging because it doesn't allow even
momentary errors. If you slip up on a minor detail right at the end of
the lesson, you must redo the entire lesson from the beginning. That
leads to boredom and little training. I have never made it through
flying "Plan A". Has anyone gotten all the way through?

I wouldn't know. It has never operated long enough for me to get
through more than the first few lessons. It's a piece of crap and
a waste of over $300 for the pair.

I've got On Top and IP Trainier (old old verisons, got them when winME
was new forget verison). I basically can't run them on my new system.
However, I have an old win98 system that I use for genlocking and they
both work fine on it.
Both programs really need to be updated to work with win32s, but they
can run under winXP/win2k. It just takes a lot of playing with the
settings.