ballz said:
I ask because i'm driving 5 hours away to prepare for ACS (i have zero flying experience) and their sim doesn't move around and stuff like that, so the guy i was talking to said it might be worth my while to just get a couple hours of flying under my belt instead of practicing on their sim. I just wanna know if i should do that cause it costs quite a bit more money and i'm at college living off kd and noodles.
I don't know why so many of the people have noted on the boards that they are driving 5 hours out of their way, spending however much money to get a few hours in a plane, buying $300 yoke and pedals and flight sims off eBay all to prepare for Aircrew Selection, etc. etc. A few hours in a small plane or spending forty million dollars on top notch flight sim equipment and decking out your entire basement is not going to determine whether you pass or fail - it may not even really help you prepare "properly".
Each simulator flies differently, the CAPSS simulators as well. The CAPSS simulator isn't even designed to fly as a real aircraft would - it's designed to simulate FLYING an aircraft, but not designed to simulate how an aircraft actually flies. If you are really intent on passing ACS, ENSURE you know your instruments, where each of them are and what each corresponds to - that will make your crosscheck (another important element of ACS) much, much more efficient as you won't spend that extra 2 seconds making sure you are, in fact, looking at your climb and descent rate, or your airspeed indicator, etc. Read and re-read and then re-read again the study manual the CFRC gives you, and then when you're done re-reading it, re-read it again. Once you've finished that, re-read it again. And then again.
As noted in the CAPSS study guide, session #4 measures your ability to fly around a traffic pattern. My advice for this session (obviously, this session is the most important as it has an entire two pages (?) on it in the study guide) is to (in your re-reading of the study guide a thousand times, like I mentioned) memorize the traffic pattern as best as you can. If you memorize the traffic pattern, just like where/what all the instruments are, you won't spend that extra, crucial 3 seconds looking at the screen in front of you and reading and interpreting what you have to do next. If you have to spend those 3 seconds reading and interpreting the next maneuver on the traffic pattern, those 3 seconds are all it takes to let your instruments get away from you, potentially ruining your flight performance. If you know all the maneuvers you're going to be having to make ahead of time, you can execute the motions no problem (maybe with a quick double-check to confirm, although that is better than however long it may take you to look at, read, and interpret the upcoming maneuver).
On my course, there were four candidates - half passed for pilot, and half failed. The two candidates that failed BOTH had prior flying experience, and one of them had his PPL. The two of us that passed (myself and another younger individual) both had/have no prior flying experience whatsoever - I have never touched a private airplane and I have spent a maximum of maybe 2 hours in my lifetime on a flight simulator on my computer, just farting around. The reason a seemingly unreal amount of people with their PPL's fail is simply due to the fact that because they are already qualified pilots, they know that it is OK in the real world to fly 20 ft above or below assigned altitude, to fly 5 kts faster or slower than the assigned airspeed, etc. These pilots go into the CAPSS simulator with these pilot habits, and blindly fail simply due to the fact that the simulator is measuring your ability to follow instructions and how well you can maintain perfection of all the instruments.
Like someone else mentioned in another similar thread, which candidates do you think are going to pass? The one who keeps the aircraft perfectly steady at 2,200 ft when the ASSIGNED altitude is 2,000 ft and fly at 180 kts when the assigned airspeed is 160 kts... or the candidate who fluctuates above and below the assigned altitude and faster and slower than the assigned airspeed but does everything in his power to attempt to maintain an altitude of 2000 ft and an airspeed of 160 kts? Think about it.
The CFRC gives you the study guide for a reason. Read. Re-read. Re-read again. And then, yes, you got it, re-read one more time. Then maybe once more just for poops and giggles. Stop going out and spending eighty thousand dollars on flight simulators, private airplanes, neon blue flight suits to wear to bed at night, personal plastic wings to wear on your back while you watch Jetstream, Mayday, or Flight Path on TV. It will not prepare you for ACS and the stresses you will face there. (Oh yes, stress being another thing you will have to deal with... that is a whole other story, trust me). Just memorize the study manual. The only thing prior experience does to help you is ensure you know the instruments, their locations, and functions.
Feel free to ask if you have any more questions. While at Trenton, relax, enjoy the great mess food @ Yukon Galley, go sightseeing and see some Hercs and Globemasters, watch some good TV but most importantly, study study study.
$0.02
Dave
not to get nervous and you'll be fine. There's nothing wrong with trying to find out information about what you are going to go through, I was doing it 
