The cheapest Cessna (say a half-a-century old Cessna-150 with only a thousand or hours left on the engine before mandatory refurbishment) will set you back maybe $20k.
Then there’s the maintenance costs (one every 50 flight hours, a bigger one every 100 flight hour and so on as well as the yearly one), plus insurance and fuel.
Oh, and flying one of those planes is not really excitting (except for landings, those are cool) mainly because it cruises at 90 knots airspeed (about 160 Km/h) which at the minimum flying height per flight regulations (except during takeoff and landing) which is 1000 feet (around 300m) does not feel at all fast.
Absolutelly, spend $30k (if you get it as a kit and assemble it yourself) and you can get something a little more excitting … or spend $2k in that setup (I’m guessing, assuming you assemble it yourself) and let the Suspension Of Disbelief save you the rest of the money and you can even fligh planes that cost many millions of dollars (which, judging by the controls, is what that setup is simulating).
Mind you a Commercial Pilot License is “only” 1000 flight hours so you might get it for less than $100k depending on which country you do your training in and hence the cost per hour in the air (or, if you do like my Amateur Pilot Trainers in the UK and give lessons for the flight hours, which can be done with only an Amateur Pilot License) though you’ll get a lot of “special moments” with trainees at the controls (did I mention landings are exciting ;)).
Flight simulators are a pretty niche hobby. Spent a lot of time playing the Microsoft Flight Simulator - comes handy if you wanna study aviation or become a pilot.
I can 100% promise this cost less than getting a pilots license, especially if you want to fly jets. Most people will pay over $10,000 just to get their private pilot license.
Yeah and the $10,000 is just for single prop. ATPL costs like $70-100k so yeah like Yurgenst said, this setup is definitely cheaper.
Also this isn’t the craziest setup I’ve seen. On Reddit years ago I saw a F-16 pilot recreate his entire cockpit complete with the FLIR displays and a real F-16 yoke but managed to make it collapsible. So he could stow it into a chest like thing that his wife approved of haha. He was like “I just really love my job, I want to keep doing it when I’m not working”.
This person is probably a CFI, and simulator time is always cheaper than actual flight time. 25% of your flight time can be in a simulator when learning to fly.
Fuel and maintenance are the big ones. I had a CFI who owned his own old Cessna 150 and would teach me for free. I just had to pay for gas and maintenance, and it was still almost $200 an hour. Aviation is expensive!
I’ve seen certified simulators that are nothing more than a 27" monitor, a yoke, peddles, and a throttle control. That set-up looks better than any certified simulator that I’ve ever seen.
You are completely correct. Most certified simulators aren’t used for familiarisation training but basic manoeuvres. Buying a certified simulator is often extremely expensive and getting one you’ve built certified is insanely expensive and very, very complicated (which is why they often come as pre-assembled kits that flight schools can line up themselves).
I would wager one of my children that this set up isn’t certified.
I wouldn’t bet against you. This setup looks like it is for a jet, probably a commercial airliner. It seems unlikely that anyone is getting certified flight instructions for a 737 in some dude’s dining room.
There’s also the issue of medical. Someone might not be able to medically get a pilots license, but can pull up a chair. It might not have anything to do with money.
They might already have a pilot license. This setup costs way less per hour than actual flying. And it lets you try things that would be risky in a real plane. Or you can practice bad weather or equipment failures safely, so you can better handle a real situation if it occurs.
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