IFR for Simulator Pilots

About this course

This series of lectures and demonstrations will teach you the knowledge and skills needed to confidently fly your airplane using IFR rules. This enables you to fly any plane through almost any kind of weather and fly like the pros do. We focus on the Cessna 172 with a G1000 panel in MSFS (FS2020), although any simulator and airplane could work. You will eventually transition up to faster planes including the Beech Bonanza, The Cessna Citation Mustang TwinJet, and the CJ4. This real-world curriculum starts with holding patterns. First without wind correction nor any kind of fix. Then we add more complexity to the scenario. Holding with wind correction, holding on NDBs, VORs, VOR intercepts and GPS fixes. Moving on to learning chart reading and interpretation, we learn about approaches to airports and missed approaches. Transitioning to deeper topics, we cover more details about SIDs and STARs, complete with explanations and demonstrations. IFR radio communications are broken down to be easily understood. Using the G1000 glass cockpit, found in many planes both in real life and in the simulator, you learn to manage all aspects of the panel along the way. We eventually move on to faster planes that still have the G1000 such as the Bonanza and the Cessna Citation Mustang. As a final tip in the course, we learn the basics of an FMS system in the CJ4 twinjet.