Introducing an Updated Design for the Mach 0.1

One of the things that experienced glider pilots and instructors say is that even though they have tons of experience, they can NOT fly a glider well in Condor, especially on tow. There are two reasons for this that they need to understand. If they are using a joystick on a table, they are controlling the stick using their shoulder muscles, not their fingertips like they would in a glider. This means that while they KNOW what to do with the stick, they have to learn a different way to cause those movements, which takes them back to being a beginner again. In the Mach 0.1, they would have their forearm resting on their thigh, just like in the real glider, and controlling the stick with their fingertips. We have found that at the conventions, CFI-G’s who say Condor is a waste of time change their opinion after flying in the Mach 0.1. Without exception, every experienced pilot was able to fly the tow on Condor when they were in the Mach 0.1. Second, experienced pilots are hardwired to expect to feel the movement of the glider when they move the controls. When they don’t get this feedback, they instinctively move the controls more, leading to over controlling. Again, this makes some instructors think that Condor is not accurately modeling how a glider behaves. When a student, with little or no experience gets in the sim, they are controlling the glider based on visual cues, and don’t have the hard wired response yet of expecting to feel the gliders movement, so they don’t have this problem with over controlling.