A Generic Virtual Reality Flight Simulator

Abstract

Flight simulators are used for different purposes, such as pilot training, aircraft design and development. Full-scale flight simulators have high costs and dependency on aircraft type due to hardware constraints. Hence, virtual reality flight simulators are designed. On the other hand, they are generally created only for specific applications, such as helicopter simulators. As a result, these tools can hardly be used as a generic tool which can work with various aircraft simulations. Although, there are certain generic virtual reality applications that can be used for virtual prototyping and ergonomics, they lack realistic flight simulation and environment. In this paper, we present a generic aerospace application which brings a solution to these problems. The architecture of the application is described and a calibration method which, makes the application independent of the physical mock-up and the flight simulator compatible with different aircraft types, is presented. The preliminary results of the first prototype are given as the generic virtual reality flight simulator is used by the aerospace industry for research and development purposes.