is it possible to land a plane using autopilot?

[stevehookem]

FSX does support autoland. Full autoland is possible if you use an airplane that has it. Try Level-D 767, Captain Sim 757 and PMDG 747 to name a few. They have full autoland with flare and rollout. Perfect for Cat 3 approaches to zero/zero. You see the runway when the wheels touch! Literally!

To say it's a waste of time to use the autopilot is not correct either. This is a sim, not a game. Using the autopilot is part of real-world training and will help you improve as a pilot. For example, autopilot will allow you to learn ILS approaches and navigation easier and faster. You can focus on the systems rather than the hand flying. Of course, I think you should be a proficient pilot before getting to that point but to rule it out completely is not good.

[Brett_Henderson]

To say it's a waste of time to use the autopilot is not correct either. This is a sim, not a game. Using the autopilot is part of real-world training and will help you improve as a pilot. For example, autopilot will allow you to learn ILS approaches and navigation easier and faster. You can focus on the systems rather than the hand flying. Of course, I think you should be a proficient pilot before getting to that point but to rule it out completely is not good.

That's an excellent point, but redundant. Of course it's perfectly realistic to use the autopilot.. there's really no way to fly long distance without one.. ESPECIALLY a tube. However.. these threads are started by people asking questions (good questions), that indicate that they are NOT proficient yet. The person who already understands this stuff, is usually the question answerer. What I try to do, is encourage people who are obviously IFR "challenged", to get back to basics (in smaller slower aircraft). Leave that autopilot off until you master instrument flight , else you're puting yourself in a position to be asking questions that have answers you probably don't understand 8-)

"Realistically", you'd not even BE in a tube cockpit, before you could fly a C172.. navigating by instrument alone.. flying flawless, published approaches (holds and all), sans autopilot ..

I don't fly tubes often.. it's just too much work to do it realistically, when you don't do it regularly... But if I do commit to a tube flight, wrestling that beast to the ground at the end of the flight is THE most fun part. Why just be a passenger at that point ?

[SEDKW]

Very few of us who fly "tubes" in real life use the autoland system, simply because we ENJOY FLYING! We WANT TO land the plane manually, and we want to do it as smooth as we can, so the comfort for passengers will be at the highest level.
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