Welcome to the Bristol Flight Simulator Group

Our Aim...

...Is to enable flight simulator enthusiasts to enjoy this hobby and to allow them to learn and share their knowledge about the many aspects of a wide range of flight simulation programmes together with the software and hardware available to enhance them.

Our Activities

We seek to achieve our aim through different activities. Our monthly meetings - held at Aerospace Bristol, Hayes Way, Patchway, Bristol, BS34 5BZ - attract a host of people with expertise and interests that span across the flight simulation spectrum. Our weekly online fly-ins, hosted on our own private servers, attract a wider audience and have groups that cater for both GA and "heavy" aircraft operations.

If you'd like to read more about our activities, click on the "Read Whole Article" link below.

There is no charge for registration to use our forums, but we will ask you a few simple questions which will help us to put you in touch with the right people from the off. Please note that we require that acceptable standards of courtesy and good manners are maintained in all forum posts and online activities.

SO…

However you choose to join us, we look forward to welcoming you.

Meetings

The group started small – around ten to fifteen members who travelled to the Lincombe Barn in Downend, East Bristol for a monthly face to face meeting, and these meetings continue today in the same venue – although we now use a much larger room to accommodate the close to thirty people that we see most months!

At our meetings you’ll find seasoned simmers working with new pilots to answer their questions and help them set up their kit, some members showing off their new purchases, others discussing mutual interests in the simulation arena, and the occasional guest speaker either from the industry talking about their company’s offerings, or from the membership pool talking about a particular aspect of flight simulation.

Most importantly, you’ll find a friendly bunch of people, and a membership made up of a selection of scenery designers, VATSIM controllers and pilots, real-world pilots (both commercial and GA), cockpit builders, developers and (most importantly) flight simulation enthusiasts. Our members largely fall into the “GA” or “Airlines” camps, and fly one or more of FS9, FSX, X-Plane or Prepare3D. Somewhere in there, you’re bound to find someone who shares your interests.

Meetings are generally held on the fourth Sunday of the month, from 10:00 until 14:00 although they tend to move to earlier weekends in November and December as Christmas approaches.

We levy a small annual membership fee of £20 to cover club expenses.

Online

As time rolled on and the group grew, so did the appetite for sharing between meetings, and the website that you’re now reading was born in early 2008. The whole history of the group since it went online is here – we delete or archive nothing!

Whilst these forums are a key part of our group, the focus of our online presence now are weekly fly-ins on Tuesday and Thursday evenings where we connect our simulators to the group's private server and fly together online. Fly-ins are organised by the GA and Heavies elements of our group on Tuesdays and Thursdays respectively, and align with aircraft that fall into those categories. The systems we use however are able to support most combinations of computer and simulation software. Apart from adding an additional dimension to flying simulators, our private server offers a perfect environment in which to overcome those online nerves – you’re amongst a group of friends where mistakes don’t matter and encouragement is plenty. A good number of our members have gone on to become accomplished VATSIM pilots after growing their wings through flying online with us and most weekends a group of our members participates in a global VATSIM event. That said, many of our members have no intention of taking that step – it’s entirely up to you.

Away from the fly-ins we run the occasional online course using the server. To date these have covered subjects such as ATC terminology (for both pilots and controllers), and getting to grips with any of a number of high fidelity simulations. In the future – who knows?!

The server is available 24/7 (with occasional exceptions for maintenance very early in the morning some weeks), and many of our members take the opportunity to chat or iron problems out together online using TeamSpeak between meetings and fly-ins, so you’re sure to find someone to talk and possibly fly with most evenings.

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