To get a VFR license, yes, you have to know about everything you mentioned. You must learn about all the instruments. What kind of instrument scans to do in va

To get a VFR license, yes, you have to know about everything you mentioned. You must learn about all the instruments. What kind of instrument scans to do in various kinds of situations. Ascent/descent, climbing turns, level turns into a heading, etc. VFR pilots do learn about reading the instruments, but at the same time they learn about the dangers that come with focusing too much on the instruments— such as not watching for traffic or other awareness issues. They also must learn a ton about weather. So a VFR pilot is trained in some of the basic instrument reading things needed for low visibility flight. But there’s a lot more expertise involved in safely flying instruments than in visual flight. Precise, mentally demanding procedures, multitasking. VFR pilots are also required to learn about why instrument flying is so much more difficult. A big part of the reason is spatial disorientation[1]. Your senses tell you one thing while the instruments tell you another. And the scary part is that when the equipment fails, sometimes it’s your senses that are more correct. Pilots either blindly following their senses when their senses are wrong, or ignoring their senses when their instruments are wrong— both of those kill people. To compare flying in a real small plane versus a simulator: When you go into a stall in a small plane, the feeling of dropping feels a lot like a roller coaster, with your stomach coming up into your mouth. That woozy feeling is much the same. And certain kinds of weather can cause a similar rapid change in elevation even without you changing the attitude of the plane. The small plane is so much more (potentially) wild than a big jet, it’s a bit more like being in a flying lawnmower. A simulator does teach lots of the skills you need to know, and is especially useful for establishing muscle memory for things like instrument scans and other procedures. Then doing that in a real plane is like doing the same thing, but on a wild roller coaster, and with the full knowledge that if you mess up you’ll die. You should go for a ride! Tons of places offer very cheap introductory flights where you get to take the controls for a bit during that first flight. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spatial_disorientation https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spatial_disorientation