> The fanciest thing in the plane was probably the HSI. The HSI is probably the most intuitive navigation instrument for me. You point the picture of the plane

> The fanciest thing in the plane was probably the HSI. The HSI is probably the most intuitive navigation instrument for me. You point the picture of the plane to the heading you want to fly into or away from the radio beacon, and it tells you whether you need to fly left or right in order to intercept the correct course. For fun, I fly the Lockheed Super Constellation^1 in my flight simulator (FlightGear; it's FOSS) in CAT2 or even CAT3 weather mode, and try to fly from one airport to another using only the 'steam gauge' instruments and my memory of the radio navigation frequencies. Recently I've been hand-flying without the autopilot as well. I'm the pilot, navigator, radio man and flight engineer for the quad R-3350 engines all in one seat. There's something amazingly satisfying about seeing the ALSF lights appear through the jet-black haze seconds before a smooth touchdown, and I'm proud to say that I've only crashed into hills a few times! ^1: ...which predates glass cockpit instruments in airliners by about half a century