Flight simulator with hardware and virtual reality for aeronautical engineering education in higher education

Immersive flight simulation has emerged as a promising strategy for narrowing the theory–practice gap in aeronautical engineering education. This study evaluated whether a virtual reality-enhanced flight simulation environment produced stronger learning gains than a desktop-based simulation environment in an undergraduate aeronautical engineering course. A quasi-experimental pretest–posttest design was implemented with 40 s- and third-year aeronautical engineering students. Participants completed the same eight-session training sequence over four weeks using Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 and identical flight-control peripherals, while the immersive condition additionally used a Meta Quest 3 headset to provide a first-person cockpit view. Data sources included a 30-item theory test, simulator-based procedural traces, a post-intervention experience questionnaire, and discomfort records. Baseline comparisons showed that the two conditions were comparable in age, sex distribution, prior virtual reality experience, and pretest performance. Both conditions improved significantly over time; however, the immersive virtual reality condition achieved higher posttest scores and larger learning gains than the desktop condition. Mean theory scores increased from 18.55 to 23.45 in the immersive condition and from 18.70 to 21.15 in the desktop condition, corresponding to mean gains of 4.90 and 2.45 points, respectively. Post-intervention experience ratings also favored the immersive condition, with higher perceived realism, immersion/usability, satisfaction/value, and overall training quality. Session-wise simulator traces showed a consistent descriptive pattern, with greater improvement in instrument-reading accuracy and faster response to simulated failures in the immersive condition. Overall, the findings indicate that a classroom-based immersive flight-simulation configuration built with commercially accessible hardware and software can strengthen conceptual learning and improve the perceived quality of training in aeronautical engineering education, while highlighting the need for future studies with longer follow-up periods, participant-level simulator logs, and multi-institution replication.