Flight Simulator Robot: From Link Trainer to ABB Arms

A flight simulator robot puts a cockpit on the end of an industrial arm and lets software throw it around the sky. It is the newest answer to an old problem: pilots need to practise engine fires and bad landings without leaving the ground. This post follows the story from a French training barrel and the Link Trainer to the six-legged motion platforms in airline simulators, then to robot-arm cockpits built by researchers and by Embraer. It also covers this month's simulator orders and where ABB robots could fit. ABB does not sell a flight simulator, so those parts are possibilities.

A Baltic Aviation Academy full-flight simulator on its six legs, 2012. Photo: Baltic Aviation Academy / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

From a training barrel to the Link Trainer

Pilots trained on the ground before simulators had screens. The Antoinette company's "tonneau," a seat in a half barrel on a frame, moved by helpers on the ground, is considered a precursor of the flight simulator, and French military officers started ground training around 1910. During the First World War, ground-based simulators taught new pilots to aim guns at moving targets. They were crude, but they proved that some lessons could be learned without risking an aircraft.

An Antoinette training barrel, an early ground trainer, with helpers around the frame. Photo: Unknown / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Edwin Link turned the idea into a product. He began building his trainer in 1927, the work took about 18 months, and it went on sale in 1929. Pitch and roll came from organ bellows made in his family's organ factory in Binghamton, New York, driven by an electric pump. After fatal accidents on the mail flights, the US Army Air Corps ordered six Link Trainers on 23 June 1934 at $3,500 each. American Airlines became the first commercial airline to buy one in 1937.

A Link Trainer Modelo C-8 on display in a museum. Photo: Rjcastillo / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

The Second World War made the Link Trainer a mass product. Link built more than 10,000 of the blue boxes, one every 45 minutes, and about 500,000 US pilots trained on Link simulators. In 1954 United Airlines bought four simulators from Curtiss-Wright for about $3 million, the first of today's modern commercial simulators, with visuals, sound and movement. A Comet 4 simulator used three-axis hydraulic motion in 1958. By 1962 Redifon offered hexapods, and D. Stewart described the six-jack layout in 1965.

A Link Trainer and its instructor, from a US Army Air Forces postcard of Chanute Field, Illinois. Photo: US Army Air Forces / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Full-flight simulators in 2026, and the first robot arms

Orders are still arriving. On 15 October 2026 Business Wire reported that FlightSafety International will build a Level D full-flight simulator for Azul Brazilian Airlines, to be delivered to Azul's training center in Campinas in late 2027. The Level D label is the FAA's highest, and it requires six-degree-of-freedom motion, a horizontal field of view of at least 150 degrees and a collimated display. The simulator is for an Embraer E2 jet, and reports differ on whether that is the E190-E2 or the E195-E2. Cabs like this sit in a white shell on legs that move the whole cabin.

A FlightSafety International C-17 full-flight simulator at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, 2014. Photo: US Air Force via Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Other buyers are doing the same. On 21 October 2026 afm.aero reported that CAE is adding four business aviation full-flight simulators across the Americas this year. In June 2018 there were 1,270 commercial airline simulators in service, and 85 percent of them were full-flight devices. In 2021 EASA approved the first virtual reality based flight simulation training device. The photo above shows a CAE C-130J full-flight simulator at Ramstein Air Base in Germany in 2015, and like the others it rides on six jacks.

A CAE C-130J full-flight simulator at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, 2015. Photo: Senior Airman Timothy Moore / US Air Force via Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Robot arms offer another way to give six degrees of freedom. In 2011 Deakin University in Australia showed its Universal Motion Simulator, a heavily modified industrial arm that can generate up to 6 Gs for fighter pilot training. In 2015 researchers in Germany showed a robotic arm moving a cockpit through virtual takeoffs and landings. Embraer and ITA's patent, granted on 9 January 2024, describes a six-axis arm such as the KUKA KR 1000 on a 10 metre rail, giving seven degrees of freedom, carrying a spherical screen about 4 metres wide.

A KUKA Robocoaster 4D simulator giving coaster rides at a public celebration in Munich, 2012. Photo: digital cat / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Where ABB robots fit, and what is hard

ABB has no flight simulator and no passenger-rated robot, and we found no ABB arm used as one. ABB's large IRB 7720 carries up to 620 kg, while the Embraer patent names a KUKA KR 1000 as its example arm, so any ABB version would need a payload check against the cockpit and screen. A passenger robot would also need certification that ABB does not have. The better fit is software. Motions for an arm cockpit would be planned and tested in RobotStudio before they ever reach a real seat. Our posts on the racing simulator and on theme park robot arm rides cover the same arms.

Two engineers program an ABB IRB 7710 or IRB 7720 large robot with a FlexPendant. Photo: ABB

Cost and rules are the main limits. A Halldale article from 15 September 2026 asks how much training really needs the full-flight simulator, a sign that operators are weighing the price of every hour in a cab. A robot arm also needs room, strong foundations and fences, and an emergency stop plan that can bring a pilot down safely if a joint fails. A regulator would have to qualify the whole machine, and the Embraer design is a patent, not a certified product.

An engineer programs a robot cell in RobotStudio next to an ABB industrial robot. Photo: ABB

The next jobs are smaller and lighter. In 2026 Skyfly introduced a mobile eVTOL simulator that combines virtual reality with motion cueing, and CAE launched its 700MXR at the Farnborough Air Show in July 2022 for single pilot eVTOL operations, with a compact mini-motion platform and a 360 degree field of view. Volocopter and CAE also planned a mixed reality training program for an air taxi. Factories already use big arms such as the IRB 5710 for heavy handling, and the programmers and safety engineers who run such arms are the people simulator makers would need if they choose robot cockpits.

Engineers with an ABB IRB 5710, a large robot for heavy handling. Photo: ABB

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