these days they're hard scheduling pool guys for sims too....bastards. makes it damn near impossible to get an OFT
as far as the transition, sure, it's quite a leap, but very doable. the trim is pretty good in the -45. All trim is electric. Aileron and stab trim are controlled by the coolie hat on the stick, while there is a SLOW little knob for rudder trim. For the most part, you can trim the rudder after t/o and leave it. You have to trim the nose for a/s rather often, but if you're doing something constant, itll hold trim rather well. After t/o about the only time you'll mess with aileron trim is on dirty up. You trim a lot, but its none of that "what way do you trim if you add power and climb" crap.... you trim to a neutral stick feel, and with centerline thrust, there really aren't any weird yawing tendencies.
just hop in the IFT all you can and work on basic flying. start off with straight and level, then try a 1k fpm descent, level off, 1k fpm climb, and repeat. Once you get that down, try to make a standard rate turn at the same time (don't worry about timing)... then try accel/decel while turning and maintaining rate/alt. Basic stuff like that will really help you build a scan and get a feel for the sim -- you won't get a feel for the jet till you actually fly it, but so much of the early stuff is in the sim.
you won't be behind at all....sure, some people get a lot more sim time than others prior to classing up, but they build you up pretty good. don't sweat it and more importantly, don't believe anything anybody in primary-land says about Jets or the jet VTs.
