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pipper

Flight director and command bar

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Hello again to the PMDG community....Last week I posted a comment/question about the PMDG 737NG command bar possibly displaying "questionable" commands. I was referring to the V bar exclusively. In my post I had stated that I frequently got climb UP commands when ABOVE the GS and vice versa. A bunch of guys responded with some good feedback. Well, I think I found an explanation. I have tested my theory for the past week and I think its accurate. When flying on AP, with LOC capture selected, if you capture the LOC but then turn the AP OFF to hand fly an ILS, the command bars will only provide LOC guidance, and NOT the GS. If you had selected APP following LOC capture, and shortly thereafter turned the AP off to hand fly the ILS, then you will receive GS and LOC guidance with the command bars. I always thought that following AP disconnect the command bars would provide GS and LOC guidance regardless of whether APP was selected, but that has not been the case for me. Now, if I want to hand fly the ILS following selection of LOC capture, I select APP and shortly thereafter disconnect the AP and I can hand fly the ILS with command bar guidance.I guess this begs a second question.....assuming AP OFF, will the flight director command bar display LOC and GS guidance? Thanks again to the guys who offered some help....hope this helps you out too!Cheers to all.......Joe Swier

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>I guess this begs a second question.....assuming AP OFF, will>the flight director command bar display LOC and GS guidance?> Joe,Not sure I understand this question. Whether AP is ON or OFF has nothing to do with workings of the FD. As you correctly just discovered what really matters is what vertical/horizontal NAV mode is selected on the panel. It can be VOR, HDG, LOC, ALT, LNAV, GS, APP, VNAV, etc. - FD will work with all of them. You may be stuck with an erroneous idea that FD is only for flying APP mode. If only horizontal mode was selected FD will only provide horizontal cues, the same applies for vertical.Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

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Thanks Michael for pointing out that AP off or on has nothing to do with FD workings. Indeed, the mode selected is the whole key. I guess I thought that if you selected LOC Capture but were flying an ILS,that the glide slope would automatically be integrated into the flight director. I now know this is not true......but glad I found out!Thanks for the feedback!Joe Swier

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Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this also dependent on whether you have a normal VOR tuned in or a speciel equipped VOR giving you the ILS functionality...ie a glidscope as well as the localizer/TDI (Track Deviation Indicator)?Cheers,


Richard Åsberg

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