Hi allwhen you land the 744 in fs9, then press F2 once to bring the plane into one notch of reverse, is this the idle reverse??Thanks

Just a wild guess here, but I don

Yes, real jets have moving reverse-levers because reverse thrust can be graduated. But as far as I know, reverse-levers can only be moved if the main thrust levers are in the idle position.Jose Luis

As I understand it, idle reverse means the reversers have only slightly been applied, the reverse mechanism on the engines has opened up but the engines are still only producing idle thrust. From that point, the more you lift the reverse levers up the more thrust is applied. As I understand it there is a limiter system in place to protect the engines from exceeding design parameters, but crews have to be careful not to just apply all the reverse thrust without consideration for the engines and indeed the actual NEED for all that reverse thrust. Something to bear in mind is that the majority of the deceleration on the ground is handled by a combination of the speedbrakes dumping the lift, and the autobrakes applying brakes to achieve a constant rate of deceleration. I can't quote the exact contribution of the reverse thrust as a percentage of the deceleration effort, but I do know it is a lot less than most folks think. Given the noise that most reversers make. Having said all this, I normally use either full reverse or idle / none at all depending on my Vref and the runway available.

Thanks for your help :-)I asked this, because a while ago I read a report into the QF744 incident at BKK where the company policy was to only use 'idle reverse'It then goes on to say this has since changed, and that pilots should use much more than idle.

Remember that any company policy you come across is just that: A policy. Not law, not regulation, etc... If you NEED maximum reverse thrust, then by all means throw it all out there!Certain airports have limitations on use of reverse thrust for noise purposes but unless I've been misinformed, these limitations are in complete deference to an emergency situation where (at the risk of being sensationalist) it would be better to wake a few folks up at 11PM than roll a multi-million dollar airliner into a harbour because you were scared of using all the resources available to you.Wow, look at all the foam around my mouth. :-)

Qantas policy at the time was actually to use no reverse thrust if I remember correctly. When I travelled on QF to LHR and back from MEL in '99, and they didn't use reverse thrust once to my knowledge on the 747-400 series.

More often than not these days QF will use idle reverse thrust as this is all that is normally necessary, but ultimately it comes down the decision of PIC. Same deal with autobrakes, although in normal conditions 3 is usually the go.