General Flight Procedures

[Guest]

Hi All-I'm rather new at the FS2002 game and would appreciate a little help. For general flying, I've just been firing it up, setting a flight through the included Flight Planner, and flying away. I set my own weather, generally to nasty weather, as I like to fly IFR.I know there's a lot more that can be done, so I'm looking for some tips.For example:Let's say I want to fly from Houston to Denver. What do you experienced guys do? What are the steps? In other words, do you first use a Flight Planner add-on such as FSNav to generate a flight plan? Then do you import this into FS2002? Does this then couple up with something like Radar Contact?I keep reading about these elaborate flight plans with airways, intersections, STARS and SIDS, but where does all the info come from? Do the add-ons automatically "grab" all the appropriate VOR/ILS, ADF frequencies? Are you able to modify your routes? Can changes be made enroute? Are there any tutorials available that show how to set up a "real" flight from planning to pre-start to shutdown?Having a great time with all of this flying, but would really like to get into as much realism as possible.Thanks!Tailwheel

[yellow5 0]

I usually start with the flight plan and in the flight planning area I drag the red path line to a vor or intersection along my route. This way my IFR flight plan will follow this until ATC radar guide me to the IAP. This is something I would do in real life is to file my flight plan with my correct route. I use weather-maker so I don't have to create my own weather. I just put in the parameters and let it surprise me as this is what weather would do in real life. I go on line and see what the weather is in the area I am flying and try to represent that. Other than that I plan my fuel consuption. Once my flight plan is filed and the aircraft is checked out. It is cool to do a walk around and see that everything is in working order. Then get in set radios, AP, etc. Listen to ATIS, Contact Clearence, Start up, and the rest you all know how it goes. This is basically how I can get close to FS being as close to reality as possible. Somethings are left out, but they are pretty minor...

[Guest]

Tailwheel,Welcome to the great hobby of flight-simulation.To be frank, your question is not easily answered, but maybe if I give you a rundown on my personal approach will help you.Since you are specifically asking about IFR I'll stick to thatThere are many tools out there that help you create flightplans. FSNAV 3.0 being one (freeware) and FSNAVIGATOR 4.5 (commercial) that come to mind where you can visually plan your flight path and even export flightplans to FS2002.However those programs have their limitations as they do not take into account local flight restricitions and one-way airways for example.I have a pretty exhaustive collection of Enroute flight maps from most places on earth (I am still lacking in Asia though) for Low Altitude and High- Altitude airways which you can buy used at EBAY for example or new ones at Jeppessen or other vendors for aeronautical charts.I have complemented that with an complete original set of Terminal Charts for Europe (expensive) and have complemented that with Simcharts (Jeppesen) for the rest of the world, which are also Terminal charts but they come on a CD and are only to be used for simming.Then I check out with the terminal charts and the enroute charts my route by hand, feed that into FSNAVIGATOR and go flying. I usually fly online with VATSIM or IVAO (online ATC environments) unless I just want to go VFR joyriding in a GA (which is what I do more and more).In your shoes I would start small and would get a Jeppesen Simchart Region with the Enroute Charts (Europe for example) and get practicing on that, that gives you more to fly than you can actually swallow.There are some pretty good tutorials available on IFR flying here on AVSIM. Just go to the AER, almost all you want to know you can find there, but be warned, it takes a lot of reading.Hope that gets you started.Happy flyingRalph HummelStaff ReviewerAVSIM Online

[Vulcan 14]

Welcome Tailwheel,Just to correct something Ralph said, and give an explanation of my method.>However those programs have their limitations as they do not take into account local flight restricitions and one-way airways for examplehttp://www.fsbuild.com/, current version is free but Ernie is about to release a new version which is payware and more features.For airport charts your best bet is to go to the Vatsim site for that area, they usually have links to SID/STAR charts, but FSnav has those built in as well, although they may not be up to date.There is no need to import a flight plan in FSNav into FS2002, FSNav runs as part of FS2002 and you can link it into the FS2002 auto-pilot so FSNav will fly your plane on the route.Hope that brief account of my method helps.Good luck.

[Guest]

Hello,Personally, I fly for Meridian VA, so the first step for me is to get a 'dispatch' with the prefered routing. If you don't fly for a VA or they don't have the route I visit http://www.fly.faa.gov/Products/Coded_Depa...s_database.html which is the FAA prefered routing database. Next, I get the charts for the required DP/STAR. I get those from http://www.myairplane.com/databases/approach/index.php. The next step is to go to PM Flight Planner http://www.pmflightplanner.com/ and punch in the route. It'll give me lots of weight and balance infromation. I take the printout from PM Flight Planner along with the VA dispatch pages and put it on a clipboard in the 'cockpit'. I also have a binder that I put the manual for the aircraft I'm flying. All of the different operations manuals come from the AVSIM library (search "xxx operations", xxx being the aircraft type). Next, I gather all the charts in another binder. Finally, I load up FS2002. I put the plane at the proper airport/gate, load the fuel, load the plan, then set the time to about 45 minutes before scheduled departure. I load FSMETEO for live weather, SquawkBox for VATSIM ATC, and S-Combo for the crew voices. I then get the FMC and aircraft ready, following the checklist. Once I've got the speeds and everything calculated, it's off to the runway and into the skies. I try and make things as realistic as possible for the VA flights, and that's about as close as I can get to real-world operations. Have Fun,MarcMarc Gibsonhttp://www.freewebs.com/flightsimcfi/http://vatsim.pilotmedia.fi/statusindicato...tor=OD1&a=a.jpg

[Guest]

Always happy to learn something new.Would you point me towards the feature how FSNavigator 4.51 (latest built) displays one way airways?After what you wrote I tore through the manual and the program but could not find any mention of it, but maybe I have overlooked it. Any help on this would be appreciated :)Thanks in advanceHappy flyingRalph HummelStaff ReviewerAVSIM Online

[Vulcan 14]

Hi Ralph,Would you point me towards the feature how FSNavigator 4.51 (latest built) displays one way airways?Happy to oblige.The one-way airways are shown by a dotted line from a waypoint. That means you cannot fly that way up the airway but can fly To the waypoint from the opposite direction.Sorry not at my FS PC at the moment otherwise I would have cited an example.HTH

[ronzie 21]

For IFR flight of Commuter Class aircraft here's my procedures and supplies:1. Radar Contact 3.01 (payware). FSMetar (freeware) for on or off-line weather surface conditions only. NAV 3.1 (freeware) flightplanner without using the autoroute feature. Desktop Wings IFR Low Altitude Enroute Atlas (now sold from www.flightsimcentral.com) covers U.S. Several recent WAC and TCA charts. They also have a VFR atlas which I do not have composed of outdated WAC charts. I am building a collection of FAA TERP books purchasing them at about $4.00 each from local pilot suppliers. These are current approaches, SIDS, STARS. I also have the IFR/VFR FAA Flight Planmning Chart and just acquired the three high altitude jetway charts covering the U.S.2. I figure out the time, season, etc, departure point, destination, type of flight conditions, and aircraft. If it is over a lengthy distance, I look at the planning charts to get an idea of the route.3. I download the current METARS and save them for offline flying. I look at the departure and destination METARS to assist in choosing runways.4. I plan the route in NAV using the TERPS and appropriate enroute charts entering the departure point, SID if desired, waypoints desired, and destination info. I print the plan from NAV and correct bearings according to the chart if required entering also any additional NAVAID info not included. I save (to use again either with or without modification) and export to FS myflights.5. I fire up Radar Contact, select NOTAM style departure and arrival so I can stick to published TERP specific altitudes, choose departure and arrival runways according to METARS (with RC these choices can be changed after FS is activated), activate the flight which has been saved as a parking location with seleted aircraft, change season and time, activate RC, and proceed with taxieing and the flight.6. I also have the Reality-XP FLA 1.2 avionics installed in some panels. With the Apollo GPS itself after the flight is activated, I load in the desired flight plan. I do not load the plan into FS since I do not use FS ATC or the default GPS.7. For commuter aircraft I use the Beech 1900D, SAAB 340B, and am refining the BAe/AVRO RJ-85, the last two being in the livery of Mesaba Airlines operating as Northwest Airlink out of KMSP.Hope this helps you understand my preocedures and modeling goals.

[Guest]

Thanks to all who responded! Having a blast and getting educated at the same time. What a deal!

[Guest]

Ahhhh... now THAT makes sense...To be honest I looked at all the documentation I have for FSNAV and never saw it, or I might have overread it :)Thanks for the tip, I appreciate it :)Happy flyingRalph HummelStaff ReviewerAVSIM Online

[Guest]

That's what makes this community so great :)Enjoy and do not hesitate to ask questions. Remember, there are no dumb questions, only dumb answers!Happy flyingRalph HummelStaff ReviewerAVSIM Online