I've been flying the C172 VFR in FS9 and want to try the B737. In the C172 I've been using World|Map to determine my location relative to my destination airport before I start my approach. I haven't added the complication of entering a pattern and other traffic just yet.I'm sure I'm doing at least several things wrong; One big thing is that I don't know how to get a good visual on the runway and then get oriented to the ILS. It seems impossible to pick the runway out of the scenery from more than 5 - 10 miles out. What do pilots in the real world do? GPS? VOR? Can I get vectors from ATC to help me? Do I need to be IFR for that?The C172 is slow and maneuverable enough that I can adjust my altitude and heading several times to line up with the localizer. But the B737 is, of course, much faster and has a larger turning radius so I find myself flying in circles. Can someone help me refine my procedure for this phase of landing - both in the Cessna and in the 737?Thanks, Gary

Hello,If not the most realistic.. GPS (and course) is the fast way for locate and intercept the ILS beam from distance were you have not yet the runway in visual ....Try to intercept the ILS beam ( with autopilot ON and approach ON) from a altitude of 7.500 feets (+-2.500m) this let you plenty time to configure for land.Regards.Gus.

There are basically two ways you can navigate an airliner. The most common method these days is to program a route of interconnected waypoints into the Flight Management Computer (FMC) via Computer Display Unit (CDU) on the flight deck, to create a route plan. The CDU is the thing near the throttles on an airliner that looks like a big fancy pocket calculator - sadly, the default airliners do not have them though. The other (older) method for navigating an airliner is to navigate to a series of waypoints by using ground based radio aids which you detect with your navigation radios and avionics, and either home in on or steer by, basically, you'll be going from one to the next until at your destination. Effectively you would be manually doing what an FMC does when doing that. There are other ways, such as using an Inertial Navigation System (INS) linked to a computer, which was the precursor to the FMC, but essentially there are those two ways, automatic or manual.For both of those methods you can use the autopilot to assist you, either by putting in the required heights and headings yourself as you go from point to point, or when using an FMC, the computer is linked to the autopilot and it steps through the waypoints automatically and adjusts the autopilot for you. Typically this is done by using the LNAV (lateral navigation) and VNAV (vertical navigation) buttons on an autopilot.The whole point of this is that if you want to get to a runway and get lined up, typically what you do is place the very last waypoint of your flight plan (before the runway) at something called the Initial Approach Fix (IAF - although sometimes referred to as the FAF - Final Approach Fix). These are marked on airport approach charts and are usually a conveniently located radio beacon. If you fly from that beacon on a suitable heading, it will set you up for an approach to the runway you are after. In practice, Air Traffic Control will often steer you to that point in Flight Simulator, just as is often done in real life. But, you can do that yourself if you like, and here is how...Take a look on the map in FS and zoom in on your desired destination airport (you might have to move the map around a bit by scrolling the edges). It is extremely likely that where there is a runway with an ILS feather (the green fan shaped icons coming off the runways), there will also be a suitable beacon some way out from the extended centreline of the runway, perhaps about twenty miles or so out from the airport. Normally what will happen with ATC, is that they will direct you to that beacon and hopefully you will be something like thirty degrees off the extended centreline of the runway, meaning that you can fly into the Instrument Landing System's radio localiser signal, and if your Nav radios are tuned to that ILS frequency, and you have VOR/LOC selected on your autopilot, when your autopilot and radios detect that signal, they will override the heading control on the autopilot and commence lining you up to fly down the extended centreline toward the runway.You can usually see the crosshairs of the ILS signal on your navigational equipment, and when you see the glideslope indicator centre up on the readout, you hit the APP (approach) button on your autopilot, and it will begin tracking the glideslope signal and slave it to the autopilot so that you fly down the glideslope radio beam to the runway threshold (usually down at an angle of 3.5 degrees). If your autopilot is dual channel (i.e. if it has two or more CMD (command) buttons on it, then at this point you can select the second one and you will be making a dual channel autopilot approach, which means your aircraft will probably be able to perform the flare and stouchdown for you. however, on the default FS 737, you cannot do that, so you'll need to disengage the autopilot as you cross the runway threshhold and manually take over to flare the aircraft. Most pilots will do that at about 200-400 feet.In short, you need to be about twenty miles away from the runway and flying into the ILS signal at no more than about thirty degrees off the extended runway centreline to be in with a good shot at capturing the localiser without risking your passengers spilling their drink and peanuts everywhere.There are a number of tutorials built into FS which you can look at that will help you with all of this by the way.Al

The FMC is great fun to fly but they are quite advanced these days. Forgive me if I’m wrong but it sounds like you might need something a bit simpler to start with. I hope this helps but if you already know this, maybe someone else can use it or add to it or edit it!There are approach procedures built into the default FS9 GPS. The approach procedures are guidance to both the airport and the runway that you wish to land on. The 172 will follow a chosen flight plan when the NAV switch has GPS selected and the aircraft is on autopilot. If you selected a departure and arrival airport in the FS9 flight planner, that route will have already been loaded into the GPS for you when you start your flight. All you have to do is set a few radios and dials and it will lead you directly to the airport and runway you want automatically. You could also follow the route manually by flying the line that the GPS draws on its map but let’s see how you like it on autopilot. Try this quick flight in the default C172 and check if it makes sense...Start FS9 and In the MS Flight Planner, set the departure Airport to KEMT and the destination Airport to KSNA then begin the flight.Pre Flight Cockpit Setup...Radio Stack1) Tune your NAV1 radio to 111.752) Tune your ADF locator radio to 3373) Set the target altitude to 3500 AGL4) Set the ascent rate to 700 FPMMain Panel5) Set your VOR1 dial heading to 1956) Keep your ADF dial heading set to your current compass rose heading (If you change headings then change the ADF heading to match)7) Set your NAV/GPS switch to GPS for nowGPS8) Open your GPS and press the PROC button9) Select ILS 19R as your desired runway10) Select POM as your approach to that runway 11) Load the approach but don't activate it yet !!!Now take off at full throttle...that's always fun! When you’re about 700 ft AGL then....In Flight Cockpit AdjustmentsRadio Stack1) Open the radio stack2) Press the NAV button3) Press the ALT buttonThe autopilot should now be engaged and you will be turning towards KSNA..GPS4) Open the GPS5) Press the PROC button5) Select "Activate Approach"6) Press EnterYour plane should now be turning towards the Pomona waypoint and you can follow your current position on the GPS. You can look out the windows and enjoy the view while you climb to 3500 AGL. You don’t have much to do except monitor your current position and keep an eye out for the SAGER waypoint...it’s the next one after POM. We’re going to make some NAV setting changes right after SAGER so you need to be aware of it. There are 4 waypoints between you and KSNA 19R using the POM approach. They are POM, SAGER, SNAKE, and LEMON. Even though SNAKE and LEMON are in the flight plan, we won’t use them for this flight. So wait until you’re just past SAGER and it finishes its funky mini-procedure turn. After which you should be aligned with runway 19R, (at full throttle), even though you probably cannot see it yet. This is where you should change the type of navigation from GPS to VOR. Flipping the GPS/NAV switch to NAV enables the autopilot to use the VOR1 radio for navigation, (which should be tuned to 111.75), rather then using the GPS for navigation. I believe it’s called a precision approach because VOR navigation can give you both horizontal and vertical indications while GPS navigation provides only the horizontal in the 172. So here we go on approach...On Approach after the SAGER procedure turn...Main Panel1) Flip the GPS/NAV switch to NAVRadio Stack2) Press the APR button (Approach button)That’s it...you should now be on a precision approach to runway 19R via the autopilot which is following the ILS beacon. The only thing left to do is to descend at a proper rate of anywhere between 300 FPM and 500 FPM until you reach the runway. Lateral movement will be handled by the autopilot. All you have to do is to learn how to use the throttle and the flaps to keep your decent rate optimal. That’s where the VOR1 dial really comes in handy. I mean, that’s what it’s made for. It’s a cross hair that shows your relative horizontal and vertical position to where it should be. That is also why you set the heading of the VOR1 dial to the runway 19R heading...so the displayed deviation is relative to the ILS and runway.If the crosshairs are aligned dead center, then both your approach decent and your horizontal alignment is perfect. Any deviation is displayed as being off center. When the horizontal hair is to the right of center you are to the right of the correct horizontal alignment. When it’s to the left of center, you are to the left of the correct horizontal alignment. When the vertical hair is above center, it means that you’re too low. If the vertical hair is below center, it means you’re too high. The job is to keep those crosshairs on center, but for now, all you have to do is to concentrate on the vertical hair.Using the throttle is really fun and that’s your adjustment for the vertical and your speed. I typically throttle back to between 2200 and 2400 RPM at full flaps to control the decent. I keep adjusting the throttle so the crosshairs stay on center. I don’t want to land too fast or too slow, somewhere around 70 knots, so I adjust the throttle accordingly. If I dip to low I give it a bit more power until the cross hairs align. If I’m too high then I slowly lower the RPM until it’s aligned on center. I try to do this while keeping the vertical decent to between 300 FPM and 500 FPM. If I'm coming in to fast I might use the trim to increase my angle of attack, (nose a bit higher), which decreases my airspeed. Don’t worry...you’ll get used to it and it’s a blast!Mark

There is something that I forgot to mention here and is very important. When you come out of the SAGER procedure turn and you flip the navigation type from GPS to VOR, the vertical cross hair will show that you are lower then the ILS beacon. That is perfectly normal and the way that you should always CAPTURE an ILS beam if possible. You should try not to ascend into an ILS beam, (if posible), but stay at your current altitude and wait until you cross the beam's path before starting your descent.So as the vertical cross hair of the VOR1 dial centers itself, that is the moment when you should start descending into the runway. Can't believe I forgot to mention that...I'm such an amateur sometimes :)Mark

Good tutorial. I also recommend getting used to using the default GPS. Most airports that can handle a 737 will probably have a choice of runways with IFR approach procedures. Even if you are not on a filed IFR plight plan using the ATC function, these procedures can help you get aligned for a straight-in approach to the runway, or at least get in a position to enter the visual traffic pattern.Most times people will just look for an ILS procedure, but any of them will do. What you need to know is that the approaches in the GPS have two parts: the "transition" and the "final". In most cases there are multiple transitions starting at various (initial approach) fixes so you can find one (hopefully before you take off or you may need to pause the sim to keep from getting behind the aircraft) that makes sense from the direction you will be arriving from. The GPS will show the legs of each approach procedure on its map, but you can't slew around so you have to zoom out to see it all and it can be hard to picture exactly what the approach does (helps to have a paper chart of course).The basic design of the approach is the initial segment and final segment. The final segment gets you aligned within +/- 10 degrees of the runway, so you should be able to see the runway in time to complete your alignment, even at airliner speeds. Of course, the final segment for ILS approaches are more closely aligned, typically right on the runway centerline. The initial segment is intended to get you on the final segment course using one or more turns.Thus using any of the approaches, along with the GPS/NAV toggle switch, can give you guidance on how to get aligned with the landing runway.Also helps to use the view zoom alternating from about zoom .5 to .8 or so to better pick up the airport environment. Also compare the outside view in VC to the 2d (if you use it) as the outside view in 2d is compressed vertically and that may make picking up the airport more difficult.Some scenery may be designed so that airport objects pop up kind of late (to help FPS) so look out for that too.scott s..

I'll include this suggestion when I find time to fly again. One question - I've read in several places that I should approach at approximately 2.500 feet so I intercept the ILS beam from below instead of from above, which I'm told could be a false signal. Should I be concerned about that?Gary--------

Hello,If not the most realistic.. GPS (and course) is the fast way for locate and intercept the ILS beam from distance were you have not yet the runway in visual ....Try to intercept the ILS beam ( with autopilot ON and approach ON) from a altitude of 7.500 feets (+-2.500m) this let you plenty time to configure for land.Regards.Gus.

FS doesn't really simulate the false glideslope beams in the way they occur in the real world, just as it doesn't simulate the fact that VORs offer a more reliable signal when they are near the coast. So it's not really a major concern, but if you like realism, then there is nothing wrong with treating things in a 'realistic fashion' and coming at the G/S from underneath. It will be a good habit to pick up if you ever do it for real.Al

Wow, I have some practicing to do, don't I?You mention that the default FS airliners don't have CDUs and that the default FS 737 doesn't let me do what you call a dual channel autopilot approach. Do all real-world 737-400s all have CDUs and allow for the dual channel approach? If I wanted to get those capabilities, what would I do? Buy some sort of after-market aircraft sim?I haven't used autopilot on either the C172 or the 737. I've been doing "seat of the pants" approaches and they haven't been pretty. I've watched some airliners approaching KRDU and sometimes they seem to be on their base leg very close to the airport - maybe 7 to 8 miles. But they manage to be right where they should be, both vertically and horizontally, when they go to final. How do they do that?I have only used tutorials on FS2002. I'm getting the idea that there are FS9 tutorials that will help me get the information I need without pestering people on the forum again - at least for a while. Is that true?Garyquote name='Chock' date='Jul 18 2009, 01:18 AM' post='1606354']There are basically two ways you can navigate an airliner. The most common method these days is to program a route of interconnected waypoints into the Flight Management Computer (FMC) via Computer Display Unit (CDU) on the flight deck, to create a route plan. The CDU is the thing near the throttles on an airliner that looks like a big fancy pocket calculator - sadly, the default airliners do not have them though. The other (older) method for navigating an airliner is to navigate to a series of waypoints by using ground based radio aids which you detect with your navigation radios and avionics, and either home in on or steer by, basically, you'll be going from one to the next until at your destination. Effectively you would be manually doing what an FMC does when doing that. There are other ways, such as using an Inertial Navigation System (INS) linked to a computer, which was the precursor to the FMC, but essentially there are those two ways, automatic or manual.For both of those methods you can use the autopilot to assist you, either by putting in the required heights and headings yourself as you go from point to point, or when using an FMC, the computer is linked to the autopilot and it steps through the waypoints automatically and adjusts the autopilot for you. Typically this is done by using the LNAV (lateral navigation) and VNAV (vertical navigation) buttons on an autopilot.The whole point of this is that if you want to get to a runway and get lined up, typically what you do is place the very last waypoint of your flight plan (before the runway) at something called the Initial Approach Fix (IAF - although sometimes referred to as the FAF - Final Approach Fix). These are marked on airport approach charts and are usually a conveniently located radio beacon. If you fly from that beacon on a suitable heading, it will set you up for an approach to the runway you are after. In practice, Air Traffic Control will often steer you to that point in Flight Simulator, just as is often done in real life. But, you can do that yourself if you like, and here is how...Take a look on the map in FS and zoom in on your desired destination airport (you might have to move the map around a bit by scrolling the edges). It is extremely likely that where there is a runway with an ILS feather (the green fan shaped icons coming off the runways), there will also be a suitable beacon some way out from the extended centreline of the runway, perhaps about twenty miles or so out from the airport. Normally what will happen with ATC, is that they will direct you to that beacon and hopefully you will be something like thirty degrees off the extended centreline of the runway, meaning that you can fly into the Instrument Landing System's radio localiser signal, and if your Nav radios are tuned to that ILS frequency, and you have VOR/LOC selected on your autopilot, when your autopilot and radios detect that signal, they will override the heading control on the autopilot and commence lining you up to fly down the extended centreline toward the runway.You can usually see the crosshairs of the ILS signal on your navigational equipment, and when you see the glideslope indicator centre up on the readout, you hit the APP (approach) button on your autopilot, and it will begin tracking the glideslope signal and slave it to the autopilot so that you fly down the glideslope radio beam to the runway threshold (usually down at an angle of 3.5 degrees). If your autopilot is dual channel (i.e. if it has two or more CMD (command) buttons on it, then at this point you can select the second one and you will be making a dual channel autopilot approach, which means your aircraft will probably be able to perform the flare and stouchdown for you. however, on the default FS 737, you cannot do that, so you'll need to disengage the autopilot as you cross the runway threshhold and manually take over to flare the aircraft. Most pilots will do that at about 200-400 feet.In short, you need to be about twenty miles away from the runway and flying into the ILS signal at no more than about thirty degrees off the extended runway centreline to be in with a good shot at capturing the localiser without risking your passengers spilling their drink and peanuts everywhere.There are a number of tutorials built into FS which you can look at that will help you with all of this by the way.Al

I'm sure the FMC is great fun to fly. But you're right - I probably need something simpler now. And I need to look through FS9 to see if there are already tutorials there to help me understand all the great advice I'm getting. Can you recommend any specific tutorials? Also, I enjoy the C172 but I'd like the thrill of moving a 737 around the sky - without scattering passengers, drinks, or peanuts around the cabin. I'll try your test flight. I'd like to fly from KRDU to KGSO so will try adapting your directions to that flight. I did quite badly on my first attempt in a 737 - doing everything manually until I finally managed to find the ILS signal. There were peanuts and soda all over.Thanks for your help. -Gary

The FMC is great fun to fly but they are quite advanced these days. Forgive me if I

Yoiks! I really need help. I don't know yet if I should be VFR or IFR to do what I want to do in a 737 - with at least SOME realism - or if it doesn't make any difference. I mentioned in a reply to one of the other respondents that I've seen airliners turn from base leg to final no more than 7-to-8 miles out. Can't imagine how they position themselves on the glideslope and on the centerline when they're that close. They always seem to touchdown where they should. I'm impressed. I'd like to be able to do both straight-in and that kind of approach, as well as what appears to be a larger and higher pattern approach, in which they probably go nearly 20 miles downwind before turning to base. I have lots of practice ahead of me, and your advice, along with the rest of the guys, is priceless.You mentioned using zoom. Do you mean to temporarily zoom the view outside the aircraft so I can see farther into the distance and possibly spot the runway?I haven't used autopilot or GPS at all. Been doing everything manually and have botched a few. I've used VC most of the time. Say, that reminds me of a couple of things. In the C172, when I turn a certain way relative to the sun the instrument panel seems to "gray out" or get dark and it's hard to read the guages. What's up with that, and how can I prevent it? And even though I don't check the "settings" box to indicate that I want to control all the lights myself, FS9 doesn't seem to do that automatically even in the dark. I have to turn them all on myself. And if I happen to be in VC mode, some of the switches are hidden behind the yoke. I'd have to go into a stall to get the yoke out of the way. Have you ever encountered that?-Thanks, Gary

Good tutorial. I also recommend getting used to using the default GPS. Most airports that can handle a 737 will probably have a choice of runways with IFR approach procedures. Even if you are not on a filed IFR plight plan using the ATC function, these procedures can help you get aligned for a straight-in approach to the runway, or at least get in a position to enter the visual traffic pattern.Most times people will just look for an ILS procedure, but any of them will do. What you need to know is that the approaches in the GPS have two parts: the "transition" and the "final". In most cases there are multiple transitions starting at various (initial approach) fixes so you can find one (hopefully before you take off or you may need to pause the sim to keep from getting behind the aircraft) that makes sense from the direction you will be arriving from. The GPS will show the legs of each approach procedure on its map, but you can't slew around so you have to zoom out to see it all and it can be hard to picture exactly what the approach does (helps to have a paper chart of course).The basic design of the approach is the initial segment and final segment. The final segment gets you aligned within +/- 10 degrees of the runway, so you should be able to see the runway in time to complete your alignment, even at airliner speeds. Of course, the final segment for ILS approaches are more closely aligned, typically right on the runway centerline. The initial segment is intended to get you on the final segment course using one or more turns.Thus using any of the approaches, along with the GPS/NAV toggle switch, can give you guidance on how to get aligned with the landing runway.Also helps to use the view zoom alternating from about zoom .5 to .8 or so to better pick up the airport environment. Also compare the outside view in VC to the 2d (if you use it) as the outside view in 2d is compressed vertically and that may make picking up the airport more difficult.Some scenery may be designed so that airport objects pop up kind of late (to help FPS) so look out for that too.scott s..

There are many tutorials in FS that can teach you how to fly the aircraft in FS properly, in fact it is one of the major features of FS that is probably most underused by people, since you could start out knowing nothing about aeroplanes, work your way through the lesson in FS, and be fairly well set up for flying in the real world just by doing that.In addition, you can find many tutorials on AVSIM in the tutorial section of these forums, including one by myself on how to land the default 737 on autopilot, although to follow that tutorial, you will have to be reasonably familiar with one or two of the controls and switches in the FS default 737. so if you are not great at flying the Cessna, then it is perhaps worth getting to grips with that first, as it is always better to walk before you can run (or even fly), and you will find that being able to fly the Cessna well is a much more satisfying experience than struggling with the 737. You can always have a shot at the 737 next week when you've got the Cessna sussed out properly.It would be very rare to find a large commercial airliner these days that did not have dual channel autopilots and a CDU, in fact for most commercial flights they would be legal requirements to allow the aircraft to carry passengers and fly in all weathers, since dual autopilots are required in order to land in bad weather with poor visibility. But that does not mean you cannot use the default 737 for some enjoyable flights; what the default 737 in FS can do is give you a good introduction to the basics, and you can in fact 'upgrade' it by adding a third party FMC if you like, as there are one or two add-on FMCs kicking about.But if you want something that is more like the real deal, you are probably looking at a payware add-on aircraft. There are many payware add-on 737s for FS, including those from PMDG, Wilco Publishing and Ariane Design. If I had to pick one to recommend to someone less familiar with all that stuff, I would say go for the Wilco Publishing one, since it actually includes three variants of the 737 (the 300, 400 and 500 models), which means it represents pretty good value for money. If you want a very complex modern 737, the PMDG would be a good choice, and if you want a fairly complex one that has a very nice virtual cockpit, then the Ariane one is like that.If you want a good book that will teach you how to fly airliners properly, then I would recommend getting hold of Mike Ray's 'Flying the Boeing 700 Series Flight Simulators', which is aimed at teaching novices to fly an airliner in FS using payware add-on airliners. It's a really good book and very easy to follow, with lots of lessons, diagrams, quizzes and that sort of thing.The main thing to remember with all this learning new stuff, is that it is a big help to learn the basics well before you leap to the more complex stuff, as if you miss out the basics, it can lead to frustration later down the line. Above all, make sure you have fun with it though.Al

I read through the tutorials below, (one many years ago), and they worked for me. Also, read through Alan's tutorials as he is an expert in the field!General Navigationhttp://www.navfltsm.addr.com/ FMC Navigationhttp://www.b737.org.uk/fmc.htmMark

Also, read through Alan's tutorials as he is an expert in the field!Mark

I wouldn't go that mad, but let's just say it might help a bit.Al

Oh, here's one more site that gives you a nice selection of things to read...http://www.flightsimbooks.com/And Alan is still a good resource despite his modesty!Mark