Hello all,I've always played VFR, however I have played the default 747 casually.I bought the PMDG 747 a while ago, but haven't really had the time to buckle down and try to learn it until recently.Just a little info on my background: I have no real life flying experience. I have casually played MSFS until recently when I bought a new rig and discovered the world of add-ons.My goal is to eventually learn enough of the PMDG 747 functions to be able to play on VATSIM competently.I have a few questions (amateurish questions I am sure) about the PMDG 747 and general aviation procedures that I would like to pose on this thread. I will pose similar questions that may come up in the future on this thread.I thank all those in advance that will take the time to help me achieve my goal.1. Does the ATC select which runway the departure runway when you request clearance for IFR or is this predetermined once you file for IFR? Same with arrival, is the arrival runway predetermined or does the ATC choose it when you are on approach? If it is predetermined, where can I find this information? The FMC prompts me to input this information....2. I recently learned there are standard departure patterns for various airports. Does the FMC have these patterns recorded for every airport or do I have to input them? Would I then turn on auto-pilot on take-off which would then have the plane follow the path on the FMC? What about ATC? Usually when I take off, the ATC asks me to contact departure, departure would then tell me to turn to a certain heading....why does ATC request that I take a certain heading when I am supposed to be following a departure pattern?3. How do I know which departure pattern my plane needs to take that is best for the route towards my destination?Thanks all, Hirgab

Well what you are referring to are Standard Departure (SID) and Standard Arrival Routes (STAR). In short FSX does not recognise these, so you have to obtain charts for each airport which show these for you. On the PMDG you can download NAVDATA which then allows the FMC to recognise these routes and display the path for the autopilot to follow. In this case anything ATC tells you in the sim just after takeoff and before landing are just going to be vectors to/from the FSX flightplan which will be different to the FMC info, so ignore it if you want to use realistic SID/STAR data. Regarding the runways, FS tells you the arrival runway when you are about 80-100nm away. Other than that you can guess it by looking at wind direction.

1) Yes, although you can always set the wind in the weather dialogue, and ATC will choose a runway accordingly. The same goes for your arrival, you can specify wind direction and a runway will be chosen according to the wind. This will work until you feel confident about selecting departure and approach procedures. With the complex airliner simulations you're always on the learning curve setting new goals as you go.2) As far as I know the PMDG has a faily complete set of approach and departure procedures, although it is worth pointing out that a lot of airports don't have them anyway. The LNAV button on the MCP is the one you push after liftoff. It will follow the sequence of waypoints entered into the FMC.I wouldn't fly IFR while I was still figuring the PMDG 747 out, though. It's not easy juggling so much at once.3) There are probably SIDs and STARs listed online somewhere, but I've never looked. I've found that experiment and practice have been enough to keep me going.There is always the option of flying the PMDG 747 like you would any other bird - you don't need to follow SIDs and STARs!Good luck with this beautiful bird!

Hirgab,1. Runways get determined by the prevailing winds. You can listen to the airport ATIS information frequency to get a better idea of which runway you'll be directed to. When multiple ones are in use in real life, ATC's usually going to give you the one that's closest to your gate and that best matches your aircraft type and weight - ie, in a fully loaded 747, you're not going to get assigned a shorter runway, you'll be given the long 10 or 12 thousand foot one. Usually you can ask the clearance/delivery controller when you obtain your IFR clearance and they'll tell you which runway to expect for departure. The final decision is up to the tower controllers though, I have been switched right in the middle of taxi before, both in real life and on VATSIM because the winds changed.2. SIDs and STARs - as Max said above, FSX ATC isn't aware of them and that's why you can't file them in the flight planner and ATC just gives you vectors. On VATSIM you won't have that issue if it is a full "pilot nav" SID where you're expected to just fly it without any sort of vectoring at all. Again though, whatever ATC says goes - if they tell you to do something different than what's on the chart, you do that. Some times you will get assigned a heading for spacing with other aircraft etc and in that case, you just fly it and at some point they will give you an instruction like "Proceed direct (waypoint name) and resume the (SID name)."STARs can be a bit different - you'll usually be vectored by the approach controller somewhere before the end of the published STAR route - you'll often see this on the chart itself, it'll say "Passing (waypoint name), expect radar vectors to final approach course." In that case, you just come out of LNAV and into HDG SEL as your lateral mode in the case of the 747.All of our planes have a comprehensive SID/STAR/IAP database, it costs a small fee to update it every month at www.navigraph.com3. This depends on where you're doing your flying. If you're in the US, just go to http://flightaware.com/statistics/ifr-route/ and enter in the ICAO airport pair - if any real life flights have taken place between them, it'll show you the actual route that was used in real life. Otherwise, you'll have to actually look at the charts and make an educated guess based on the general direction the STAR goes in - for example, here in Phoenix, I just know from the charts that if I'm going somewhere to the northwest, it's going to be the CHILY1 SID, if it's directly to the west, it'll be the BXK2 SID etc. Each SID is going to have different "transition" waypoints that mark the end of the SID - these get you onto an airway usually that starts your enroute cruise portion of the flight.You can find the charts for the US at Flightaware, and I've found the VATSIM country sites useful for finding them outside of the US.Feel free to ask any questions at our forum, lots of people experienced with the 747 there.

Thanks all!What would I use the FMC for if I opt out of using SIDs and STARs? Does it have any other vital functions? Do I need to configure the FMC at the start of the flight for an ILS landing? It was easy getting an ILS landing to work on the default 747, all I had to do was tune nav radio to runway frequency and I'd capture the localizer and the glideslope and switch to nav instead of heading hold. Is the concept the same for the PMDG 747 or will I have to get the FMC configured for any ILS landing?

When you hit the LNAV button the AP will follow the list of waypoints entered in the FMC. If you don't want to follow procedures then the minimal amount of information required by the FMC is your departure airport, your destination airport, and a waypoint in the vicinity of your destination airport, say a VOR station which you can use to track your approach. You'll also want to fill out those other pages with info like ZFW, crusing altitude and flaps etc.When you enter these three bits of info into the FMC, and hit the execute key, you will get a magenta line on your ND which the AP will follow. When you get close to your destination hit the HDG Select button to switch to HDG mode and fly the approach as you would any other aircraft.If you want to fly the ILS then use the HDG mode to line up on the runway, make sure both localiser and GS are active and hit the APP button. You can enter your ILS frequency manually on the RAD NAV page of the FMC.I hope this helps.

Since most the questions were answered as if you were going to fly offline I'll answer the original questions with VATSIM in mind. 1: ATC will assing you a runway for takeoff and departure, however you can request another runway if you wish. Sometimes you might get assigned a too short runway for your takeoff weight, and in a situation like that it is appropriate to request another runway. ATC will always try to assign you to the runway used in the real world for the current weather conditions. When there are two parallel runways normally the runway closest to the terminal is used for departures and the one furthest away is used for arrivals. Some ARTCCs (air route traffic control centers) have a list of the runways currently in use, for example New York ARTCC has set up this website that lists the current runway operations http://www.nyartcc.org/runway. You can also figure out which runways is in use by checking the ATIS for the airport you are departing from / arriving to. 2: Got answered by Tabs3: Also got answered by Tabs, however, if you fly in Europe clearance delivery will assign you to a SID, unlike in the US where you select your SID when you file your flightplan (or possibly choose to not select a SID alltogether).

What would I use the FMC for if I opt out of using SIDs and STARs? Does it have any other vital functions? Do I need to configure the FMC at the start of the flight for an ILS landing? It was easy getting an ILS landing to work on the default 747, all I had to do was tune nav radio to runway frequency and I'd capture the localizer and the glideslope and switch to nav instead of heading hold. Is the concept the same for the PMDG 747 or will I have to get the FMC configured for any ILS landing?

The FMC is used for all kinds of things other than just selecting the SID and STAR, it contains your flightplan and performance data like weight and flap configuration for takeoff. This data is essential for a safe takeoff. It also calculates stuff like the top of your descent point, it controls your airspeed according to your flightplan / altitude (youre not allowed to go faster than 250kts below 10 000 ft, when you climb above 10 000 the FMC will automatically increase the speed), it will show all kinds of useful info like fuel usage, estimated time to arrival and how much fuel you will have at your destination. In short, the FMC is absolutely critical to program properly for every IFR flight, even if youre not using a SID / STAR. I'm not a 747 driver, so I dont know exactly how the tuning of the NAV radio for ILS approaches works, in other boeing planes you can manually add the ILS frequency and course without having to use the FMC, but there's also an option for having the FMC tune the radios automatically. Im not sure if the 747 works that way (EDIT: according to the previous poster you need the FMC for manually tuning the NAV radios in the 747). In any case I would recommend always programming the FMC, or else you'll spend way too much energy handflying the plane that it would be next to impossible to fly online. Remember that the real plane has two pilots sharing the workload, and they always program the FMC. Doing it all by hand with only one pilot is not really an option