Did I set something wrong, or if not, how would you deal with this? I flew from KATL to KLAX and everything was great until my arrival in to LAX. I did have RC set up with NOTAMS enabled for KLAX and I flew the SEAVU2.TNP arrival. I was able to meet the specific crossing restrictions all the way down as I was given step descents to 11,000. i crossed the last fix (SEAVU) at 12k as required on my descent down to 11,000. That's where the problem began. I neeed to continue a descent pretty quickly to get down to around 7,000 to cross FUELR which was the IAP to 25L. Again, ATIS advised 25L for the arrival - that's what I had set up. But when I contacted Approach I was given 24L (not even 24R) and was not given a descent on the initial call. By the time I could request 25L I was way past any chance of descending in time to get down. It was only later that the controller gave me something like a descent to 3,200 which was about impossible to make to capature the glideslope. The controller was, of course, asking for 210k or less but there was no way to do that and descend too.

 

The question is how do you handle something like this? Runway changes, lack of descent clearances in time to make the IAP, etc.? Is there something I could set up initially to avoid this? Thoughts and thank you again!

If i do a star arrival once i get told to contact i approach i select the runway if its not the one i want and then i select IAP approach and then ill continue the star from there

Some STARs are runway specific and others take you to a point for vectoring. I put the common points of runways specific STARs into the flight plan, usually to the 40 nm point and after acknowledging the first vector request an IAP to the assigned runway. That allows me to use the STARs in the navigation gear database.

 

Whether runway specific or common, STARs are chosen based on the arrival direction and transition point on the airways that is common to the STAR.

 

I use FSBuild for generating flight plans and it has a feature after putting in all the waypoints you can delete the waypoints you don't want before exporting the plan for RC's use. The other important thing about this product is it is now updated from the Navigraph site used to update FMC databases so the terminal data (SIDs and STARs) now should break out to the same waypoints as in the FMC.

 

The other alternative to achieve sync between RC and the FMC is to export the plan in FS format and FMC format and let RC and the FMC load the same datapoints.

 

Another point to consider is once RC assigns a runway is to load the final approach (IAP) in the FMC so it displays on the nav display and also on a LEGs page if used can display the intercept altitudes. This provides situational awareness in the case of taking vectors as you work your way through the airport vicinity arrival pattern. If using a GPS this also provides guidance though you may need an IAP chart for the vertical profile - always good to have at hand.

 

Charts and chart bundles are available for FAA airports from flightaware.com by clicking INFO after entering the ICAO code .European Union member nations have charts available from Eurocontrol. Register here (free);

 

http://ead-website.ead-it.com/publicuser/public/pu/login.jsp

 

and then after receiving your password click Enter Applications, then PAMS Light (AIP). A query screen pops up and you can browse by authority, civil type, charts, AP or in the advanced search enter with wildcards *EGLL* to bring up the list of EGLL charts. Click the .pdf in the second column to download the chart.