December 4, 201510 yr Here's a flight plan that I created with PFPX... It's a very short flight from KIAH to KDFW. It says my initial flight altitude is FL340, but when loading this flight plan into the PMDG 777 and getting ther PERF INIT automatically updated on the FMC, it shows a different FL. So which one do I use? FL340 seems like such a high altitude for such a short flight. Doesn't sound right to me. Not sure what the real world FL is for KIAH - KDFW. Also what's the proper order to go through setting up the FMS before you take off? Do I set up the fuel load first using the information provided to me in the flight plan below, enter my ZFW, configure my payload, or does payload unnecessary since it will get that number when I enter in the plane's ZFW? Looking at my flight plan below, what numbers am I looking at and what numbers do I need in order to set up the fuel load on my 777 correctly? This part I still don't understand. What am I suppose to enter in for the GR weight, fuel, etc on the FUEL LOAD page of the plane's FMC? In PFPX there's a section for step climb and it's set to 2.000 FT, should I leave it? I've seen tutorial videos on youtube and I see some people change it to no. So I'm not sure what's the proper way to do this. ******************************************************************************** F O R I N F O R M A T I O N O N L Y ******************************************************************************** UNITED AIRLINES FLIGHTPLAN - IFR UAL1950 N771UA KIAH-KDFW -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ALL WEIGHTS IN POUNDS (LB) STD 03DEC/2315Z -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- OFP 1 - PREPARED 03DEC/2249Z BY UA1950/UAL1950 N771UA/B777-2LR GE ROUTE: (AUTO) DEP: KIAH/IAH 33R ELEV 96 FT COST INDEX: 85 TTL G/C DIST: 198 NM ARR: KDFW/DFW 18R ELEV 607 FT INIT ALT: FL340 TTL F/P DIST: 209 NM FUEL BIAS: 100.0% TTL AIR DIST: 218 NM AVG WIND CMP: HD016 KT ALT: KDAL/DAL 13R ELEV 487 FT 131 NM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CONFIG DOW PAX CARGO TOTAL ULOAD LIM ZFW TOW LDW STANDARD 316500 191 39390 75971 68529 ZFW MAX 461000 766000 492000 PLN 392471 417904 408405 ACT ...... ...... ...... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ** TAKE-OFF DATA KIAH 33R ** COND: 417904 LB // RWY DRY // +16°C Q1027 CALM // LMT: OBS(A) CONFIG: FLAPS 5 // D-TO1 +70C // A/I OFF/AUTO // A/C ON SPEEDS: V1=133 VR=134 V2=138 ENG OUT: AT 4 DME 'IAH' 116.6 RT TO ITCPT R 330 'IAH' 116.6 TO 'GOMER' [24.9 DME 'IAH' 116.6] (256 INBD,RT) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ** LANDING DATA KDFW 18R ** COND: 408405 LB // RWY DRY // +16°C Q1027 200/03 // LMT: STRUCT CONFIG: FLAPS 30 // A/I OFF // A/C PACKS ON SPEEDS: VREF=130 VAPP=136 ENG OUT: RT TO 'FUZ' 115.7 (313 INBD,LT) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FUEL CORR ENDUR TRIP 9499 ........ 00:34 ALTN KDAL 6364 ........ 00:23 FAR RSV 9570 ........ 00:45 MIN T/O 25433 ........ 01:42 ..................................... EXTRA 0 ........ 00:00 CAPTAINS SIGNATURE (....) TAXI 570 ........ 00:10 RELEASE 26003 ........ 01:52 I ACCEPT THIS OFP AND I AM FAMILIAR WITH THE PLANNED ROUTE AND AERODROMES FUEL TANK CAP 319727 LB / MAX EXTRA FUEL 83595 LB LIM BY LDW TRIP CORR FOR 10000 LB TOW INCR: +131 LB / 10000 LB TOW DECR: -121 LB 2000 FT LOWER: +16 LB / EET 00:34 CLB: 250/310/84 DES: 84/320/250 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- KIAH STD 23:15Z/17:15L ETD 23:15Z ACT OFBL .... EST T/O 23:25Z ACT T/O .... KDFW STA 00:10Z/18:10L ETA 00:04Z ACT ONBL .... EST LDG 23:59Z ACT LDG .... 00:55 00:49 TTL BLCK .... TTL FLT .... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ATC ROUTE: N0477F340 LOA9 LOA DCT CQY CQY8 ALTERNATE PLANNING -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ALTN/RWY DIST ALT/FL MSA COMP TIME FUEL DIFF ROUTE KDAL/13R 131 FL230 UNK TL005 00:23 6364 - TEX4 FUZ DCT CVE DCT BYP FINGR5 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AWY WAYPOINT MT ALT MSA FREQ TAS LEG FUEL REM / USED LEG ACC -FIR NAME ISA WND/SPD GS REM POSITION ETO / ATO -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- KIAH/33R 96 UNK 25.4 / 0.6 GEORGE BUSH INTERCON 209 N2957.5 W09520.4 ...../..... LOA9 WLLIS 332 *CLB UNK 38 19.7 / 6.3 07 00.07 P04 171 N3032.1 W09539.1 ...../..... *TOC 332 FL340 UNK 477 17 18.5 / 7.5 03 00.10 P07 262/058 456 153 N3047.9 W09547.6 ...../..... LOA9 LOA 332 FL340 UNK 110.80 477 22 17.9 / 8.1 02 00.12 LEONA P07 264/056 456 132 N3107.4 W09558.1 ...../..... *TOD 345 FL340 UNK 474 28 17.1 / 8.9 04 00.16 -KZFW P07 264/056 464 103 N3135.1 W09604.5 ...../..... DCT CQY 345 *DES UNK 114.80 37 16.9 / 9.1 05 00.21 CEDAR CREEK P01 66 N3211.1 W09613.1 ...../..... CQY8 HOWDY 313 *DES UNK 17 16.8 / 9.2 03 00.24 P03 50 N3223.1 W09626.7 ...../..... CQY8 BELLS 311 *DES UNK 9 16.7 / 9.3 01 00.25 P03 41 N3229.2 W09634.0 ...../..... CQY8 TACKE 312 *DES UNK 7 16.6 / 9.4 01 00.26 P05 34 N3234.0 W09639.5 ...../..... CQY8 WARDZ 313 *DES UNK 8 16.5 / 9.5 02 00.28 P05 27 N3239.5 W09645.7 ...../..... CQY8 DIETZ 313 *DES UNK 11 16.3 / 9.7 03 00.31 P01 16 N3247.6 W09654.9 ...../..... CQY8 KDFW/18R 312 607 UNK 16 15.9 / 10.1 03 00.34 DALLAS-FT WORTH INTL N3254.9 W09703.3 ...../..... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WIND INFORMATION - OBS ASKY -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (CLIMB) (DESCENT) FL330 263/056 -44 FL330 286/040 -49 FL270 281/036 -34 FL270 298/032 -37 FL200 307/027 -20 FL200 301/022 -23 13000 315/016 -4 13000 302/012 -8 6000 021/013 +6 6000 328/009 +5 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- END FLIGHTPLAN 00046 UAL1950 N771UA KIAH-KDFW 03DEC2015 ASUS ROG Maximus Hero XII ▪︎ Intel i9-10900K ▪︎ NVIDIA RTX 3090 FE ▪︎ 64GB Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro ▪︎ Windows 10 Pro (21H1) ▪︎ Samsung 970 EVO Pro 1TB NVME SSD (OS Drive) ▪︎ Samsung 860 EVO 2TB SATA SSD ▪︎ Seagate 4TB SATA HDD ▪︎ Corsair RMx 850W PSU
December 4, 201510 yr Generally when loading the FMS the best way to do it is to enter the route first, then put in the weights and performance information. The reason is that if you put the weights in first, when you then go to enter the route the FMC will be constantly trying to update the predictions which in the real thing slows the process down a lot as you have to wait for it to compute before you then put the next leg in (not much CPU power in your typical FMC...). In a two-crew operation, you would generally load up the route and calculate the performance whilst your mate sets up his side of the flight deck and does his/her performance calculations separately. At some point you would then come back together to do the "critical data entry" -- the point being that you don't want to just be chucking weights and performance data willy-nilly in to the FMC without somebody else checking it as data entry errors in the past have led to some nasty incidents. So the way it would work is that one of you reads the ZFW off the loadsheet. The other enters this figure in to the FMC, and reads the calculated gross weight (assuming the fuel is all on board). The guy who read the ZFW off the loadsheet then checks the GW you've just read out against the TOW on the paper flight plan (i.e. out of PFPX). This confirms that all the data from all the different sources (loadsheet, flight plan, FMC) matches up (within a reasonable margin). You then move on to load the takeoff performance data, again in exactly the same way -- one reads, the other checks against their own calculations and enters. As to when to do the actual physical loading of the aircraft -- it doesn't really matter, as long as it's complete by the time you push back. Obviously for the reasons mentioned above it's useful to have the fuel in before you do the critical data as this enables the FMC to give you an accurate GW figure, but as for loading pax/cargo etc -- in FS I would tend to do that immediately (unless there's a "real-time" loading capability such as in the Aerosoft Airbus) as then I can forget about it! Obviously in real life the pax and bags are going on whilst you are doing the setup. You'd have a provisional loadsheet, which you'd use for all the calculations etc, and you might get a final loadsheet (via ACARS) once the doors are closed and it's known for certain who and what is on board. If the final loadsheet figures are different (outside tolerances) from the provisional, you would then have to re-do the critical data procedure and takeoff performance. Fuel load on that OFP layout -- RELEASE fuel is the minimum fuel to load. As PIC you may elect to add to that if you feel circumstances dictate that you need it (bear in mind if you add significantly -- like, tonnes and tonnes -- more, then all the calculations on the OFP will start to be off). TRIP is the fuel required from takeoff to touchdown. ALTN is fuel required to divert from your destination to your alternate RESV is your final (never-go-below) reserve MIN T/O, it therefore follows, is all of the above added together -- the minimum fuel that you need on board when you push the throttles forward to take off. EXTRA is any extra fuel you specified at the flight planning stage (for delays, holding etc). TAXI is fuel for the taxi out. RELEASE is all of the above (i.e. MIN T/O plus EXTRA and TAXI). Step climbs in PFPX -- generally, unless you have a good reason for forcing PFPX not to use step climbs for the entire flight (I can't think of many situations where this would be necessary) then 2000ft is fine. In the olden days before RVSM (1000ft vertical separation between aircraft above FL290), you had to have 2000ft separation between traffic in the upper levels, therefore same-direction levels were 4000ft apart, so you would have entered 4000. I think I already answered your question about the initial flight level in your other thread -- depends on the situation and what ATC are prepared to give you! Simon Kelsey
December 4, 201510 yr Author Okay so let me confirm what you just wrote. Please correct me if I'm wrong. So after loading my flight plan that I just created in PFPX into the FMC. I enter in my departing runway and hiy ACTIVATE and EXEC. Then I go to my FUEL setup page on the FMC, enter in my fuel weight in the LSK1 field (Total LBS), which is the Release value which is 26003lbs? What do I enter in as my ZFW? the PLN 392471? or the MAX ZFW? Also on the TAKEOFF REF page on the FMC, under the v1,vr,v2, it says GR WT 418.2 and then TOGW ---.-. What do I enter for that field? ASUS ROG Maximus Hero XII ▪︎ Intel i9-10900K ▪︎ NVIDIA RTX 3090 FE ▪︎ 64GB Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro ▪︎ Windows 10 Pro (21H1) ▪︎ Samsung 970 EVO Pro 1TB NVME SSD (OS Drive) ▪︎ Samsung 860 EVO 2TB SATA SSD ▪︎ Seagate 4TB SATA HDD ▪︎ Corsair RMx 850W PSU
December 4, 201510 yr Bear with me a little bit because although I'm familiar with Boeing FMCs in general, I'm not specifically familiar with the PMDG 777. Bear in mind that there is a difference between physically loading the aircraft (so that the weight is in there) and programming the FMC. I think the PMDG 777 has some form of load and fuel setup page in one of the FMC menus that enables you to fuel and load the aircraft. So in here you need to put the release fuel (i.e. whatever fuel you want to load) and the actual ZFW you generated the plan with (392.5 klbs -- as read from the PLN (planned) ZFW column). This loads your aircraft with that amount of fuel and weight. After you have loaded the route, you then need to go to the INIT REF page where there should be a box to enter the ZFW and/or GW. The usual practice is to enter the ZFW (the planned/actual ZFW that you just entered to load the aircraft). Once you have entered this, you will see a figure appear in the GW field which should be the ZFW plus the sensed fuel on board (check it against the totaliser). On the Takeoff Ref page, you don't actually need to enter anything in to the TOGW field. However, it stands for Takeoff Gross Weight. The reason it is there is because the aircraft will be calculating the speeds based on the current gross weight (in the GW field), which obviously includes the taxi fuel you have loaded. However, a couple of hundred kilos isn't going to make any practical difference most of the time on an aircraft the size of the 777 and the weight difference is in a safe direction (i.e. lighter than planned) anyway. Simon Kelsey
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