I am afraid Asobo (or the aircraft creators) did not correctly understand the role of the Flight Director in the concept of Autopilot. Someone explained that to me one day saying "the flight director is the brain, the autopilot is the muscle", which is I think a very good explanation. The FD determines what needs to be done and the autopilot acts on the flight controls to do it. It means you can activate the FD, select heading and altitude targets, and follow the FD while flying manually.

What I experienced in the TBM is different. I set heading and target altitude, engaged the FD but the FD symbols does not indicate I must turn to meet the heading target (see screenshot). I think this is a bug, isn't it?

As soon as I engage A/P, it works fine, the aircraft turns left to the desired heading. Nevertheless the FD magenta symbol should indicate a left turn before A/P is engaged.

You are correct, been like that since day 1.  I guess its on their list of things to fix eventually.

Does not AP button have to be pressed also, so that the FD is reading the selection?  Otherwise the FD will not follow the selection as it cannot read the heading course? 

Edited September 20, 20205 yr by jaydor

8 minutes ago, jaydor said:

Does not AP button have to be pressed also, so that the FD is reading the selection?  Otherwise the FD will not follow the selection as it cannot read the heading course? 

That is not how any of that works. I am not an expert on the G1000, but I have plenty of time using it to know it basically works like every other modern Flight Director in the FD can be engaged in any mode and the comand bars will provide the flight path for the pilot to hand fly. 

1 hour ago, KenG said:

That is not how any of that works. I am not an expert on the G1000, but I have plenty of time using it to know it basically works like every other modern Flight Director in the FD can be engaged in any mode and the comand bars will provide the flight path for the pilot to hand fly. 

That's right, that's the way it works in every aircraft: FD can be engaged in any mode and the command bars provide flight path that you can hand fly or that the AP can follow. The AP role is to move the flight controls in order to follow the FD command bars.

In the 737-200 Combi equipped with the ancient dual-axis Sperry 77 autopilot, although there is a flight director installed, it is completely isolated and independent of the AP.

So, it will provide flight guidance, but the pilot must manually fly the aircraft using the AP's HDG and VS controls, or via CWS (control wheel steering).

2 hours ago, Rocky said:

The FD determines what needs to be done and the autopilot acts on the flight controls to do it. It means you can activate the FD, select heading and altitude targets, and follow the FD while flying manually.

Correct...please upvote this thread & report it as a bug on their Zendesk page so it gets some attention by the Asobo developers:

https://forums.flightsimulator.com/t/flight-director-please-fix-it/262936

 

Done