A question about flight plans

[Rimshot 1,157]

Hi fellas,

In recent years when I was behind my sim I have exclusively flown VFR to uncontrolled airfields. In the old days I used to do IFR as well, but that goes all the way back to FS2000 and FS2002, so that's a pretty long time ago and you could call my skills rusty. With the recent news that WT are upgrading the CJ4 I'm tempted to pick up IFR flying again. I do have a question though; as far as I can tell you have to create or import an IFR flightplan in MSFS before you hit the 'fly' button. This means that when you startup your aircraft the flightplan is automatically loaded in your GPS/FMC. But this is not realistic, because in real life you would have to create the flightplan in your GPS/FMC (or load it when you have created it before) when sitting in the aircraft. Ofcourse you could do this in the sim as well, but the question is will the sim then 'understand' I'm going to fly this plan, i.e. will ATC pick it up? Or is there no other way than creating/importing a flightplan before the flight and just accept it is being automatically displayed in your avionics? I hope you guys can enlighten me.

[sonny147 580]

just download Simbrief  everyone uses it for IFR 

[Johan217 49]

In the case of the CJ4: yes, default ATC will recognise a manually input flight plan. The Working Title CJ4 has a special setting for this. You do have to request the correct flight level via the ATC menu, however.

[orchestra_nl 947]

MSFS has the support built-in but the instrument (FMC / GPS) you are using to create the flightplan with needs to be able to send/sync this updated flightplan to ATC.

The PMS50 GTN750 has this option called "ATC sync" which syncs a flightplan you have modified or created from scratch in the GPS unit to the MSFS ATC.
After this an option in the ATC window becomes available to request clearance for this new or updated flightplan.

I assume most addon aircraft with FMS have this option also.

Edited November 19, 2022 by orchestra_nl
Removed quote

[FlyingGoose 405]

3 hours ago, Rimshot said:

ld do this in the sim as well, but the question is will the sim then 'understand' I'm going to fly this plan, i.e. will ATC pick it up?

Yes, you can do this. The way I do it is:

 

1. Create plan in Simbrief

2. Simbrief downloader autodownloads the flight plan to the MSFS flight plans directory

3. In the World Map screen, press space and load the plan that just downloaded. This ensures that the in-game ATC has the same plan as the plane.

4. Load into the flight - the planes I use the most (PMDG, Fenix, A310, etc) do NOT autoload the flight plan from the in-game planner by default; as far as the plane is concerned, there's no plan.

5. Load the plan into the plane in-game - either use the Simbrief integration built into these planes, or load manually. Same result either way

6. Once loaded, ask for IFR clearance

Now the plane and ATC flight plans are synced, and everything works as expected. 

Maybe there are other ways of doing it, but this process works great for me for planes that don't auto-load the flightplan. 

[Noel 4,531]

47 minutes ago, FlyingGoose said:

Maybe there are other ways of doing it, but this process works great for me for planes that don't auto-load the flightplan. 

I only to IFR flights and only use the MSFS planner.  After in the plane (CRJ700/PMDG 738) I just hit the "N" key to bring up the plan coming out of the World Map Planner and input manually.  This is part of the ritual to keep it real plus gives me something to do while PAX boards (PACX).  The B78X does accept the route from the WMP so I use that since it's already there.  A Pilot's Life v2 uses SimBrief for some flight plane elements but I still input the route manually to keep the default ATC in sync.

[FlyingGoose 405]

2 minutes ago, Noel said:

I only to IFR flights and only use the MSFS planner.  After in the plane (CRJ700/PMDG 738) I just hit the "N" key to bring up the plan coming out of the World Map Planner and input manually.  This is part of the ritual to keep it real plus gives me something to do while PAX boards (PACX).  The B78X does accept the route from the WMP so I use that since it's already there.  A Pilot's Life v2 uses SimBrief for some flight plane elements but I still input the route manually to keep the default ATC in sync.

Yeah, that sounds like a good way to do it as well. I have dual monitors so it's always been a habit to have planning up on one screen and the sim on the other - been doing that for ages so it's just what I'm used to. 

[briansommers 74]

I love this hobby. I’ve been in it for around 40 years and I keep learning new things…thanks for this.

Where is this “ATC sync” button?

ive been using navigraph but had to pass it through Little Navmap to choose a starting parking spot. But then it always automatically loads it into the g3000 (I do IFR in the Honda jet).  Is there a way to pick a parking spot through Navigraph charts?

[Rimshot 1,157]

Thanks for all the replies. So it depends on the aircraft whether or not a flight plan is automatically displayed. Unfortunately my preferred aircraft for my renewed IFR adventures is equipped with a Garmin GTN unit. I will try to see if I can get ATC to follow a plan I have entered in the PMS50 GTN, as I understand that is the only Garmin unit for MSFS that allows this? I hope it will one day be possible with the WT Garmins and the TDS GTNxi as well.

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

51 minutes ago, Rimshot said:

 I hope it will one day be possible with the WT Garmins and the TDS GTNxi as well.

It really depends on how you approach flight planning.. For our weekly Avsim flights, I typically load or prepare the flightplan in LittleNavMap.  From there, I can export a pln file and a gfp file of this plan.

I load up MSFS with the pln plan, that takes care of ATC and the in flight map.

In the GTNXi, I load the gfp plan.

With that done, I use the GTN as the navigation device, and the map for general orientation and multiplayer display.

I am sure there are many variations on this theme.. but this works for me. 😉

Edited November 20, 2022 by Bert Pieke

[Rimshot 1,157]

1 hour ago, Bert Pieke said:

...in LittleNavMap.  From there, I can export a pln file and a gfp file of this plan

Thanks for the insights Bert. Of course! The TDS GTNxi won't load the MSFS flightplan automatically; it is based on an external trainer. Hadn't thought of this before, this unit may suit my needs. I still do hope though WT will also consider an option to not automatically load a MSFS flight plan.

I can't seem to find how to export a plan as a gpf file though when using Little Navmap? Plan-G fortunately also offers this option.

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

3 minutes ago, Rimshot said:

I can't seem to find how to export a plan as a gpf file though when using Little Navmap?

Multi Export Options / RXP GTN...

I changed the target folder to  C:\ProgramData\TDS\GTNXi\FPL

[RandallR 446]

On 11/19/2022 at 4:48 AM, Rimshot said:

With the recent news that WT are upgrading the CJ4 I'm tempted to pick up IFR flying again. I do have a question though; as far as I can tell you have to create or import an IFR flightplan in MSFS before you hit the 'fly' button,,. but the question is will the sim then 'understand' I'm going to fly this plan, i.e. will ATC pick it up?

OK... in the case of the CJ4, the WT version is already a tremendous aircraft with a great FMS.  I was happy to hear they are going back to work to make it even better!  In the meantime, don't hesitate to fly it!  Create your FP in SimBrief.  When in the aircraft, import your plan into the FMS.  There is an option to sync the SimBrief plan with ATC.