16 minutes ago, Fiorentoni said:

Were you „cleared for the ILS“? This implies the descent to the altitude of the FAF.

I think I might have been, yes. 

EDIT. Just had a look at the video. Completely missed it. Would have been a perfect flight if I didn’t 😊

In a way I didn’t mind doing the missed approach though, as it demonstrated what BATC is capable of. Despite the “climb FL162”, the vectoring around for a 2nd approach was very impressive.

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by Cpt_Piett

11 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I think that would be too much to expect, as there much be thousands of different local variations. 

There might have been other flaws during my flight, but to be honest I don’t have enough knowledge of ATC to know for sure. I was cleared for the Lambourne transition to 09L into Heathrow, but never got a descent clearance from 7000ft IIRC. Because of this I had to declare a missed approach. In hindsight I was wondering if somewhere within the ATC instructions, it was implied that I should descend to, say 3000ft. 

I believe that if you’re cleared for the transition then technically you can fly the published arrival, as long as you respect the altitude constraints of the FAF etc. BATC had me fly a transition into Belfast in my flight yesterday and basically just left me up to my own devices after that for the ILS. I think the answer might be to not plan a transition off the STAR in the simbrief flight plan to force BATC into vectors. 
 

The issue is that some routes will end with a VOR or similar on or near to the airfield and it’s very unrealistic to fly to this waypoint and then get vectored. Every ATC add on I’ve ever used back to the FSX days struggles with this. Usually the tidiest option is a STAR that feeds onto the LOC from its last waypoint, meaning that the route is simpler to plan. However even then as with those very long downwind legs such as in Germany where almost always a shortcut will be given, BATC will have you flying the whole thing. 
 

If they can nail vectoring, this will be an amazing program. 

When i got vectored into Paphos yesterday I ended up about 5NM left of track.  Should I have just ignored the vectoring and carried on being a child of the magenta line straight to the ILS? 

25 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

There might have been other flaws during my flight, but to be honest I don’t have enough knowledge of ATC to know for sure

I've noticed that indeed 😉  You said Schiphol tower ready at rwy 24, while you were actually holding short of rwy 24. However, Beyond ATC did not recognise that because it instructed you to line up rwy 24 ..  

You better fly a while on VATSIM first to learn the ATC radio protocol

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by kiek

26 minutes ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I was cleared for the Lambourne transition to 09L into Heathrow, but never got a descent clearance from 7000ft IIRC. Because of this I had to declare a missed approach. In hindsight I was wondering if somewhere within the ATC instructions, it was implied that I should descend to, say 3000ft. 

The same happened to me on my test flight from EHAM to EGGL and I was wondering that too. I decided to descend but it would be interesting to know whether that was the correct the correct procedure.

4 minutes ago, kiek said:

You better fly a while on VATSIM first to learn the ATC radio protocol

Well, in my defense I don’t have an ATPL license. Just a simmer trying to learn new things. But… use VATSIM to learn how to handle BATC? I’m sure you just forgot to add an emoji after that sentence 😉

6 minutes ago, Shack95 said:

The same happened to me on my test flight from EHAM to EGGL and I was wondering that too. I decided to descend but it would be interesting to know whether that was the correct the correct procedure.

On the Chart is a clear "Actual descent clearance will be as directed by ATC"-Infobox and the minimum altitude is 7000. So if you havent got a further descend I would say BATC did it wrong.

They always give out descends in RL anyway. 

11 minutes ago, techman said:

On the Chart is a clear "Actual descent clearance will be as directed by ATC"-Infobox and the minimum altitude is 7000. So if you havent got a further descend I would say BATC did it wrong.

Inbound to LAM on LOGA2H I was told to “cross LAM at or above 7000”, which I thought was impressive. The STAR requires you to be at 7000ft at LAM, then fly 30nm outbound at 220kts before descending further.

1 hour ago, martinboehme said:

s I was the only aircraft as far as BeyondATC is concerned, I think it would have been realistic to receive something like "after DB462, proceed direct DB452".

That's the one thing I noticed in the demo video a few weeks ago, were the flight was going to Liverpool and ATC let the aircraft fly all to the Clearance Limit point.

I already commented back then, that this betrays one of the major shortcomings of the way it is currently programmed: The vectoring does not at all take into account the amount of traffic arround you. No matter that the program doesn't control AI traffic at this point, the vectoring should, in my opinion, be programmed from the start to account for traffic density. If there is no traffic at all, like at the moment, you should get shortcuts immidieately.

 

A good example was an IVAO flight I did yesterday from FRA to DUS, with complete coverage of all ATC stations. My flightplan was  MARUN Y152 ARPEG Z850 ADEMI T854 DOMUX. Which would then be followed by the DOMUX23 transition. Since there was absolutely no Aircraft around at that time the departure controller cleared me direct to DL454 which is a fix on the final approach of the transition. That was while I was barely at FL060 still climbing out on the SID at Frankfurt. And it made total sense to do this, because there were no possible conflicts on the route. I was then vectored about 10 Miles before reaching DL454, right onto final.

This is how it should be done. If there is no operational reason (traffic) around to fully fly a route, STAR or Transition, ATC will give you a shortcut that puts you right on final. 

(Small aside: As someone who lives in the vicinity of an airport with night cargo operations, I wish this was illegal. ATC should be forced to let traffic fly the procedures fully as published after 22:00. They are usually designed to lead traffic away from densily populated areas, and if ATC gives shortcuts this undermines that and you will have aircraft blasting right over your house even though there is no SID or STAR route to be found near it)

And that BeyondATC does not do this, even though there is no traffic around you, shows that the underlying programming is flawed and incomplete.

 

1 hour ago, Cpt_Piett said:

I think that would be too much to expect, as there much be thousands of different local variations. 

I'm sure there is way to program that into a database. It could potentially be even editable by the user and then shared like a GSX Profile.

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by Farlis

Done 2 flights with it so far, EGLL to EGPD and back, and I'm very impressed after previously using ProATC in P3D, giving up on default ATC a while ago and having returned FSHud for a refund last year as I found it awful.

BATC is very clearly "Early Access" but I think it has tremendous potential as long as it keeps getting developed and the roadmap is going to be delivered. It already had 2 patches in 24 hours, so that's promising. Here are my observations after 2 flights.

The Good

• All my departures and climbs have been perfect.
• Taxi instructions were good on both from gate to runway.
• Love the Simbrief integration.
• EGPD doesn't have a SID and I got vectored perfectly from RWY 34 to my first waypoint.
• I used auto-respond (FO control) on one flight and PTT on the other. Both modes worked very well, BATC had no trouble understanding me at all.
• The voices can be very impressive. I'm using the basic voice model and some of those are excellent.
• Everything installed without issue, setup was easy and I like the auto-update function for patches.

The Bad

• Disclaimer - I know it's early access and I am not in any way complaining about there being bugs, just pointing out what I came across which impacted my experience negatively.
• Descent planning and approach need a lot more work. On the first flight I advised I was ready for descent, got cleared to FL300 and was kept there for 10 minutes before getting further clearance. I ended up way too high and had to work hard to manage my energy and altitude to get back on track.
• Vectors into EGPD (no STAR) - BATC somehow sent me in a "turn left" 360 loop that took me to the FAF when they could have just given me a minor heading change to the right to end up in the same place.
• EGLL arrival on the second flight was a little better with the altitude planning but still had to use speedbrakes to get back on track as was too high (much less so than the EGPD arrival). Would have been nice to get vectored by BATC instead of just following the BNN transition 1:1 but that's hopefully coming.
• After landing on 09L I was instructed to exit via A9W. When I requested taxi to gate I was told to "taxi via A9W to 515". No other taxiway instructions were given. I don't believe that's a scenery limitation as it was able to give me taxi instructions for departure from EGLL. I was also only able to select 2 stands from the menu...would be great if there was a way to get more or maybe one day it could link up with GSX to get the selected gate from there?
• Voices - as good as some of them are, there are some really indecipherable ones too. Keeping in mind that this was a domestic flight, all of Manchester Centre was manned by Dutch people on both flights and half of London...I honestly don't know what language that was, but it wasn't English. Sounded a bit like Borat speaking through a blanket...awful. This really needs work as some of the accents are way overdone and nigh impossible to understand. I also wouldn't expect to hear so many non-UK accents on a domestic flight in UK airspace.
• The interface is functional but having to go to a separate window outside the sim to interact is killing the immersion. Either integrate it into the Sim or offer a remote option for the interface that can be opened on an iPad - like the Fenix MCDU/EFB.
• No documentation at all - again it's early access, but some sort of manual would be nice rather than just pointing to a YouTube tutorial.

Overall I'm happy with it and can't wait to see bugs fixed and features added. AI traffic will be great down the line. I'll keep using it and work my way around the bugs as they will hopefully get fixed.

1 hour ago, Cpt_Piett said:

Well, in my defense I don’t have an ATPL license. Just a simmer trying to learn new things. But… use VATSIM to learn how to handle BATC? I’m sure you just forgot to add an emoji after that sentence 😉

I have no ATPL license either but flown 1000 hours with the Level-D 767 at VATSIM. That helps a lot to learn the phrases that are used in ATC. Talking and listening to ATC is stressful in the beginning, so it helps if you are a bit used to it. You will not learn the right stuff from Beyond ATC I guess, that's why I recommend to work with human controllers at VATSIM first. They will help beginners like you better then BeyondATC.

Furthermore, VATSIM is free and it does a better job then Beyond ATC. At the route EHAM-EGLL there are controllers present most of the time. Speaking about immersion, thats the way to go.

 

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by kiek

8 minutes ago, kiek said:

I have no ATPL license either but flown 1000 hours with the Level-D 767 at VATSIM. That helps a lot to learn the phrases that are used in ATC. Talking and listening to ATC is stressful in the beginning, so it helps if you are a bit used to it. You will not learn the right stuff from Beyond ATC I guess, that's why I recommend to work with human controllers at VATSIM first. They will help beginners like you better then BeyondATC.

Furthermore, VATSIM is free and it does a better job then Beyond ATC. At the route EHAM-EGLL there are controllers present most of the time. Speaking about immersion, thats the way to go.

 

Most times flying on Vatsim, I wound up talking to myself on Unicomm.😉

I was flying from EHRD to Biggin Hill. 40 miles out ATC told me to stay at FL90 and fly current heading up until capture of localizer. No further descent clearance. He did not clear me for a star or said I should descent via a star. He only told me to expect the star and to descend to FL90. And then to stay at that altitude and to fly current heading.

18 minutes ago, Bobsk8 said:

Most times flying on Vatsim, I wound up talking to myself on Unicomm.😉

It really depends on time of day and where you fly. The system they have for their controllers is a blessing and curse at the same time. Having local controllers that speak the local language as well and knowing the procedures of the airpsace in and out,  is really helpful for all kinds of operations. But it leads to the same result that you get with scenery add-ons. Where no one lives or flies, coverage is bad. 

Even within the busiest airspaces of the EU you get very white spots on VATSIM, becaues of the very small number of people from countries like France or Spain who are willing to controll traffic.

And it's just a handful of people anyway. I hear the same voices doing the same sectors all the time.

People should rather recommend more people to become Controllers on VATSim instead of flying there. Currently there are 950 Pilots online worldwide on VATSIM but only 49 Controllers.

On IVAO you have 450 Pilots and 43 Controllers as of this moment.

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by Farlis

Compared to SI one of the biggest showstoppers of the current BATC are the terrible "local accents".of the basic voiceset - In a previous build the option just to use plain English voices was there (see https://beyondatc.nolt.io/54) - in the published version(s) this option is gone...why?

 

 

 

  

Edited May 6, 20242 yr by MaGer1965