2 questions about approach

[Rakham 0]

1) Is it possible to have the runways lights on during day time?2) When approaching an airport, I find myself always too high when too close from the runway. With the Cessna, what would be the right altitude at about 8-10 mn from an airport? This to avoid a dive at the last minute.:-)ThanksRakham

[Guest tonyc]

1. If you mean the runway lights, the answer is no. You should , however, be looking at the VASI lights that are usually located on the left side of the runway, just after the beginning of the runway. These lights are for glide control, and if you see a combination of red and white(I believe), you're ok. All red, you're too low, and all white and you're too high.2. When getting ready to land, you look at the airport altitude and add 1000 feet to it. This is a general rule for entering your downwind pattern. At 10 miles or so, I would start to descend a level off at the airport altitude + 1000 feet. From here, it takes practice, but in real life you pick an imaginary point on the runway. This is your touch down point, and on final you make sure that this point does not move up or down. If it moves up, you're too low; if it moves down, you will be high. I hope this helps.tony

[Guest jrewing]

Hi Rakham,It is possible to have runway lights on during the day in real life, but not in FlyII (to my knowledge anyway). In real life, it's often difficult to see runway lights at night until you're pretty darn close to the airport.An approach to landing is a gradual process of slowing down and descending, so you must manage both altitude and airspeed. I gather you are flying the 172, but I don't know which airport you are using. Anyway, here are some general suggestions for the 172.Try to make a straight-in approach to the airport.Try to be about 3000' above the airport elevation when you are about 3 miles out. Start a gradual descent by removing power from 2400 RPM to about 2000 RPM. The nose will start to drop and should be able to maintain about 100 to 110 knots with a 500'/minute descent rate. If your airspeed gets too fast, hold the yoke back slightly to slow down. If your airspeed is too slow, let the plane descend.As you get closer to the airport and you can see the runway, imagine the runway centerline extending toward you and get right on top of that imaginary line. When you are a mile or so from the airport, try to have descended to 1000' above the field elevation, then reduce the power to 1800 RPM and add 10 degrees of flaps. The nose will start to go up when you first add the flaps, so gently hold it in a descent. Let the airspeed should slow to about 90 knots.Wait 10 seconds or so, then reduce the power to 1500 RPM, slow to about 80 knots, and add 20 degrees of flaps. Keep the nose slightly down and focus on the big numbers on the runway - try to keep the numbers in the same spot over the instrument panel, as if you wanted fly right into them.Set the flaps to 30 degrees and pitch the nose up or down to maintain about 65 to 60 knots. If you appear to be high, remove some power and pitch down slightly. Keep descending toward the runway numbers. If there is a VASI, remember Red over White - you're alright (on the glideslope). Red over Red - you're dead (below the glideslope). White over white - you're outta sight (too high).As you get close to the runway threshold, slowly reduce the throttle to idle (count to three) and begin to gently raise the nose of the plane. Your airspeed will drop as you get right over the runway. The plane should settle onto the runway just as the stall horn sounds.With practice, it's a piece of cake! ;-)John

[Rakham 0]

Thank you both for your suggestions. Yes the plane is the basic 172 but within Fly!1. I do not use Fly!2 for the time being.I am not a programmer, but I am very sure it should be possible to keep those runways lights on all the time :-)I did refer to the red-white lights but as I said, I was always far to high (3000) at about 8 miles from touch down.I land anywhere but only on short trips (20 minutes) and on airports equiped with radios. ILS is the best of course, but since all airports are not equiped, that was the reason of my question.I combine the whole stuff with the KLN 89 which I just started to master after 3 years! I will practice a lot now.Have a pleasant weekendRakham

[Guest]

Rakham>1) Is it possible to have the runways lights on during day >time? Yes, this is possible. See my step-by-step tutorial below!Procedure to change the airport lighting(Example for London Heathrow (EGLL) in Fly!II)Needed: Vol!Edit 1.1 and DexImport 1.2See also the PFD handout which comes with Vol!Edit. Go to the folder Terminal Reality Fly! II system, make a copy of the file AIRPORT.POD and save it in a different folder in case anything should go wrong. In that case you can replace this file. Create a new folder (anywhere with any name) to which you can export your DEX-files Start Vol!Edit When started for the first time you have to specify your work directories The directory in which Fly!II resides The work directory (Just change the drive letter if neccessary) The directory you uses for exporting your DEX-files to (see above) The default version of Fly! (select Fly!II) Click in the menu bar "DBD Files" Click in the pull-down menu "Open a DBD file from a POD" Select in the window AIRPORT.POD and click Open After some seconds you will see the database with all the airports on the lines and all the variables in the columns. Now we must find Heathrow. Type EGLL in the frame left from the button Arpt OACI and click this button. You will see that the key UK00523 will appear in the frame above. Since the database is sorted on this key you must scroll down, till you find the line where the key UK00523 is in the 5th column: line 5120. (May be there is a way to jump directly to this line but I have not found this way yet). Doubleclick on any cell of this line and a window Data change opens. Go to Page 2 and you will find a line airport lighting. Select the number 0 in the column "value" and doubleclick on it so that it turns blue. Now type 2. Click the button Close. You will see that a x has been placed in the column Change. Select DEX files from the menu bar. Click Export all (DEX) in the pull-down menu. A window opens "Save export file as

[Guest]

Hans thankyou for that little tutorial, I printed out what you said and did it all first time... no problems.If you know how to do it could you do the same with adding a runway to FlyII.Yes I know there are wonderful tutorials out there from Harald, but my grey cells just havent worked it out.Your teaching method is right up my street thankyou.Steve Brown (steviegeebee)

[Guest]

Hans, on your screenshot, looks like Geneva, am I mistaken??Cheers

[Rakham 0]

This is wonderfull Hans! I see others will be happy too despite that this does not mach the reality, it is good to see the airport from far to practice landings during the day.RegardsRakham

[Guest]

Yeah, could be. I just took a random screeny from my hard disk as an illustration how the result could look like.