Mental hangup with RCATC and the BOD point

[Guest RobA]

Really sorry to say no! The overall look is great but the image on the left is copyrighted. You can use that image for yourself but not to upload. Sorry :-(Best, Rob

[CactusDx 0]

Doh!!! Image retracted! :7Mike Chttp://jdtllc.com/images/RCbeta.jpg

[Guest klucznik]

Hi, Thanks for your note. Since my last post on this thread, which you just answered, I have tried almost a dozen flights and, using Jim Webb's Rule of Thumb, I seem to have no problem now. Pays to read and REMEMBER the information provided by professionals, huh ? Now we only have to convince JD and his group to include, at additional cost, a method whereby the user can program his own approach that RC's APPROACH CONTROL will use to pick us off at one of the airports's arrival GATES when arriving at a controlled airport.Thanks again

[Guest Scott Campbell]

Blais,V3 does tell you to taxi to a specific gate (and from one for that matter), and you enter that info in the controllers section of the program. But it's Ground that tells you to taxi to a gate, not APC to assign one. If you want to land on a specific runway to expedite taxi, then you can request any runway you wish (like you can do now). Or you can request IAP to any runway you desire, and fly that approach as you wish.

[Guest klucznik]

Hello Scott, The GATES I am making reference to are the GATES in the sky. All controlled airports have GATES that are used as pick-off points by Approach Control. KORD has several. Two of them are KRENA and PAPPI. Much easier to program Approach Control vectors to the runways from these GATES. I know KPVD, here in my general neighborhood, has some but I'm not exactly sure what they are. Hard to get info on this subject.Regards

[Guest RobA]

No prob ;-)Rob

[Guest Stamatis]

"No that's not correct. 1800/ft-min is what Microsoft has arbitrarily assigned as a default climb and descent rate in the autopilot mode control panel. Due to this, MS has created the misconception that transport category aircraft are flown by reference to vertical speed and that's not correct. Transport category aircraft are flown by reference to airspeed profiles, not vertical speed.Maintaining V2 + 15 on takeoff with a pitch of 15-20 degrees will yield vertical speeds around 3000-4000 feet per minute. Descending at 300 knots to 10,000 feet will also yield descent rates between 2000-3000 feet per minute."Amen to that! :-)I don't understand why FS "flyers" believe that a higher-than-1800/2000fpm rate of descent is necessarily a bad thing. I guess it is the misconception that high rates of descent are uncomfortable for the pax. Well, strictly speaking this is not true.What is uncomfortable for the pax is:a) the rate of change of the rate of descent, i.e. how quickly you go from 0 fpm to -3500 fpm:( the deck angle (pitch)If you increase your rate of descent very gradually, and your resultant pitch does not exceed -5 deg or so, pax will not feel a thing. Trust me, I have seen it with my own eyes when we slowly put a B737-700 to a -4500 fpm descent. You wouldn't know it if you did not watch the VSI.I flew 4 legs this month, all in the cockpit, and rest assured we descended with rates exceeding -2500 fpm almost every time.Stamatis

[CactusDx 0]

Stamatis,A couple of years ago I was coming back in to Phoenix from Chicago. Albuquerque Center kept us a little higher than normal due to traffic and when they did finally issue descent instructions the captain had to really work to make the crossing restriction. We were dropping out of the sky like a lead safe. Descent rate was close to 5000 fpm but, as you mentioned, the pitch transitions were done smoothly and unless I looked at the VSI I would have never known.:-)Mike Chttp://jdtllc.com/images/RCbeta.jpg

[Guest klucznik]

Hello Stamatis, Your point of view is well taken. I am not a pilot but have been on many, many flights, both large commercial jets and small private putt-putts, and the only time you seem to experience discomfort is when there is a rate change in acceleration. So what you say does indeed make sense. I'm not sure, me, about the vertical climb rate. I notice when reading about takeoffs that the aircraft's vertical climb angle is quickly reduced to a more general 9% from a more typical initial 14% or a little higher. When I use PS1 the FMS quickly reduces the climb angle to about 9% or so from a previous higher rate used to get off the ground and attain some altitude. (This is with a 747-400.) I guess the better forum to use on this subject is the Aerowinx Forum (PS1) due to the number of commercial ATP's that contribute to that particular forum. You did indeed make sense in what you stated.Regards

[Guest klucznik]

Hello, Just thought I'd mention that I performed a PS1 flight yesterday and realized that the descent rate of an aircraft is dependent on many variables, such as pressure altitude, weight, etc. The rates I have been using in MSFS are considerably off-base. In case any of you folks might be interested in going in deeper here is a link to a HTML file which discusses this and other aircraft related aerodynamics.http://www.aerowinx.com/html/aerodynamics.html Have a good weekend.Regards

[Guest RobA]

Thanks for that link. Very interesting.Rob

[Guest klucznik]

Hello RobA, PS1 is a very complex simulation. It takes a long, long time before you feel at ease with it but it does give you a good idea what the RW 747-400 Glass Cockpit folks are faced with. On the other hand, the PS1 folks go out of their way to help out in any way they can. A rather unique bunch.Regards