BenW

To be honest, it's as simple or as time consuming as you want to be. I only fly in FS9 but I do have the iFly 737 NG, not as detailed or as good as the NGX but for the purposes of planning a flight exactly the same. My FS9 has all the bells and whistles; FS2Crew, Pro Flight Emulator ATC, GEX, REX etc. Planning a flight for me means firing up Active Sky and letting it download the current weather. Then I fire up Vroute premium and select a route. I don't have time for sitting there for hours in the cruise so I usually just look for a fun, short hop, say Dublin to Liverpool, around 30-40 minutes tops. Vroute spits out the route with the right SIDS and STARS and I export that into the FMC. Then I fire up TOPCAT, select the departure and arrival runways and it calculates the performance numbers for me so I know I'm not going to be too heavy and run off the runway into Liverpool Bay because I don't have enough room to stop. This information can also be presented on the kneeboard (which I trust still exists in FSX!) inside the VC. Then I fire up the sim at the departure gate. Airliners are 99% of the time already warmed up by the time the crew arrive, so I always begin flights with external power connected, packs running etc so the main task is inputting the information into the FMC and readying the aircraft for flight, a job that takes about 10 mins, tops. Then it's a case of buttoning up the doors, calling AES for pushback and getting her started, taxy out and depart. This is probably about 10mins, depending on how big the airport is! Once in the air I usually engage autopilot after the flaps are up, especially if I'm flying with ATC as I want hands free to climb or turn as what they ask me. Cruise is a matter of looking out of the window and enjoying the view of the Irish Sea until North Wales comes into view and then planning the descent. I'll usually fly this on autopilot until fully established on the ILS with gear and flaps set. A whole flight of this might take 15 mins planning, 40 mins in the air and 10 mins to taxy in and shut down. That's usually enough for me. Hand flying is a funny one. Having flown light aircraft for my PPL and full motion Level D simulators, FS still doesn't give me much sense of actually flying. The cues are all wrong and it's actually much, much easier in a real 737 simulator (I flew BA's 737-400 at Heathrow) to hand fly than in FS as trying to accurately hand fly, operate the MCP and talk to ATC (a task that would be shared in a real airliner) is too hard to be very satisfying IMHO. I'm much more interested in operating the aircraft SMOOTHLY. In real life, autopilot is often punched in very soon after departure, especially in busy traffic environments as it frees up the crew to concentrate on the SID and handle ATC. The same is true of arrival. Rarely are airliners hand flown much in the descent in busy airspace, anyway. I find it much more rewarding to manipulate the aircraft through the MCP with precision all the way to a stable approach and well flown manual landing rather than wobble all over the sky trying to do everything myself. Consequently my hand flying skills have eroded beyond following the magenta line, but if you read PPRUNE you will see that's a consequence of automation. I'd get the NGX and open your mind to a new world that is less about flying and lining up VOR tracks but to one that is about actually OPERATING the aircraft, in the way that the job of the modern pilot does. Flying a 737 NG is about 0.5% VOR tracks and 99.5% management of systems. I find the latter very rewarding when it all comes together.

Might be worth trying at a different airport. Mega Schipol is a well known stinker when it comes to performance.

You should probably just bite the bullet and get your head round the FMC, to be honest. All the proper stuff (PMDG, iFLY, QW 146, Level D) needs to be flown by the numbers if you want to do it properly and the only way to do that is by programming the FMC. The trick with FMC programming is to make it easy on yourself. The hardest bit is probably entering airways and waypoints and then getting them to marry up with the corresponding SID or STAR. If you use something like Vroute Premium it spits out the route and you just enter it the start and end airport codes straight into the 'route' section of the FMC and everything is loaded for you automatically. Vroute even tells you which SID or STAR is most appropriate for the weather and runway in use so you just select those from the 'dep' and 'arr' pages. Nothing to it. The other program that makes FMC programming easy is TOPCAT. It calculates all the performance numbers based on the aircraft weight, runway in use and prevailing weather and all you do is type them in on the PERF and TAKEOFF pages. Once you get up to speed you could program the FMC in about 4-5 mins, tops. Once you understand how the aircraft uses the information from the FMC to fly, you will find that it decreases your workload in the flight deck enormously.

I'd be interested in the answer to this as well. Djerba's terminal seems to kill things stone dead on my system - again like you things become a slideshow.

Nope, Jersey in the Channel Islands which is between the UK mainland and France. Small island populated by rich tax exiles and was the only part of the British isles to be occupied by the Jerries in the war. It's a bit like England but near to France, so the weather is a bit better and they have nice cheeses. Or something like that....

Another vote for PFE. It's certainly a zillion times better than Radar Contact from an immersion point of view, if not quite there in terms ease of use and reliability. There are a few quirks however, in that there must be some language code inside FS which tells it which voice set to use. Flying around the Caribbean for example, throws up some quirks. Some of the islands are French, some are Dutch, some are British but the language you would expect to hear would be West Indian. PFE in its wisdom sees the British sound code for say, Antigua and plays you a clip of the Antigua controller who sounds like he is from deepest Manchester! This does detract from the realism a little but it's still a great programme.

It was on the 'future airports' list on the UK2000 page but seems to have disappeared since. It's a shame as it's a perfect airport for an hour of simming, being only a short hop from all the airports on the South Coast so a busy sector ending in a very challenging short runway to arrive into at 1700m. In fact, I think it's probably the shortest in the UK handling stuff like 737s and A320s. 757s and iirc BA 767s and Tristars have all been in there in the past. When I flew BA's full motion 737-400 sim at LHR I asked the instructor if we could have a few approaches into Jersey, the last one of which she obligingly gave me in moderate turbulence and poor viz. Needless to say the touchdown was 'firm' but I was quite chuffed when she told me that it was 'a darn sight better than most Jersey landings she'd seen'! Let's hope someone does it, I'd buy it in a flash.

It's a real shame that Rob has decided to end his involvement with the AS forums. Thanks to him my A320 became useable again and I for one am incredibly grateful that he gave me a couple of hours of his time for a one on one team viewer session to get it up and running.

Be great if it's true, but it'll take a bit more than updating the website to convince me.

When I jumpseated on a Maersk Air UK 737-500 back in the pre-9/11 days between Birmingham and Milan the pilots made extensive use of VS in the descent. Climbs were generally made in VNAV, with the altitude window set to the next cleared flight level. The skipper explained that FLCH for small changes can be uncomfortable for punters due to the deck angle/engine noise that controlling speed with pitch can give.

I wasn't very impressed with it. The frames were on the lowish side and the oversimplification of certain systems (that I had fully learnt how to use in the LDS 767) was a chore. I also found it very 'pitchy' to fly. The 146 though is absolutely superb.

It's not a level-D sim, but rather a fixed base 'mockup' type. The link to their site is here: http://www.virtual-aerospace.com/737_simulator.html It certainly looks pretty good but it still runs on MS flight simulator so don't expect to be blown away. I've flown lots of sims from home built ones to BA's own 737-400 level-D motion sim and by a long chalk the BA one was the easiest to fly. The visuals, the motion cues and the properly damped controls make it far easier to fly than anything with a fixed base running on flight sim. We had a crack at a turbulent, wet and filthy night into Jersey, which for our non-UK friends is only 1700m long and is nicknamed 'HMS Jersey' by BA crews because it's like landing on a carrier! The turbulence on approach had us bouncing around in our seats and as we taxied in after an (intentional, you don't ever look for a greaser at JSY) firm landing my instructor turned to me and said 'well that was better than most landings I've seen at Jersey!'. I have to admit, I was more than a bit excitable for a few hours after. Still compared to £400 for an hour in BA's sim, it would be a fun day out for £150.

A *LONG* list of missing alphas for Aerosoft's Schipol scenery - you know, the one that runs like a dog, funny that.... Also any users of the Muscat X scenery (which is fairly average as scenery goes, so I've always wondered why it runs poorly) be aware that there's a list of missing alphas as long as your arm for that one too.

Cheers Rafal. I'll give the advice on that thread a try.

I tried Djerba X, looks great but the frame rates are nasty when the terminal is in view. I tried the update and turned off ground shadows but to no avail. Odd that considering it has no ground traffic and it's such a small airport it's so bad on frames. I might reinstall. I had terrible frames with the ifly 737 FP update but that seems to have sorted itself out, as FS9 sometimes does....

I actually found the REX clouds easier on frames than the AS ones, and better looking to boot. Use AS for your weather though, Rex's weather engine is a bit agricultural.

I've reinstalled more than a few times and the advice not to bloat is a good one. I ditched a load of pay ware and freeware on my last install with no regrets.

I love Malaysia. Air Asia X (which is sadly not serving us here in Europe any longer) took us to KL and we took two internal flights with Air Asia and they were great. Certainly better than a certain budget airline with a harp on the tail nearer home ;). The landing in KL in the A340 was the smoothest I've ever felt - he just greased it on. Had it not been for the thrust reverse you'd barely be able to tell we'd landed. The only scenery I have in Asia is FT Kai Tak. Apart from Macau, are there any good add-on airports that are within say an hour's flying time of Hong Kong?

PFE is a funny one. I use it most of the time now and my success rate is high, although there will be the odd flight where it just throws an utter brain fart. Support is good (in that you always get a reply) but often it'll be a one line response that doesn't entirely solve your problem. It's soooo much better than RC4 in many ways, the accents matched to airlines and ATC centres and the fact that it'll give you proper taxy instructions and speeds as well as vectors to final. It does take much more setting up than RC4 however and is arguably a bit more temperamental. I'd forget about the TGS. In the real world, you get the taxy instructions and you need to read the chart. If you're using add-on airports then these will correspond to the chart and you'll be able to find your way to the end of runway without much difficulty unless you're somewhere mental like CDG. You've also got your virtual co-pilot giving you guidance so that should be sufficient. Also don't worry about the PFE displayer. I don't know anyone that seems to have got it to work! My method for a good flight in PFE - Get the route through vRoute Premium and use the fuel planner page to build a vertical profile of your route. Export the route into PFE. Once your route has gone through PF2000 and it's in PFE then enter the altitudes from the vertical profile in Vroute alongside the corresponding waypoints in PFE. Work out which runways you're going to use. TOPCAT and Active Sky are good for this. If you're using a SID, make sure 'SIDs active' is ticked on the SIDS STARS page for your selected airport. Enter an altitude to complete the SID. Even if you haven't finished the SID PFE will clear you to 'own navigation' beyond this altitude, which is fine - just go direct to your first waypoint. If you've a fast climbing aircraft then set the SID completion altitude higher so that you complete more of the SID, or you can set a waypoint as the end of a SID. I find it easier to do it the first method as in real life you often don't fly the whole SID. Put an X against the runways that you're not using. PFE uses wind direction for runway use unless you specify one, not the direction of all the ai so it might vector you into the face of traffic taking off towards you. I prevent this by also closing the runways I don't want using an AFCAD editor. I don't bother using STARS as I like getting vectors from the last waypoint as it's more fun. It's worth swotting up on the right STAR for the approach anyway, so you get an idea of the altitudes and fixes for the final approach, even though you won't be following them. When you first fire up FSX and PFE, put your VCP to 'off', so that you tune the frequencies yourself. Once you've pushed back, set VCP to 'VCP handles all comms' BEFORE you tune for taxi clearance, as the TGS prevents you from changing the VCP mode. The VCP will now do everything, including calling the tower when ready for departure as you reach the end of the runway. If he doesn't (and some add-on airports have dodgy holding points that don't register with PFE) then you tune it yourself and press '6'. That's it. Everything else will be automated - you simply follow the ATC instructions all the way to the destination. While in the cruise press '2' to load ACARS for your destination. In FS9 (can't speak for FSX) it loads up in the kneeboard. Amongst other things, it'll give you the runway in use for arrival, so you can get your approach set up. After landing, it only seems to assign a gate about 5% of the time so best assign a gate for yourself at each airport in the set up, too. I love PFE as it's the best ATC program by far, but it's needlessly fiddly to get the best out of. My method above is usually pretty foolproof though.

Good stuff guys. I'll try some of your tips. Rob, I'll give you a shout over at the AS forum and hopefully you can help me become a Bus convert. My old flying instructor is a good mate of mine and now is a 'Bus captain for Easyjet so I've no shortage of help flying the thing - just getting it installed is the tricky bit;)

Guys I'm not down with the 'Bus terminology so forgive me. I use a combination of F1 View and Active Camera to move around the VC. The mouse wheel moves you forwards and backwards in the VC. In the iFly 737 you just click next to the knob in the MCP to rotate it, or on a PMDG aircraft hover until the little hand appears. In the Airsimmer you use the mouse wheel to rotate the knobs on the FCU, so there's a conflict. The only solution I could see to this was to uninstall F1 View when using the Airsimmer, unless someone has a better idea. I'd love nothing more than to get it working properly and Flex, if you could spare me some time on teamviewer to get this done I'd be very grateful. Looking at the install process for the ET version (the one I have) on the AS forum looks too complicated for my modest brainpower!

Yes I have it and stick by what I said. There are just too many annoyances with it. The APU ctd, the legs page ctd, the wonky nav modes, the sifting through cryptic forum posts to try to figure out how to make it work, for me, it's just not worth it. Plus my main bugbear which is the fact that I can't use F1 View as you need the mouse wheel to turn the MCP buttons so I have to uninstall that just to load the damn thing. I can fire up the iFly 737 and go somewhere. I don't need to worry about the aeroplane as it just works so I can concentrate on the flying. The Airsimmer seems to be 99% farting about with and 1% flying, which seems to end in tears. As I said, it's great but flawed. Tell me that's not the case?

If the A320 is up to PMDG standard (and with it being Lefteris' project, there's no reason to suspect it won't be) then I think this will be the moment I ditch FS9 for FSX. I can live without the NGX as the iFly NG works fine in FS9. There's no decent 'Bus for FS9 and there never will be, so I'm watching this one closely!

+1 on world of ai. It's weird that no payware developer has come up with an ai program that matches the quality of the woai stuff that is free.

Im afraid to say you'd better get used to stuff not working properly as far as the Airsimmer is concerned. You'll be spending a lot of time trying to make it fly! It's a crying shame as the VC is absolutely amazing and the sound set is fantastic. It was so nearly a FS9 classic but I'm afraid with stuff from iFly, Level D, PMDG etc around which works out of the box and has great support I found that life was too short to try to work around the Airsimmer's many shortcomings. A real pity as we'll probably never see a proper Airbus for FS9.