Flight planner, Navigation and ATC

Hello,

I'm fairly new to FSX. I've been doing the missions and I'm pretty familiar with the Airbus A321. But in free flight I'm having some issues when approaching my destination.

Yesterday I was flying a VFR flight from Heathrow to Schiphol (pretty annoying that the included fsx heathrow does not have terminal 5 and new taxiways but anyway) All was well. I departed Heathrow and followed my route to Schiphol.

In flight planner I just selected a random gate at heathrow, Schiphol as destination and generated a high altitude route to Schiphol.

I followed all the way points and it brought me right on top of Schiphol, 25500 feet on top of it to be exact...

There was no top of descent waypoint and no instructions from ATC on course speed and altitude like you get in the missions.

I requested the landing and all I got from ATC was: Runway 6 left. cleared to land.....

So I then had to somehow get my plane down turn around find my own approach into runway 6 because when I asked ATC for directions all they were giving was: airport is x miles at x o'clock...

The whole thing ended in me crashing into Rotterdam.

Does anyone know where to find a proper tutorial on planning flights and how to get proper directions from ATC. I'd really like them to give me an altitude, heading and speed so I can just autopilot myself on top of the runway and only do the touchdown manually.

Does it make a difference to use IFR routes?

Thanks

Kevin

Yes, in the IFR case you will get "vectored" (ie ATC assigns you altitudes and headings to fly) onto and off of your planned route, which includes lining you up with a runway for a visual approach or assigned an instrument approach (an ILS approach if that's available).

With VFR you are pretty much on your own except for takeoff and landing clearance (or class B transition). The advantage of VFR is that ATC does not pester you and you can just follow your flight plan.

Generate the plan same as you did before but choose IFR. Then when you start your flight you need to request IFR clearance at which point ATC will give you your initial altitude and squawk code. You'll be asked to change radio frequencies as the flight proceeds and contact the controller for the next stage of flight.

When ATC starts asking you to descend, you'll want the airbus descending at around 1800 FPM to get down in time. Also note that EGLL-EHAM is only around 200 miles so I'd keep your cruise alt at 22000 feet or less, otherwise it's going to be difficult to achieve that much vertical change on such a short flight. My rough rule of thumb is to choose the distance as my cruise flight level, ie a 200 mile flight is at around FL200 (which is 20000 feet). Obviously this breaks down for really long flights but works pretty well for regional hops.

Unless weather is clear you'll probably be assigned an ILS approach into EHAM. Youtube is chock full of tutorials on how to fly an ILS approach if you haven't done one yet.

(pretty annoying that the included fsx heathrow does not have terminal 5 and new taxiways but anyway)

Bear in mind everything "default" in FSX is as it was when FSX came out. There haven't been any updates for it. Every airport, navaid, taxi-way, you name it, has been static since FSX first hit the market.

You can download and install updates for it all, though. You just have dig them up and install them. I am sure there is a payware, and probably freeware as well, updates for Heathrow.

I KNOW there are payware, and freeware as well, updates for almost every navaid in the game. I even found an updated file for the TACAN channels used at military airports, even though few planes in FSX even HAVE TACAN capable radios.

God luck!

Pat☺

While planning, click on "nav log" to see things like distance of the flight and fuel required.

Btw, getting lost is no excuse for crashing.;) Especially not in flat country like the Netherlands.

To prevent getting lost, there is a beacon at EHAM. 108.4 is the frequency of it. Tune that on NAV2, and you should see a arrow on the HSI screen, that points to the airport at all times. (beacon is a high altitude VOR. Those signals can be recieved if you are within 200NM.)

Have a look at the map in fsx to see where the beacon is located. You can click on it for info about it.

You can check the map mid flight as well if you get lost again.

Also the 'zoom in/out' buttons on the gps help.

---

you're not the first to get lost though, and won't be the last either. I remember flying online one night, over berlin somewhere, when I saw someone type 'help' in the chatbox. It turned out to be a first time pilot who had immediately tried multiplayer.

He was also flying EGGL-EHAM, just like you. I had him switch on the autopilot. (had to explain, he didn't't even know he had one:) ). Then made him tune some vor's and found out he was flying south-east of london, over the sea, on heading towards paris.

I checked how much fuel he had, was enough, so made him turn north-east. Steered him to rotterdam (vor 110.4), talked him down so he was at 3000 at rotterdam.

Looked up what runway was active at EHAM. Explained to him how to do an Ils landing on that runway during the descent. And made him set the needed Ils frequency and heading. Then left him after rotterdam, when all he had left to do was to fly north and press "APP" button. He made a good landing, his first ever.

Was so much fun to do. He turned out to be a 12year old guy that got fsx for his birthday a few days before. Good times!

Happy Flights!

il.

To add a little more info to the use of IFR mode flight plans - as provided by bdf369 at post #2.....

On longer flights if you want to stop following ATC instructions (such as regularly changing frequencies between sector centres etc) you can simply open the ATC window and select the 'cancel IFR flight plan' option. ATC will cancel flight following and will tell you to resume your own navigation. You can then still fly the planned route. At about 150 miles out from the destination reopen the ATC window and select the 'Open IFR flight plan' option - this will open your saved flight plan list. Select the required flight plan and click OK to load it. The ATC engine will then work out where you are and start giving routeing info again. Note you must re-open the plan with a good distance to run. If you re-open it to close to the destination the ATC engine may struggle to provide timely/correct instructions.

Even better, IMO, when ATC hands you off to the next controller, accept the hand off and do not contact the next controller.

Now you can fly in peace and quiet, without cancelling your flight plan, and contact ATC later in the flight at a time of your choosing.

When you do contact ATC it might give you some confusing instructions until it sorts out exactly where you are. Ignore those commands and ATC will catch up with your flight plan intact.

peace,

the Bean

 

pretty annoying that the included fsx heathrow does not have terminal 5 and new taxiways but anyway

Hmmmm

Heathrow T5 opened in 2008. That is two years after FSX was released.

Hmmmm

 

Heathrow T5 opened in 2008. That is two years after FSX was released.

And that's exactly WHY the Terminal and taxiways aren't on it. The programmers who wrote FSX couldn't possibly know what was going to happen two years from when FSX was published.

It's as though 5 years from now some complains about you not doing something you should have 2 years from now. How in the world could you know to do it?

Now I've got a temporal headache...

Pat☺

And that's exactly WHY the Terminal and taxiways aren't on it. The programmers who wrote FSX couldn't possibly know what was going to happen two years from when FSX was published.

It's as though 5 years from now some complains about you not doing something you should have 2 years from now. How in the world could you know to do it?

 

Now I've got a temporal headache...

Pat☺

If that's not confusing enough, the data in FSX was repeated from FS2004 - release date July 2003.

All data in FSX can be updated, including aftermarket airports that DO contain T5. Both Freeware and Payware.