Simviation Forum - Easier Flight Planning?

Jun 27^th, 2004 at 5:18am

JRoc Offline
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Hey there.

Is there any possible way of entering waypoints within FS without having to hunt down a particular intersection and do the click and drag routine (which REALLY sucks if you're looking for a certain one in Europe, due to there being soooo many airways) ? I know there's programs like FSNavigator, which I might check out, but I'm a stickler for a purdy GUI, and I think it's uuuuugly.

It's a bit of a pain in the rear having to hunt that stuff down when you have a flight plan like this:

eg.

CYTR..FIR..FIR..MSS J586 YJN J500 YFC J581 YQX..KOBEV..5050N..5240N..5230N..4120N..DINIM UN514 LESLU UB40 MERLY UM140 DVR UL9 KONAN UL607 KOK UM150 TGO UL607 ARNOS UP735 MAGAM MAGA2A LDZA

As you can imagine... it ain't fun clicking and dragging that for an hour before you can get out and fly.

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Reply #1 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 8:02am

Nexus Offline
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The greater of two evils...

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FSnav not only plots the visual route, but is also capable of flying it for you (autopilot).
I never use the default planner since it wont give you realistic routes, and that database is not up-to-date either.

So my advice is to swallow your pride and buy FSnav.
Another solution would be to acquire an aircraft with some form of FMS where you can program the route by just typing in the waypoints/airways, that will get rid of the 'waypoint hunting' Wink

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Reply #2 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 11:11am

RollerBall Ex Member

???

I can never understand why people are so sniffy about the default flight planner. And I can't understand why someone should spend an hour trying to identify and insert all the intersections when the flight planner does it for you in like 5 seconds if you choose to fly airways. Personally I spend more time taking out waypoints I don't want to include in the plan.

Does anyone actually care if the route created by the flightplanner isn't exactly the one flown by real pilots in real airliners? If they do I think they probably need to get out a bit more. Sorry Wink

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Reply #3 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 11:38am

pete Offline
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Cloud Cuckoo Land

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There are of course the times when people wish to rehearse a real flight - like I have recently.

It is then you find some shortcomings in the default flightplanner. It is a good flightplanner, IMHO - but there is the fact that many real pilots use FS9 to simulate a real flight plan - particularly in amateur GA flight - . 8)

Think Global. It's the world we live in.

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Reply #4 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 12:35pm

Nexus Offline
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The greater of two evils...

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Rollerball, Have you ever tried to re-create a trans-atlantic flight by using the default flight planner?
Take a look at this, the white line offcourse represents the suggested flight by the default flightplanner, and the red line is the one my other REALISTIC flightplanner suggested

So I think you should really reconsider what you said, I'm in no mood to fly all over to Alaska and the turn again to Boston...but I guess it's okay for you ???

Like I mentioned earlier the default navdatabase is out of date, and I run the current AIRACS from navdata.at, so there's another reason I can't trust the default flightplanner, in many cases airways change names, start/end waypoints etc.

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Reply #5 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 5:44pm

RollerBall Ex Member

Ha - I don't think so.

Direct GPS seems to give a perfectly good route to me for the number of times I fly from LHR to JFK.

When I look down from 50000 ft all of the sea looks exactly the same to me! Wink

And I don't lose too much sleep over whether it's identical to the route the real big boys fly

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Reply #6 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 6:08pm

Nexus Offline
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The greater of two evils...

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Direct GPS is no fun, you lose all the goodies that comes with having to actual plan your flight, and calculating fuel burn that are almost 99% accurate.

Besides I don't have a garmin in the aircrafts I fly anyways.
I need my waypoints Grin

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Reply #7 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 6:59pm

Silver1SWA Offline
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Morgan Hill, Ca. (SF Bay Area)

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Hey Nexus82,

Does FSNav insert the plan into the game allowing ATC to recognize your plan as it would using the default planner. In order to get ATC off your back on approach and not give you the bogus vectoring, I have found that you need to plug in those waypoints on the default planner. I too enjoy flying the real-world, REALISTIC flight plans, but if you don't enter it as close as you can in the default flight planner even if you aren't using the default autpilot (I use the PMDG FMC for example) they will bitch until you follow their vectors. If I use ATC, I still need to plug in the flight plan, each waypoint at a time in order to let them fly my desired approach.

P4 3.20Ghz 800Mhz FSB&&1 GB PC3200 400Mhz DDR RAM (Dual Channel)&&Nvidia GeForce 6800GT 256MB 8X AGP&&SB Audigy MP3+&&Win XP Pro

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Reply #8 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 8:01pm

Nexus Offline
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The greater of two evils...

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I file an IFR flight, let them give me the tower hand off, then I won't bother contacting ATC until I'm close to my destination airport and then contact the proper ATC frequency...I usually do a good job in anticipating the active runway so I can live with their bitching until they ask me to contact tower for landing clearance.

If it's VFR conditions I cancel the IFR flightplan and use the "nearest airport" option in order to receive the landing clearance.

Can't answer about Fsnav, only used it a couple of times, but the program is obsolete for me since every aircraft I fly has its own FMS.

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Reply #9 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 9:48pm

jordonj Offline
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Loose my license...WHAT
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Michigan

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I'v been having fun plotting my courses VOR to VOR without using the flight planner by looking at the map...the extra work is part of the appeal of the game to me. Sometimes, as I have mentioned in previous posts, I don't get a distance on my distance indicator, while it is obvious I have the VOR coming in (I check the morse code). There are also times I do use my GPS (in real life, I would want as many backup plans as I can find) and when I encounter that problem is one of them. I also use to help plan landing.

But don't let anyone preach to you about how to play, navigate, or anything else...

The goal here is to HAVE FUN!!! Grin

My first flight in a 172 on August 20, 2004&&&&&&Doing the right thing is more important than doing the thing right. (P. Drucker) &&&&When all think alike, then no one is thinking. (Walter Lippmann)&&&&Boredom's the problem. And how do you beat Boredom? Adventure!!!&&&&Tyler: You-You'll remember my position, won't you?&&&&Rosie: Sure! Stop by for a drink sometime!&&&&Tyler: Wait! Wait! What is my position?&&&&Rosie: Ehhhh...beats the hell outta me! I just hope I can find my way back home!

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Reply #10 - Jun 27^th, 2004 at 11:19pm

JRoc Offline
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Nexus: Which aircraft are you using (with FMCs)? I noticed a sexy looking panel in one of your posts.

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Reply #11 - Jun 28^th, 2004 at 3:21am

BiggBaddWolf Ex Member

Some VOR's dont have DME, that is why your distance wont show when you are tracking the particular VOR Shocked

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Reply #12 - Jun 28^th, 2004 at 8:43am

jordonj Offline
Colonel
Loose my license...WHAT
license?!
Michigan

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I wondered about that...thanks!

My first flight in a 172 on August 20, 2004&&&&&&Doing the right thing is more important than doing the thing right. (P. Drucker) &&&&When all think alike, then no one is thinking. (Walter Lippmann)&&&&Boredom's the problem. And how do you beat Boredom? Adventure!!!&&&&Tyler: You-You'll remember my position, won't you?&&&&Rosie: Sure! Stop by for a drink sometime!&&&&Tyler: Wait! Wait! What is my position?&&&&Rosie: Ehhhh...beats the hell outta me! I just hope I can find my way back home!

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Reply #13 - Jun 28^th, 2004 at 3:35pm

garymbuska Offline
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I would rather be flying
Jacksonville, Florida

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I mix up the flight plans depending on where I am coming from & going to I will pick High altitude airways on long legs and either vor to vor or direct gps on medium & short legs. But which ever way I fly it I always edit the path so I do not go out my way to far. That way I avoid going to alaska to get to Boston. I also will put different weather at different places along the way. Since my system is not connected to the internet I can not fly with real world weather so I make my own. And will even fly around or over some of the worst weather just like the big boys. This works great for me.
On over seas flights I try to insert as many waypoints that I can to break up the leg lengths. 8)

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