Simviation Forum - JFK to Heathrow

Jul 14^th, 2004 at 5:05pm

DiveBomber89 Offline
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Can't fly Cessnas
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When I make a flight plan(High/low altitude) from JFK to Heathrow, it tells me to fly all the way across North American to Alaska, then fly back east to London. Isn't there a faster way to get across the Atlantic using a premade flight plan? I don't want to use direct GPS since, well, I just don't like using it...

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Reply #1 - Jul 14^th, 2004 at 6:40pm

wji Offline
Colonel

Posts: 1644

FSBuild, by Ernie Alston has 5000 premade flightplans including the NATs (North Atlantic Tracks); also, go to VATsim UK/Oceanic to get all the current NATs and fixes. they look like this:
http://www.vatsim-uk.org/

V REDBY CARPE 54N050W 56N040W 58N030W 58N020W GOMUP GINGA
W YAY 53N050W 55N040W 57N030W 57N020W MIMKU MORAG
X DOTTY 52N050W 54N040W 56N030W 56N020W NIBOG NURSI
Y CYMON 51N050W 53N040W 55N030W 55N020W KORIB BABAN
Z YQX 50N050W 52N040W 54N030W 54N020W MALOT BURAK

These can be entered by hand (edited) in Notepad by editing the GPS Direct *.PLN. As one can see, there's various options to get one from HERE to THER

bill

PhotoShop 7 user

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Reply #2 - Jul 14^th, 2004 at 7:49pm

Nexus Offline
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The greater of two evils...

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This may be a longshot, but anyway:
If the entry 54N050W is not accepted or will give you an error, try 5450N, which would be the waypoint name I'd use when programming the FMC.
The 54N050W format is not even accepted in any Boeing/airbus database, you have to modify it in some way or another

And it seems awfully complicated to modify the flightplan by hand, I took a glance at it and it was all greece to me Grin

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Reply #3 - Jul 14^th, 2004 at 11:41pm

YodaNYC Offline
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New York City

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I use FS Nav...look up the NAT's for that particular day and then enter the waypoints into the planning tool. Also, FS Nav already contains the SID's and STARs for KJFK and EGLL so you can choose the corresponding departure and arrival...

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Reply #4 - Jul 15^th, 2004 at 6:52pm

DiveBomber89 Offline
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Can't fly Cessnas
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Thanks for everyone's help, but I'm really new to this game, especially with editing stuff Embarrassed

. I tried that FS Build, but I don't know how to exactly imput all that stuff into my IFR Kennedy Intl to Heathrow.pln file.

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Reply #5 - Jul 15^th, 2004 at 7:27pm

wji Offline
Colonel

Posts: 1644

"I don't want to use direct GPS since, well, I just don't like using it... "

Too bad. If one DOES use the GPS Direct in FS9, KJFK to EGLL, one will see the very track it sets mirrors the realworld NATs.

I just did one (took about four minutes) and the FS9 GPS track misses PUTMAN VOR by about eight feet; hits GANDER right-on-the-nose as it does SHANNON; if one then drags the red line over COMPTON, you're lined up with the ILS to land at Heathrow's Rwy 09s

May I suggest getting to like such a valuable resource as is FS9's Flightplanner. It would make life much simpler -- and flightplanning.

bill

PhotoShop 7 user

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Reply #6 - Jul 15^th, 2004 at 8:36pm

DiveBomber89 Offline
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OK, I'll try it out again.

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Reply #7 - Jul 15^th, 2004 at 11:46pm

YodaNYC Offline
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New York City

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Quote:

"I don't want to use direct GPS since, well, I just don't like using it... "

Too bad. If one DOES use the GPS Direct in FS9, KJFK to EGLL, one will see the very track it sets mirrors the realworld NATs.

I just did one (took about four minutes) and the FS9 GPS track misses PUTMAN VOR by about eight feet; hits GANDER right-on-the-nose as it does SHANNON; if one then drags the red line over COMPTON, you're lined up with the ILS to land at Heathrow's Rwy 09s

May I suggest getting to like such a valuable resource as is FS9's Flightplanner. It would make life much simpler -- and flightplanning.

bill

...but the GPS still doesn't allow for correct programming of the SID's and STAR's. Also, what happens if runway 9 is not the active runway and you have to fly the STAR to 27R? Flight planning is not simply a four minute straight line process.

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Reply #8 - Jul 16^th, 2004 at 2:41am

RollerBall Ex Member

Cor this hoary old chestnut again.

Who cares about programming the SIDs and STARs except for a veeeeeeeery small minority of sim users, and nothing wrong with that.

Departure and arrival legs are handled by ATC in the sim - you don't have to program them. That's one of the things you paid for when you bought FS9 and there's no reason for the huge majority of users to go out and buy extra software to plan this kind of flight. So don't give the impression they have to to, to do things 'right'.

Direct GPS is a perfectly OK way to plan this route and as Bill says it gives a track that as close to 'real life' as to make no difference whatsoever to the average simmer.

My plan for a 767-336 gave me a total distance of 5535.2 km, fuel burn of 28610.4 kg and time en route of 5.28 hrs.

Shove the details into your fancy payware and see how different your numbers are!

You don't just take off and go straight onto the GPS track, just as you don't fly direct to LHR and land. You are vectored at both ends by ATC so long as you elect to fly IFR which anyone in their right mind does. That's close enough to a SID and STAR for me thanks very much. And you try flying a different track from the one allocated you by ATC in real life and see what happens!

Obviously there are simmers who want to do things exactly as per real life, and as I said nothing wrong with that. But you don't have to give the impression that people who don't want to sit there plugging in the numbers (a) are some kind of second-class citizen or (b) get less from the sim.

There you go - got that off my chest.........again Wink

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Reply #9 - Jul 16^th, 2004 at 8:43am

Nexus Offline
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Rollerball, how much wind did you calculate? That has major effect on fuelburn!
Also taxi time?
Holding time?
Route contingency?
APU time?
Or what about reserve fuel?
Alternate distance?
Step climbs?

I always use those variables for my fuelplanning, it gives me a good margin. A dispatcher wont tell the pilots "Hey guys we're going to need exactly 28610.4 kg's of fuel here since the trip is 5535.2 km long and will take 5.28 hours"

Yes those numbers looks very accurate with all those decimals, but how accurate are they when you will land after some hours, given you fly in real world weather?

I'd love to see you flying over the north atlantic when you will run out of fuel because you did not include the 85kts headwind Grin

For ME it's unrealistic and that's why I do not use it, however I won't tell everybody to stop using that one because it's wrong, it's just that personally I prefer other fuelplanners.

It's not right it's not wrong - it's just different

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