Originally Posted by
ManaAdaSystem
The A320 will happily fly right past TOD and it will not start a descent even if a lower altitude has been set. You need to start the descent yourself. The only trigger you get is a weird «deselerate» message to remind you.
The approach mode engages automatically, except when it doesn’t. You may have to select it yourself.
You will not even get the ILS indications unless you press LS, even if the correct approach has been loaded and frequencies checked.
Some aspects of this aircraft are not user friendly.
Not automatically descending just because you have reached the computer predicted descent point, is a good thing. ATC might have denied descent clearance - there might be something below you, which the aircraft would hit if it descended without a pilot's say so. The decelerate message is to try not to get too far above the profile.
The approach phase engages automatically when you are in managed nav and you fly over the decelerate icon, the "strawberry", some call it. If you are flying vectors using heading, approach phase will not automatically engage - again, another safety feature, requiring the pilots say so before starting an approach.
Both these functions make perfect sense to me because the aircraft does not know everything and cannot make such decisions on its own. And I think one has to rely on at least one pilot being professional, engaged and awake in commercial operations, otherwise we might as well all give up and let Mr Musk or someone build us pilotless passenger aircraft.
Proper training. Proper testing of pilots. Following proper SOPs and proper CRM does work. We know how to do this now. It is very sad that in 2020, aircraft are still continuing unstable approaches and crashing.