Short story, gums,
Landing on a beautiful day in Dallas area in a Global. Former schoolhouse IP is playing with FMS entering a " hand drawn" visual by copying the runway threshold and adding an distance/altitude final fix and cranking down the altitude selector to the field. Hand flying with A/T engaged. Because I was flying a visual pattern, I was a steeper than the defaulted 2.5 degree path and would never intercept that 2.5 degree path. As we rolled out on 2 mile final, hands on throttles, I noted speed slowing to approach expecting the throttles to start "waking" up to about 1200-1300 pph of fuel flow which they weren't doing. I clicked them off and noted THRUST in the HUD. It dawned on me what was going on. The A/T were in idle because we lacked a vertical constraint--altitude or path. Good debrief followed.
Now, I never fail to announce modes shown in the HUD or the mode annuciator.
The problem you, I and others who came out of the old generation is that we have thousands of hours of hand flying, due to the nature of the planes we flew. That experience isn't easily or, more to the point, economically, replicated today. The conversion from those planes to "magenta line" isn't always easy for types like us, but we can fallback on those previous hours of flying. Imagine never flying those hours and they take away the automatics, then add in the fact that you rarely saw throttles move.
Last edited by galaxy flyer; 14th Dec 2013 at 22:58.