Wingtip777: Greetings from "steam-gauge" land.
We went through O'Hare about three times recently. The SID, which is basically runway heading for vectors on course and expect clearance to 5,000', states something about your initial heading. My description here is not necessarily accurate, but the O'Hare Nine etc seems to go like this: if the initial (runway?) heading or course is to be between 330 and 060 degrees, you must climb to at least 4,000' by 8 DME. Certain initial headings require a min. of 3,000' by 5 DME if I remember correctly, or maybe both of these altitude/DME combinations. This is stated in small print at the top of the O'Hare Nine or Eight....
During the years when I was FO through there, few captains ever mentioned any of this. We took off once with reduced flaps (5) and a few knots tailwind from rwy 22L. The departure controller warned us to watch out for the SID restrictions and luckily only "slapped our wrists", having implied that we had not made the required altitude. Our last departure from there, about a week ago, was on runway 32L from T-10 intersection, about 8800' length available. As non-flying pilot I kept ORD (VOR) DME [freq: 113.9] on my side and the 4,000' was barely made in a fairly heavy plane by 8 DME or so. Believe there was no headwind on that takeoff. If in doubt, unfamiliar or heavy, hot, no headwind or lousy airframe/engine combination, using engine/airfoil anti-ice... or just fatigued and had no time to fetch a bitter Starbucks coffee etc, just tell tower "we can not guarantee that we can meet the climb requirements", or such. Of course, these days, part of any long radio transmission at a major US airport will probably be totally blocked! Maybe we should all forget the "quiet EPR" climb out from Vzf (minimum clean) speed thru 3,000' agl and go straight from takeoff power to climb EPR at Vzf?
DTW (Detroit) also has such a restriction on the Palace Two, and few guys ever mention it. The fact that we don't ever use "quiet EPR" at DTW seems to help everyone make such a restriction.
