Real and Virtual World nav and planning aids

[Pace]

had this drop into my E mail as an addon for flight simulator Microsoft FSX NOTE the ref to verified by Eurocontrol.

I know of some pilots who use a Flight sim programme called Routefinder as its free.

All of these flight sim programmes usually have " not to be used for real Navigation" as a warning but it made me wonder how many Real World pilots use MS flight simulator programmes to assist their real world flying.

Some are pretty good and usually very cheap compared to the real world variety because of the volume sold to the MS hobby enthusiasts. What are your feelings on programmes like this and how extensive is their silent use by real world pilots

Pace


>>>Make your pre-flight quicker and easier with Dispatch Planner X.

Dispatch Planner X includes new advanced features such as full Nav Log with leg times, advanced fuel calculation and Load Sheet.
A breakdown of fuel, aircraft weights (retrieved from FS), airframe limit weights, flight-plan, weather, loadsheet and other information can be generated for each and every flight in just a few clicks of the mouse.

Features:

Easy to use interface. Make the planning process as simple or as detailed as you like.
Compatible with both FSX and FS9
Save and retrieve flight details quickly and easily, upload to server to share with other users
Log of previously Saved Flights allows quick loading into the program
Choice of Kilograms (KG's) or Pounds (LB's) as mass unit
Print All documentation quickly and easily
Dispatch Sheet/Nav Log

Detailed Nav Log
Automatic retrieval of airfield elevations
Aircraft Performance data for many airframes
Accurate Fuel Planner with figures for Trip, Contingency, Alternate, Hold Final Reserve etc.
Fuel Tankering
Quick, easy access to web-based flight-plan websites, to use with Dispatch Planner
Full flight-plan parsing including distance, flight-time and fuel used for each leg
Automatic retrieval of ZFW (Zero Fuel Weight) from ALL installed FS aircraft
Automatic retrieval of payload from ALL installed FS Aircraft
Database of Airfields, Runways, VORs, NDBs, Intersections and both Low and High altitude Airways
VORs, NDBs, Intersections and Airway databases can be updated every month via the popular Navigraph navdata service
Flight-plan validation via Eurocontrol
Link to VATSIM flight-plan filing, automatically fills fields for quick filing
Loadsheet

Realistic airline-style load-sheet
Weather Report

Detailed weather information (both METAR and TAFs) for departure, destination and alternate airfields
Editor

Allows quick and easy alterations to aircraft performance data, such as fuel burn, limit weights etc.
Create new profiles for air <<<

[DavidHoul52]

I use the cheap NavBox one. Very basic but all you need for VFR. Pity you can't change the format of the PLOGs though. Memory Map good for doing the actual chart - better on the eyes too.

[IO540]

had this drop into my E mail as an addon for flight simulator Microsoft FSX NOTE the ref to verified by Eurocontrol.

I know of some pilots who use a Flight sim programme called Routefinder as its free.

Talking of airways routings, you use the Eurocontrol website (http://www.cfmu.eurocontrol.be/chmi_public/ciahome.jsp?serv1=ifpuvs) to validate the routing before filing the flight plan.

It doesn't matter how you got the routing worked out. You could throw darts at the airway chart in a dark room. If the result validates, you can file it, and if the route i not too long for the aircraft type, you can fly it :)

My 12 year old was flying FSX the other day and did some routing across Europe. I thought.... this doesn't sound far wrong!!! It wasn't far wrong. It didn't actually validate but obviously FSX has some autorouting function in it.

However I don't think this stuff is of any use for real flying. The best current tool, that I know to be openly available, for working out airways routings is Autoplan (http://www.autoplan.aero).

Navbox doesn't do any of this - you have to work out the route separately, draw it on that, and it can be used to print out the plog etc.

Why would you want Eurocontrol validated routings for flight sim use, anyway?

[Pace]

10540

I used to be quite heavely involved in FS. Some of the addons are very professional and built to very accurate standards.
Thre are millions of people worldwide involved in FS and a huge industry in addons.
The difference to real world is that the market is far bigger and hence the FS addons are far cheaper while the expectations of the FS world demands as near to real as possible.

The programmes and tools of which there are many carry "not to be used for real world navigation" many use Jeppeson database and used with caution could be of benefit to the real world.

Part of the hike in cost Real world is getting approval for the utility tool to be used real world.

Thanks for the link to autoplan

Pace

[bjornhall]

Got to be very, very careful doing that. Some "highly renowned" flight sim flight planners look very convincing, but turn out to have major faults when you look a little closer. Getting true north and magnetic north mixed up is one example, or "for convenience" doing the true/magnetic conversion at the wrong stage, requiring you to use magnetic wind direction for the wind calculations, or truncating rather than rounding the fuel and distance figures giving significant cumulative errors, are some examples.

For the most basic stuff, such as finding airway routings, there are free online solutions available. For anything more critical, such as time/fuel/distance data, I'd never use flightsim tools, not even for calculating bearing and distance between waypoints.

I could be wrong, but I am not aware of any flightsim flightplanning tools that use actual Jeppesen data (apart from MS FlightSimulator itself). Rather, they use data from various sources (that may at some point have originated as Jeppesen data) and run it through various third party/hobbyist conversion routines to get it on the right format for the flight simulator tool. The errors that occur in that process include rounding/truncating errors and not understanding what "map datum" is about.

In addition, quite often they do not give the result in a way that is convenient for pilots, but rather some flightsim rendition/flightsimer's idea of what figures you might need for what and when. But that is more about convenience than accuracy...

IMHO, the only acceptable degree of caution when using flightsim stuff for flight planning is to verify it against actual flight planning data; i.e., they are useless.

[TotalBeginner]

I've used Routefiner a number of times in our GA centre to get people out of a snag (cannot get hold of ops, laptop battery is flat etc...). Provided you get the system to show you any relevant restrictions and apply them as necessary, you can normally get a route that will be validated by IFPS. It's a bit of a minefield, but for a program that's only intended for simulation, one can't complain! :ok:

[IO540]

I think some people are getting mixed up here. The business of generating airways routings is a very isolated function, and any old tool which generates a CFMU-validated/validatable routing which you are willing to fly is by definition good enough.

Mag headings are irrelevant in this case - they don't form any part of the routing.

Once you get the routing validated, you then paste the route into say Jepp Flitestar, into its plain text entry box (in the routepack wizard) and all the 'plog stuff' with headings, tracks, etc etc is generated by Flitestar.

If FSX could generate a CFMU acceptable routing it would be brilliant - but it CANNOT because the CFMU database has something like 10000-20000 changes done to it every day, is not available to pilots, and the only way to get a valid route is to "somehow" generate it and then validate it using the CFMU website.

Yes it's a crazy system. A bit like a country with written laws but which are secret, and if you want to do something you describe it on a website and the website tells you if you can do it... but if you cannot do it all you get is a cryptic message :) :) So if you want to have sex with a girl of say 14 you would enter her age as 10, then 11, then 12 and looking at the error messages you would eventually discover that when you go above 16 (or 12 in the airspace of the Netherlands :) ) the error message changes to NO ERRORS and then you can do the business.

It would not suprise me if FSX used Jepp data. Jepp do sell something called "simcharts" which is basically an out of date Jeppview, AFAIK.

[bjornhall]

I think some people are getting mixed up here. The business of generating airways routings is a very isolated function, and any old tool which generates a CFMU-validated/validatable routing which you are willing to fly is by definition good enough.

Mag headings are irrelevant in this case - they don't form any part of the routing.

I suppose the confusion is that while some posts in the address the question of airways routing generation, others address other issues relating to flight planning.

FSX does indeed Jeppesen data, as have all MS Flight Sim versions I've been dealing with (FS2000 onwards). :8