Altittude knobs A320
Join Date: Mar 2001
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A few years on the bus and i never bothered to find out how many clicks it is. It is virtually useless knowledge in my opinion. But then, if it makes you happy...
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Wingham NSW Australia
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"Clicks per turn"
Using the inference in Wiedehopf's post I guess the A380 has 38 clicks. I am joking of course.
Join Date: Jun 2007
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Hi guys
Why A320 altitude, V/S , heading and speed knobs are completing a turn with 32 click ?
Why A320 altitude, V/S , heading and speed knobs are completing a turn with 32 click ?
On the A330 it has 33 clicks a turn as far as i know.
For Altitude and Speed select, Concorde used what look like bog-standard "35mm camera film rewind" knobs with fold-out cranks. In an era before digital-push-button FMC flight plan entries, it was probably nice to be able to whizz-whirr one's target altitude up to or down from 60K feet with a rapid crank.
(Concorde pros can comment)
http://www.concordesst.com/inside/co...tures/ap17.jpg
http://www.destoutz.ch/slides/typ_nm...ob_black_2.jpg
When it comes to the number of clicks per revolution in today's knobs - some "human factors" engineer probably had to figure out the optimum number to allow fast adjustments (more clicks per turn), while retaining discrete spacing of clicks for fingertip precision (fewer clicks per turn).
And came up with "32-ish."
Dog Tired
In the RAF, an IR renewal always asked what the rpm of the turn and slip gyro was. I know it had 27 in it; 27/270/2700/27000; who cares? Wholigan asked me...(Mil forum).
32 is a number that comes up often in computing - 32 bit registers were used often in early computing for example. Perhaps it was an easy way for those early, 1980s vintage computers to register inputs?
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/32-bit
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/32-bit
Rather than how many clicks per revolution of the knob, a more useful thing to know is how much does the target quantity change per each click?
From memory I think Airbus FBW is as follows, (but will check next time I fly):
SPD 1 knot or 0.1 Mach per click
HDG: 1 degree per click
ALT: 100' per click or 1000' per click depending on the setting of the scale selector
V/S: 100' or 0.1 degree FPA per click
From memory I think Airbus FBW is as follows, (but will check next time I fly):
SPD 1 knot or 0.1 Mach per click
HDG: 1 degree per click
ALT: 100' per click or 1000' per click depending on the setting of the scale selector
V/S: 100' or 0.1 degree FPA per click
Let us know where and when you are going to do this checking and we'll make sure we are watching on Flightradar....
Last edited by wiggy; 18th Sep 2017 at 07:16.
I'm going to twiddle my non-bus knobs this arvo and see if they're 32bit or 64bit!
From memory I think Airbus FBW is as follows, (but will check next time I fly):
"Turn right 5 degrees"..... "err sorry can you make that 4 or 6 degrees"