Ask The Pilot

[jb747]

A few questions since my recent travels to Seoul..

Does the pilot make most of the decisions to stay at a certain altitude?

The pilot requests the altitude that he wants. ATC will give it to him, or not, based upon other traffic.

EG we where about 2 hours from Seoul when i noticed on the flight status, the pilot slowed the plane down (form 900km/h to around 750-800km/h)

He most likely didn't slow down at all. The normal speed variation in the cruise is about .03 mach..which about 17 knots TAS. What has most probably happened is that the wind has become less favourable, and the ground speed has reduced.

....and on the way back to sydney we spent most of the flight at 31500 feet, and only went to around 37000 feet within 3 hours of sydney..who makes that call and why wasn't the pilot flying at 38000 feet?

Well, you shouldn't really be at FL315. Perhaps the display was of an uncorrected GPS altitude. He may have had a block altitude (in which you are, say, cleared to operate anywhere between F310 and F320, but there are some real safety drawbacks to using them, and most ATC centres won't issue them.

F380 is not the correct altitude for that track. It would be 370, then 390.

Climb is often restricted by other traffic. At times we elect not to climb because we have a wind advantage where we are. Additionally, there is little point in climbing in the later stages of a flight, as the fuel burnt in the climb won't be paid back.

Do pilots have their phones switched on in the coughpit? By turned on i mean either fully on or in flight mode?

The are normally off. Not much reason to have them on, although there are some useful apps I guess. Mine stays off for the entire time I'm overseas. The peace is delightful.

How dangerous is taking off when it is snowing? I noticed a few flights that kept going, even though it was snowing (fairly light falls however).

Within reason, it's not at all.

 

[led-zep]

Thanks for answering guys!

Have one more, i guess a comment more than a question..

Was reading about the Concorde and supersonic travel. Now that it is gone (i understand money, 1 crash and other issues caused problems) but with that technology available in the 70s, why haven't we tried to build faster planes to reduce the route times? Surely, i would be one of them, most business customers would prefer to travel 30-50% less time and pay more..


I understand that carriers are losing money and figure a plane full off 200-300 people is better than 50-150, i just feel that most would prefer to pay for a faster service. Eg Syd-LAX if we could do that in 5-8 hours i know so many people who would happily pay double the ticket prices.

Why have we decided against faster travel? Any thoughts on this service, or others, returning in the future.

 

[rechoboam]

Many aircraft have been stolen. I suspect it's a growth industry in many places. Do a search...I can even recall a Hercules that was taken flying by a ground crew person. It didn't end well.

Big stuff? Well there are a lot of obstacles in the way. You'd need to get access to the airport for a start. Then you'll need an aircraft that is not parked against a terminal (unless you'll also nicked a tug, and know how to use it). You'd also need to remove the stairs/ladder that you use to gain access. If you get in, have the chocks removed, and have no obstacles in the way...you'd probably still be there in the morning trying to work out how to start it.

The airliners aren't fuelled after their last flight of the day. That's doesn't happen until the last hour before flight, so even if you did manage to get one going, it might not be for long.


Small aircraft, yep. Big stuff no, but you might have trouble getting up to the doors without access to a bridge or stairs...

I wonder if the detailed (add-on) simulators for Microsoft MS would teach people enough to start a plane from dark and cold in real life? I realize no refueling would prevent actually taking it somewhere else.

 

[Sifor]

I wonder if the detailed (add-on) simulators for Microsoft MS would teach people enough to start a plane from dark and cold in real life? I realize no refueling would prevent actually taking it somewhere else.

FSX will give you an idea, however I'd be more inclined to take this with me...

 

[jb747]

All things being equal though an aircraft will fly as high as possible which is limited by weight. As fuel is burned the aircraft weight reduces and is capable of climbing.

Simplest way to think about it is that it is a balancing act between achieving the speed that has the airframe operating at its best angle of attack, and the engines operating at their best power setting. So, as the aircraft becomes lighter, that angle of attack will occur at a slower airspeed (which is why they slow as they burn fuel). Once the angle of attack/power balance could be achieved at a higher altitude, then you climb.

TAS reduces as you go up, so whilst you may burn less fuel, it will all take longer, so on a costing basis, it could well be more efficient to fly somewhat lower.

 

[harvyk]

I wonder if the detailed (add-on) simulators for Microsoft MS would teach people enough to start a plane from dark and cold in real life? I realize no refueling would prevent actually taking it somewhere else.

A few years ago I was in the coughpit of a B747 when I asked the pilots had any of them seen \ used the PMDG add on. The second officer piped up and said he would use it for systems training as the way the systems worked was very similar to the real thing. However there was some differences which he put down to PMDG being designed on the GE engines, and he would normally fly (for real) with the RR engines (he didn't elaborate what those differences where). Of course the "realism" was limited to how systems acted, and the actual "flying" wasn't exactly realistic.

So I expect someone who has played one of the more realistic sims could be able to do some of the basic system type things in the real thing. That was certainly my experience one day when I went up to the flight deck after arriving in SYD where the cap't was happy for me to do some of the very basic shutdown type things, it was mainly flick switches to turn a few systems off. It was both a big surprise when he got me to do some of the shutdown and of course it made my day.

That said with the "standard" flight sim planes, not a chance (where is the CTRL-E button ).

 

[rechoboam]

I'm particularly referring to pilot-in-command 737 for fsx which seems to have every step imaginable. In fact that one (or is it another) actually allows you to change the engines to a different manufacturer.

Edit; thanks for the ops manual, I have a good 747 simulator too so will take a look one day, but work has kept me out of the simulator room for months.

 

[anat0l]

I think jb747 has consistently commented in this thread that most, if not all, flight simulators (except the real training ones) are unrealistic in some capacity or leave out critical things. I remember him regaling (perhaps more than once) that a friend went from game simulator to real simulator and as "skilled" as he was in the "game", he only barely, barely managed to hold it in the real simulator.

 

[rechoboam]

I think jb747 has consistently commented in this thread that most, if not all, flight simulators (except the real training ones) are unrealistic in some capacity or leave out critical things. I remember him regaling (perhaps more than once) that a friend went from game simulator to real simulator and as "skilled" as he was in the "game", he only barely, barely managed to hold it in the real simulator.

For some of us nonpilots the fun is in maps, navigation and even using the flight computer rather than pretending to learn how to fly though.

 

[harvyk]

For some of us nonpilots the fun is in maps, navigation and even using the flight computer rather than pretending to learn how to fly though.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love flight sims, (you should see the project I'm building if there was ever any doubt) and like has been said, they are pretty close, but not quite the same.

I've played the PIC 737, and I agree, it's pretty detailed, but as has once been said on some other forums I've been to, there is no way they could build a detailed package perfectly simulating every feature on an aircraft, and then sell it for $99 down at the local computer game store.

The other thing to remember is those programs don't punish you like some bloke from engineering would do if you got something wrong, or missed a vital step...

 

[mjt57]

ROFL! Amen to that.

Ah yes, the good old digital camera. I use my phone as a camera more than a phone these days. If only I carried one about in those days. There'd be some interesting action shots.

While current phone cameras are pretty good (my Samsung Galaxy S2 has an 8 mp camera) they still really are little more than point and shoot cameras.

I had a Canon AE1 back in the mid 80s. I got some really good high speed shots of F18s, a Mirage and shots of the race cars at the Aust. GP over in Adelaide. I doubt very much if any of the digital cameras that I've owned could match what it could do.

A few years back JB emailed me a few shots of a fellow A4 driver on a climb out of Nowra. Quite spectacular. I doubt that a phone camera could do as good, even today.

My brother has a $2,000 DSLR (forget which brand). It does some pretty good work, but as I'm not familiar with it I don't know how it would compare to a top of the range Nikon SLR film camera.

 

[jb747]

Was reading about the Concorde and supersonic travel. Now that it is gone (i understand money, 1 crash and other issues caused problems) but with that technology available in the 70s, why haven't we tried to build faster planes to reduce the route times? Surely, i would be one of them, most business customers would prefer to travel 30-50% less time and pay more..


I understand that carriers are losing money and figure a plane full off 200-300 people is better than 50-150, i just feel that most would prefer to pay for a faster service. Eg Syd-LAX if we could do that in 5-8 hours i know so many people who would happily pay double the ticket prices.

Why have we decided against faster travel? Any thoughts on this service, or others, returning in the future.

I thought I'd answered this...it must have disappeared into the ether.

SSTs were basically an aberration. They rely on access to cheap fuel (!), something we're not likely to see any time soon. The vast majority of countries have banned supersonic overflights, so that's an issue that greatly limits where they can be used.

But, the biggest factor against them is that they simply would never sell enough to make it viable to build them. Look at the cost overruns being encountered by some of the later military aircraft, and imagine that applied to something with such a limited market.

I very much doubt that many people would be prepared to pay the necessary to make it viable. If you are looking at some sort of multiple of the first class fares, all to save a couple of hours, then your market would be slim at best.

Beyond that....up at 60,000' feet the world is a very unfriendly place.

 

[simongr]

I have seen/read about hypersonic jets for years - going back to Tomrrow's World (UK science show) in the 90s or before. Always going to be built 20 years from the date of the article...

 

[jb747]

While current phone cameras are pretty good (my Samsung Galaxy S2 has an 8 mp camera) they still really are little more than point and shoot cameras.

I had a Canon AE1 back in the mid 80s. I got some really good high speed shots of F18s, a Mirage and shots of the race cars at the Aust. GP over in Adelaide. I doubt very much if any of the digital cameras that I've owned could match what it could do.

A few years back JB emailed me a few shots of a fellow A4 driver on a climb out of Nowra. Quite spectacular. I doubt that a phone camera could do as good, even today.

My brother has a $2,000 DSLR (forget which brand). It does some pretty good work, but as I'm not familiar with it I don't know how it would compare to a top of the range Nikon SLR film camera.

The A4 shots were taken with a Minolta 35mm SLR. I also did some air to air with a Mamiya 645, but it was difficult to stow in the coughpit. I'd have killed for anything like our current DSLRs. Effectively you don't run out of film, and the 'motor drives' are way faster than the physical motors we had back then.

Camera phones, are, in my opinion, next to useless...but a limited camera is always better than no camera.

For a while I carried a Nikon P6000 pocket camera. It was quite versatile, especially having a 28mm equivalent, but I've given up and gone back to taking a D90 everywhere.

Just purchased a GoPro Hero 2, so it will be interesting to see what I can get with that over the next couple of trips. Might try a time lapse or two...Singapore to Sydney in two minutes.

 

[jb747]

I think jb747 has consistently commented in this thread that most, if not all, flight simulators (except the real training ones) are unrealistic in some capacity or leave out critical things. I remember him regaling (perhaps more than once) that a friend went from game simulator to real simulator and as "skilled" as he was in the "game", he only barely, barely managed to hold it in the real simulator.

I'm always rather surprised at just how incensed some of the flight sim fans become when I express disbelief in their ability to fly the aircraft. Yes, I'm sure that with a bit of time they could get one started. And, they could play with the MCP and FMC and make the autopilot fly it around. But that isn't actually flying. I'd expect most would very quickly find the meaning of 'pilot induced oscillations'.....

I don't know of many pilots who are avid flight simmers, though it does have some application for (for instance) studying approaches. One of the A380 Captains owns a company that does some form of military flight sim (but I have no idea what it is).

I've never seen one in which the flight control loadings, or responses, are in any way realistic.

 

[harvyk]

I'm always rather surprised at just how incensed some of the flight sim fans become when I express disbelief in their ability to fly the aircraft.

The problem is that with exception to the ones which are sold as games, a flight sim is usually sold as something that mirrors a realistic plane. Some sims try and guess how a plane might react to certain control inputs, others have used real life data to simulate how a plane should act using certain control inputs. Of course there is a big difference between should act and does act.

There is a big learning curve to learn how to take off (without tail strike) \ navigate \ land etc, especially for some of the more realistic style sims like the PMDG and the PIC737 which was mentioned before. So it's quite easy to understand how a desktop pilot could believe their flying skills would transfer across to the real world, they could have easily invested many hours (I'm talking hundreds if not thousands) into a simulator learning how to fly the sim properly. They have probably also invested some big $$$ into things like yokes, switches and rudder pedals trying to "up the realism".

The thing which made me realise that sim skills probably wouldn't transfer to real life flying skills was when I went from playing the default flight sim planes to one of the "more realistic" add-ons. Here I was an "expert" at flight sim feeling like I had only seen the game for the first time. At that point I realised that it would probably be a similar step up again to go from the "more realistic" add-ons to a real plane. Also my skills where learnt via trial and error, and by reading articles on the web from other flight simmers who most likely learnt via trial and error. Thus would most likely bare little relationship to proper procedures (thus the basis of some of my questions here in this thread)

 

[AVC]

I'm always rather surprised at just how incensed some of the flight sim fans become when I express disbelief in their ability to fly the aircraft. Yes, I'm sure that with a bit of time they could get one started. And, they could play with the MCP and FMC and make the autopilot fly it around. But that isn't actually flying. I'd expect most would very quickly find the meaning of 'pilot induced oscillations'..

I agree. It's the same with most "sim-based" training. Using a resus dummy in a carpeted training room, no matter how sophisticated they are, is still not like doing an actual resus on a railway station platform (or some other crazy location) where the patient is akin to a beached whale, nothing fits, and a hundred people are watching. Sim dummies don't vomit either

Another example, from when I was in the Army, was the firing range. The AA developed the WTSS (Weapons Training Simulation System). Essentially like a bowling alley with real F88 Steyr rifles (albeit compressed air powered) and a projected target at the far wall. Great for practising drills and handling actions, but in the real world, there's noise, hot brass, wind, cold, and sticks & stones jamming into various body parts.

Simulators are certainly great training aids, and a cost effective way in a of of cases. But they are not real world.

 

[medhead]

Another example, from when I was in the Army, was the firing range. The AA developed the WTSS (Weapons Training Simulation System). Essentially like a bowling alley with real F88 Steyr rifles (albeit compressed air powered) and a projected target at the far wall. Great for practising drills and handling actions, but in the real world, there's noise, hot brass, wind, cold, and sticks & stones jamming into various body parts.

Really, I thought there was a sub-calibre kit same as for the SLR? Still that only gave the smell and the cold, inside an air-conditioned building.


Sent from the Throne (80% chance) using Aust Freq Fly app

 

[anat0l]

I thought I'd answered this...it must have disappeared into the ether.

SSTs were basically an aberration. They rely on access to cheap fuel (!), something we're not likely to see any time soon. The vast majority of countries have banned supersonic overflights, so that's an issue that greatly limits where they can be used.

But, the biggest factor against them is that they simply would never sell enough to make it viable to build them. Look at the cost overruns being encountered by some of the later military aircraft, and imagine that applied to something with such a limited market.

I very much doubt that many people would be prepared to pay the necessary to make it viable. If you are looking at some sort of multiple of the first class fares, all to save a couple of hours, then your market would be slim at best.

Beyond that....up at 60,000' feet the world is a very unfriendly place.

Can't remember it being answered, but interesting to hear it here anyway. (Your reply might be in another thread that mentioned Concorde). We might need to split this off.

Cheap fuel - well, that won't come to pass for a while indeed.

I wonder why many countries banned supersonic flights. (Come to think of it, it's interesting to note to what extent above the ground does the jurisdiction of a country own its "sky" - there must be a legislation or something out there, a bit like UNCLOS).

I suppose demand may always be a problem. Sure, you can find a bunch of people, but they wouldn't fill the aircraft all the time it was flying, or at least to make for a viable schedule. Even BA Concorde in its "hey-days" - just after BA dramatically increased fares to match people's "expectations" - was still running at a bleeding loss.

Let's say supersonic flights SYD-LAX retailed at twice the cost of F. For argument's sake, I did a random search of QF F r/t fares on this route and selected a First Saver cash fare. The cost was about $18,000. So a hypothetical Concorde fare would be something like $36,000; perhaps more like $40,000 for a round trip. That's a lot, even to a business person who could rationalise saving that much time. I don't think even bossreggie would handover that kind of money (no offence intended, bossreggie). (And no, don't even think about how many FF points and status you'd get plus whether or not you'd be able to redeem a Classic or Any Seat Award for it!)

Then, you have to find 100 such people to fill the Concorde. Each way, and possibly at least 3-4 times a week to make the schedule useful. Even if we cut it to twice a week, or once a week, with nil competition, you're dealing with a very tough task. Yes, the hypothetical fare is based on a fare that QF makes a killing on when purchased, but you also have to take into account that the hypothetical costs of running Concorde would not be proportionately twice the amount. Ironically, the route where Concorde was running before its demise - Trans-Atlantic - was probably the best market for the aircraft.

I think jb747 is on the money here (no pun intended) - even if you had the other Swiss cheese holes line up (cheap fuel, open skies to SSTs, diversified and subsidised maintenance to reduce that cost), market demand and pricing will be very difficult.

The Concorde experience is probably a novelty to some but overall from reports it was just mainly a Y-ish seat that cut your travel time significantly. Hate to think what the procedures would be in emergencies if one happened at 60k feet in the air. You might just feel your heart rise up into your mouth!

 

[harvyk]

(Come to think of it, it's interesting to note to what extent above the ground does the jurisdiction of a country own its "sky" - there must be a legislation or something out there, a bit like UNCLOS).

100km up is usually considered by most countries to be the edge of space and thus at the limit of ownership of airspace. I believe although don't quote me on it, the US uses 80km up as the edge of space. That said I'm pretty sure if Iraq back in it's Saddam days where to place a satellite at 81km's above the US they would have revised that figure.

Considering concorde could fly at only roughly 20km above the ground, countries still had a lot of say over where it could fly over.