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#11
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Intercepting the ILS
Your procedure is just fine - better because it is simpler.
Certainly legal because 1800 is a minimum, not a mandatory altitude. However: (1) For a localizer-only approach, you would want to make the descent to 1800 prior to JOTLY to avoid an unnecessarily steep final descent. (2) When following the glideslope, you are still responsible for meeting any crossing restrictions,. A good example is the CIVET 4 STAR into LAX http://naco.faa.gov/d-tpp/0601/00237CIVET.PDF On a standard day, following the GS will meet the crossing restrictions, but on a hot day it may not (the pressure levels are higher). This can result in loss of separation with IFR traffic crossing below. Pilots have been busted for this. (3) Another reason to pay attention to step-down altitudes while following ther glideslope is that it isn't certified for use or flight tested at arbitrarily large distances from the antenna. I would continue flying it your way. Likewise on the ILS 25R into LVK from TRACY, I always stay at 3300 until intercepting the glideslope, rather than descending first to 2800. There can be nasty up and downdrafts over the Altamont. There's no need to expose yourself to them at an unnecessarily low altitude. Ed (LVK CFII) http://williams.best.vwh.net/ wrote: Hello, Yesterday I was out getting an IPC. We were doing the Stockton, CA ILS. ATC had us intercepting the localizer at 2000 feet. The altitude for glideslope interception is 1800 ( underlined ). My old CFII taught me that the glideslope interception altitude on the chart is a minimum altitude, and that it was fine to intercept it higher. So I just tootled along at 2000 - figuring it was simpler to do one configuration change at GS interception rather than three changes - one to descend the 200 feet, another to level off, and a third to intercept the glideslope. The new CFII criticized this procedure and told me that the plate specified 1800, and it was wrong to intercept at 2000. Which one was right? - Jerry Kaidor ( ) |
#12
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Intercepting the ILS
Roy Smith wrote:
wrote: Yesterday I was out getting an IPC. We were doing the Stockton, CA ILS. ATC had us intercepting the localizer at 2000 feet. The altitude for glideslope interception is 1800 ( underlined ). [...] The new CFII criticized this procedure and told me that the plate specified 1800, and it was wrong to intercept at 2000. I can't see any reason not to intercept at 2000. I think your new guy is full of it. As a matter of regulation, the G/S is to be used as primary vertical guidance only from the PFAF inbound. There are some places, where early use of the G/S has resulted in airspace violations, LAX being the most notable. In the case cited, the CFI is nitpicking but is nonetheless legally correct. |
#13
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Intercepting the ILS
It depends. If you look at the ILS for MHR (Mather, just north of where
you were), you are below the glideslope for most of the approach. There are several step downs on the approach. However, from a real world point of view, when I've shot the ILS into Stockton in fog, I remember just flying the GS because I was lazy. -Robert |
#14
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Intercepting the ILS
FWIW, I have been chewed out by Seattle Approach for intercepting higher
than the published GSIA of 2200 for the ILS 13R. wrote in message oups.com... Hello, Yesterday I was out getting an IPC. We were doing the Stockton, CA ILS. ATC had us intercepting the localizer at 2000 feet. The altitude for glideslope interception is 1800 ( underlined ). My old CFII taught me that the glideslope interception altitude on the chart is a minimum altitude, and that it was fine to intercept it higher. So I just tootled along at 2000 - figuring it was simpler to do one configuration change at GS interception rather than three changes - one to descend the 200 feet, another to level off, and a third to intercept the glideslope. The new CFII criticized this procedure and told me that the plate specified 1800, and it was wrong to intercept at 2000. Which one was right? - Jerry Kaidor ( ) |
#15
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Intercepting the ILS
In article , Bob Gardner
wrote: FWIW, I have been chewed out by Seattle Approach for intercepting higher than the published GSIA of 2200 for the ILS 13R. For which airport? |
#16
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Intercepting the ILS
In article , Bob Gardner
wrote: FWIW, I have been chewed out by Seattle Approach for intercepting higher than the published GSIA of 2200 for the ILS 13R. Nevermind the "Which airport" question if my cancel didn't work, I found it; Boeing field, I assume. I can't see why they would have chewed you out -- if the instruction was something like "Maintain 2500 until established on the localizer, cleared the ILS 13R," you did nothing improper. If he wanted you at 2200, he should have instructed you to do so; the chart only lists it as a minimum altitude, as most do. What if you weren't DME-equipped? How would you know you were within 10NM of NOLLA, and thus safe to descend to 2200? You really wouldn't, unless you had done the procedure turn, or the controller had cleared you with a "You're X miles from NOLLA" (and X happened to be less than 10 miles). -- Garner R. Miller ATP/CFII/MEI Clifton Park, NY =USA= http://www.garnermiller.com/ |
#17
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Intercepting the ILS
I can tell you that I have been told to intercept the ILS at altitudes
well above the glideslope intercept altitude at the FAF by ATC. I have been cleared for the approach outside of the FAF. I followed their instructions and flew the approach. Never have had a problem. I don't see what the problem is, so long as you are intercepting the glideslope from below, and so long as you are at least as high as is charted you should be. So long as you make sure you are at the proper altitude when you cross the FAF, I don't see the problem. Unless I see it as unsafe or some obvious violation, I do what ATC tells me to do. What did your CFI tell you to do? Decline ATC's instruction? If you do that, the ATC guy is going to be confused and probably ask you what it is you want to do. In which case you can tell him that you want to go down to 1800' and intercept there. Ok, descend to 1800', intercept and cleared. Not much different than what you did, now is it? In the meantime, the freq is crowded and in all the confusion someone else is hosed, maybe you too as ATC might have to leave you and talk to someone else. Or maybe, in the meantime your plane has gotten out of shape (have fun going missed). To some extent we pilots have to rely on ATC to be telling us to do the right thing. Sure, watch out for being cleared into a mountain, but something like this seems ok to me..... Some pilots take the tactic not to have ATC control them, but have them control ATC by telling ATC what they are going to do and that they expect that as their clearance. You can try that approach, but sometimes it backfires. Me, I have discovered I can't fly the airplane and do ATC's job too. But then I rarely have the luxury of a copilot. |
#18
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Intercepting the ILS
Another comment I would make is if you decline ATC's instruction at
this point, you are probably going to end up going missed (or intercepting the glideslope from above). |
#19
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Intercepting the ILS
Garner Miller wrote: In article , Robert Chambers wrote: Were you timing the approach as well for when the GS goes out of service as they sometimes do on IPC rides? the timer should start at the FAF which can be a busy time if you're going down, staying centered, maintaining airspeed, calling the tower at FAF if that's what they wanted, etc. The Final Approach Point (not fix) on an ILS is the published glideslope altitude (in this case, 1800) intersecting with the glideslope. That's NOT where the timer for a LOC approach would start, because there's no glideslope to define the point! In this instance there's a 5.3 DME defining the FAF, and the Outer Marker it's 4/10th of a mile from GS intercept. It's a busy time. I didn't say he started timing at GS intercept at 1800, I believe I did say at the FAF. With an IPC you expect things like GS's to fail which adds to the workload. Thats all I meant. |
#20
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Intercepting the ILS
Doug wrote:
I can tell you that I have been told to intercept the ILS at altitudes well above the glideslope intercept altitude at the FAF by ATC. I have been cleared for the approach outside of the FAF. I followed their instructions and flew the approach. Never have had a problem. I don't see what the problem is, so long as you are intercepting the glideslope from below, and so long as you are at least as high as is charted you should be. So long as you make sure you are at the proper altitude when you cross the FAF, I don't see the problem. Unless I see it as unsafe or some obvious violation, I do what ATC tells me to do. The OP didn't say what ATC's instruction was, so we don't know. I don't think ATC's instruction is relevant to the OP's question. The OP just wanted to know whether descent to 1800 was mandatory. As far as we know, ATC didn't instruct the OP one way or the other. snip |
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