Real-life flight planning

Heh. Actually I'm quite a bit west of where you were- 8707 7 Mile Road
to be exact, 4.5 miles west of 94. So, I think about 8-10 miles west of 32.

Maybe you can talk me into flying some cringle out to the hotel some
time this summer. :-) As for me- I have not been able to touch the
stuff since I ate a whole one by myself when I was about 12. No lie.

~Paul

Jay Honeck wrote:
Yep, Timmerman. I actually live just over the line into Racine county
right now, on 7 Mile Rd, which I'm sure you remember.


Good God, man -- Mary (my wife) lived on 7 Mile Rd (just west of Hwy 32)
when I first met her! I must have driven down that road a thousand times...

Small world!

Now go enjoy a Derango's pizza for me, have some perch at Dino's (on 16th
St.), and start your day off right with some pecan kringle from O&H bakery!

:-)

Paul Folbrecht wrote in message hlink.net...
1. www.Aeroplanner.com has some really great on-line flight planning
stuff -- including the ability to print out sectionals with your course line
and 10-mile-ticks superimposed. They are fabulous on long trips, cuz
they're on notebook-sized paper and you just "flip" from one map to the
next. No "octopus arms" in the cockpit, fighting to fold a sectional!

Now that is cool- I had wondered if such software (that printed
sectionals with routes) was available and figured that it must be. This
I will have to check out.

FWIW, we tried it out and we didn't like it. I bought a month and
did several long trips (2-3 3 1/2 hr legs) and several short trips.
I deliberately set up the triptiks to be more pages and wider, so
that if we had to deviate or detour maybe we'd stay on the chart.

The problem we had is that even a reasonably straightforward
detour for afternoon t-storms took us off the edge of the triptik.
Strategic replanning for the return trip (the sort where you
wind up flying a totally different route due to wx systems) and
we might as well throw it out.

So I would say, if you try it make sure you have other charts,
at least WACs, to back up your planning.

Of course I suppose you could always just not deviate

Sydney




2. Destination Direct ( www.destdirect.com/ ) is (IMHO) the best stand-alone
PC flight planner. I've used it for years, and was able to flight plan your
trip from Timmerman to Appleton in about five seconds, with fuel burn, ETA,
waypoints, etc.

snip

By the way, where did you train -- Timmerman? I trained in East Troy ten
years ago, and lived in Racine until '97.

Yep, Timmerman. I actually live just over the line into Racine county
right now, on 7 Mile Rd, which I'm sure you remember.

BTW, your establishment is definitely on my list of places to visit at
some point.

So I would say, if you try it make sure you have other charts,
at least WACs, to back up your planning.

Yeah, we kept the WACs on board when using the Trip Ticks, just in case.

Didn't need 'em, though. We never went off the maps, even when diverting
around icing (on our way back from Sun N Fun last year) -- those maps are
pretty wide. You musta diverted pretty far!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message news:xlQRb.44403$U%5.236284@attbi_s03...
Yeah, we kept the WACs on board when using the Trip Ticks, just in case.

My "tick" is, I really don't like WACs, especially if I wind
up flying VFR under a layer.

Didn't need 'em, though. We never went off the maps, even when diverting
around icing (on our way back from Sun N Fun last year) -- those maps are
pretty wide. You musta diverted pretty far!

I would say the opposite. You must not have diverted far at all,
if you stayed on the triptiks. My CFI went off the triptik I made for
him (IFR low-alt's, which are more like WACs in scale) with a modest
diversion around afternoon heating thunderstorms near coastal
GA. I've had the same experience with Aeroplanner triptik
sectionals -- just a modest diversion to land short of our planned
fuel stop and a bit south of the route took us off the chart, and
a modest ATC rerouting when we took off again under IFR kept us off.

But yes, to avoid wx systems we sometimes do replan our flights in
a significant way. Fly from Baltimore to St. Louis via W. Va
instead of via OH and that kind of thing.

If I recall correctly, coming back from Sun n Fun you guys weren't
too happy about the wx -- I seem to recall you thought you were
pushing it, wound up in lower ceilings/vis than you like and picking
up icing and Mary wasn't sure she wanted to do the trip again?
Excuse me if I'm remembering incorrectly. My only point being
sometimes rerouting with a broader scale is helpful with
that sort of thing (and of course sometimes not).

Cheers,
Sydney

My briefing strategy changed when AOPA launched their recent planner. Best
free planner out there.

For long multi-leg cross-country VFR or IFR from home: Plan less than 4 hour
legs out of a 5 hour tank. Use AOPA's planner and ADDS for planning the day
(or days) before. DUATS briefing (using AOPA's planner) to get a weather
update, NOTAMS, and to make it official the day of the flight.

With the planner, I start with the origin and destination and the rubber
band the route to nearby nav aids or airports along the way. The Nav Log
that it puts out is fine for me. I print it out forward and backward so I'm
ready for the trip home.

Long multi-leg cross-country VFR away from home: Plan less than 4 hour legs
out of a 5 hour tank. ADDS and DUATS briefing using a web site interface to
get a weather update, NOTAMS, and to make it official for planning and the
day of the flight. Might be replaced by using a weather station at an FBO.
My last choice is to do this over the phone.

I will plan out a route even if I am planning to fly direct using my
handheld GPS. It provides enroute time checks and a back up. It also gives
me a chance to validate the route against TFRs or other hazards. I don't
want to be flight planning in the air. It also provides some enroute points
to talk about with a briefer, if I end up doing it over the phone.

I agree with abbreviated planning for a familar route that is less than a
few hours. If it's a clear day and I'm going for a breakfast or lunch at a
nearby airport, I'll call for a briefing on the way to the airport. That is
the minimum I will do.

Anything more than an hour from home and I want to have a good idea about
weather and enroute checkpoints. Since winds aloft are so variable, I need
something to measure my progress. Maybe I'm trying to get there and back on
one tank of fuel. What starts out as a short little flight with no worries
could turn into a fuel crisis on the way home.

I subscribed to Aeroplanner for one month. Nice service but too expensive
for weekend flyers and too slow. The Cirrus interface for DUATS is also a
waste of time now that AOPA's planner is out. I haven't tried any other
fee-based planning services.
-------------------------------
Travis


"Paul Folbrecht" wrote in message
ink.net...
Being newly licenced (yesterday), I've started thinking about the type
of VFR flight-planning I'll do in the real, post-student world, and what
tools I'll use.

As a student, of course, I did everything by hand, and meticulously, and
eschewed GPS navigation as well. Some of my observations from my brief
XC experience thus far:

1) Winds aloft forecasts are never right- usually not close.

2) There's no need to produce a nav log, etc. with checkpoints when the
route is familiar.

So, for a route that is now familiar to me- say, Timmmerman (MWC) to
Appleton (ATW) (about 75nm), of course I get a briefing, and check the
winds aloft, but I'm not going to produce a nav log. I'm going to fly
by pilotage with my GPS to back me up and with a VOR receiver to back
that up. And, of course, if I encounter particularly unexpected
weather, I'm going to turn back.

For new routes, I am going to produce a nav log, knowing full well that
my heading will not likely match the precomputed values due to differing
winds aloft. No matter. But, of course, for such flights, I'm not
going to be doing things the old-fashioned way anymore. I want some
good software to make it easy.

So, I think I have two questions: 1) Does this make sense? and 2) What's
the best flight-planning software out there? I've used AOPA's tool and
I like it, but I don't really know what's out there (and yeah I can do a
google search but then you don't know if you're hearing about the latest
& greatest). I do have a Palm 5 device so PC software that has a Palm
component too would be a plus.

~Paul

P.S. Hope this isn't too much of a "newbie" post for this forum.
Thought it was more appropriate here than over at .student.

I use the Contel Duats, enflight.com, and the AOPA flight planners.
Each one requires a little bit of getting used to but they all provide
just about everything you will need.

For the palm, I recommend Co-Pilot. It does everything I need,
including calculating the windss aloft so you can pass them on as a
pirep.

Wow, thanks a ton to everyone for all the replies so fast.

A couple things:

1) I have used duats a lot for wx but not yet for planning.

2) I have a Garmin 295 GPS and I didn't even know it was possible to
download route data to it. Damn, that is cool. Gonna have to read that
manual.

"Paul Folbrecht" wrote in message
ink.net...
| Wow, thanks a ton to everyone for all the replies so fast.
|
| A couple things:
|
| 1) I have used duats a lot for wx but not yet for planning.
|
| 2) I have a Garmin 295 GPS and I didn't even know it was possible to
| download route data to it. Damn, that is cool. Gonna have to read that
| manual.

You will like it a lot less once you have tried it.

Recently, Paul Folbrecht posted:

2) I have a Garmin 295 GPS and I didn't even know it was possible to
download route data to it. Damn, that is cool. Gonna have to read
that manual.

I also have a Garmin 295, and find it much easier to just enter the route
during planning.

Neil

I use duats ( www.duats.com )
its free and will do your winds, fuel, ground speed, everything, for you.
all you is put in where your at and where your going.

You will see after a few short X-C's by yourself if you really need to do a
nav log. the thing is to do what your comfortable with, do it safely and use
common sense.

Wednesday morning, I am flying from las vegas to the los angeles basin, I
have 6 hours of fuel on board so I dont care about fuel usage, I know it
takes me about an hour to get there, so all I am concerned about is what
altitude will I get the best ground speed and smoothest ride.


Paul Folbrecht wrote:

Being newly licenced (yesterday), I've started thinking about the type
of VFR flight-planning I'll do in the real, post-student world, and what
tools I'll use.

As a student, of course, I did everything by hand, and meticulously, and
eschewed GPS navigation as well. Some of my observations from my brief
XC experience thus far:

1) Winds aloft forecasts are never right- usually not close.

2) There's no need to produce a nav log, etc. with checkpoints when the
route is familiar.

So, for a route that is now familiar to me- say, Timmmerman (MWC) to
Appleton (ATW) (about 75nm), of course I get a briefing, and check the
winds aloft, but I'm not going to produce a nav log. I'm going to fly
by pilotage with my GPS to back me up and with a VOR receiver to back
that up. And, of course, if I encounter particularly unexpected
weather, I'm going to turn back.

For new routes, I am going to produce a nav log, knowing full well that
my heading will not likely match the precomputed values due to differing
winds aloft. No matter. But, of course, for such flights, I'm not
going to be doing things the old-fashioned way anymore. I want some
good software to make it easy.

So, I think I have two questions: 1) Does this make sense? and 2) What's
the best flight-planning software out there? I've used AOPA's tool and
I like it, but I don't really know what's out there (and yeah I can do a
google search but then you don't know if you're hearing about the latest
& greatest). I do have a Palm 5 device so PC software that has a Palm
component too would be a plus.

~Paul

P.S. Hope this isn't too much of a "newbie" post for this forum.
Thought it was more appropriate here than over at .student.