Hi I'm new and have a few questions...

Hi I have Microsoft Flight Simulator: a Century of Flight and I know how to take off and I know how to handle the plane flying. The thing that I don't know how to do is find out what angle the runway is at. Everytime I get to the airport I notice that the runway is at a different angle and I don't have time to adjust the plane in the correct direction and get it low enough to land on the runway. Is there someway to find out which runway they want me to land on and what angle I need to come in at when I am still far enough away from the airport to direct the plane in the correct direction?
Thank You

You need to get some recently out of date sectionals for where you want to fly. Or get and older AOPA airport directory. The directory will have every airport in the states. It will have field elevation, runway directions, length, navaid frequencys, and taxiways. As for how to get lined up with your intended rnwy, you need to plan your approach several miles out or more when landing at large airport. When landing at small airports, there is what's called a landing pattern, most are a left hand pattern. Say you want to land on rnwy 360, you appraoch the field from the south 180 deg. about a mile to the right of the rnwy. When are abeam the rnwy, you are on what's called the downwind leg of the approach, when you are about 1/4 mile past the approach end of rnwy you turn left to heading 90 deg. You are now on the base leg of the appr. Pay attn to the runway on base leg. A little before you are even with the rnwy, turn left again to line up with rnwy, 360 deg. You should be at 1000 feet agl when you enter the pattern, When abeam the first third of the rnwy, start your descent, 400 to 500 fpm should be your rate of descent. If this is too confusing to you, go to the learn to fly part of FS 2004 and listen and learn. What I have explained to you will make sense to you after you've gone through the process. P.S. I'm a real bonified FAA certified pilot. If you need anymore help, just holler, I'll do what I can. Leadfoot.

Those charts and directories are nice, but you don't need them. Go to the Learning Center in the flight sim, and read the section on GPS. Once you learn how to use it, you can enter any airport into the GPS and it will show you the available rwys and data about them.

Alternatively, go pick up FS Navigator. You can find out all about any airport by mouse hovering over it. And you have an always on-line map showing the airports, VOR lines, ADF ... the list goes on and on. When you hover over an airport you get the ICAO, tower freq, ATIS freq, airport height level, heading to reach it, distance ... sort of a Swiss Army Knife of navigation. If you pay the pittance they ask then you also get the ability to save flight plans and more. It's prolly one of the best buys out there. I tried for some time to try to read a real map while I was flying but didn't have a whole lot of success. Now it's on the screen. It even does interface with multi-player (although I've heard it has some problems there) and will show all your party on the screen when you hook it up properly.

Check it out!

The ATC will also tell you over the radio what runway to use when you approach, or for small airports, the listing of runways will be there. The runway number is the angle that it sit's on. Just remember that it is truncated, 4 = 40*, 27=270*
I believe the default radio key is the `~ key. at least it is on mine.

dekoven mentioned FS Navigator, I've never used the program and I thought that I'd just post the site where it is for sale if anyone is interested.
It looks very interesting to me, some very good screen shots on the other page.

Hi CoasterXtreme, to add to some good answers there's another part part that will help you. Prior to entering the pattern you adj your HSI to the runway direction, i.e. If landing runway is 18, the runway direction is most likely 180 (S), so you can hit the "V" key on KB, then use minus key to adj your HSI to 180. This gives you the direction of runway in relation to your headind. It is also essential when making a ILS approach. Keep practicing... You can enter a pattern to a runway, then save that flight so you can come back to it often for practice. Practicing at airports with lots of runways really helps, like ORD and Boston. rob

Ok, everyone typed SOOO much that it'll get you all confused. So to put it simply and not to confuse you, as you are new at it, and probably odnt know about the ADF, VOR, ILS and all those other systems yet, let me put it to you this way



As a beginner


THE MAP AND GPS ARE YOUR BESTEST FRIEND!!!!!!!
I cannot stress that enough, USE BOTH.

Also, as far as the runway finding goes, whatever number the runway is, thats it's compass heading!


for example

18 = 180 degrees

23= 230 degrees

4 = 40 degrees.


There, now you know!