Instrument Approach questions

as far as I know, some of the newer planes have auto landing system, pretty much sit there and monitor all the gauges. but APPR button donest do any good to landing, it is not designed for flare, you have to take over the control before it gets to the flare height....... i am not a pilot, just my 2 cents from the sim experience

ad123456789 wrote:

Firstly, is it normal drill to kill the autopilot as you cross over the fence and flare/break manually, or do any aircraft support some kind of auto-flare etc? or do you tend to keep the approach hold on and pull the stick back? also where does auto-throttle figure in all this? it must be very handy to fly the finals with this on, but similary is it killed as you cross the threshold? or can you use autobreak etc and just sit back?

Yes it is normal to turn autopilot off at about 1000 feet and flare manually. In very bad conditions, modern aircraft have an autoland feature which lands and flares and breaks. Auto throttle maintains the speed you want on approach, similarly, down to 1000 feet.

Autoland has been around for about 30 years. The flare can also be done automatically in many planes. In low visibility conditions, you take control of the plane whenever the runway lights come into sight. If you dont see the runway, *I think* the autopilot has to keep flying the plane.

Thanks, next question kinda follows, does anyone know of any Flight sim aircraft that suupport auto-land? I knows its a bit boring, the challenge being in the actual landing etc, but just for fun every now and then...

Also when using approach hold I find most aircraft are really unstable in the vertical direction, whears they are rock steady in the horizontal plane, Does this have something to do with picking up a different localizer? or is approach just designed to get the left/right bit sorted for you.

Modern aircraft like the PMDG 737 and the A340 range (PSS I think it is) have the autoland feature. You don't need to buy addons, a lot of panels addon freeware panels have autoland feature.

One of the problems you might be having as regards to the approach is that you are engaging it too early. Make sure you engage it when ATC tells you that you are established. Also engage it when you are on course, i.e. don't leave autopilot to start the approach, only use it when you are lined up. This is because autopilot tends to over compensate for lining up which is why vertical direction is unstable. Also speed is critical for the vertical descent. Speed should be around 180-200KIAS at the top of the glideslope so the aircraft doesn't have to pitch down to descend. 😉 Hope it helps ❗