Jetstream Chronicles: Bahia Solano to Tocumen

As you can see from my virtual hangar, I have a British Aerospace Jetstream 41 (ICAO: JS41) turboprop made by PMDG.It cost me dearly but have mostly stayed in the hangar except for some test flights. I read the Pilot Tutorial (93 pages) and the other docs, countless Tips & FAQS but attempts to use it nearly always terminated in one or two engine fires right at the apron. Mostly after I pressed the engine start buttons and if not right at the moment I tried to begin taxi. Quite frustrating if you spend nearly an hour going through checklists in a virtual cockpit (not as comfortable as a real cockpit). But despite the fact that PMDG wasn’t interested in producing a service pack to solve the cockpit state issues, it remains an add-on of very good craftmanship (except for the woes). So, rather than wasting my time running the checklists to end in engine fire I have opted to use this a/c with engines started and program the FMC and set the instruments.

So, today we will fly from Bahía Solano to Panama. I tried this many months ago with the JS41, the first time the engines melted down at the apron. The second time I was 80% into the flight and started descent and had troubles descending and slowing down (something you can’t do at the same time in this a/c) so it overstressed and it was game over, for that see my post “Virtual Incidents & Accidents: Jetstream 4100”. The Jetstream stayed in the hangar since then in 2010… Until now!

Here is our flight plan made with the excellent Plan-G planner. It will be an IFR flight in the Jetstream 4100 from Bahía Solano to Tocumen Intl. airport in Panama. Initial altitude will be 6,000 feet, then when approaching the border with Panama we would temporarily climb to 7,000 feet. Flight Plan is as follows:

SKBS BHS dct DAKMO/A070 a317 ITAGO a317 TBG MPTO

Departure – Bahía Solano

We will be departing (engines started) from Parking #2 of the José Celestino Mutis (ICAO: SKBS, IATA: BSC) regional airport at Bahía Solano in the province of Chocó, Colombia. [runway picture. Twin Otter real life landing at BSC). The stock FSX airport is just crappy so based on aereal recoinassance I made a quick & dirty reproduction. The airport is at 81 feet but in FSX with the mesh it appeared at over 400 feet. The best I could do was move it slightly and accommodate it at 4 feet. However just like the real airport, it is surrounded by a lot of vegetation and hills.

The FMC has been programmed already, Tuned both NAV1 and NAV2 active frequencies to the Ambalema VOR/DME (ABL: 112.70) with OBS 317. It is way back near Bogota with a range of 200nm so I used it to get the initial intercept towards DAKMO but the signal will vanish prior to getting there. The heading bug is set to 343. NAV1 standby frequency set to La Palma VOR (PML 113.10) and the ADF tuned to the Bahia Solano NDB(BHS 244.0 kHz).

So, at about 05:45 AM (UTC-5) after configuring the PMDG Jetstream for take off configuration. V1 and Vr are 103 knots, V2 110 knots, Flaps 9, set torque to 100%, turned off taxi lights, all others on, Ground Spoilers armed.

Slowly pushed the Condition lever out of Taxi to 100% (flight), let it stabilize a bit and then slowly pushed the throttles forward let it build up a bit, brakes relased, the aircraft started to move slowly and you wonder whether you are going to clear the end of the runway. It continues, 70 knots callout, speed picks up and I am near the last quarter of the runway (35), V1 and Vrotate callouts.

I gently pulled the yoke maintaining the a/c on a steady climb following runway heading. Cleared the tree and small hill at the end of the runway. Positive rate of climb callout, gear up… 700 feet AGL retracted flaps to clean configuration. We have the 1965 ft. Cerro Mutis on our left.

The a/c flew above the town of Bahia Solano and into the bay of the same name and Point St. Francisco Solano to our left. Past the Bay of Nabugá and Gulf of Cupica on our right as we head inland to intercept the ABL radial. Then at 200nm outbound ABL the signal goes out as expected.

By now I am at our initial cruise altitude of 6,000 feet continuing heading 347 towards DAKMO. DAKMO intersection is right on the border of the Colombian and Panamanian airspace over the mountains of Darien province, as we neared I climbed further up to 7,000 feet.

Cruise
Jetstream 4100 at 7,000 feet over the mountains of Darien. Passed DAKMO intersection but continuing on the same heading. Now I have the PML VOR on NAV1 & NAV2 with Taboga VOR/DME (TBG 110.00) on standby and the Taboga NDB on the ADF. Unfortunately PML has no DME. I set the OBS1 to PML R-239 to mark our arrival to the ITAGO intersection on this heading (311). Once cleared the mountains I decended to 6,000 feet again.

Passed ITAGO above the Gulf of Panama, the beautiful Pearls Archipel is ahead with the big San Miguel island coming soon in sight. Started planning for the approach which is very tricky with this aircraft. First reduced the speed to around 190 knots, reduced torque to start a descent to 5,000 feet. I reprogrammed the Jetstream’s four speedbugs to 123, 108, 110 and 125 knots respectively for about 20,000 lbs of weight at landing. The last speed being that for Flaps 25.

Arrival
Just prior to reaching ITAGO I had swapped NAV frequencies so that I had TBG on the active and could track the inbound radial (R-311).

A few nautical miles prior to reaching TBG turned right, swapping frequencies yet again so that now I had TBG on NAV1 standby and on NAV2 active and on NAV1 active I had the Tocumen (ICAO: MPTO, IATA: PTY) Runway 03L ILS (INAT 110.70). Here with a beautiful view of Panama city, the Pacific Ocean entrance to the Panama Canal and the equally beautiful Amador Causeway with its three islands (Naos, Perico & Flamenco). My interactive Weight & Balance sheet is now tucked in. Currently at 3,500 feet and intercepting the ILS with OBS set to 030 degrees (pressed V/L on the autopilot and set 030 on the CRS to set intercept heading on the Jetstream). RPM set to 99%, APR armed

It was still early morning and as I approached MPTO there was a low cloud cover making it impossible to visualize the airport, anyway there is the HIS where I was already aligned. At this moment I disabled the altitude hold on the autopilot, enabled the Approach mode and I could see how the a/c maintained horizontal alignment. The EHSI showed it was right on the glideslope, descending gently, still no runway in sight, all is white on the windshield.

The time passes, still nothing in sight just whiteness… kept on monitoring the instruments, aligned to ILS, still right on the glideslope. Suddenly just underneath the blanket of mist I could see the treetops of the mangroves near Tocumen. I was coming at 180 knots, couldn’t make the target of 170 knots. I judged better not to use flaps because Flaps 9 would cause this a/c to either balloon or try to stay afloat above the runway.

More hidden treetops and then some point slightly above Decision Height and suddenly there it was, God gracious! Runway 03R. Disengaged the autopilot and continued the final approach visually.

Landed on the sweet spot, a little flare and then when fully landed reverse thrust to slow down the beast. Spoilers deployed (automatic), applied brakes. When it slowed down to 70 knots I disengaged reverse thrust to taxi out of the runway.

The problem is, apparently with the throttle when you notch it out of reverse (there is a detent) the simulator tends to interpret it as thrust applied and there it goes again. I had to vacate the runway via taxiway F at the end of 03R.

Here a nice misty screenshot from the cockpit as I neared the Tocumen passenger terminal (scenery by Tropical Sim).

And finally I arrived to the gates and went through the shutdown checklist. Didn’t check how much fuel it consumed though… But no aircraft was lost in this operation

The Jetstream 41 from PMDG is a pleasure to fly, it is a bit of a medium maintenance a/c during the whole flight, especially if you get icing conditions or engine overheat which must be monitored closely.

Simulation Events
As I mentioned this PMDG is highly demanding with resources as well. This time I was just crossing ITAGO when I clicked on the instrument panel and the simulation crashed (I get that most often with this PMDG). I had to start all over, but rather than redoing it, I took off from SKBS, took the a/c to cruise altitude then slewed it to the geographical position where the simulation had crashed and continued thereon.

I have a realtively power PC with 4GB so I am considering getting a full 6GB or 8GB (I had 6GB but the memories got damaged due to spikes).

Incidents & Accidents: PMDG Jetstream 41 radar contact lost on the Gulf of Panama

Background Information
As you readers know I bought a PMDG BAe Jetstream 4100. So far I have done two or three low altitude flights (5000’) around local airports, basically take-off do a circuit or two and land again. No incidents although in both occasions the engines were already started by FSX. I had also read the Pilot Tutorial, the Instrument Reference, a few tutorial articles and browsed through relevant parts of the Aircraft Operating Manual.

I felt confident about doing my first full flights as the “virtual captain” rather than the “virtual first officer”. I had chosen the excellent Air Panama livery by Jim Hodkinson at the PMDG forum. For this flight I had an “emotional” reason, so I chose Bahia Solano, Chocó, Colombia to Tocumen Intl., Panama. Simply because me and my ex-girlfriend had plans to visit this small coastal town but that never came to happen. I attempted this flight two days ago but the JS41 engines melted down at the ramp during startup procedure, propellers where not unfeathered and did not remove start locks. Yesterday I tried it again and it all went well, took off and reached cruise altitude. Then a relative came asking for the passengers and I went to show him by switching views with the FSX menu and…. FSX crashed to the desktop!!!! most irritating considering it took me 45 minutes to prepare! So apparently a known problem with the PMDG JS41, I applied the workaround (a Vista 32-bit DLL in the FSX root folder).

Purpose
Since this would be my first full flight in the “captain’s chair” I wanted to accomplish the following:

• A successful start from a cold and dark cockpit: no burnt engines
• A successful take-off with a cruise climb using autopilot (had an issue yesterday)
• Navigate using instruments instead of “following the line”
• A proper descent and ILS approach
• A safe landing into Tocumen International airport in Panama (my “home” airport)
• Virtual Mission: to get “type rated” and turn the newly painted a/c to the owner airline

Flight Brief
We will depart from the small provincial airport of Bahia Solano, Chocó in the neighboring republic of Colombia in spite of the bad weather. We would climb to a cruise altitude of 16,000 feet. Our route will be to direct DAKMO intersection, then airway UA317 to fix ITAGO and then along the same airway to over Taboga Island (TBG VOR) before intercepting ILS to runway 03R on Tocumen Intl. in Panama.

Departure from Colombia
Bahía Solano is a small local ecotouristic place in Colombia where the town of Mutis is. Bahía Solano’s airport is small and has is named Jose Celestino and has runway 17/35. The only navigation beacon here is the BHS NDB (240.00). The only VOR we can use as a reference is farther away, UIB (113.20). If we were to track R-330 127nm outbound UIB we would reach DAKMO. We will keep it tuned in NAV1 (with TBG standby) but use BHS as main reference (tuned on ADF1) because we will flight direct to DAKMO. DAKMO intersection is the handover point between Colombian and Panamanian airspaces.

It is the rainy season so we expect a lot of clouds and rain. Indeed some passengers got very wet when boarding the a/c. We had the full set of PMDG ramp manager artifacts. Departure was scheduled for 10:25 local time. Cockpit preparation up to engine start would take 45 minutes.

In our first leg we will climb runway heading over the town of Mutis off the coast to the beautiful bay of Bahia Solano. Then fly heading 346 degrees to DAKMO. This would take us again into the mainland, jungle to be exact.

We were carrying only 8 virtual passengers, me as the “virtual captain”, the virtual first officer and a virtual airline official in the jumpseat. Using the data from the Load & Balance Worksheet our Speed Card showed that fro 19500 lbs. we would have to set V1=Vr=101, V2-109,Vyse=123 and Vy=143 knots. Because I anticipated a heavy workload (these checklists are long!) we were planning to land with around 800 lbs. of fuel for a landing weight of 18316 lbs. The speed card showed we had to set the following speeds for landing configuration: V1=Vr=97, V2=106, Vyse=120. We don’t want to look for that and set it when we are extremely busy performing our descent. After all, in “real life” I have to perform both Captain & FO duties and communicate with ATC.

As you can see not only did we had rain during boarding, it was still raining during take-off and there was a lot of heavy clouds. We would climb to 16,000 ft above the cloud cover while our selected passenger list would enjoy a nice meal with a beautiful stewardess.

Luckily having learned from engine meltdowns twice, I read in the PMDG forum that the trick is to first load a default a/c, turn everything off and then switch to the J41 while on the ramp/gates. Unfortunately there is yet another J41 bug in which the panel state is not completely saved, therefore this workaround. After 45 minutes I had already started the right engine, did pushback, started the left engine. Then keeping the condition levers in Taxi setting I taxied to runway 35, the weather was not going to be on my side. I followed all checklists to the letter.

Climb out and Cruise
In my previous attempt (when FSX crashed) I had to struggle during the climb because no matter what I did the autopilot would disengage constantly. Very difficult to find out why when you are also busy with navigating, watching your instruments to prevent engine fire and figure out why it happens!. As it turns out, The J41 has the feature that if the pilot uses the yoke for anything the autopilot would automatically disengage! This simulation is very detailed but that was not mentioned in the manuals :( No wonder why it kept happening! Also, this autopilot works differently that what I was used to. This time however, following the advise of fellow virtual J41 captains I set the autopilot for climb (ALT SEL and V/S mode) and did not move the yoke, only very carefully using the pan hat switch to change views around the cockpit.

During the climb I also had to keep an eye on the EGT and RPM, checking the maximum limits where not exceeded. With autopilot for climb I could at least show my father some nice views. During the climb however, the simulation threw me a surprise: Shaker! yeah, close to the last 1000’ feet of the climb the a/c began to stall. There is no auto-throttle here so you also have to manage it yourself for the chosen V/S or IAS mode. Once on cruise the Flight Mode Controller would switch from ALT SEL to ALT (altitude hold) mode. To reach DAKMO we would use the BHS NDB behind, probably R-330 of UIB VOR/DME and the La Palma VOR (113.10) in Darien, R-134. Just for fun. We don’t want to fall in the jungles of Darien, if you survive the crash the animals may eat you, and if not then the FARC that incursion into Panamanian territory may kidnap you (at best…).

During cruise this excellent simulation from PMDG threw some more challenges to me, I got the “Icing AOA” lit up on the right instrument panel and “Ice” warning on the CAP panel. I looked on the overhead and the engine/propeller and windshield anti-ice was on. The warning wouldn’t go away in spite of cancelling the “Icing AOA”. This cold mean trouble, especially with those ominous clouds and ark skies. As you can see on the picture on the left, there where ice formations on both wings (leading edge is no longer black) and on the nose!. Finally I found the Airframe De-Icing cycle switch! I turned it on and it went through cycles and the ice was gone, pfew!!! later on it happened again so this became routine during cruise.

Descent & Arrival
So far so good! in spite of the bad weather and the two warnings we reached DAKMO and turned heading 308 degrees on the same airway over the beautiful Pearl Archipel. Our next waypoint was TBG VOR which I had already tuned on NAV1 and set the appropriate radial. I also set TBG NDB (311.0) on ADF2 and set the Tocumen INAT localizer (110.70) of runway 03R.

I had already looked up the V speeds for landing configuration so I set them on the EHSI using the Flight Mode Controller, getting the hang on this aircraft jewel. Now the big question… We have to descend from 16,000 ft. to be at 5,000 at Taboga to intercept the localizer (right turn). Things got stressful, I set the new altitude on ALT SEL, lowered throttles (not to idle though, was uncertain), used the knob to set the descent vertical speed to –1000 ft/min but it was not going down fast enough.

Here is were the pilot error occurred, in all this hectic moments trying to descent and go through the checklists I forgot to monitor the airspeed. As a result the bells started sounding and seconds later the aircraft overstressed :(. The unthinkable happened, after over an hour of flight this virtual aircraft disintegrated at 12,000 ft 38nm inbound TBG. All passengers and crew died (myself included) a sad moment sniff, sniff… I guess I was not yet ready for sitting at the “captain’s chair” and must now go back to the books. I should have paid attention to the article written by a real-life captain of a J41 “Slow down then go down”. If you don’t lower your speed first then descending is going to be a big problem. Even if you manage to descend, it would be difficult to stop the a/c on the runway if you don’t have the correct approach speed! My fault… game over and try again :( luckily that is the beauty of a simulator. Obviously I was frustrated because of the failure as well as not being able to declare the flight with the virtual airline. I hope my next full flight attempt is successful, I love this PMDG, it frustrates at the beginning but you really learn a lot about the real aircraft.

BAe Jetstream 41 Video Tutorials

Just found these excellent video tutorials for the PMDG J41.

BAe J41 : Test circuit in Cali, Colombia

As you all folks now, I am now doing test flights –more like circuits around an airport- of my new PMDG BAe J41 to get a better idea of the workload of this nearly full simulation and be able to find the instruments quickly.

Today I took it for a circuit around SKCL (Cali, Colombia) with cloudy weather and some dark clouds. In this screenshot the a/c is on blocks with all items from the ramp manager enabled.

I took off and flew several circuits before landing because yes I got disoriented hile moving around the virtual cockpit. In one of the attempts I was forced to do a go around because it just didn’t want to touch down, time to set full throttles and use the Go Around button on the left throttle lever, retract gears, up flaps later and then turn left after gaining sufficient altitude in a positive climb.

Here I had to familiarize myself with the Radio Management Unit (RMU), the EHSI, EADI, Flight Mode Selectors and Display Control Unit while “flying” it. In particular for our navigation we had NAV1 tuned to the CLO VOR/DME (115.50) and the IPAS Localizer (109.90) with the course selector on 13 degrees for our ILS approach to runway 13. I also tuned to the CLO ADF on 210.0, the more aids the better. Because it is not so easy to see on the VC I had to keep on zooming in/out until finally I found the VLOC button! only then I could finally do my final circuit. Now I could follow the glideslope. I noticed that this PMDG was kind of slow and showing the VOR radial approximation, first it was way off and then suddenly it was right in!.

I was watching my speed because I wanted to be able to stop the bird. It also had the tendency to keep on climbing. One thing I found weird though, I could not get the autopilot to maintain altitude or heading, either this autopilot is way different that what I have used so far or I am doing something wrong!. This screenshot is that of the happy final approach prior to landing following ILS glidslope. Don’t forget to arm the ground spoilers prior to landing!

Last but not least the happy landing of my BAe Jetstream 4100 with MANX livery on the Cali airport. Landed right on the centerline; good following of the glideslope too. Upon landing I set throttles to reverse while applying brakes. I used about half of the runway before coming to a stop, pulling the condition levers to TAXI condition and throttling to vacate the runway. At the ramp it was time to familiarize myself with the proper way to shutdown the engines and unfeathering the propellers.

Unhappy Things
Earlier today I was in the virtual cockpit getting familiar with all procedures. I was following all the checklists, if all went well I was going to do my inaugural flight SKBS – MPTO. Did the Preflight checklist, External checks, Cockpit checklist, Weight & Balance worksheet, programmed the FMC (this bird cannot use FSX generated flight plans, you have to enter them manually). Just before the engine start checklist I was trying to set my navigation radios on the RMU, sometimes it just wouldn’t tune! And then in one of those several attempts to tune this PMDG crashed my FSX, 25 minutes of checklists gone down the toilet! I Also noticed the landing field elevation setting (Pressurization Panel) works only in multiples of 10 feet.

I like this a/c, it is good for VFR but it is also equipped and rated for IFR. Unfortunately the weather panel is non functional. This doesn’t have the Garmin GPS we have grown used to in default a/c so you really have to pay a lot of attention to your instruments and sharpen up your navigation skills, I like that! A downside of this PMDG simulation is that it is not fully compatible with the GoFlight MCP Pro or EFIS modules.

Rio Hato circuit on BAe J41

A bit over a week ago I gave myself a birthday present, a shining and professional simulation from PMDG, namely the BAe Jetstream 4100 (J41) turboprop. There have been excellent reviews on this a/c and I decided to buy it and it was a good buy.

To fly this thing you have to at least read the Pilot Introduction booklet and the Pilot Tutorial or you will end up with engine fires or catastrophic engine failure. I have only browsed the Aircraft Operation Manual (500+ pages!).

So, having done some reading I decided to familiarize myself with it to see if I have understood the concepts, you can't fly this bird like you would a default (or freeware) FSX aircraft. Because I am still a "student" and was short of time I took the controls of the bird with engines running (not a cold start).

You can say I was the First Officer (FO) Pilot Flying being instructed by the Captain. My plan is to do a full range flight (Bahía Solano, Colombia to Tocumen, Panama) once I feel comfortable with it and ready to do my first "line flight".

Prior to this I had developed an add-on scenery for Rio Hato airport (MPRH) for FSX. Our J41 was parked on the only medium ramp on this airfield near the main hangar on the apron. My virtual captain had given me control after ready for taxi.

Flight Brief

We will depart from Rio Hato (MPRH)'s medium ramp and taxi to runway 34. We will pay close attention to the lessons learned about ground and air handling. In particular the proper use of the condition lever and thrust lever according to the phase of flight. We would monitor the EGT, Torque and RPM on the Engine Instrumentation Panel, we do not want to burn the engines.

After takeoff we will simply do a full circuit around the airfield with the last part over the sea prior to landing on runway 34. The weather was clear with perfect visibility.

The circuit

We will take off and climb runway heading to a height of 4000'. Then we will do a 1+ minute crosswind leg at around 190 knots keeping the condition lever in the flight setting.

Then we will turn left on our downwind leg heading out to sea (I can't swim!). On our way we will have both the airfield and Decameron resort on our left. We will continue some 8nm into the sea, around the same place where the victor airway to MPCE (Chitré) passes. Keep an eye on the speed, we don't want to be too fast because this bird has some quirks.

Finally turned left again after some 2 minutes after passing the coastline and started our base leg (see picture) having descended to around 3500'. Our airport is just left of the green forest seen right atop the cabin on this screenshot. In our virtual cockpit we monitor the EHSI to keep our heading. We will also reduce speed to around 160 knots. Use the panning button on the virtual cockpit to also look out the window, we want to keep an eye on the small island (Farallon island). Don't go past that island, we must have it around 1nm on our right during the final approach.

Then our final turn into the final approach leg continuing our descent profile, our throttles where down and the condition lever full forward (we need 100% on descent). Make sure to start your turn on time to be properly aligned with runway 34. When crossing the coastline you will see the buildings of the Decameron resort (and some beach huts) on your left and the (abandoned) house of former dicator Manuel Noriega on your right. Keep an eye on the runway, there is a small radio beacon on your right (real life obstacle).

The landing was nearly perfect with a flare at the end. I think I was a little fast (138 knots). You can see on the screenshot the control tower, the main hangar we we started and a white van ready to take us to the resort after sweating it. Unfortunately I did not land on the spot I wanted, as a result even with reverse thrust I did not manage to stop the a/c before reaching the end of the active runway. This means we overrun the Panamerican highway!

Well, this airfield is a curiousity, it is a larger runway split in two by the Panamerican Highway! so we did not hit any car (luckily) and we could use the rest of the former runway (nowadays closed) to come to a full stop, we didn't need much of it. After that I put the condition lever to its TAXI position, throttles to idle and turned right into the taxiway. Then again right onto Bravo taxiway crossing the highway and past several hangars on our left. At the end we turned right again near the radio beacon and passed behind the head of runway 34 to head to the ramp where I started originally and shut down the engines. Pfew! I was scared of having engine fires or melting down the engine but I guess it did good to monitor the engine parameters and use the levers properly. The virtual captain however, was not too happy about overruning the highway :O.

I still have a lot of reading to be done, having already color coded the Pilot Tutorial with indications of where to find the various instruments. Lately I am having a lot of joy flying small aircraft (virtually) and turboprops. I also have my Wilco Publishing/Feel There Legacy to be mastered.

Adding a BAe Jetstream 4100 to my FSX

It is with great joy that I am announcing the addition of the PMDG BAe Jetstream J4100 to my FSX hangar!. This is to follow my 2009Q4 acquisition of a FeelThere Embraer Legacy.

Lately I have grown so attached to my FSX that I no longer fly FS9, FSX is so immersive that there is no comparison. I have also been developing a lot of custom scenery for Panama (for FSX) which requires me doing a lot of short flights in propeller and turbo propeller aircraft. With these new add-on scenery I have developed it is finally a pleasure to fly in this part of the virtual globe, so nothing better than a good, realistic turboprop to visit all my new airports.

The BAe J41 is well suited for Panama because it has a range of 2 hours of flight which is more than enough for a round trip from Panama city to any end of the country without refuelling.

I read good reviews of this a/c in Computer Pilot (April/May 2010) and now that it was with a 10% discount I plunged to get my birthday present :-)

Unfortunately I haven’t had much time for true virtual flying (end to end) because of other commitments, family and scenery development. Yet I hope that now I can “take a break” and dedicate more time to reading my BAe J41 manual and take it for some training flights. The same goes for my Embraer Legacy. I will be reviewing both at Virtual-Aviation.info (BTW it is going offline for a month or two).