Generating a Flight Plan:How Easy is It?

[Saved A Buck 0]

I like the idea that PFPX supports so many products. The only reason I haven't bought is it's so complicated. What I would like to do, is use it to generate a formatted flight plan for my addons.  That's all. How much is involved in getting to that stage of exporting a flight plan? 

 

Thanks in advance, 

 

Saved a Buck

[BW901 58]

Hi Saved a Buck,

 

What you've written repeats what seems to be a common misconception. I had a similar discussion a month ago at Flightsimcon 2017 with a couple of PFPX users who are dispatchers for US majors. We were all united (no pun intended) in our view.

 

First up PFPX is not "complicated".

 

The beauty of PFPX is that you can make the flight planning process as simple or as "complex" as you the user wish. Once you've used PFPX a few times running a plan can be very quick, it takes a matter of seconds to input the required parameters. You can configure PFPX to mirror various real world regulatory regimes or company policies if you so wish, you can tweak routes, you can play with performance parameters, or .... you can keep it simple. There are loads of Youtube videos available showing how to quickly generate plans.

 

A common simmer misconception is that real world flight planning systems are infallible and will always immediately give you the perfect route automatically. If that were the case why would airlines waste money buying a hugely expensive flight planning system and then also employ dispatchers, nav and route planning specialists and an entire ops department?

 

Your other point about only generating flight plan info for addons seems to be a third common simmerism. I wonder how many, or more precisely how few, people actually use the generated OFP as it's used in the real world as a "howgozit"? It adds another dimension to monitor your time and fuel progress against plan, particularly if you're in an ETOPs environment, and especially for anyone flying with online ATC.

 

But that's the flexibility of PFPX, you decide how simple or complex (not "complicated") it should be. Quite simply PFPX provides far more capability and usability than any other sim-related planner out there.

 

Cheers
Jon