Just read in aopa weekly mail today that the FAA is considering shutting down the BDL (Bradley, Hartford CT) and PVD (Providence RI) VORs. These are not exactly podunk navaids. Both are located at Class C fields with substantial airline traffic (not just RJs either) and they support a decent...

Yesterday, I stopped by a small VFR airport in western NY state and struck up a conversation with a few locals. During the interesting aviation chat I learned that the FAA had been to their airport a year or so ago performing a survey that would hopefully result in a GPS approach. On average, how...

So here's a question I had never thought of until getting my instrument rating and owning an IFR-equipped aircraft: how long should records of VOR checks be retained? Do they need to be retained at all? Can the FAA come to me and ask, "Remember that IFR flight to SLO you made 2 years ago? Show...

I am curious to know how many airports exist where you have to fly a non- radar instrument approach (ie feeder routes, IAF, procedure turn etc..). I have come across a few in Colorado and New Mexico, but I have never encountered one in other areas I have flown.

How much protection do we have on an off-field VOR approach? I was always under the impression that as long as the equipment was within tolerances for an airborne VOR receiver check (+/- 6 degrees) and the approach was flown to PTS tolerances (no more than 3/4 scale deflection) it was impossible...

I had an interesting experience earlier today. I thought after all this time I had the CNX-80 figured out, but I found a new way to screw things up. I was on the POU GPS-24 (http://204.108.4.16/d-tpp/0508/00286VDG24.PDF), full procedure, Kingston IAF. We were IFR, in and out of IMC. We had...

This, by no means is as exciting or interesting as some of the other threads I have followed, but serves as a constant reminder to me, how quickly things can change! Wanting to get my plane down to Cameron Park before Feb 1. for an annual, I determined that yesterday was probably my best...

For several weeks now I have been flying to the Dunkirk airport (KDKK, NY State, US) for business. Most weeks, the weather was VFR for my departure. However, the last two weeks the weather was IFR and adherence to this airport's obstacle departure procedure was required. The procedure is very...

It never ceases to amaze me how I keep finding something I don't know how to do on the GNX-480 after all this time. Had a flight plan going when I got a pretty significant re-route in flight. I went into FPL, hit EDIT, and started deleting waypoints with the CLR button. After a while, I...

Interesting call today. I talked to S-TEC/Meggit. I am doing my annual and wanted to cure a longstanding issue with my S-TEC 30 autopilot. The issue was that when dimming the unit down, when you turn the potentiometer below a certain value, the light on the S-tec 30 goes to full bright. The S-tec...

Hello: I just wonder if there is a place where you can check which is the last date changed were made to a Jepp approach chart of Low-Altitude Enroute Chart. Our club has 49 / 50 enroute charts, that are supposed to be current (last changed Jul 04), but I found out a frequency was wrong. How do I...

In two words, don't bother. Flew today Anacortes (north of Seattle) back home to Palo Alto, IFR at FL190. The flight plan was pretty complicated, over a dozen waypoints all carefully entered into my shiny new 530 during climb out. And guess what... I got to fly to exactly one of them. Initially I...

Let's say I want to file a standard instrument arrival route (STAR) on my IFR flight plan. For example, flying to Henderson Executive (KHND), south of Las Vegas. I want to fly from Palmdale VOR (PMD) to Hector VOR (HEC) to BASAL intersection to Daggett VOR (DAG), to Henderson (HND)...

I'm planning my 250 nm XC for my instrument rating and would like to do a PAR approach at Pt. Mugu naval airfield (NTD) in CA on my way back from San Luis Obispo. How would I file that? I will be coming down V25, should I expect the IAF to be VTU? Is there any way to indicate in the flight...

If I just want to do IFR approaches at my class D airport of origin, how should I file? One FSS person suggested that I file McKinney (TKI) direct to a 5 mile on a 360 radial from the airport (which has no VOR) and then back to TKI -- putting "multiple approaches" in the comments section. Any...

I am ready to start working on my IFR training. I took an intensive weekend crash course to pass the written and got a 93%, so that's out of the way. My CFI for my private was fabulous, but he was a real drill sergeant. He's also no longer in the area. I have read Joe Campbell's IFR Diary and that...

None of the RNAV approaches at my local airport has LPV minimums. I want to try out our club's nifty new 530W. I've tried a couple of LNAV+VNAV approaches, and they aren't all that exciting because the mins aren't any better than the LNAV-only minimums. Is there a search engine that will find...

Hi, I have buy flitestar and jeppview one year ago, now I can't more visualize jeppview charts in flitestar because jeppview data is "outdate". Anybody know if is possible to force the visualization of the jeppview charts in flitestar? Best Wishes rexwind

What are the recommended procedures in obtaining an IFR clearance enroute? Flying from NJ to FL, I prefer to fly VFR, but undoubtedly I will encounter IMC along the way. If I filed IFR in advance, it takes 1/2 hour or more to clear it through ATC. I obviously cannot wait 1/2 hour if I encounter...

It's great that the charts are now "free" online at http://www.naco.faa.gov/ but it seems to take a lot of my personal time to figure out which charts I need. I used to just carry the paper charts with the knowledge that if I had to divert, I had all the charts for all nearby airports. How do you...