Approach Questions

DUNDY is incorrectly charted. It is an IF, not an IAF. The FAA has made this
mistake on a lot of these abbreviated radar required IAPs.

Roy Smith wrote:

In article ,
Andrew Sarangan wrote:

A few questions came up in ground school that had me stumped. Any insight
is appreciated.

Why do some approaches say Radar required when all the fixes can be
identified using other equipment required for the approach? For example,
VOR-DME-A at 3G3.

According to airnav.com, DUNDY, the only IAF, isn't charted on any
en-route charts, so there's no tie-in to the en-route airway system,
making radar vectors the only way to get to the IAF. At least that's my
guess.

When a holding pattern is published in lieu of a PT, my understanding of
the AIM (5-4-9 (4)) is that you only have to perform the entry, and are not
required to do any laps around the pattern.

That's correct.

What if the hold requires a
direct entry? In that case it seems that you can effectively skip the
holdind pattern, which does not make sense to me because a PT (or hold in
lieu of PT) is a required maneuver. Take a look at SDF10 @ DWU.

The rule says that unless you are flying a published NoPT route or are
on radar vectors to the final approach course, you must fly the PT. It
doesn't always make sense, but that's the rule.

Why does the hold in lieu of a PT always say "1 min". Isn't a hold always 1
min? Why is this mentioned only for this type of hold, and not mentioned
for all other holds?

Holds don't have to be 1-minute legs. If you have DME or GPS, it's
common to specify the leg length in terms of distance, not time. A good
example would be the GPS-9 t KIJD.

What exactly is a Fan Marker? See SDF10 @ DWU. How is this different from
an OM? The fan marker seems to have its own identifier code.

FM's are pretty rare these days. I believe they were originally used as
distance fixes along the old A-N airways. A FM has a wider radiation
pattern than a standard OM. My guess is that an OM isn't wide enough to
reach to the edges of the SDF course, so they use the wider FM instead.
My recollection is that they have the same carrier frequency and audio
keying frequency as the OM, so they light up the OM light on your panel.