Concorde - First Look

[Will Fibich]

Checklist question: The BA checklist copy I have from Feb. 2002 has the "autopilot changeover" item. What's that exactly? 

 

Also, what is the checklist usage philosophy BA used? How much of it was silently done, read and do, or just the do a flow, and then the checklist backs up that flow (sort of how we see current aircraft operations today)?

[Fraser Gale]

3 hours ago, Will Fibich said:

Checklist question: The BA checklist copy I have from Feb. 2002 has the "autopilot changeover" item. What's that exactly? 

 

Also, what is the checklist usage philosophy BA used? How much of it was silently done, read and do, or just the do a flow, and then the checklist backs up that flow (sort of how we see current aircraft operations today)?

The AP changeover was a check to ensure both AP's were operating correctly and was especially important for autolands where there is a master - slave arrangement.  The opposite autopilot to that operating would be selected on (eg. AP1 controlling, AP2 selected on) and the crew would look for the newly selected one to latch on (in the same mode) and the original AP to drop out.  This had to be done before selecting an approach/landing mode.  It proved that the second AP would automatically take over in the same mode as the original if the original failed.  All being well both AP's could then be selected on for approach if required but would only both latch in an approach mode. 

Checklists were slightly different depending on phase of flight but in brief each crew member did their own "Scan check" to prepare the aircraft on the ground which was then backed up with the "Before Start Checklist".  After starting engines it was basically a read and do scenario though many items would already be set anyway.   The rule was that any action involving the pilots was read allowed and anything that was on the engineer panel that the pilots really didn't need to know about could be done silently by the engineer.  I think this shows the faith that was placed in the flight engineers and shows why it stated on the pilot licence that they were only certified to fly it with a qualified engineer! The engineer read the checks from the taxi check onwards, the non-handling pilot read the checks before the taxi check only. 

[Will Fibich]

3 hours ago, Fraser Gale said:

The AP changeover was a check to ensure both AP's were operating correctly and was especially important for autolands where there is a master - slave arrangement.  The opposite autopilot to that operating would be selected on (eg. AP1 controlling, AP2 selected on) and the crew would look for the newly selected one to latch on (in the same mode) and the original AP to drop out.  This had to be done before selecting an approach/landing mode.  It proved that the second AP would automatically take over in the same mode as the original if the original failed.  All being well both AP's could then be selected on for approach if required but would only both latch in an approach mode. 

Quite important! Thanks for that

 

3 hours ago, Fraser Gale said:

Checklists were slightly different depending on phase of flight but in brief each crew member did their own "Scan check" to prepare the aircraft on the ground which was then backed up with the "Before Start Checklist".  After starting engines it was basically a read and do scenario though many items would already be set anyway.   The rule was that any action involving the pilots was read allowed and anything that was on the engineer panel that the pilots really didn't need to know about could be done silently by the engineer.  I think this shows the faith that was placed in the flight engineers and shows why it stated on the pilot licence that they were only certified to fly it with a qualified engineer! The engineer read the checks from the taxi check onwards, the non-handling pilot read the checks before the taxi check only. 

Ah, okay. Normally I just did a flow and backed it with the checklist when flying single pilot in the old 32-bit bird. The actual checklist was denoted with CP/FO/FE (I think that's how they did it), so that's helpful for my case. I would watch the ITVV video a lot and see Roger doing stuff silently and also reading, but I never knew if there was a prior flow attached to those for the IRL stuff. 

Thanks again! Big help 

[Fraser Gale]

Once in the air there wasn’t much time to spare so the checklists basically setup the aircraft for the next phase of flight.  On the ground it was less of an issue. 

[AdrianSmith]

23 hours ago, Andrew Wilson said:

Ah, the CDU selector is on WPT, so it's actually showing waypoint 5 position (Vicenza). Ordinarily the Captains CDU would have been on POS to display a rolling position to the crew.

CDU 2 shows 3.2 minutes to waypoint 9, Concorde Point Charlie, N42 06.0 E016 28.0. 

Couldn't see what the selector was set to so I "assumed" it was on position.

 

Out of interest, was there a SOP for what each INS unit showed during normal operation?

I tend to have INS1 on XTK TKE, 2 on TR/GS and 3 on DIS/TIME.

[duartevieira]

On 4/23/2023 at 5:15 PM, Rob Ainscough said:

Visuals over substance? 

PMDG didn’t elect to use PBR for their VC in P3D … suggest you compare to iFly 737 Max that did use PBR.

If you want better lighting and complete control over P3D lighting, install TOGA Environment Plus.

What you’re missing in lighting support in “current” 5.x P3D is SSAO … “current” 

MSFS has far more limitations on visual lighting control, any attempt I’ve seen on trying to adjust MSFS lighting has resulted in worse visuals … especially the cloud shaders, ugh!

can you send us your toga envplus please rob private msg thank you 

[Will Fibich]

On 4/25/2023 at 2:36 AM, Fraser Gale said:

Once in the air there wasn’t much time to spare so the checklists basically setup the aircraft for the next phase of flight.  On the ground it was less of an issue. 

Honestly makes things quite easier for us. Won't have to remember too much

[Jean-Claude Bailly]

Interesting reading, for your enjoyment:

https://edition.cncom/travel/article/what-it-was-like-to-be-a-concorde-pilot/index.html

[Rob Ainscough]

On 4/24/2023 at 2:02 AM, Jose Rodrigues said:

will "current" antialiasing be improved?

Not permitted to discuss ... you can find tid bits of info in various forums ... and most are well aware P3D V6 exists given LM's public slip-up.  LM know what they need to accomplish  

[Nihar Modak]

When will Concorde release? 

[Peng Jia]

1 hour ago, Nihar Modak said:

When will Concorde release? 

Q1 next year，I guess.

[Nihar Modak]

1 hour ago, Peng Jia said:

Q1 next year，I guess.

Oh no

[Norman Blackburn]

32 minutes ago, Nihar Modak said:

Oh no

Hi Nihar,

You can safely ignore Peng's reply. 

[Will Fibich]

9 hours ago, Norman Blackburn said:

Hi Nihar,

You can safely ignore Peng's reply. 

Hi Norman. As April comes to a close, how has this month been for you guys on the development side? 

[John Price]

I do enjoy these videos from the BBC archive, but this one I particularly enjoyed, for obvious reasons. A lovely explanation, actually, of what is surely the most complicated fuel system on any airliner

 

[Eric Dziura]

Excellent video. Thank you

[David Porrett]

I'll stick my neck out and say that aside from Apollo, this would have to be one of the greatest engineering feats ever achieved.

[Fraser Gale]

7 hours ago, David Porrett said:

I'll stick my neck out and say that aside from Apollo, this would have to be one of the greatest engineering feats ever achieved.

Agreed, and I’m told that some NASA people would privately admit that Concorde was actually more difficult because of the level of safety required. 
The major difference of course was that Concorde lasted 27 years…..

[Martin Richards]

I remember reading about the amount of work it took to get the intake system on Concorde working reliably with the technology of the time being not dissimilar to some of the feats accomplished in the Apollo Program.

Iirc it took until a good few years into Commercial service for all the glitches in the engine/ intake system to finally be ironed out.

[Fraser Gale]

1 hour ago, Martin Richards said:

I remember reading about the amount of work it took to get the intake system on Concorde working reliably with the technology of the time being not dissimilar to some of the feats accomplished in the Apollo Program.

Iirc it took until a good few years into Commercial service for all the glitches in the engine/ intake system to finally be ironed out.

The change from all analogue to an early version of digital processing for the core added a delay to the programme and it took a few years to get a set of laws that allowed operation close to the surge boundary in all conditions of temperature/speed/incidence/yaw condition/engine N1 setting etc.  Operating close to surge gave optimum performance but unless every possibility was covered you could cross the surge boundary which of course was undesirable.   
 

Although the French were reluctant to change to a digital core it is generally believed if they hadn’t they’d still be trying to get them working!   The fact that the end result led to an intake that you could throw the throttles from one end of the quadrant to the other while doing Mach 2, the intake not caring at all and the engine continuing as normal shows they pretty much got it right!   
 

It’s also worth mentioning that most supersonic multi-engine aircraft at the time (maybe even now?) suffered from the major issue where if two engines failed on one side, you lost the aircraft - not on Concorde! 

[Craig Baillie]

In other news!

[Stefan Nirschl]

Nice. So sth to play with until fs labs drops the Concorde

[Charlie Carter]

As someone who is checking this forum daily hoping for a new post or an announcement, I'm reticent to ask but curiosity is getting the better of me. The hope in March was for Beta testing to be entered by the end of that month, and I believe that was then updated to sometime in April. As we approach the final third of May, is it possible to get an update of how things are going?

I totally understand that this is a complicated undertaking, I'm sure little glitches here and there are constantly being discovered/corrected. My previous offer to help with Beta testing in any small way still stands. It would be wonderful to have even a rough estimate of the pathway to release from here on in if at all possible.

Thank you in advance and keep up the good work. The screenshots we've had so far are certainly whetting the appetite, would love to see more.

[Andrew Wilson]

Hi Charlie, 

I'll be posting an update tomorrow on where we are with the title, and sharing some more details on some of the new features. 

[Charlie Carter]

1 hour ago, Andrew Wilson said:

Hi Charlie, 

I'll be posting an update tomorrow on where we are with the title, and sharing some more details on some of the new features. 

Amazing, can't wait! Thank you for the prompt reply!

[Vimal Anandharaman]

Excited!

[Charlie Carter]

On 5/18/2023 at 6:24 PM, Andrew Wilson said:

Hi Charlie, 

I'll be posting an update tomorrow on where we are with the title, and sharing some more details on some of the new features. 

Looking forward to this Andrew. 
 

One thing I did want to ask - back when

I used SSTSIM all three models (Prototype, Pre-production and production) were available. Is that going to be the case with this release?

[Andrew Wilson]

Hi Charlie,

Similar to its predecessor, Concorde-X, this new Concorde title will exclusively feature the production variant.

[Charlie Carter]

Understood, Andrew. Look forward to that update from earlier this week.

[Andrew Wilson]

Understood, Andrew. Look forward to that update from earlier this week.

Check the Concorde forum, it was posted on Friday.