How do people fly 8-9 hr blocks?

[David Vega]

I think you'll get a variety of responses, from those that sit in front of the monitor for the entire duration without blinking to those that will get up and do other things while the flight takes place.

I sometimes will depart before going to bed, fly for a while, and go to bed, get up the next day and land. Either I time it, or use a common feature to pause the sim so many miles out. You can find that feature in some publicly availabel gauges, or even in FSACARS. In the real world, some long flights will take an extra crew to take turns at the controls. Some of these airplanes have crew quarters where the non-flying crew can sleep.

[chriszdc]

<7>7 hours I usually do as Dave, overnight with the pause at top of descent or a timer, get up, make coffee, land.

[chriszdc]

Less than 7 hours, I usually do stuff around the house or yard work, checking in occasionally - more than7 hours I usually do as Dave, overnight with the pause at top of descent or a timer, get up, make coffee, land.

[Al O'Brien]

What software are you using to pause at top of descent.I have looked but have had no luck finding that particular guage.
al

[Marty_Becker]

Search Avsim or FlightSim for "Pause." There are various available.

[Al O'Brien]

Thanks Marty, will do.

[David Vega]

FSACARS also provides this service. Check out the FSACARS options.

Dave Vega

[Dave Blake]

I saw a NM option to pause a certain distance, but it was greyed out. Maybe you have to be in the air to use it, I only tried on the ground I think.

The FSACARS Pause option will become active (not greyed out) after you start the log.

[shackler781]

For the sake of argument, what is the difference between going to bed and not monitoring the majority of flight and using accelerated mode?

[Dave Blake]

For the sake of argument, what is the difference between going to bed and not monitoring the majority of flight and using accelerated mode?

Well, for one thing, if you used accelerated mode one could easily log more than 24 hours of flight time in a 24 hour day, which in my mind is not realistic at all. At least if you start a flight, go to bed, then complete the flight the next day you are logging real-time flight hours.

I remember chatting with a pilot from another VA many years ago and he said that he had just flown to Europe and back this afternoon. When I asked him if he had a Concord he said NO. He used a B747 and accelerated mode. Needless to say, I was not impressed.

Did you know that you can set FSACARS to pause at x miles from your destination? Using this you don't have to worry about the co-pilot forgetting to wake you up in time to land the aircraft. You will find this on the OPTIONS menu but you can only set it while in flight.

[orac]

Did you know that you can set FSACARS to pause at x miles from your destination? Using this you don't have to worry about the co-pilot forgetting to wake you up in time to land the aircraft. You will find this on the OPTIONS menu but you can only set it while in flight.

Does FSACARS then hook into Flight Sim and pause it, too? Curious how this could possibly work.
__
Neil

[David Vega]

Yes, that's exactly what it does. FSACARS pauses itself and the simulator. This works on FSX and FS9. A very good tool on those loooooooong flights.