As a special Christmas treat, and because we were invited to take part in VACCHU's Christmas event, we offered not one but two online events: the first, a fly-in to Budapest-Ferihegy (LHBP) on VATSIM, and the second, a fly-out from Budapest-Ferihegy (LHBP). Maybe it was a function of the time of year, but participation was lacking - no-one flew the VATSIM event, and only one pilot took part in the IVAO event (and said pilot, me, would have participated in the VATSIM but for a prior commitment that evening!) Feh! More space for me to describe the flight :-D

"Given I've been flying the IVAO VFR WT like a mad-man recently, my Project Magenta setup has been allowed to "go fallow", so I decided early on I was going to fly the Boeing 737-800 on a good, long flight, preferably with ProPilot (which thankfully it turns out wasn't possible) - how about LHBP-EGLL? It's Class 6, so the 738 is permitted, and it's not so long as I would have to load up too much on fuel. Pre-flight went well enough, got the FMC programmed quickly, so I contacted GND (who was sharing a voice channel with TWR for some reason) and got the FP clearance out of the way; first problem (of many), couldn't find the departure in the DEP/ARR page (I'll explain why chronologically in a moment). Anyway, as I had FSNav loaded anyway, I pulled the correct departure into it and made the map view small enough that I'd be able to hand fly it.

Push/start and taxi I get out of the way no problem, and line up rwy 31L, only to fully discover problem number two - the captains EFIS controls aren't doing anything to the PFD/ND! I'd noticed this right at the beginning of the pre-flight, when I would normally check the flight plan in ND PLN mode, but assumed it was a wireless network problem and so ignored. Thankfully, I know enough of the keyboard controls for the glass cockpit software to do most of the things I needed, so I continued to ignore the problem and took off; full automated TOGA with hand VNAV/LNAV is not as easy as it looks - trying to maintain a sensible airspeed meant a climb rate of over 2,500ft/min (even in CLB2)! Any way, departure was a wee bit wobbly but good enough for the passengers, and TWR was kind enough to clear me to an intermediate cruise level good and early. No APP or CTR, so I was able to devote some attention to the PM issues prior to take-off. FMC not having was the departure turns out to have been a simple case of pilot error, and dead easy to fix too; in my pre-flight haste I'd put in LFBP as my departure airport! Funnily enough, LFBP has a rwy 13/31 as well, hence my not twigging to the problem immediately, and since I hadn't been able to check the programming in PLN mode it had gone totally unnoticed. A quick flush and reload later and we're back on FMC track to Vienna FIR.

So, scroll forward two FIRs (Vienna and Munich had CTR, so I had to pay attention, even while cruising at FL340) and I finally get a chance to have a good look at the glass cockpit. Pop up the first config screen in PFD and everything looks about right for how I have ended up as a result of keyboard fiddling (all navaids displayed, and range 40nm), so pop up the "raw data" display and what do I see there? "First Officer's Display"! How the heck that had happened I don't know. Pop up the second config screen in PFD and tick the "Captains Display" checkbox and, big surprise, the captains EFIS controls on the MCP are magically working again!

Rest of the flight passed without incident (apart from the autoland trying to put the plane on the deck a few hundred yards shy of 27R! I was ready for that one though and kept it 100ft up by hand, touching down just past the threshold.)"

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EHM0654 Murray Crane

Just about to cross into Vienna airspace.

Parked at my favourite gate at Heathrow; 152 on the EuroPier. The excellent scenery is Heathrow Pro by Gary Summons (UK2000 Scenery).

The following EHM members participated in the event:

EHM0654

Murray Crane