ploucandco wrote:
The biggest advantage of jeppesen charts is that they are uniform and made for pilots.
That is one of the key points about the Flight Sim charts I mentioned, they are also uniform for all countries and with a very much smaller subscription price.
When they will include smaller cat A,B approaches and smaller airports they shall be hard to beat.
I mainly refer to Instrument Approach charts but I guess it will be also applicable for En Route.
Jean wrote:
Of course you can fly [cat C/D approaches] with a smaller aircraft, they are just longer.
Isn’t it about time we agreed that there exists no such thing as an “official” chart, whether VFR or IFR?
Which makes the title of this thread rather meaningless.
As for the subject (using charts that are not even conceived for actual flight) that is quite a different matter, on which I’ll not speak out.
Not that I would do so myself: up till now I have only used charts as close to official as possible, coming from official publishers like IGN, DFS, or the Belgian equivalent.
Jan_Olieslagers wrote:
Isn’t it about time we agreed that there exists no such thing as an “official” chart, whether VFR or IFR?
Jan I believe it is clear by now that “official” are only the charts published by states/countries that are contained in their AIP published by the CAA.
They are not user (cockpit) friendly and each NAA can choose slightly different formats to display EN ROUTE and APPROACH charts.
Other NAA’s do not even publish En Route IFR/VFR charts but only the AIRWAYS DATA in the AIP.
So then come the multiple vendors with the unofficial as I understand but mostly used and trusted charts !
The subject’s thread may be “Official vs Unofficial IFR charts” but what I am focusing on is the legality or not of the use of various type of charts.
As I understood its not about the publisher (certified.approved, etc.) but about the validity of the data that is printed within.
If its valid and and the data has not changed, your are legal.
In 2007 I had to do a short flight from Shoreham to Bournemouth in UK. The day before it was projected to be VFR (the forecast) and weather switched to IFR for the approach in Bournemouth the morning just before departure (because Bournemouth Glideslope was u/s that day and it would be a LOC DME approach with increased minima). I had not prepared myself for the IFR (flight and) approach. I opened up my laptop (no tablet back then), looked up the Jeppesen IFR (en route portion and) approach plate but I did not have any means to print it. I wanted it hard copy because this was my personal safety minimum on IFR approaches (having charts in paper in my kneepad).
So I sat for a couple of minutes, took a blank A4 parer and DESIGNED the chart myself with my pen in the paper with all the DATA as per the Jeppesen chart.
I closed the laptop, filed IFR, briefed myself on the approach before start up and off I went.
I always wondered back then if I was “legal” regarding the ad hoc chart I used.
Here’s a capture of me from a spotter on short final of that flight !
Legally, you just need to have the necessary and up-to-date information for your flight. If you let your 10-year-old nephew draw them on a napkin for you from AIP information or if you use a Jeppesen chart makes no difference. The difference should be in your possibility to take regress for false information. I don’t know if Jeppesen exclude or limit this liability, but if you take a flight simmer chart which has written in big letters “don’t use in the air”, it is clear you won’t be able to take regress.
The second point is of course that any aviation authority would try to get you under a catch-all “reckless operation” clause if you made a mistake and then showed them the napkin, or FS chart, solution. You would probably need to show how you validated the information before the flight. Whereas if a Jeppesen chart was wrong, they might accept that as an excuse.
But if your flight goes right and you do have all the data you need, I don’t think anyone could do anything about it.
Some news from NAVIGRAPH the AIRAC data and CHARTS provider for flightsimmers.
http://blog.navigraph.com/post/158703930126/jeppesen-charts-to-the-flight-simulation-community
I believe, but am not certain, that part of the PBN certification is to use plates from an approved source. Does anyone have access to that bit of legislation?
All RNAV approaches and procedures will form part of PBN, so if that is right, it would scupper unapproved suppliers. But this needs to be checked. @bookworm ?
Timothy wrote:
Timothy23-Mar-17 08:07 #17
I believe, but am not certain, that part of the PBN certification is to use plates from an approved source. Does anyone have access to that bit of legislation?All RNAV approaches and procedures will form part of PBN, so if that is right, it would scupper unapproved suppliers. But this needs to be checked. @bookworm ?
In FAA land for RNP, the database must be from a supplier who holds an LOA. And for Part 91 ops it must be current. I do not know of any regulations re a plate. It is all about the GPS/FMS database.
Plates there are essentially just part of the briefing process you must do before each flight. My understanding is that strictly speaking you do not even have to carry them if you are adequately briefed. Question how you could be adequately prepared for IFR flight in IMC without them but that is a seperate issue.
Incidentally, and this is a bit of a tangent, but relevant, I know of a (potentially dangerous) error on an AIP plate that has been corrected by Jepp.
Look at the RNAV approach to runway 11 at EBAW Antwerp. It is a 3.5° slope, but the AIP published RODs commensurate with a 3° slope. This would put someone above the slope all the way down and not going around until too late, potentially popping out and seeing the runway too close. While this is mitigated by them getting the check altitudes right, pilots cannot be relied on to use all the information on the plate.
The numbers are correct on the Jepp plate, presumably demonstrating the value of their own QA department and that they don’t blindly copy what the AIP says.
I wonder if the same is true of other sources?
JasonC wrote:
In FAA land for RNP, the database must be from a supplier who holds an LOA. And for Part 91 ops it must be current.
If you are using RNP in the general sense to include RNAV (GPS) approaches (RNP APR), then it depends on the GPS AFMS wording. Some are worded to permit use of an expired database as long as the data is retrieved from the database and the data that is retrieved is verified to be current. Later AFMS have similar wording but only with respect to AIRAC rollover procedures.
