chrisparker wrote:
IFR waypoints
You talking about airways, intersections and VORs?
You may want to try using a flight planning tool like Foreflight, Skyvector or iFlightPlanner and create a few flight plans – you can create arbitrary waypoints and name them using rubber-banding that makes a quick job of an RNAV route. Load them into your 750 and get your own named waypoints you create for VFR use that are off the trafficked areas, especially if you are using GPS.
I plan my VFR flights using IFR waypoints because they’re in my GTN750. I’ve got only three user waypoints saved, all in the local area for departures and recoveries to Fairoaks.
I went from what person A is doing. Then installed a Dynon autopilot (with a D10A) in my Europa in order to do what person B is doing. At this time, I was thoroughly programming my GPS with waypoints.
Nowadays, with the help of Skydemon, I just write down frequencies, identify some critical points (typically 2-3 for a trip of 400nm) or border crossing points (typically IFR waypoints, easier to explain to controllers in CAS where you are flying to) and then let’s fly! When on autopilot, I now only use HDG mode and make adjustments when too much deviating from the track on skydemon. Next step is upgrade to Dynon Skyview and do what Carl suggests with “elastic band”. Also synchonise Skydemon and Dynon Skyview via WIFI.
That is well assuming that weather is fine and so no stress situation is expected.
From a communication standpoint I think it is a lot easier to talk to ATC and (to keep it to Belgium) say you are inbound Nicky (NIK) than that you are flying north of whatever town. The ATC guys are used to these waypoints, so why not use them. Even if I fly IFR and am e.g. inbound NIK I can hear other aircraft being directed inbound NIK at the same time, but just at different altitude. I have never seen them though as the big sky is really big.
It’s a ‘big sky’ and midairs away from busy airports are not the problem. Enroute nav on airways are more dangerous than RNAV using GPS and staying off the airways.
A friend of mine told me about an occasion years ago when he was flying a Falcon 50 across the Atlantic at night.
They were flying a GPS track on autopilot. They were in contact with someone going the opposite direction on the same track.
It was a clear night and the could see if nav lights for many minutes before they cross over.
At the moment that the other aircraft pass under them, all on autopilot, the radar altimeter suddenly called out “one thousand”!
Middle of the Atlantic yet crosses directly over one another because of GPS accuracy.
Personally I use GPS waypoints all the time, but I tend to not follow “common routes” such as VOR to VOR.
What I was getting at is that one may plan a flight using waypoints (navaids, airway intersections, whatever you can dig out of the GPS database and chuck in) and these will be on your plog, which will form a rough guide to the flight, so you have a good idea of where you will be flying before you get off the ground (always a good idea 
).
Then, enroute, if you have a means of getting really good CAS/etc awareness, you can fly around as you wish, take shortcuts, whatever…
Apart from trivia like Shoreham to Lydd I would not recommend getting airborne without some sort of basic route plan which is definitely flyable and a look at the MSA along the route.
A large part of the enjoyment of flying is to remove the “WTF are we supposed to do” moments, and having a route loaded in the GPS is a big part of this.
The fact that a “cheap” IFR GPS like a 430/650 has a map screen way too small to be used solely for off-route flying is a separate issue.
Also consider that the pilot who got done 5000 quid for busting the Eastbourne air show a few years ago, from Belgium IIRC, had the good route planned, but diverted from it to do some sightseeing…
carlmeek wrote:
How do other people approach this?
Except in the CTR of an airfield, I don’t think I have ever used a “waypoint”. Lakes, mountains, roads, vallies, islands etc is what I use, also in easy VFR. Interestingly the ippc fpl site has just now started using some autorouting (using waypoints), but only for IFR, so I won’t be using that.
The biggest thing is that traffic depends very much on altitude. If you fly at say 1500ft, especially in the UK, you will be having near misses all the time, on a nice day, and 10x more on a weekend.
What I do in reality is that I might plan a route via navaids etc but then when I fly it I do shortcuts which are done on headings which just miss the CAS. So most corners get cut. With an autopilot there isn’t much to do except keep an eye on stuff and take photos, so this is not an issue.
Or – another example – there might be a lot of low level cloud around. Say I am going Shoreham-Coventry, 2400ft. If that puts me in the cloud, it’s not going to be a nice flight. But say the tops are 4500ft. One can do that trip VMC on top, but one has to go further “out” away from the LTMA CAS “upside down cake”. So I might fly it at 5400ft, managing the track on the fly, using the GPS moving map. An IFR GPS like a GNS/GTN has far too poor quality mapping for this, and I then use the CAA 1:500k map running as a moving map on a tablet. Then I would fly the whole flight in HDG mode, and turning the heading bug as required.
The GNS430W has a feature called “parallel track” that let’s you fly left or right of the direct course between waypoints.
