Navigraph Charts Tutorial

[Karola]

Iearned my instrument rating when VORs were the latest and greatest method of air navigation. Now, that I'm trying to get back into flying through the safety and economy of X-Plane I'm lost in the complexity of GS530, Navigraph Charts and Navigraph Simlink.

I've tried watching YouTube videos but the ones I've found they to start at step 2 or 3 and step 1 doesn't exist. In other words, these videos seem to assume some basic knowledge that I don't have. So I'm hoping someone can help me get on track. So some questions:

Thanks, Herbert, for your help. Thanks especially for your offer to answer further questions. Maybe later today some more questions will come up. But first I'm going to try to absorb what you've already given me.

Another vote for Little Navmap! it is super rich of features, can be sync in real time with X-Plane and it allow you to export the flight plans to be imported in the aircraft navigation instruments. It is really good! Amazing free software.

For me the most confusing part of learning planning was getting the STAR and approach to line up as smoothly as possible. Navigraph charts has a visualization feature that makes it quite easy to see this, I use it while using simbrief.

Finally, although tedious, sometimes I manually input the waypoints and approach if it's not a long flight to help learn the functions of the GNS units. Simbrief downloader can download a .pdf of your plan so you can work off that or you can use it on a tablet/iPad as a kind of electronic kneeboard.

Thanks for all your valuable information. I think I'm beginning to understand. Navigraph and SimLink are integrated, right? So do I really need a Navigraph subscription since SimLing is free? I think you're saying that planning a flight is easier and more complete in SimBrief, right? Is SimBrief part of SimLink?

Hi, Herwald. Right now I'm flying the Beech Baron. Many years ago I owned a Cessna 170, so I enjoy fling the XP 172. Eventually, I'lll upgrade to airliners once I'm more familiar with XP, Navigraph, etc. I did download the EMB195 and my son played around with it some (he has a type rating for the EMB175 & EMB195), but he was a little disappointed in the sims FMC and a few other things.

Simlink is free, but unusefull without Navigraph, so you only need it if you have a subscription.

SimBrief should still be free, I cannot confirm because I have a subscription to Navigraph

However, you should be able to create and export the flight to the simulator without issues. At least before Navigraph acquired SimBrief, it was possible

@DsandburgSimbrief is like the Corporate dispatch/flight planning office. it's free although needs a navigraph login since its part of the navigraph family now. It's most useful for larger planes and IFR flying especially with a FMS or GPS.

If you want up to date charts and navdata- either for ease of planning and flying or online flying- yes you need the subscription. As mentioned, all symlink does is allow the sim to transmit its location so the navigraph charts moving map is usable. It has no other function.

I find Skyvector ( a great free IRL reference site) works well for VOR and VFR planning since it uses real world US sectionals. Its coverage outside the US is less detailed. It too has a simple flight planning function.

Thanks everyone for your very useful information. I think I'm making some progress. I'm now able to create a flight plan, export it to the correct file in XP and actually fly the route. I do have a subscription to Navigraph but I downloaded the Navigraph applications to my Mac. I didn't down load to the cloud, so I guess I'm unable to use Moving Maps. I don't have a tablet, but I assume I could use my laptop, right? Would I have to re-download the apps to the cloud, or can I move them manually somehow?

My next question is, how can I activate ATC? When I hit the enter button on my keyboard the message I get from ATC is totally irrelevant to my flight. So, I'm assuming I need to file my flight plan with ATC, right? How do I do that?

1. Can you switch between meters/feet on the charts or is it provider restricted (in this case LIDO)?

2. The demo does not allow for type and search. Can you search for airports using their ICAO/IATA designators?

Its quite bland with not many options available other than creating clips (set of charts). Once you have a few charts open, your only option is to either keep them all open or close them all in one swoop. I found no option to get rid of specific charts from the clip.

The app only requests login credentials and then provides no information on the UI or the options and it's computed result making it slightly unfriendly to new users of LIDO such as myself (unless you have the announcement page open in a browser to read about some of it). Jeppesen, on the other hand, does a great job of teaching the user all the bits and pieces of information as well as tutoring on small time saving tactics when browsing several charts.

Apparently Navigraph has some form of tutorial videos for handpicked procedures which is a great way to familiarize yourself with an area but the 'teaser' videos (supported in the Demo version according to the email I received) did not work so I never got a chance to see how comfortable I was with that feature either.

Again comparing to the demo of JeppesenTC/FD, the charts are named differently. I'm not sure what some of them stand for as there is no legend provided although sectioning charts into their respective groups helps a little in understanding what the chart would provide before downloading it.

I tried to access the Navigraph forums and while it let me log in, it didn't let me view the iPad app support section - let alone post anything in there unless I had a subscription to one of their products. On clicking the 'Support' tab through their website, I was pointed to the forums for any questions but no email address I could have direct communication with. Again, nothing major as I believe other developers have similar policies for their dedicated forums but it restricts the amount of knowledge I can gain as a user before I am convinced to purchase it.

What are your thoughts on it? I'm keen on looking into it further as I like the aesthetics of LIDO charts but so far I haven't really been impressed by their mobile app and lack of user privileges on their forum.

Though the Jeppesen apps themselves are free, they require a charts subscription to be of any use, which costs hundreds of dollars per year (for just US charts) to several thousand dollars per year for worldwide coverage. I would not expect the Navigraph app (which is intended solely for hobbyist use) to be comparable to the Jeppesen apps which are certified for use in real-world aircraft.

First impressions...I really like it. Just added a random selection of Airport map, SID, STAR and approach using the tabs and added them to a clip. The UI is minimal but that's how it should be. It's far better than the old web based way that's for sure!

What's wrong with the charts cloud? I really got used to it. Charts are always up to date, with a good internet connection, loading times are fast. Where, do you guys think, is the advantage of the app? I haven't had a look at it yet, maybe I'll do. But saving the charts locally on iPad, doesn't attract me too much...

Not to say they won't do one eventually, but as I understand it iOS are always likely to get apps first in any field: it's a stable platform with a very small range of versions and hardware configurations, which makes it easier for developers to work with compared to Android which comes in a hundred and one different flavours and on a virtually limitless number of devices, all with their own quirks and features.

I'm not familiar with Simplates, but from looking at the website it looks as though Simplates just pulls together all the free chart resources from around the world and gives you a GUI to access them. It's also not clear whether Simplates is a "live" service offering updated charts or whether they are just a "snapshot" that could be months or years out of date.

To that extent, the main advantage I would say I get from Navigraph over the free chartage that is available elsewhere (other peoples' priorities may differ) is the fact that you get a consistent chart presentation for every airfield you visit: I don't have to worry about US charts being notated with runway lengths in feet, or charts from other countries with information written in about three different languages, or trying to find where on this particular chart the ILS frequency, or the MSA is written: it's always in the same place. Also, of course, you're getting the convenience of a one-stop-shop for all your charts. En-route charts are also available, which I find very handy as well.

The charts are also de-cluttered and optimised for airline flying - they are the same layout used by LIDO's real airline customers (Lufthansa, BA and numerous others), which makes them clearer to read than many of the state-created charts which have to cater for everybody -- not just pilots, but procedure designers and airport planners as well. To this extent, the UK and European charts certainly (and others, I'm sure) contain a lot of "raw" data which is either irrelevant to pilots or requires processing before it can be used in the flight deck (for instance, you'll not find a DA/H on UK AIP published instrument approach charts: only OCA/H which is the obstacle clearance altitude/height used by procedure designers to calculate the DA/H).

On the other hand -- as the LIDO charts are designed for airline pilots, they don't contain Cat A or B procedures or minima that would be relevant to GA pilots flying light aircraft: so if you do a lot of this sort of flying you may not get full use out of them. The subscription is also fairly expensive: I far preferred the old system that enabled you to purchase the charts for individual airports for a small fee. Having said that, it's a heck of a lot cheaper than a subscription to the real LIDO/eRouteManual system, which would run in to the thousands.

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