Navigation in days before GPS

strykerpsg

strykerpsg

SOH-CM-2023
So, definitely loving P3D (even if I must reinstall to fix my scenery), thanks all for the tips. I also have a strong attraction to the older aircraft of recent releases, such as the Helldiver, B-50, Thunderbolt, DC3/4/6, etc. I know that they can knowingly be equipped with GPS type devices, but I would like to know how one might navigate without GPS installed?

Is VFR the only way or are there abilities to access maps and plot routes manually?

Thanks in advance and hate sounding like a noob, but always navigated with GPS type equipped aircraft.
 
Well, as an old Comm/Nav troop I have a few suggestions for old school getting around without the gee whiz newfangled stuff. There's ADF, VOR/ILS, TACAN, INS, Radar Mapping and LORAN (not usually found on flight sim aircraft). This is the way we got from point A to point B back in the old days. Of course we also wet our finger and stuck it up to see which way the wind was blowing. Most flight sim aircraft at least have ADF & VOR/ILS. Go to the FAA website and you can download a free copy of the Instrument Flying Handbook. Happy flying!
The OMS
 
oldmsgt said:
Well, as an old Comm/Nav troop I have a few suggestions for old school getting around without the gee whiz newfangled stuff. There's ADF, VOR/ILS, TACAN, INS, Radar Mapping and LORAN (not usually found on flight sim aircraft). This is the way we got from point A to point B back in the old days. Of course we also wet our finger and stuck it up to see which way the wind was blowing. Most flight sim aircraft at least have ADF & VOR/ILS. Go to the FAA website and you can download a free copy of the Instrument Flying Handbook. Happy flying!
The OMS
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Thanks OMS. I realize these assets accompany everything from the 30's on..I just could not remember exactly how FSX/P3D deal with this aspect. Ultimately, I have been away from the fold a while, and even when I was flying, it was almost always with a late 20th century bird.

I will indeed look up the IFR handbook, thanks for the tip. Hope it's almost dummy proof for an weathered flyer.

Have a great night.

Matt
 
For FS nav, Rimshot's link is a good start for "dead reckoning". I was using FS2k2/FS9 in the early flight schools days and surprised it was pretty close with a VFR sectional at the time, at least major features. Of course, not much to look at in LA (lower Alabama). The 90kt "finger" doesn't work on a 1:50k chart as well without photoreal scenery. It can be a fun challenge to work out your time/distance/heading to arrive at an landmark/LZ +/- 30 seconds without the use of GPS aids.
 
That's a good question. I'm also a steam gauge fanatic and don't use GPS at all. Classic navigation - dead reckoning - works very well, and I'm glad I learned that in real life flying. For my flight planning I use the maps from

https://skyvector.com/

I usually print out the maps on large sheets on routes I fly often. I also have several E6B type flight calculators here that I use often. These things are also available for android smartphones or tablets, but I use the "hardware".

A good read is also the Army Air Corps field manual for air navigation, if you want to get into that. I put it on my Google drive for those who are interested:


https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwOfYMzWLc1vQVl1NTFZMFlJbEk/view?usp=sharing

Or a bit more comprehensive the TM-205 Air Navigation

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwOfYMzWLc1vT05ReDNpY2k4bE0/view?usp=sharing

Amazing that you really can train in the sim what is written in these old manuals.

Also, who needs GPs when you can use NDB and VOR navigation. Expecially NDBs have been around for a long time, and are a special challenge when you need to shoot approaches or triangulate your position using several stations :)

Cheers,
Mark
 
Victory103 said:
For FS nav, Rimshot's link is a good start for "dead reckoning". I was using FS2k2/FS9 in the early flight schools days and surprised it was pretty close with a VFR sectional at the time, at least major features. Of course, not much to look at in LA (lower Alabama). The 90kt "finger" doesn't work on a 1:50k chart as well without photoreal scenery. It can be a fun challenge to work out your time/distance/heading to arrive at an landmark/LZ +/- 30 seconds without the use of GPS aids.
Click to expand...

roger-wilco-66 said:
That's a good question. I'm also a steam gauge fanatic and don't use GPS at all. Classic navigation - dead reckoning - works very well, and I'm glad I learned that in real life flying. For my flight planning I use the maps from

https://skyvector.com/

I usually print out the maps on large sheets on routes I fly often. I also have several E6B type flight calculators here that I use often. These things are also available for android smartphones or tablets, but I use the "hardware".

A good read is also the Army Air Corps field manual for air navigation, if you want to get into that. I put it on my Google drive for those who are interested:


https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwOfYMzWLc1vQVl1NTFZMFlJbEk/view?usp=sharing

Or a bit more comprehensive the TM-205 Air Navigation

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwOfYMzWLc1vT05ReDNpY2k4bE0/view?usp=sharing

Amazing that you really can train in the sim what is written in these old manuals.

Also, who needs GPs when you can use NDB and VOR navigation. Expecially NDBs have been around for a long time, and are a special challenge when you need to shoot approaches or triangulate your position using several stations :)

Cheers,
Mark
Click to expand...

LOL, excellent feedback gents! I most definitely have some work cut out for me. While I like the idea of the map print out, I might also try and additional monitor just for the maps and maybe associated NAV/Radios.

On a side note, I am curious what all of this will look like, and how it can operate, in Occulus Rift VR. My headset is inbound next month and certainly want to be as immersed as possible.
 
Most of my real world flying came before the advent of the GPS. Today, in the sim I still often use a sectional and look out the window. I then cross check my position with a cut from two TACAN/VOR or ADF stations. Although, I really like the Flight 1 GTN 750. It can spoil a fellow, like me.
 
Just for getting from one airport to another, in the days before GPS (and not the real old, old days), civilian pilots used sectional, low altitude airways and high altitude airways charts. (Military used similar charts, but the military version.) The "navaids" embodied onto / supporting the charts were VOR / DME (primarily civilian), TACAN (primarily military), ADF and beacons of various types. Usually a fix was at a specified radial off of a specified VOR at a specified DME. Airways were usually a line between two (2) VORs (a sepcified radial out and a specified radial in). I could go on, but I think you get the idea. As you go farther back in time, you get into LORAN and ADF. Farther back you have only beacons and a navigator with a chart (and a few other devices) to get you from one beacon to another.

I don't remember many commercial aircraft having INS, but many military aircraft did. Not too many commercial aircraft use radar for navigation, but in the military radar navigation is usually used from the IP (Initial Point) to the target. With radar navigation you usually have someone with a chart, a stop watch and a means to calculate the wind for heading corrections between turn points. I've been there and many times the radar turn point is hard to discern and you tell the pilot "Turn on time, take heading XYZ." That is code for, "The leg time is up and I have no friggin' clue based on radar images where we are but we gotta go somewhere!" That will usually keep you somewhere close to course.

The cool thing with small planes now is that there is GPS with EFIS (electronic flight information system). A full featured EFIS can be better than the old INS that was in the military aircraft I flew, and it is significantly cheaper, more capable, much smaller and easier to use. It will have an Altitude Heading Reference System that contains both micro-gyros and a magnetometer for magnetic heading. Combined with your pitot / static system, these systems are today's INS. And when I say cheaper, for experimental aircraft these systems can be acquired for about $5,000. The older INS's were in excess of $1,000,000!

For me, I'll take GPS so I can spend more time enjoying the flight and looking out the window when possible! The good old days were great, but for pure sight seeing you can't beat today.
 
Even older technology (actually the first real "technology") was the low-frequency radio range system. A simulation of this is included in the Milviz Cessna T-50 Bobcat (Sky King anyone?)

The low-frequency radio range (LFR), also known as the four-course radio range, LF/MF four-course radio range, A-N radio range, Adcock radio range, or commonly "the range", was the main navigation system used by aircraft for instrument flying in the 1930s and 1940s, until the advent of the VHF omnidirectional range (VOR), beginning in the late 1940s. It was used for en route navigation as well as instrument approaches and holds.[SUP][1][/SUP][SUP][2][/SUP][SUP][3][/SUP]
Based on a network of radio towers which transmitted directional radio signals, the LFR defined specific airways in the sky. Pilots navigated the LFR by listening to a stream of automated "A" and "N" Morse codes. For example, they would turn the aircraft to the right when hearing an "N" stream ("dah-dit, dah-dit, ..."), to the left when hearing an "A" stream ("di-dah, di-dah, ..."), and fly straight ahead while hearing a steady tone.
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Can you imagine having fly for hours listening to that continuous stream of CW characters? When actually "on-course" the two characters sort of blended into a continuous tone, but hearing that was considered a "Bad Thing". The reason being that they were required to fly parallel to, but not directly on the beam! They were to stay to the right of the beam to avoid any aircraft flying the reciprocal course...

For full details of this primitive system, read the Wikipedia article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-frequency_radio_range

Oh yes, I just noticed this short video that features a flight around a LF Radio Range in an actual aircraft complete with graphic illustration as well as audio illustration:
 
The site for DC-3 Airlines has a really nice A-N radio range gauge It's a stand-alone gauge. Doesn't have to be installed in a DC-3, although that's what it was originally intended for. It can be added to any panel, in any plane. It includes a really nice, well done DC-3 aircraft, and adds radio stations into the entire lower 48, Canada, Alaska, Hawaii, Burma, etc etc.
It can be found here: http://www.dc3airways.com/our_fleet/radio_range/radio_range.htm
Very well done, super high quality. They also have a Navigation Tutorial on how-to use the gauge to navigate.

I really recommend it. :encouragement:

Have fun, however you do it. Me, I was always a fan of IFR navigation. I Follow Roads :biggrin-new:
Pat☺

PS: The DCA site has a lot of great gauges, tutorials, info on the DC-3, etc. They also have a version of the Sextant mentioned above. Really nice. Usable in any plane. A quality E6B as well. XML, can be used in any plane's panel. Awesomely done stuff on that site. Take a look around :D
Pat☺
 
Wow! Just outstanding replies all the way around! Thanks so much for all the tidbits and suggestions. I really have some work cut out for me.
 
My first years of aviation were flying a cub around the Arctic with nothing but a map and a compass that pointed East.. Eventually flying airways via typical VOR and occasional ADF, even up into flying Herk's and 737's. A big development was the "Ring Laser Gyros" (not a gyro...) which permitted some degree of off airways nav. The first time I flew the Atlantic was in a Herk with Loran and a real Navigator with sextant! The next advance for me was the 747-100-200-300 with inertial nav which was usually capable of finding Japan... As a backup yes radar was a good crosscheck. Would have saved Korea 007! Anchorage to Korea? Water on the left land on the right... The integrated 747-400 and later Inter continental had very accurate and sophisticated inertial systems backed up and updated with both ground based and satellite (GPS). Even useful for precision approach!

We had a Europe to Australia felt sim race a number of years ago using no GPS, was quite fun!!

T
 
fliger747 said:
[...]

Anchorage to Korea? Water on the left land on the right...

[...]

T
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ROFL !!!
Great post, Tom!

I remember when flying in south western Bavaria I always took the Danube, the autobahn and a nuclear power plant (Grundremmingen) as my visual main navigation points. The latter always had a steam condensation plume over the huge cooling towers which were visible for many miles.
And the compass and clcok, of course. Never used ADF / VOR on these flights. After a while I knew from ground features (a speck of forest, a villlage, crossing the autobahn) when to turn to avoid a restricted area or airport boundary or change the heading for whatever reason.
I really loved that challenge.



Cheers,
Mark
 
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