OnCourse Software

anubhav100 wrote:

Yes - tried with a waypoint closer to the airport and same problem. No clearance from ATC for the STAR - I never get the " blah blah..I'll have traffic for you" message.

Ok, then one of the official support guys are going to have to help you.

Give the following a try; it has been working fairly well for me. Include more of the STAR in your flight plan. Try including in your flight plan more of the fixes between your transition and the MOD VOR, up to and including MOD. Make sure "STARs Active" is unchecked, as Peter suggested. On the flight plan page, start the STAR at OAL (as you have been doing). What SHOULD happen is when you cross OAL you should get clearance for the STAR, and when you reach the last waypoint in your flight plan (MOD) you should get vectors for the active runway (whichever runway PFE determines is active, based on AI or wind).

Also, when you load a flight plan into PFE and you have previously made (and saved) changes to the flight plan page, a message should pop up, something like "A SID/STAR and/or Waypoint Altitude Adjustment file has been found for this ADV Flight File. Do you want to use these same adjustments for this flight?" This should appear if you are loading a flight plan with a designated "Start of STAR" or "End of SID" waypoint. (Select "Yes" when this appears.) This will help confirm that PFE is actually loading your plan with the saved "Start of STAR" waypoint.

Good luck; hope you are able to get it to work.

One thought.....are you requesting a change of flight level at all during the flight? I have found that doing so can mean that you wont get descent instructions.

I am not requesting any change in altitude - understand that screws up PFE's calculations quite a bit.

Appreciate all your help guys - I will give dan77's solution a try tonight and will report back. Thanks again for your help.

Just tried Dan77's solution and no luck whatsoever. Ended up getting vectors close to the airport but never got cleared for the STAR at BSR. This is with the "STAR's Active" option unchecked by a start of star defined. Tried the same thing this with the start of STAR set as ZONAL, which is the waypoint before BSR. Same problem - ATC refuses to acknowledge my start of STAR.

Then tried the same flight (with the entire STAR in the flight plan) and this time with the "STAR's Active" option Checked - and again no call from ATC upon passing start of STAR. All I get is a call to change center. Actual star clearance comes well into the STAR itself.

This is mystifying.

It sounds like for some reason your start-of-STAR waypoint label isn't getting saved or used.

Start PFE and load the ADV you flew. You should get the "A SID/STAR and/or Waypoint Altitude Adjustment file has been found for this ADV Flight File" message. (Select "Yes" when this appears.) Then, if you click on the "Adjust Waypoint Altitudes, SIDs and STARs" button on the PFE title screen (above the "Connect to FS" button), does your start-of-STAR waypoint have "ST" next to it?

Finally got it to work!...but have another problem.

Dan77, you're right - my changes on the "Adjust Waypoint Altitudes, SIDs and STARs" were not being saved. I looked at my logs and it said "NOT using Adjust Waypoint Altitudes, SID..". So I just opened that the adjust waypoint altitudes page again which already had my "DP" and "ST" marker set and hit save again. No changes -just opened it again and saved it and voila, my log now said ""Using Adjust Waypoint Altitudes, SID".

Tried the flight again and this time, right before the start of STAR waypoint got the STAR clearance and the "remain on this frequency, I'll have traffic for you".

HOWEVER - the problem I am now having is that the star clearance is for the "Sierra Tango" default STAR, even though I have a different STAR name put in for all the landing runways! I have tried this both with the "STARs active" checked and unchecked, but the STAR clearance is always for the "Sierra Tango" star. Why would ATC say "Sierra Tango" when I have a different STAR name for the arrival runways (all of them!) on the SID/STARs page (and saved!). The correct SID name is being called out but not the STAR. I understand ATC calls out the SID/STAR name phonetically, but I am not even getting that.

Could it be possible that PFE ATC doesn't decide on runway until close to the airport so the start of STAR will always be Sierra Tango (and therefore not picking up my STAR name as a runway hasn't been selected by ATC yet)?

Glad you’ve got it working. After I make changes on the “Adjust Waypoint Altitudes, SIDs and STARs” page, I save it and then exit PFE. Then I restart PFE and load the amended ADV file. So far I haven’t had any problems, but use whatever method works for you.

I think you are correct about the STAR name issue. If you designate a start-of-STAR waypoint, the default Sierra Tango name is used because PFE doesn’t know at that point which runway will be active. (For example, if you are flying the Modesto arrival with the OAL transition, you are getting your STAR clearance over 200 nm from the field.)