I assume:
- mostly IFR flight, only VFR landing
- destination has a Unicom or Multicom frequency (no Tower)
- VCP mode #2, I don't want to manually tune any frequency
- you know the procedure for departing from the big airport
At some point I'm close enough to the last waypoint or below center altitude, so ATC tells me to contact approach:
18/11/2016 10:31:02: 810 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Contact Approach on 132.5 '
18/11/2016 10:31:10: 020 - Transcript: '132.5 J-Bird 1608 Good day '
18/11/2016 10:31:19: 260 - Transcript: 'Approach J-Bird 1608 with you 3 thousand IFR '
18/11/2016 10:31:26: 530 - Transcript: 'Roger J-Bird 1608 QNH 995 '
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Vectoring starts when reaching the last waypoint:
18/11/2016 10:33:10: 990 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 maintain Heading 325 expect vectors for the runway 27 '
18/11/2016 10:33:19: 300 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:33:39: 760 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn right heading 060 '
18/11/2016 10:33:46: 950 - Transcript: 'right to 060 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:35:25: 630 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Reduce speed to 140 '
18/11/2016 10:35:31: 760 - Transcript: '140 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:37:19: 960 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn left heading 040 '
18/11/2016 10:37:27: 160 - Transcript: 'left to 040 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:40:46: 570 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn right heading 105 '
18/11/2016 10:40:52: 730 - Transcript: 'right to 105 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:43:47: 430 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn right heading 135 '
18/11/2016 10:43:53: 660 - Transcript: 'right to 135 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:47:34: 960 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn right heading 210 '
18/11/2016 10:47:41: 140 - Transcript: 'Roger right to 210 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:47:49: 570 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Reduce speed to 110 '
18/11/2016 10:47:56: 650 - Transcript: 'Reduce speed to 110 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:53:34: 230 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Reduce speed to 90 '
18/11/2016 10:53:41: 390 - Transcript: '90 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:55:00: 040 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Turn right heading 240 '
18/11/2016 10:55:06: 180 - Transcript: 'right to 240 J-Bird 1608 '
18/11/2016 10:55:15: 460 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Cleared to final for runway 27 Radar service terminated. Squawk 1200, change to advisory frequency approved on 132.5 '
18/11/2016 10:55:29: 780 - Transcript: 'until established on final for runway 27 J-Bird 1608 '
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I could manually tune to FSS, close the flight plan (hotkey 1), tune to Unicom and announce my intentions (hotkey 0) etc., but there is another way:
The Approach hotkey 8 (Report airport in sight) automatically tunes to FSS and closes the flight plan.
At this point I'm at an intercept course for final, but don't want to make a straight-in landing, so I guess I should have done this earlier. But there were clouds at 3000 feet, so vectoring was actually helpful to find the airport:
18/11/2016 10:56:25: 540 - ****** HotKey #8 detected!
18/11/2016 10:56:26: 700 - Transcript: 'Approach J-Bird 1608 has the airport '
18/11/2016 10:56:32: 840 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Good day '
18/11/2016 10:56:42: 040 - Transcript: 'Radio J-Bird 1608 Would you close my IFR flight plan at this time? '
18/11/2016 10:56:47: 290 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Roger. We'll close out your flight plan at 56 '
18/11/2016 10:56:55: 460 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Roger thank you. '
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FSS hotkey 7 (Request Airport Advisories) can be used to automatically tune to Unicom and ask for wind/QNH with a single keystroke:
18/11/2016 10:57:15: 430 - ****** HotKey #7 detected!
18/11/2016 10:57:16: 620 - Transcript: 'Radio J-Bird 1608 Request field advisory '
18/11/2016 10:57:22: 860 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Contact Unicom for advisory on 118.65 '
18/11/2016 10:57:31: 010 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Roger thank you. '
18/11/2016 10:57:40: 210 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 9 Miles east at 3 thousand Request field advisory '
18/11/2016 10:57:53: 930 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Winds 220 at 23 QNH 994 '
18/11/2016 10:58:04: 200 - Transcript: 'J-Bird 1608 Roger thank you. '
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At this point you are tuned to Unicom and can announce your intentions using hotkeys (VCP mode 2 does not assist you here):
18/11/2016 10:58:21: 860 - ****** HotKey #0 detected!
18/11/2016 10:58:23: 210 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 8 Miles east at 3 thousand '
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Before entering downwind, press hotkey 2, take your time to check for traffic (PF3 will do this, too) and be ready to agree or disagree with PF3 about the chosen runway. If there is no other traffic, PF3 will always use wind (as you should, too), not your position/direction, to determine the landing runway. But since you were still looking for traffic when pressing hotkey 2, you can easily turn where your own announcement tells you to. I haven't tried if Ctrl-Shift-W works here to select another runway.
18/11/2016 11:06:38: 910 - ****** HotKey #2 detected!
18/11/2016 11:06:40: 230 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 2 miles from Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar at 1 thousand entering downwind for runway 27 '
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After hotkey 2 above, it is just 3/4/5 before turning base, before turning final and after leaving the runway:
18/11/2016 11:08:30: 970 - ****** HotKey #3 detected!
18/11/2016 11:08:32: 100 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 turning base for landing runway 27 '
18/11/2016 11:09:25: 630 - ****** HotKey #4 detected!
18/11/2016 11:09:26: 760 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 turning final landing runway 27 '
18/11/2016 11:13:06: 190 - ****** HotKey #5 detected!
18/11/2016 11:13:07: 350 - Transcript: 'Echo Delta Whiskey Oscar (Local) Traffic J-Bird 1608 Clear of the active runway '
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You can do many variations of this, especially when tuning to FSS or Unicom by yourself.
For example, when tuned to FSS, you could switch from IFR to VFR (hotkey 6) even before the airport is in sight, and even before you have reached your last waypoint.