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Autorouter updates (merged)

EuroGA is pleased to introduce the AUTOROUTER – developed by Achimha and Tomjnx.

The user interface is self explanatory. Several predefined aircraft types are provided and you can define new types for which you will have to provide aircraft data and performance data from your POH.

The router does need a good detailed aircraft performance model and without that it won’t work. It is thus recommended that you use one of the predefined types initially. Just pick one whose max altitude capability matches or exceeds the level you want to route for.

Any questions or issues – please post them in this thread.

Last Edited by Peter at 26 Mar 08:22
Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Good Morning!

Excellent initiative and great user interface (haven’t tried it on the iPad yet). But my initial attempts to create a route were unsuccessful. The autorouter always quits with the error message “SID not found”, even if I select one from the list belonging to the departure airport.

(How glad I am that I don’t develop software any longer, it’s much more fun reporting bugs than fixing them )

Max

Last Edited by what_next at 26 Mar 07:53
EDDS - Stuttgart

Max,

one of the main difficulties for the user is that we absolutely need to understand the aircraft’s performance model. This tells us how it climbs, cruises and how much fuel it burns. This is a bit of tedious work using the POH but without that data, we cannot come up with a really good route.

I suggest you start with an aircraft from our (small) template library. For your Citation, you’re missing climb and cruise data. Over time we should get a better library of aircraft and people will have to come up with their own less often. So far the focus has been on piston airplanes and turboprops. For jets, the user interface will need a bit of improvement.

Last Edited by achimha at 26 Mar 07:57

one of the main difficulties for the user is that we absolutely need to understand the aircraft’s performance model.

OK. But what do you need that performance data for? I understand this is a routing and not a flight planning software.

In our company we use PPS for flight planning (like probably 95 percent of commercial operators in Europe). It will let you do the routing independently from from the flight planning.

For your Citation, you’re missing climb and cruise data.

I wanted to enter some, but I coudn’t get beyond the BPH entry fileld…

Edit: I now could enter some climb and cruise data and it generated a route from EDDS to EDDC with four level changes.

Second edit: Ok,I admit this one is difficult (LFBL → EDDS, we flew it yesterday and it took our dispatcher half an hour to find a valid routing and two phone calls to Brussels), but there is a valid routing that is only half as long as the one generated here:

Last Edited by what_next at 26 Mar 08:56
EDDS - Stuttgart

You can configure min, max etc. so you can constrain it vertically if you want to.

For light GA usage, below FL200, it is normally fine to have a route with level changes, but disregard them on the day. ATC does not usually operate the airway restrictions which their country publishes This is subject to certain “obvious” things e.g. it’s no good having the route developed for FL100-190 but expect to fly all of it at FL100 on the day, because there might be active military airspace or simply no available airway at FL100 somewhere. So if you want to fly no-oxygen you do have to constrain it appropriately vertically.

In the upper airway system (FL200 plus) one normally can develop and fly the whole route at one level, but below that you tend to get very sub-optimal routings, which is why facilities which do the whole route at a single level (e.g. Eurocontrol’s own “route suggest” feature) are of limited use.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

OK. But what do you need that performance data for? I understand this is a routing and not a flight planning software.

Both actually (see the GRAMET and PLOG feature). Also when looking for the best routes, it helps a lot when you know about the aircraft. For jets, it’s all very similar but in the smaller GA world it makes a huge difference if you’re a C172 or a SR22T. Is it better to climb to avoid a restriction or a detour? Which level gives better speed/range? A lot of things to take into consideration.

Second edit: Ok,I admit this one is difficult (LFBL ? EDDS, we flew it yesterday and it took our dispatcher half an hour to find a valid routing and two phone calls to Brussels), but there is a valid routing that is only half as long as the one generated here:

Do you know the valid LFBL-EDDS routing? Up to FL190, there is a nice one, above that it gets difficult. Keep in mind that we have done virtually no testing in the upper airspace and with jet aircraft. The focus has so far been put on the piston and turboprop aircraft. Still, the ultimate goal is to always find the best routing for any kind of aircraft.

As to level changes, we will have to better understand what they mean to jet operators and how strongly we should penalize them in our algorithm. Also for a piston aircraft, it is much less important to fly at a given level than for a jet/turboprop. There might be better ways for us to implement this type specific preference.

Last Edited by achimha at 26 Mar 09:07

Thank you for that great tool.
I tested 2 flightplans EDFZ-EDXW (Mainz-Westerland) and Mainz to Colmar. Both routings make sense with not much overhead. EDFZ-EDXW was with initial climb to FL100 then descent again to FL060 (because of a TRA = Temporary Reserved Airspace). So I corrected the first climb to only FL60 and that was of course accepted.
Great tool because I excluded the autorouting feature in my Rocket Route subscription this year – not too many IFR flights to justify the extra cost.

EDxx, Germany

If you are building an aircraft model, make sure the data makes sense. Mathematically speaking, the performance has to be monotonic. For example if you put in something physically unrealistic like a rate of climb of 1000fpm at 10000ft, 900fpm at 11000ft, and 1100fpm at 12000ft, it isn’t going to work

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Do you know the valid LFBL-EDDS routing?

This one was filed and accepted (still a big detour and luckily we got some directs during flight):

BALAN R66 ADABI UN858 TABOV/N0433F310 UN491 LASAT/N0378F210 UN491 ZUE/N0372F200 T125 REUTL

As to level changes, we will have to better understand what they mean to jet operators and how strongly we should penalize them in our algorithm.

Usually, level changes are required by the heavier/bigger/long range jets as they can’t climb to their optimum cruising level without burning some fuel first. The big advantage of (most) bizjets and also turboprop singles and twins is that they can climb straight to their final level. Once there, it’s best not to touch any lever until descending as close as possible from the destination. With the exception of some long range ones that want to climb another couple of thousand feet halfway through their journey.

EDDS - Stuttgart

Looks like it has developed nicely. It is still troubled by EGTK-EDMS at FL270

EGTK Oxford
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