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Looking for good online flight planner

LettersFromFlyoverCountry

LettersFromFlyoverCountry

Well Known Member
I was a big user of the AOPA flight planner 1.5 . But last week, without notice, they ditched it in favor of a new one. Unfortunately, the new one doesn't work. It wiped out everybody's stored routes, pilot profiles, and aircraft profiles, and it doesn't let you do anything on the new site until you update them. The problem is, even if you enter your correct DUATS access code and password, it will report that you didn't, and block you from going any further.

I've been planning a flight from MSP to PHX for the last month and I want to leave on Tuesday and now I need to find a new service.

Please note: I don't have an iPad, so that option is out of the question for now.

I'm looking for a site that allows mousing over a route and dragging it to new points.

I'm aware of the usual great flight planning sites in terms of weather -- Weathermeister etc. -- and those are great. But they're not route-planning products per se.

EAA at one point had one but dropped it, now AOPA is just messed up. They acknowledge it's a mess and vow to fix it, but I'm kind of in a hurry here.

Any suggestions?
 
Can't help with other programs, as I use an iPad, but my account is now working as before. I tried using it about 2 weeks ago and it was a mess - as you mentioned. Another error I found, is that when exporting into .gpx format to load into my EFIS, it exported the file, but when attempting to load into the EFIS, my EFIS found no aviation data.

I just looked at my account and it appears to be working 'semi' normally. Some of my old plans are there (not all if memory serves) and when I exported the .gpx file, the file was 127 bytes vs. 1 byte previously, so I imagine it will load properly into my EFIS.

A few ongoing issues that I see are once a plan is created, I cannot alter the cruise altitude planned or the airplane (the plane is not a big deal now that I own, but was used when renting). Also when submitting the plan you cannot alter the information; only choice is to submit or print. To change these parameters, I would have to create a new plan. Maybe I'm missing someting..?
 
Weathermeister.com has everything I need and in a format, language and interface I enjoy and have come to rely upon. Has your plane profiles, weather, stored routes, maps, fuel costs via airnav feeds, flight plan filing, all kinds of great stuff. AND he is an RV'er. Only time I have to go elsewhere is for international flight planning and filing. I use fltplan.com for that.
 
I've been using fltplan.com. It doesn't do the mouse-drag-rubber-band thing -- don't I wish -- but it will store your routes, performance info, etc. It's free.
 
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fltplan.com

Fltplan.com is free and is what I use for corporate flying when we don't use a planning service like Arinc. Needless to say I use it for the RV-10 too.
Fltplan has aircraft models stored and you can share your performance numbers with other users. It has an option of saving the flight plans with airport diagrams and notams for the cockpit when phone service or wi-fi is not available on your Ipad. I use my personal computer most of the time to file an IFR or view a VFR plan then I save it and can easily look it up on the ipad when in the cockpit. This is nice when there are a lot of NOTAMS at the intended airports. The more you use fltplan.com the more you see all the services they provide. If you fly out of the country a lot you can pay them to file your eAPIS too. This is great if you fly the same passengers out of the country.
 
Showing off my "geezer" status - I still use the old Cirrus program (DUAT - was GTE or CSC or something). It can be downloaded from http://www.duats.com/classic/cirrus.shtml - scroll down the page. They also still support the airport / navaid database.

It's easy and allows for rubber-banding a route. You can also download the weather briefing (including images) and a flight plan log. It handles filing of flight plans.

Dan
 
Options

I like Weathermeister and use it. I bought an iPad 3 last year and have ForeFlight. This is a one stop flight planning tool.

When you can, pick one up. The Foreflight subscription is very cost effective.

I do recommend the smaller iPad as it is a little easier to deal with in the cockpit and it's size is still very functional.
 
Bob,

Take a look at the free version of Voyager from www.seattleavionics.com . Since they also wrote the program for AOPA, it may be similar functionally and an easy transition. I used the paid version for several years, but it is not iPad compatible, so I now use ForeFlight.

Jim Berry
RV-10
 
Try iflightplanner.com, I think Doug has a link to it on the front Page. If won't let you drag and drop the route, you have to type it in by hand or let it "auto route" for you. But other than that it does everything else you're looking for.
 
jtrusso said:
Try iflightplanner.com, I think Doug has a link to it on the front Page. If won't let you drag and drop the route, you have to type it in by hand or let it "auto route" for you. But other than that it does everything else you're looking for.
Click to expand...

I use iflightplanner.com as well and does everything I need, including drag and drop rout planning (new a few months ago), certified text weather brief, and flight plan filing.
 
I use skyvector for the big picture planning too. For a long trip I use ftplan.com for my final planning and filing. Airnav is used for fuel stop, lodging and ground transportation. I value pilot comments on Airnav for selecting which FBO to use.

VFRMAP.com is also useful for finding airports near a city since you can switch between road map and aviation map. Of course Foreflight has most of the features mentioned before. For the amount of money you spend, it is the best investment you can make.
 
Golden Eagle? Remember runwayfinder? Navmonster?

Separate from and before that issue, I tried this and personally found it difficult to the point that I gave up on it.

Dan
 
Flight planner

We use in conjunction with fore flight, fltplan.com

It can be used to keep weight balance information as well as EAPIS, flight tracking, logbook and other features that you might not need.

It is more accurate than fore flight in regards to projected fuel etc.

We use foreflight for all our charts and now that they offer the track forward feature and the tags it takes a good product and makes it much better.

I have been a strong advocate of foreflight since it hit the market... But like so much other electronics in the cockpit you have to be very careful about your head down time..

Try http://www.fltplan.com. I think you'll like it

Smilin' Jack
Corporate pilot
 
Calling all canucks....any options..... up north....?

I see mention of some apps that are used for 'international' flights....
could this be, into Canada?
I'm wondering if any of these apps are useful north of 49, or are we still waiting for NavCanada to finish digitizing VNC charts etc. before we see them on ForeFlight etc.? ( I hear they have IFR stuff now)
 
With all the tools out there, I guess we don't use a one stop shop. Our planning long and short involves Skyvector for maps and overview routing (replacement for laying out the sectional), Airnav for location details and reviews, Weather.gov for real personal weather data analysis when things get interesting in the summer, and most importantly Weathermeister.com for the daily stuff and to put it all together and file the flight plan. Those are pretty much the only things we use for 200 miles or 1500 miles on any given day. Calling flight service is simply like reading weathermeister to them (I've done it before!).
 
Getting back to Bob's original post, I, with a little frustration. signed up on the "new" AOPA flight planner. A couple of interesting problems, there is a long list of aircraft, but of course no mention of any RV. Some really obscure things on the list but no mention of the most popular homebuilt. The problem this causes is you cannot enter an airspeed for the flight planning. It defaults to "100 to <200 knots." There are some good features in the program, like "rubberbanding" and the ability to do a layer that gives you METARS with a click. After my short test, I emailed the AOPA with my comments and questions. Surprisingly, I got a human response in a couple of hours, here it is:

John,

Thank you for contacting the Pilot Information Center. The new FlyQ Web was launched late last week and while we hoped it would be an easy transition, it has not been smooth for everyone. We understand the flight planner is one of the most popular products we offer and regret any inconvenience and frustration this transition is causing you.

Thanks to member feedback, we have identified several issues and are working hard to fix the bugs, enhance usability and restore lost waypoints and stored routes. Please know the team is working around the clock to get these, and many other repairs made.

Your feedback on the experimental aircraft selection list and aircraft equipment section features is extremely helpful and we are diligently working to prioritize and fix all submitted issues.

The decision to move to the new FlyQ Web format was made to provide a better and more flexible product for our members. In the end, FlyQ Web will have many new features that were not available before, like the capability to rubber-band routes, create flight plans that are wind-optimized, and then sync flight plans into ?the cloud? which will automatically load onto FlyQ EFB and FlyQ Pocket.

Thank you again for contacting us and for bearing with us as we work through the required changes. We certainly do not wish to lose your continued support over what we expect to be a brief period of product maturation. We are confident that in the near future, FlyQ Web will deliver all of the great features that you require, and more.

Craig Brown
Sr. Technical Specialist
Pilot Information Center
ATP/A&P/CFI
800-USA-AOPA

With the bugs worked out this could be a very handy program. We will see...

John Clark ATP, CFI
FAAST Team Representative
EAA Flight Advisor
RV8 N18U "Sunshine"
KSBA
 
DanH said:
Skyvector stores a user-selected groundspeed in the flight plan box. It's my rubber band big picture planner.....and Weathermeister for day of flight.
Click to expand...

+1 What Dan said. I do also use and highly recommend an iPad mini and Foreflight when that is an option for you. The latest Foreflight version is awesome. Besides, I can use Skyvector and Weathermeister right from my iPad mini (and email, read a book, FaceTime the grand kids, yada, yada, yada)
 
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Just going to throw another vote in for fltplan.com
I have a wide range of aircraft stored in my database and find the performance models are pretty close. On the turbine stuff I find after slight tweaking I can have flight times within a couple minutes and fuel burns within a couple hundred pounds after a six hour leg. They do have an RV-6 as a standard performance model. You can go in and modify it to better match your own AC performance if necessary. It is pretty easy to use after you get signed up (for free) and authorize them to file flight plans for you (also free).
No drag and drop route planning but there are other ways to plan your routing there. International/ICAO flight plans, eAPIS, weather, flight log and currency tracking etc etc etc. All for free.
I give it an enthusiastic two thumbs up, and no I am not associated with them. Just a user.
 
I've been using FltPlan.com for a long time now and am very happy with it. Don't know if you can "rubberband" routes with it, though.
 
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