cactusmike

On the 757 if the autopilot was off the autothrottles should also be off. On the Airbus, because of the autotrim feature the A/T can be left on, transient power changes are handled by the autotrim for a given pitch setting.

OKLATEX

No requirement currrently. I have been on the airplane for about 2 years, they encouraged hand flying during training. A friend of mine went to the airplane in 2003-2004 and they encouaraged a lot of automation use.

The MD-10 autothrottles are programmed to retard at the same time as the MD-11, 50 feet. Works fine on the -30, but on the -10, not so well unless you time your flare well. During IOE, they taught to hold the throttles up on the -10 until about 30 feet, then let them retard.

The FOM allows the pilot to chose which level of automation to use, what is appropriate for workload and to maintain manual flying skills. This summer, they reaffirmed this, but left it open for the pilot.

I personally hand fly a lot, and for the most part leave the throttles engaged, and do an override when I don't like what they are doing. Sometimes, I do turn them off. Previous airline and airplane, they taught to override them too, happend to be a Douglas airplane also.

My question is that some airlines seem to have a defined stance on what how to use autothrottles. I have heard at AA it was AP/AT both on or both off. Really curious as to what other training departments stance is.

During recurrent, they have us flying with all off during the sim on a couple of landings.

Phantom Flyer

Absolutely amazing what some people come up with.

Mr. Tiger...Irish variety, I agree with you and use to fly the aircraft up to cruise quite often. After awhile, I figured it was just too much work and asked for "center autopilot to command".

I flew for a major airline for over 19 years and there were no restrictions in our FOM/GOM on hand flying except during autoland approaches. There certainly no FAR restrictions prohibiting hand flying an aircraft in cruise flight as some would believe. If anyone wants to hand fly in IMC, go for it !

As for your Captain, he may be one of those pilots who lacks either the self confidence or skill set to efficiently hand fly an aircraft in IMC conditions but in any case, he's full of BS.

Have a fabulous day Mates

Phantom Flyer

Ladies & Gentlemen:

Let's all realize that each company may have different requirements for autopilot and autothrottle usage. In my previous life,(major carrier) we could hand fly the B-757, 767 and 777 anytime however, most pilots would leave the autothrottles engaged. Not company policy but "best practices". Some of the Aces of the Base would disconnect everything and could fly a hell of an instrument approach in lousy conditions. If you have the skill set, be my guest. Personal preferences and nothing more, unless it's Cat II or III.

G'Day Gentlemen and Ladies too

The Dominican

After reading some of the posts here I'm glad to work for a company that think of us as pilots and not as automation managers, hand flying once in a while (taking into consideration not overwhelming your PNF) Is viewed favorably where I'm at

TonyWilliams

My current company has no autopilot on requirements (we don't do CAT II or III at present), and encourage hand flying in "VMC" in the SOP. I flew up to FL290 today, and after I leveled off, asked for the autopilot.

I could tell the PM was napping a bit, and not fully paying attention, because he clearly didn't know it had been off the whole time.

I reached over and turned it on myself.

Bwipilot

I hand fly a ton but flying by hand in RVSM is an ego trip.

Wheels up

Some carriers want you to engage the autopilot on RNAV departures to get more precise course tracking.

johnso29

I'm on the DC9, so I hand fly a lot. We really don't have automation.

Typhoonpilot

Emirates has a very restrictive policy on hand flying/use of automation. We are only allowed to hand fly below 10,000 feet AAL, but the Flight Director and Autothrottles must remain engaged.


Typhoonpilot