Jungle Jet and CRJ speeds

[njcapt]

For the life of me I cannot figure out why you guys are out there purposly flying non-standard profiles, burning an excessive amount of fuel, and driving down trip values with this .80 bullsh*t. I hope you grow into a professional pilot someday as opposed to a pilot who is paid to fly.

Spoken like someone who has never needed to put the pedal to the metal to catch the last flight home at the end of a trip. I don't commute anymore, but did for 12 years and did many a ramp transfer to a Southwest or United flight. Ol' doin time needs to get involved with Pro Standards if he has a problem with maximum performance operations..

 

[jdru25]

Just fly it likes its stolen!!

 

[T-Gates]

I hate when the Captains taxi out on 2 engines plus the APU, sit in line for 20-30 minutes for takeoff, tell me that we wont FLEX, etc....

Then when it's my leg and I'm flying .77, they tell me to slow down because I'm wasting fuel.....

Thats about when I reach my boiling point......

Half the time I have to fly .74 and watch my fuel economy because of the poor planning on behalf of my compadre in the left seat. Then when I bring it up, the reasoning I get is "I'll start doing single-engine taxi, FLEX takeoffs, when the company pays me better......"

 

[mckpickle]

145 ER really drops climb/speed after 250. LR does ok.

The XR is getting certified for .80 ops, just had one the other day. And that thing will Climb like a motehrFukcer at 300kts/1500ft/min up to about 270, then climb at MMO at around 1000fpm up to 370. That thing ROCKS.

The ER/LR can do ok but if its hot and heavy forget it, theres no **CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED****CENSORED** wing on the thing

 

[DoinTime]

When you find unexpected winds, do the calculations, and find if you followed dispatch's numbers without question you'd end up arriving late, you'll see why pumping it up a bit and burning some more fuel is often advantageous. The customers care about on-time performance.

Now if you are burning it up to arrive 30 minutes early, that's another matter altogether. It's a pointless waste. Throwing out a blanket statement saying "flying faster outside the profile is not the mark of a professional" is totally off. The professional monitors the flight and adjusts accordingly to arrive on-time.

I don't know how tight they run your schedules at Chicago Express (my comment was directed towards my fellow pilots at Pinnacle) but unforcast winds will almost never put you outside of your schedule at Pinnacle. In every 121 operations manual that I have ever seen, and I imagine most that have ever existed, the DISPATCHER has operational control over all flights. The PIC does not decide how fast (or slow) to fly unless asked to by ATC. To quote from the Pinnacle FOM:

3.1.0 Operational Control
Dispatch has the sole authority for operational control of each flight.

I've ran late many times and asked my dispatcher to re-plan us for .78-.80 mach to help make up some time and have been denied every time. The company will not spend the money on extra fuel and wear and tear on the engines for the minimal gain of flying a few knots faster. The professional operates the aircraft in the manor that the company wants. Nowhere in any of our manuals are we authorized to deviate from the profile to make up time without the consent of our dispatcher. If you have asked and been denied that is where a professional should leave it.

FlyChicaga...don't take this the wrong way but you (as well as myself for that matter) have a lot to learn about what is, and what is not, professional behavior by a professional pilot. Every release I sign I learn more about what I do and believe me when I say that your outlook on your job and yourself will be completely different as you put more experience under your belt.

Dondk...when you said ".78-.80 is the norm for us" that pretty much means you, and the people you are flying with, are doing it all the time regardless if ATC has asked you for it. Even many of the FO's I fly with push it up to cruise maximums and let it go as fast as it can. I've been flying in our northern system for quite some time now and my personal observation is that ATC is asking us to slow down more often than speeding up.

 

[NightFlyer]

Whatever happened to captain's authority?

NightFlyer

 

[T-Gates]

Captain's Authority is still alive and well, but that doesn't apply to re-writing company policy.....

 

[dondk]

DoinTime

I will say on the "outs" I try to do the profile. If I can do it , why not! Fuel conservation, engine wear, and yes trip values...

On the "in's" it is 90% of the time Max forward OR 250KTS for spacing. It is either one, rarely can you get away with the profile on the in's. If you do.. you get the infamous "say speed" followed by pick it up to ....

 

[JJJ]

The #1 reason I fly proflie most of the time is fuel. They've been dropping our cont fuel to hardly any. If you're flying a 3 hour leg back from the east coast and ATC gives you 4K less than your planned altitude and you fly at .80, and then hold in MSP, and then fly a 25 mile final, you're not going to land with much fuel. I myself don't believe that 1.3 really equals 45 minutes of reserve. You don't want to be the guy that runs out of fuel taxing to the gate.

In alot of cases flying balls to the wall is only going to save you a few minutes.

 

[efiscompmon]

As an ex-airlinker, and one of the first to fly the "surge", I would subimt to you that on most legs out of MEM and DTW, the difference between .74 and .80 is virtually nil in block time. The level, enroute phase is so short that, at most, I was able to save 3 minutes from flight planned time, usually at the expense of a few hundred pounds of fuel. MEM to Monterrey, MX I got 7 minutes once. 500 pounds over on fuel burn. Woo-hoo. Doing .80 from PVD to MSP didn't help when I had to slow to 250 over GRB and maintain that all the way across Wisconsin, with one turn in a 20 DME hold over EAU. Or the flights from SGF where I am held back or turned off-route because of descending FDX heavy traffic that further slows me and makes the base leg for 36L somewhere over Greenville! Terminal operations will always play a more significant role than enroute speeds.

As for driving down block value, it would take a lot of flying to change it--but why take money out of you pocket and put it in Messrs. White and Youngs'? Doesn't anyone say "cha-ching" anymore when the brake is released and ACARS sqwaks with no rampie in sight? It's a dollar a minute in the left seat as I recall.....

Flying the profile: I once asked JH, #1 on the seniority list, back in early 2001 why he was such an anal retentive ba$tard. He said "Well, efis. I really like flying this plane. And it's not my plane. So if I don't fly their plane the way they tell me to, they might just take it away from me."

Something to ponder. After all, they hired us to do the job, not reinvent the wheel.