Simviation Forums

Why doesn't the plane follow your GPS line very well if you are far up north? I'm currently around N71 Latitude, and my gps looks like this:
Also, why can't you fly directly over the north pole, the flight planner  mostly takes you around it.

Magnetic versus true heading.

Does FSX follow the magnetic heading?

Well, it acts like in real life.

Try to take a heading of 360, and fly like that for a few minutes.

Then open the map, an you'll see it doesn't draw a perfectly vertical line, because you've flown magnetic heading, and the map uses true heading.

Flying 360 for long enough will take you up somewhere around Canada, the location of the magnetic South pole.

Well, it acts like in real life.

Try to take a heading of 360, and fly like that for a few minutes.

Then open the map, an you'll see it doesn't draw a perfectly vertical line, because you've flown magnetic heading, and the map uses true heading.

Flying 360 for long enough will take you up somewhere around Canada, the location of the magnetic South pole.

I thought magnetic south pole was in the southern hemisphere?

Nope!

It's confusing but I'll explain it:

A magnet is divided into two poles, a north and a south (not + and - like some people think).

Noth attracts south, but repels North, and the other way around.

A compass needle is basically a magnet. The end that's usually red will point to North, because the red end is the North pole of the magnet. To point North, it needs to be attracted by a South pole, which is located around Canada.

The poles are moving though, and IIRC in 10.000 years, they'll be located near Equator.

Did any of that make sense?

Sort of, physics and magnets have never been my favourite. How come if I type in magnetic south pole in Google, it thinks it is in Antarctica.

I've never encountered such nonsense since last visiting a third grade classroom...  ;D

First of all, the OP didn't say what the wind component was at the time. From the position of the a/c on the map and magenta line, it would appear that the winds were rather high, hence the a/c was crabbing into the wind.

Secondly, the "magnetic poles" are indeed located in the far north and far south as their names indicate.  ::)

Nope, magnetic South is true North, or at least in the vicinity.

So who is actually right?

Well, technically us both, as magneetic South is by some called magnetic North, because it lies in true North, but physically it's magnetic South.

All well and good but magnetic poles have nothing to do with the GPS.

The GPS shows magnetic north (i think in fs) on the display but indicates the direction of travel.

The APs was, and still is set to NAV.

I think you just have wind and the plane is crabbing in order to TRACK the heading of the flight plan.

There is a difference in TRACK heading and ACTUAL heading. The ACTUAL heading is the direction that your plane's nose is facing, and the TRACK heading is the direction in which the plane is actually moving. Wind is what causes the difference in these two. If there was no wind, then you would track the same heading as the actual heading, because the plane wouldn't have to crab.

I've flown up in Greenland and Iceland with FS fair weather (no winds) and used the GPS, and I didn't see this problem. So my answer is: you have winds and the plane is crabbing to track the flight plan heading.

Ok.. everyone stop posting.. this is getting silly