Frequently Asked Questions

All Embraer cockpits follow the “Dark & Quiet” convention. That means that if something is dark, it is ON or in the normal state during the flight. If something is illuminated, it means it is OFF or in a state that is not normal during the flight.

The purpose of the light is to bring attention to the function so that the pilot and copilot know that the function is not currently in the normal flight state.

Note: The BLEED APU, APU GEN and the GPU GEN are the only switches on the overhead panel that are illuminated if they are ON. Because they would normally not be used in flight.

The gust lock is a safety feature that prevents elevator movement when the aircraft is on the ground. You can see the yellow gust lock bar in front of the throttles.

AUTOMATIC OPERATION:

Turn Automatic Gust Lock ON in the EFB > Settings

• To Unlock: CLICK the GUST LOCK lever and wait 10 seconds for the unlocking process to finish.

• To Lock: You must be stationary on the ground. Simply CLICK the Gust Lock lever again.

MANUAL UNLOCKING:

Turn Automatic Gust Lock OFF in the EFB > Settings

1. CLICK and PUSH the gust lock lever forward to the intermediate position

2. WAIT for 10 seconds. When ready, the GUST LOCK light on the glareshield starts flashing

3. PULL the yoke fully back towards you

4. CLICK and PUSH the gust lock fully forward to the FREE position

MANUAL LOCKING:

1. PULL the yoke fully back towards you

2. CLICK and PULL the gust lock lever all the way back to the LOCKED

3. PUSH the yoke fully forward

Pushing past the THRUST SET notch gives max thrust and automatically selects TO-1 and you will not be able to select any other TRS mode.

If you are using hardware throttles you should set your throttle axis detents like this:

1. REVERSE - 0.0

2. IDLE - 0.25

3. THRUST SET - 0.75

4. MAX - 1.0

The 18° Flaps position on the ERJs is not used in real life, therefore it is disabled in the sim.

After turning the switch to RUN, you need to wait for about 5 seconds for the yellow box on the EICAS to stop flashing, after which you can start the APU.

Make sure you follow the checklist exactly. The most common mistake is that people forget to turn on the BLEED APU (white stripe), and XFEED to OPEN.

Make sure you hold the switches on START for at least 3 seconds.

Your throttle must be on idle for the engines to stop.

The windows only open a bit to allow the pilots to hand documents to the ground crew.

In an emergency, the windows have to be removed completely.

You most likely forgot to turn on your bleed air! Make sure your engine bleeds are on - the buttons should be dark.

The cockpit gets black because you don't have enough oxygen and X-Plane is simulating hypoxia.

You can also turn this effect off in X-Plane's settings.

The Honeywell style system requires closing the flight plan before arrival or performance data entry.

Press the line select key next to DEST to copy the destination airport ID to the scratchpad. Insert it on the next VIA.TO line as the last waypoint of the flight plan.

The route is now closed and you will be able to access the ARRIVAL page.

The Honeywell style system requires closing the flight plan before arrival or performance data entry.

Press the line select key next to DEST to copy the destination airport ID to the scratchpad. Insert it on the next VIA.TO line as the last waypoint of the flight plan.

The route is now closed and you will be able to enter your PERF data.

Set a new airport of origin or delete all entries on the flight plan.

1. Download the flight plan file in the X-Plane 11/12 (including SIDs and STARS) format

2. Save it in X-Plane/Output/FMS Plans.

3. Start X-Plane, load the aircraft

4. In the FMS, go to the first ACTIVE FLT PLAN page > LOAD FPL (LSK2), located just below ORIGIN.

5. Select your route, then ACTIVATE

Unfortunately, it is currently not possible to change the units in the FMS. Our FMS is built on top of the CitationX FMS in X-Plane 12 because both use the Honeywell FMZ system.

This FMS is developed by a senior developer who currently works for LR, and it functions just like the real FMS on the ERJs. The downside is that we are still waiting for KG support in the FMS, which is expected to come in a future X-Plane update.

Use the INTERCEPT mode (DIR>PATTERN>INTERCEPT). This type of intercept consists of the pilot defining a radial/course out of a waypoint (including PPOS - Present position) until intercepting a radial or course into a second waypoint. This creates a defined latitude/longitude location and is placed into the active flight plan as a temporary (*RRxx) waypoint. From that screen, you can select RAD/CRS.

Step by Step:

1. Push DIR key

2. Push the line select key adjacent to the INTERCEPT prompt (4R)

3. INTERCEPT is displayed in the scratchpad

4. Select your inbound point, usually 3L. This will create a point between your waypoints 2L and 3L

5. Define the radial/course out of the FROM waypoint

6. Define the radial or course into the waypoint

7. Select ACTIVATE

8. The defined temporary INTERCEPT waypoint (labeled *RRxx) is inserted into the flight plan between your two original waypointstion

SPD and FLCH are both climb and descend functions. The ERJs dont have autothrottle.

SPD is the same as FLCH (in other aircraft) – flight level change – where the AP will use pitch to maintain the airspeed during a climb or descent.

FLC scheduled climbs operate as in the real aircraft, using variable speeds for a level change climb, and variable VS rates for descents.

• Going up: The aircraft controls airspeed by pitch and you climb at 240 knots from 0 to 10,000 feet. Then the airspeed request is gradually and automatically increased to 270 KIAS while climbing to 12,000 feet. This speed stays the same until FL180, where we change to Mach automatically, and climb continues at .56 Mach.

• Going down: the aircraft will descend using a vertical speed of 2000 fpm through 12,000 feet, and this is slowly adjusted to 1000 fpm by 10,000 feet.

The ERJs do not have autothrottle in real life, which is how we configured all the systems.

The first generation of ERJs had a hidden autothrottle, but that is no longer available.

Use the throttles manually. It's simple and it makes it more fun!

1. Takeoff + Climb: Push the throttles forward to the THRUST SET detent and leave them there. You want as much power as you can get here.

2. Cruise: Pull throttles back a tiny bit, so that you don't overspeed in cruise.

3. Descent: At TOD, pull throttles to idle and descend. Control throttle manually to keep your speed.

DFDR stands for Digital Flight Data Recorder, which starts recording when the beacon light is turned on. So to clear this message, turn the beacon lights on.

This comes off any time there aren't at least 3 generators on. The airplane therefore doesn't have enough power, and it turns the SHED busses off.

The shed busses power non essential devices like the cabin lighting, taxi lights or the coffeemaker. You can override this by selecting the SHED BUSES switch to OVRD.

If you see this on the EICAS, select ICING when calculating your landing performance on the EFB regardless of the weather at your destination.

SPS stands for Stall Protection System. This message stays on after icing was detected for the rest of the flight, telling you that some of the ice might still be present on the airframe or wings.

The message is cleared on the ground by performing the Stall protection test. To engage the stall protection test you need to be on the ground, have electic power and pull the yoke back beyond the center and then press the button.

The first-generation ERJ Family featured a Vertical Situation Display provided by the Terrain Radar plugin. Since we now have fully authentic avionics, this feature hasn’t been included since it isn’t there on the real aircraft.

The planes are compatible with the Terrain Radar plugin, but it is not included in the package as we are not responsible for it.

Just search for Terrain Radar by Dr. Gluck online and you’ll find it! It is really cool so you should get it!

You can change it on the Settings page of the EFB. This will only affect the EFB, MFD and EICAS.

Please note that the FMS is always in LB, and it cannot currently be changed.

Approach charts usually publish barometric minimums such as MDA or DA, which are based on altitude above sea level. In the ERJ, the minimums alert system is linked to the radio altimeter, so pilots often convert those chart minimums into a height above runway value to get an aural “MINIMUMS” callout.

However, the radio altimeter measures the terrain directly below the aircraft, so hills or rising ground before the runway can trigger the alert early. For most normal approaches, treat radio minimums as an awareness aid and always respect the published barometric minimums.

The system is semi-automatic: you must manually select which tank to transfer fuel from.

At cruise level, choose the tank to transfer from, and the transfer will proceed automatically once conditions are met. When that tank is empty, select the next one.

The recommended order is: FUS 1, then FUS 2, then VTRL

During refueling, fill the Main tanks first, then the Ventral tank, AFT tanks and then the FWD tanks.

After reaching cruise altitude, select the tank you want to transfer fuel from. The system will handle the transfer once conditions are satisfied. When that tank is empty, select the next tank.