True vs magnetic vs compass heading tricks?

[AndyMac]

I mostly have all this down but am annoyed by not having a simple rule to remember for it. Do any of you have any simple tricks to remember what is measured or reported in magnetic vs true course?

E.g. for what I’m talking about:
-airways (and VORs) are magnetic
-weather is reported in true
-runways are magnetic

Looking for a simple thing to use to remember it. Maybe there isn’t one?


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[Van Johnston]

How about airways, VORs, and runways are all man-made, so magnetic?

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

Of course, if you hear the winds in ATIS, it is magnetic.

 

[Clip4]

Just move to an area the variation is zero and you won’t care.

 

[AndyMac]

How about airways, VORs, and runways are all man-made, so magnetic?

That ain’t bad. No sir, not at all. Thanks!


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[AndyMac]

Just move to an area the variation is zero and you won’t care.

Bwahaha


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[AndyMac]

Of course, if you hear the winds in ATIS, it is magnetic.

Well crap - you’re right. I’ll just think about our poor airport manager’s budget and how they can’t be expected to account for variation lol.


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[David Megginson]

I mostly have all this down but am annoyed by not having a simple rule to remember for it. Do any of you have any simple tricks to remember what is measured or reported in magnetic vs true course?

E.g. for what I’m talking about:
-airways (and VORs) are magnetic
-weather is reported in true
-runways are magnetic

Looking for a simple thing to use to remember it. Maybe there isn’t one?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Think back to, say, the 1970s, before there were tablets, datalink, etc in the cockpit.

If the pilot interacts with it directly when they're in the plane (and they're south of the far Arctic), then it's in degrees magnetic: that includes stuff like runways, airways, and weather that comes over the radio like ATIS and AWOS.

If someone on the ground used to read it off a teletype machine (and it still looks like that today), then it's in degrees true: that includes stuff like TAFs, METARs, and FDs.

 

[David Megginson]

How about airways, VORs, and runways are all man-made, so magnetic?

The winds in the ATIS aren't manmade, but they're magnetic. :-/

 

[Matthew]

A couple years ago I was at one of those AOPA safety seminars. A scenario to work through was an approach to an unfamiliar airport. It was somewhere in the N/W. Multiple rwys, local traffic was using rwy A but the metar being displayed on your flat panel ADSB display indicated rwy B was preferred for the winds.

The trick to this question was to remind us midwesterners that not everyone has a 2 deg variation between magnetic and true.

 

[Domenick]

...The trick to this question was to remind us midwesterners that not everyone has a 2 deg variation between magnetic and true.

My homedrome in western WA is at 15.5E. In Alaska there are places over 20E.

I remember flying east across Arkansas heading for fuel and a biobreak at Jonesboro and thinking how nice it would be to have a 0 degree variation at home. Seemed noteworthy at the time.

 

[David Megginson]

My homedrome in western WA is at 15.5E. In Alaska there are places over 20E.

I remember flying east across Arkansas heading for fuel and a biobreak at Jonesboro and thinking how nice it would be to have a 0 degree variation at home. Seemed noteworthy at the time.

Ottawa, ON, just north of the New York state border, was 14W when I initially trained in 2002 (I think it's 13W now). Nobody around here would make it to first solo, much less a PPL, without having a very firm grasp of the difference between magnetic and true.

 

[PeterNSteinmetz]

Think back to, say, the 1970s, before there were tablets, datalink, etc in the cockpit. ...

This is a very good explanation and one that I will steal to use with students. Thanks @David Megginson .

 

[Art Schmidt]

I was taught, “If it’s printed, it’s true”. With one major exception being runway number markings .

 

[Half Fast]

ADSB-In weather data - true or magnetic?

 

[IK04]

The winds in the ATIS aren't manmade, but they're magnetic. :-/

...And the wind is singular.

 

[AndyMac]

ADSB-In weather data - true or magnetic?

Been looking for this answer. Best I heard was that is shows up on the map so is most likely true. Awkward!


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[David Megginson]

ADSB-In weather data - true or magnetic?

Any text you can read (METAR, TAF, upper winds) will be in degrees true — again, it's teletype-style information. In theory, an aviation app or device could render source data that was in magnetic or true degrees (in the former case, it would keep a variation database and apply that before rendering), but here that's not necessary.

 

[Lawson Laslo]

for winds
if you hear it its magnetic
if you read it its true