Uncontrolled Airports

[FDXDave]

Got a quick question for guys and gals.
So i understand the use of CTAF for pattern.
and when requesting your IFR clearence you would use
The over laying Approach freq or what ever is published. Well that had worked for all
My flights until yesterday, i ran into a snag. I plotted a flight from
Fresno to SFO. Well both Fresno Approach and departure frequencies are unmanned.
So i looked up the last freq which i used to land into the untowered mammoth yosemite airport
Because it was closer to Fresno. And as luck would have it...score that was
The correct freq to use for clearance and departure.
But that was only a guess. so other than guessing the
Freq. How would i have been able to look up the correct frequency
For Fresno? Or any airport which does not have a published
CTAF?

Part two of this. When the controller advised frequency change approved i just swapped
To the Fresno TWR freq and used it as the CTAF. was that correct? I wasn't to concearned
i was the only other ac in the area.

Thank you for your feedback.
Dave.

[Keith Smith]

Hi Dave,

If you'd like to avoid this problem for now, you can try to stick to the 20 towered airports that we cover in WUS and wait for the list to grow (more fields are being added just as fast as we can build them). However, if you do want to try to fly out of Class C airports that aren't yet supported, care needs to be taken to see if the overlying TRACON (in this case, Fresno Approach) has been modeled yet. The list of supported TRACONs is included here: www.pilotedge.net/pages/western-expansion (see the Hidden Gem section).

In your case, Fresno TRACON is not yet modeled (since the tracon exists to serve KFAT, which is not a supported airport yet, but will be in the future). So, you have to go to the overlying Center frequency. This can be obtained easily from a low enroute IFR chart (skyvector.com). Just look for the nearest Oakland ARTCC frequency in the 'postage stamp' boxes on the enroute chart.

A 'published CTAF' is not what you're looking for in terms of reaching ATC. That frequency is used to self-announce your position (ie, the same frequency you would use for self announcing when the tower is closed). Since KFAT is a 24hr facility in real life, they don't publish a CTAF. In this regard, it's not the most realistic operation to be conducting on PilotEdge. You would have a more realistic experience by flying out of a supported towered airport, or a truly non-towered airport.

[FDXDave]

Hi Dave,

If you'd like to avoid this problem for now, you can try to stick to the 20 towered airports that we cover in WUS and wait for the list to grow (more fields are being added just as fast as we can build them). However, if you do want to try to fly out of Class C airports that aren't yet supported, care needs to be taken to see if the overlying TRACON (in this case, Fresno Approach) has been modeled yet. The list of supported TRACONs is included here: http://www.pilotedge.net/pages/western-expansion (see the Hidden Gem section).

In your case, Fresno TRACON is not yet modeled (since the tracon exists to serve KFAT, which is not a supported airport yet, but will be in the future). So, you have to go to the overlying Center frequency. This can be obtained easily from a low enroute IFR chart (skyvector.com). Just look for the nearest Oakland ARTCC frequency in the 'postage stamp' boxes on the enroute chart.

A 'published CTAF' is not what you're looking for in terms of reaching ATC. That frequency is used to self-announce your position (ie, the same frequency you would use for self announcing when the tower is closed). Since KFAT is a 24hr facility in real life, they don't publish a CTAF. In this regard, it's not the most realistic operation to be conducting on PilotEdge. You would have a more realistic experience by flying out of a supported towered airport, or a truly non-towered airport.

Thank you for the detailed answer. I got use to flying out of the towered and modeled TRACON's I forgot about reading that part in the hidden gem section. However, I continue to learn, I just learned about the blue stamps containing the Center Freq's. So thank you for the added knowledge.
Dave.