Airbus A320-214, Beginners Tutorial

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2020/12/07 15:07 15/33 Airbus A320-214
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flight display in the second (vertical mode) and third column (lateral mode).
Auto-Thrust (A/THR) Master
The Auto-Thrust (A/THR) (a.k.a. auto-throttle in other aircraft) controls the thrust to the engines.
Depending on what the flight director vertical mode is the engine thrust is either constantly adjusted
to maintain a target airspeed or the thrust is advanced to full climb thrust for a climb or retarded to
idle thrust for a descent.
Push the A/THR button to arm the auto thrust system
Move the thrust levers to the climb detent to activate it.
The state of the auto thrust system is displayed in the top right corner of the primary flight display
(PFD). When the text A/THR is in white color then the auto thrust is active. When the text is in
cyan/blue the auto thrust has been armed but is currently not operating, e.g. because the pilot still
has the thrust levers at idle or above the CLB detent (MCT with one engine failed). Setting the thrust
levers into the climb detent changed the auto thrust state from armed to engaged.
The active thrust mode is shown in the top left corner of the PFD, in the first column. When it shows
SPEED then the auto thrust system is controlling the airspeed and varies the thrust command to the
engines accordingly. THR CLB or THR IDLE are shown when climb or idle thrust is commanded to the
engines. When the mode shows MAN TOGA or MAN MCT or MAN FLX then the auto thrust is not active,
you are manually overriding it with the thrust lever.
Interaction Between Vertical Mode and Auto-Thrust
If you select a vertical mode like CLB or OP CLB by pushing or pulling the altitude knob the auto-thrust
system will increase the engine thrust to climb thrust (THR CLB) and maintain that. The autopilot will
then pitch up to keep the speed target. This means the autopilot is controlling the speed with the
climb angle now and the engines are just producing the maximum climb thrust.
When you reach the target altitude the autopilot will capture the altitude (ALT*) and then maintain it
(ALT). When this happens the auto-thrust switches back to SPEED mode and change the engine thrust
to maintain the speed target again. Now the auto-thrust controls the speed again and the autopilot