Eli5: Why do pilots change altitude and speed manually even though the autopilot is on?

Question

Eli5: Why do pilots change altitude and speed manually even though the autopilot is on?

In: Engineering

Answer 1

The auto pilot in an airplane only does what you tell it to do. If you tell it you want to fly at FL300, it will only fly at FL300. If you want it to go up to FL360, you have to tell it how to do that, and then it will do it. If you would like a more detailed description i can tell you exactly how i program the auto pilot in my airplane but in short, the auto pilot is only doing what i tell it to do.