Adding Hold When "Direct To" a Waypoint

Friends - I could use some help. I apologize in advance for the somewhat long post. Here's the scenario:

Yesterday I took off from KCMA. My CFII said, "I want you to go to FIM direct." So, I hit the "Direct To" button on the IFD540, type in FIM, and activate. So far, so good. Then my CFII says, "I want you to hold on the FIM 060 radial, right turns." So I try to go into FMS->Routes to add the hold. No joy. The only route there is the magenta current route, and it won't open. So then I go back to the map page, and touch the cursor below the FIM data block on the right side of the screen. It gives me the option of adding a hold, and I touch that option. Then it gives me three locations for the hold (IIRC, South, Northwest (1.0 miles) and Northwest (1.5 miles). I touch South, and the IFD inserts the hold but, at least on the map page, I cannot edit the hold to 060. So I go back to FMS->Routes, and try to edit the hold there. The only route is the "Current Route," and the IFD won't allow me to open the route to edit the hold.

When I got home later in the day, I played around with the IFD trainer and found this combination of buttonology allowed me to edit the hold:

With some more trial-and-error, I found an easier way to do this...

"Cessna 1234AB, fly direct FIM and hold on the 060 radial, right turns."

1. Open FPL tab in FMS.
2. Hit "Direct To" button
3. Type in FIM
4. Place cursor below FIM
5. Insert hold
6. Edit hold

The problem I was having was using the "Direct To" button while on the map page. If I switch to the FPL page, then I'm able to insert the hold and edit it according to ATC's instructions.

AviSteve wrote: ... When you do -D-> from the map, the FMS FPL tab will be displayed, but "split" with the map on the left and the flight plan legs in a narrowed format on the right.  You cannot edit the hold in this view.  To get to the full FPL layout, touch the "FPL" tab that is displayed sideways along the border between the map and the flight plan legs.  Or, you can hold down the left side of the FMS button to accomplish the same thing.  Once you can see the entire leg, you can move the cursor to the leg length, inbound course, and turn direction fields for the hold in order to edit those parameters.

Steve,

I and possibly countless others have learned this very straightforward lesson over time.  Thank you for giving the OP the straight scoop on how/where to edit the FPL.

Many of us try to translate smartphone or tablet user interface of "If I can see it, then I can edit it." to the absolutely well designed and functional interface of the IFD series of FMS's.  We quickly need to learn the proper way to make the IFD do our bidding.  I find myself just keeping the FPL page up for much of my flight time, either on my IFD540 or my IFD100.

Thank you to the engineering and support team at Avidyne.