747 400X guidance required

[RaptyrOne 1,405]

Awesome new aircraft, just downloaded it. A couple of questions:1. On landing after a 7 hour real time flight I noticed the nose wheel was not turning in the exterior view. It stayed pointing straight ahead and turning radius was terrible. Is there a nose wheel lock or something?2. On the same flight, programming the FMS as a direct route between the two airports (over water most of the way) with no waypoints in between, the aircraft tracked parallel to the indicated flight path in LNAV mode, a few miles to the left of track. What am I doing wrong?3. Again on the same flight, the aircraft tended to have a very slight bank while still holding heading. Adjusting the airelon and rudder trims did not correct this. Was as if the aircraft was fighting itself, perhaps in an effort to get back on track as per (2) above.4. On a cold and dark startup I had the aircrafts primary direction indicator screen "locked" on a heading. It would not rotate when turning the acft, nor would auto pilot engage under these conditions. What am I doing wrong here?4. It is likely I am just not reading the manual but hey, at 350+pages of documentation to work thru, it's gonna take a year. Is there any kind of QRH for making the most of this aircraft without spending a year studying the manuals :-)

[FLEX1978 373]

1. Did you perform a full autoland? If so did you disconnect the autopilot after rollout?2. Not sure why you would program the FMC without any waypoints? works with the default GPS but never tried it with the 7473. Maybe the same problem as 2 but are you using active sky? 4. Do you mean the Nav Display? did you align the IRS?5. The systems are pretty much identical to the real thing so it takes a bit of studying :) but if you go through the tutorials you should be up and running in no time.Rob

[RaptyrOne 1,405]

Thanks Rob,I was not on a full autoland approach. In fact I disconnected the AP, auto throttle etc at 2500ft and flew final app and landing manually.Still getting to grips with the FMC. Just programmed DIRECT TO destination. I had the route showing on the Nav display and all info such as fuel and ETA etc calculated correctly without any interim waypoints on FMS. Perhaps 3700nm without any waypoints does cause the system to struggle but I would not think so as it is GPS/INS /IRS based?Don't have Active Sky. Judging by your comment, not aligning IRS will cause the Nav display to "freeze" the compass arc. I thought I had aligned it but perhaps I did something wrong here.Please can you tell me if one needs to align the IRS when starting out in the airctraft that is not cold and dark - i.e. strated up and sitting on the runway ready to roll (default setting)?Sorry I know I need to read the manual more thoroughly. I purchased this acft because I love the realism (real world PPL) but heck, it's a lot of manual to read ;-)

[FLEX1978 373]

Hi, You don't need to align the IRS if your starting the aircraft powered up. It's a good idea to enter at least a few waypoints in the flight plan. I too am starting my PPL in December at biggin hill in London :) looking forward to the challenge.Rob

[craig_read 43]

>Awesome new aircraft, just downloaded it. A couple of>questions:>>1. On landing after a 7 hour real time flight I noticed the>nose wheel was not turning in the exterior view. It stayed>pointing straight ahead and turning radius was terrible. Is>there a nose wheel lock or something?No, I imagine you might have "advanced animations" turned off within you display settings.>2. On the same flight, programming the FMS as a direct route>between the two airports (over water most of the way) with no>waypoints in between, the aircraft tracked parallel to the>indicated flight path in LNAV mode, a few miles to the left of>track. What am I doing wrong?I'm not sure what is happening here, I've seen it a few times, if you look at the new AOA video on their website.. you'll see some strange LNAV behaviour. Someone mentioned something about "homing" rather than following a track, it was dismissed.. However I am not totally convinced that person wasn't right.. I've yet to do some experiements to find out if this is the case, but there is something odd here. The aircraft should really follow the track correctly, and turn to be over it. Watch the AOA vid on their site and see if that's similar. I would urge the PMDG team to look at that vid.. it's quite clear that it's in LNAV but not following the track.. It's homing direct to the beacon, and not using the specific track computed in the FMC. However I'm not always right about these things, and not a real pilot.. So if I'm wrong I'd like someone to explain this so I can learn further.>3. Again on the same flight, the aircraft tended to have a>very slight bank while still holding heading. Adjusting the>airelon and rudder trims did not correct this. Was as if the>aircraft was fighting itself, perhaps in an effort to get back>on track as per (2) above.Check your joystick sensitivity settings, also the FSX weather systems can cause some undesirable affects within the PMDG 747X.. I've seen bobbing due to sudden changes in pressures within the sim.. It's puzzling but I imagine it's a weather issue, or joystick sensitivity.>4. On a cold and dark startup I had the aircrafts primary>direction indicator screen "locked" on a heading. It would not>rotate when turning the acft, nor would auto pilot engage>under these conditions. What am I doing wrong here?I'm not sure what you mean? The display never changes? Or you can't activate various controls?>4. It is likely I am just not reading the manual but hey, at>350+pages of documentation to work thru, it's gonna take a>year. Is there any kind of QRH for making the most of this>aircraft without spending a year studying the manuals :-)I know I say this to a lot, and I'm not plugging but try reading my tutorial.. It's on the PMDG OPs page.. as EGLL to KLAX.. and also on the speedbirdonline training pages.. Here is a link.. It takes you through most of the basics... Some of it aren't correct, I am currently working on a revision that will be even more detailed..Site Link:http://www.speedbirdonline.co.uk/747.htmlDirect Link: http://www.speedbirdonline.co.uk/downloads..._1.0_206648.zipShould be more than enough to be getting on with..Hope that helps..Craig

[RaptyrOne 1,405]

Craig,Awsome, thank you very much. Instead of starting up the sim last night, spent the time going thru some of the info on the links you gave me here. Definitely makes much easier reading that the manual. Not knocking the manual, just looking for the quickest, easiest way to learn this aircraft.By the way, definitely have advanced animations turned on. I have quite a high spect PC, so most settings are on the mid to high side. Notice this acft does slow the frame rate a little, especially at 3rd party detailed airports. Was wondering if such a long flight (7 hours real time) perhaps took it's toll on system resources and that is why the animation on the nose wheel stopped.Just two more stupid questions:1. How do I open the pax and cargo doors? The standard Shift-E does not work on the 744X. If I have to assign keys in the PDMG add on menu, how do I find out which key combinations are not already in use by the sim for something else?2. On the downloads page at PMDG, a screen shot is shown with the view inside the flight deck, probably standing at the cockpit entrance looking forward. I also read that cabin views, stairway views are possible. How do I get to these views? the "s" and "a" and F9/F10 keyboard commands cycle thru many views but not these ones?Oh and Rob, all the best with your PPL! After flying the 744X sim I'm sure its gonna be a piece of cake!

[BillC 135]

A couple of other points.On very long sectors between two points you may find that the aircraft follows a great circle route and not a straight line so there may be an offset to one side of the track. Also of course a vicious crosswind can cause a slight offset as well as the apparent slight banking to one side as it tries to compensate for the wind. In both instances the closer you get to your next programmed waypoint the offset should reduce. One way to test is to add an intermediate waypoint and see if the offset reduces.Ref your nosewheel - was the FD still connected? Or were you perhaps rolling a bit too quick to make the turn?

[RaptyrOne 1,405]

Yes Flight Director was definitely still selected but Auto Pilot was disengaged. Would the engaged FD (or AP for that matter) do this to the nose wheel steering though? I would think that nose wheel steering would overide all else when on taxi?I also reviewed my joystick settings/calibration and it appears to be OK. I am using M'soft Sidewinder F/feedback 2 - rudder and nose wheel steering action is by twisting main handle. I do not have the auto rudder selected in the FSX realism menu.

[craig_read 43]

Bill,Doesn't the FMC compensate for this on the ND? I mean the way I see if, that magenta line is the law and LNAV should follow it. Even with crosswinds the 747 should be on that line and following it, even if the attitude is slightly off to compensate for a cross wind.Look at the AOA video, and a couple of other posts on here. You'll see the aircraft turns and heads directly to the beacon/waypoint and ignores the track. So the aircraft is always offset to the track, but on target for the beacon.I've put a couple of diagrams to show you what I mean, it may well be I am doing something wrong, but I have seen it do this and I am not convinced it should.. The AOA vid shows it quite clearly..If you look at my pics you'll see what I mean.. the green is how it behaves sometimes.. and the red is how I think it should behave..Obviously the sharper that turn in the plan, the more significant the offset will become if the aircraft is navigating this way, and I'm not sure that's right.. I think this offset is what is being seen here, and I see it on long legs after quite a sharp turn in the plan.. For plans with lots of waypoints, and short legs with few sharp turns, you'll probably not notice it, but in a plan like that , I think it will become more obvious.I may have this totally wrong, I might do some experiments with it tonight, see what comes up.. There was a post about this previously I think, not sure what happened.. Whatever it is it's either me or something funny in the LNAV logic.CheersCraig

[jordanal 70]

>2. On the same flight, programming the FMS as a direct route>between the two airports (over water most of the way) with no>waypoints in between, the aircraft tracked parallel to the>indicated flight path in LNAV mode, a few miles to the left of>track. What am I doing wrong?In the past, I have seen quite a bit of track-offset when I have 500nm or more between waypoints in FS9. Haven't tried such a large distance between waypoints in FSX.Another thought also comes to mind. Are the pics in this PMDG thread related to what you're seeing?http://forums.avsim.net/dcboard.php?az=sho...d=141951&page=3You might have a bad AFCAD afecting your magdef.bgl file. See my post in that same thread, about 6 from the bottom, where I describe how to check and find the culprit AFCAD if necessary.Hope this helps...

[BillC 135]

CraigRef your post and diagrams (nice diagrams btw!), yesterday I flew KPHL to EGBB in the 747X specifically to check for this behaviour and obviously had some extended distances between waypoints over the pond (up to 600nm). For the first segment of the flight I also had a significant crosswind. I didn't see any evidence of the "homing" to the next waypoint that some have referred to despite flying as fast as I could (Mach .86, GS varying up to as fast as 550kts) to make the turns as tough as possible. Each time a turn was due she accomplished that turn beautifully with a slight anticipation (CI of 100) and established on the magenta line to the next waypoint, no homing seen at all. Also, regarding the original post in this thread, no offsets nor slight banking being witnessed either. So, it seems to be working fine here which suggests that for those experiencing these issues there must be something else going on somewhere in the bowels of the system that is not happening with mine.Test Flight details:FSX SP1; 747X with service updates; ASX running; default FSX scenery throughout; "live" on Vatsim; random route to keep out of people's way: PHL7 DITCH V312 DRIFT J121 SHLEP DCT ACK DCT EBONY DCT CARPE 5550N 5640N 5630N 5620N RESNO UN551 BEL UL10 IOM CHASE1E; FL370 M0.86.Note that I included some pretty tight turns into it deliberately!

[craig_read 43]

Bill,Yeah, I think you're right.. it must be my setup somewhere.. I've been having so many problems with it just lately.. I think new PC is really the only way I'm going to sort this out because it's getting really annoying now.. I've had FSX crash out on me about 4 times already this morning, and sounds randomly stop working (switch sounds) so something is obviously a miss somewhere.. I've uninstalled the SP2 for FSX too wondering if that was the cause of my woes (you just have SP1 there).. we'll have to see I guess..Cheers for that though!Craig

[RaptyrOne 1,405]

Out of interst I have now flown this same route two more times in real time at about 7.5 hours / flight, but this time, far more precisely using multiple waypoint navigation programmed into the FMC.On these two trips the aircraft did not display the characterisitics mentioned in my original post. My guess is that 3800nm between way points is a bit rough for the FMC to deal with and perhaps in such a case, homing in on the next point as oppoesed to flying a ground track becomes a problem.If you are interested the flight was direct between FAJS (Johannesburg) and VRMM (Male, Maldives) flown in LNAV mode (no VNAV) if you want to recreate.