What Is My Problem?

[Orlaam 306]

First off, I don't get to fly the 744 very often, so my memory of certain details is probably poor, but most of the time I have a good flight. Yes, I've gone over the TRC and manual again, but with that much reading, I might have missed something.Okay, so last night I flew a PAX flight without any issue whatsoever. Today I loaded up the Cargo version for another short flight and tried twice to get her working after takeoff to no avail. What happens, and it's happened before is that the A/T never seems to pick up the ball. I engage VNAV or even FLCH, but she never picks up speed and eventually drops speed. The display will say THR HOLD, so why won't the A/T command a speed? My manual throttle is in a null zone, and no noise would be coming from it. It's nulled in FSUIPC and XP. I've had this happen before and I don't understand why it sometimes does this. Is there another reason why A/T won't work when armed besides a manual throttle issue and does the check box in PMDG options allow me to control this? I thought they allowed for manual intervention, but the throttle box is checked, so putting it back in a null zone should give it back to the plane right?ETA: Now trying a thrid flight I get the same thing after making sure my throttle is set to idle. I have no idea how I eventually got A/T to engage. I had to go manual and bring the nose down and turn the AP on and off twice. Then at clearance above FL310 to FL340 I decided to just use V/S mode for a slow climb. Once I did that, the plane began to dive. I don't get the AFDS logic in this plane at all.

[Tabs 2,790]

There's gotta be something wrong in how you're initializing the FMC I'd think. What do your LEGS and the active VNAV pages look like?You literally should be able to engage LNAV and VNAV on the ground, press the TOGA screw, takeoff, hit center CMD at 400 feet and it will do everything from there. Something's probably off with your init procedure. Give me some time and I'll write up a quick step by step list of exactly how I set it up...

[Orlaam 306]

But would that effect using V/S? That's the part I don't get. As far as my FMC goes, I literally go step by step through each page to make sure I don't miss anything. I even change the acceleration height sometimes. I double check my route and legs page, no discos, everything looks fine.I wish I had more time to experiment but with a needy girlfriend and other duties, I have so little time to fly anymore, let alone even get on the computer. :(

[Tabs 2,790]

But would that effect using V/S? That's the part I don't get. As far as my FMC goes, I literally go step by step through each page to make sure I don't miss anything. I even change the acceleration height sometimes. I double check my route and legs page, no discos, everything looks fine.I wish I had more time to experiment but with a needy girlfriend and other duties, I have so little time to fly anymore, let alone even get on the computer. :(

I reread your original post more closely and I think it might have something to do with the joystick now actually. When you have the AT "Controls Override" option checked, what that's doing is making your physical throttle act the way it does on a real 744. The problem with this is that the real 744's throttle physically moves under AT control using a servo, so the physical position of the throttle always matches up with what thrust setting the AT is commanding. I'm not aware of anything for FS other than really high end custom home cockpit stuff that has this sort of servo system.So... I think what could be happening here is that because your throttle isn't moving to the AT commanded positions, it's screwing up the actual thrust output for whatever reason. You can see it in the pic there, the commanded thrust is way up at the climb limit, but you're only getting some really low N1 %.I would try unchecking AT override in the options. What this does is basically lock out your throttle when the AT is engaged - while this isn't the ultimate in realism, it's what we recommend most people with normal joysticks do. (and it's what I do personally)Let me know if that fixes it.

[Orlaam 306]

Okay, perhaps I was confused as to how the option override worked with this plane. I'll give that a go and see what my result will be, thanks.