Well after several weeks I have mastered the cold and dark start-up, opening and closing all passenger and cargo, doors  taxiing, take off, and into "clear" operation however aggravating problems persist.

,

1. About 40% of the time it wont go into CMD.

 

2. It almost never will go into LNAV.

 

3. It will start a climb (or descent) in V/S, FLCH, VNAV and suddenly stop operating, sometimes after a couple of minutes or sometimes 10-20 seconds.  This occurs about 50% of the time.

 

4. Sometimes after a half hour of flying it will suddenly go into a dive or straight up in the air stall or out of control turns.  If I am in a VA flight the "crash" is not good.

 

5 One of the latest, just a couple of days old, is non-stop noise that is about the same as the overspeed warning but much louder.  You can't eliminate it by turning all the sound setting sliders to zero.  Some times I have been able to silence it by moving the mouse slowly over the EFIS settings area but this doesn't work for the long haul.

 

Are the above problems common?  If so how do you fix them?  I would appreciate any suggestions as I would love to put my 747 into the regular rotation.

 

Looking forward to some replies-- Ben Metcalfe

Hi bensmini,

 

 

Remember that the problem is unlikely to be with the -8 but the 747 itself [as it's only a sound and exterior expansion basically].

 

You should be able to replicate the problems when just flying the -400 which I would try first.. Then, go down your list and give more information of the situation that this is happening.

 

Hope you get it sorted,

 

Alex 

Hi Alex, Thanks for your reply but it doesn't help me very much.  Even if I was able to get the 400 to replicate the 800 problems what would I have?  By the way I was able to see some the same behavior with  the 400 but that still doesn't solve the problems.  I'll wait and see if there are any other responses, if not I'll delete and re-install.

 

Ben Metcalfe

 

 

Are the above problems common?  If so how do you fix them?  I would appreciate any suggestions as I would love to put my 747 into the regular rotation.

 

Hardware.  I'm about 90% sure of it based on your listed symptoms.  Set up a flight, take off, and then unplug your joystick and try and fly with the autopilot alone.  If it stays in CMD and allows you to use the other functions, then your joystick is to blame.

 

Often, hardware either spikes, or you have a trim axis set on the hardware and forget to zero it out on the hardware before engaging the autopilot.  You can mitigate hardware spikes through setting null zones, and the trim issues by using up/down button assignments instead.  Occasionally, updating the hardware driver can help.  Also, if it's truly the hardware, uninstall/reinstall wouldn't fix anything.

 

Also, just a heads up, this is a free forum.  None of us are getting paid to offer help, so despite what you may think about the worth of Alex's post, it did actually contain valid points.

i got the Saitek yoke, throttle and pedals after buying 747-400X.  I also have the AV8TR stick plugged in my computer.  For a while I would have random engine failures with full fuel.  i could not restart and end up crashing.  I also had problems on approaches where the engines would spool up.  One day i was on an approach when the engines spooled up.  I had a thought and looked at the stick. The throttle on the stick was full thrust.  When I returned the stick thrust to idle i had control of the airplane.  I disconnected the AV8TR.   No more problems.