ND Problem - Huge difference between Track & actual Heading!

[BAW9DV 2]

Ok,

 

I'm at a bit of a loss at this but determined to try and solve it.....

 

Flew Trans-Atlantic yesterday to recreate the flight that one of my work team members was on when she flew From London to Newark, New Jersey then on to Cleveland, Ohio in the USA.   The long haul sector was flown using the Boeing 757-200 on United Airlines.  The second sector on to Cleveland was a Boeing 737-900 winglet version jet on the same airline (757 was PSS Pro from JustFlight and the 737-900 Winglet was the IFly 737-900, all flown in FS9).   The flight was flown entirely online on VATSIM (Squawkbox) and with ActiveSky Evolution for weather.

In order to prepare for this and recreate the flight as closely as possible, I re-installed my JustFlight PSS 757 Pro for FS9 and then added the ImagineSim Newark scenery and the CLE2003 Cleveland Hopkins Airport scenery (plus updates) to get ready.   Despite a friend very kindly getting the actual route for me, I was unable to use it due to time limitations.

 

Anyway, took off from Heathrow and headed out over the Atlantic.  As time went on I noticed that the diference between the track to the next waypoint and the actual heading of the aircraft was massive!   For example, at one point the track heading was ->285 and the actual direction the aircraft nose was pointing was some 22 degrees to the left showing a heading of ->263!   The wind was a headwind practically on the nose at ->291 at 55 knots.

 

This problem got a bit worse as time moved on through the 8-hour flight and it did not change much even though at one point the wind dropped to around 8 knots.   Sometimes the difference was up to 25 degrees!  As I descended into New York airspace, it got better, dropping to a difference of say 8 to 12 degrees.   On finals at Newark into runway 04L, I was right on the ILS and did a manual landing, following the ILS right down to the runway - but the track showing on the aircraft's Navigational Display (ND) was way off to the left!   However, I was able to make the flight and successfully navigate to the airport.

 

Next leg out of Newark to Cleveland, had much the same thing happening except that this time when I began the turn to final for runway 06R at Cleveland Hopkins, I had to manually turn the aircraft as the LOC button, while activated did not cause the aircraft to turn.  Before we flew through the localiser, I therefore turned manually and flew down to the runway as a manual landing again, with the ND display showing a track that was way off to the left.

 

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The last time this happened, after Googling the problem, I re-installed the MAGDEC.BGL file in case it had been corrupted.   This made no difference.   I tried updating the MAGDEC.BGL file to the newer one available now from a site online but this did not remove the problem so I reverted back to the earlier file.   I suspected that installing the new LatinVFR KMIAv2 scenery might have caused it but after removing the scenery, had the same issue.   I also suspected a recent Captain Sim 757 Base pack install (was introduced to this by a friend who said it flew better than the PSS Pro version) and I did find that the install had made no Registry entry, no START menu option and no un-install option (Windows XP Pro SP3 installed here on my system).

 

So - I did a System Restore and restored back to before I installed the Captain Sim 757 - and all was well.   I reinstalled the Windows Critical Updates that were now missing after the restore back and corrected a few scenery issues but all was fine.  Flew Charlottle to Miami (LatinVFR v2 installed back) and no problem.   Until yesterday.......

 

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The more I look at this, the more I suspect that it might be an AIRAC or Navdata issue although I'm at a loss to sort it out.   The errors all seem to be shown on the aircraft's Navigation Display rather than in the actual FS world, since I did manage to successfully navigate from Heathrow to Newark and then on to Cleveland.   I did a full AIRAC update before flying yesterday's trips - so what to do next?

 

I'd like to avoid another System Restore, mainly because I still do not understand what caused this - and I restore might cure the issue only until I inadvertantly create it again!

 

Anyone here have any ideas on how to solve this?  I would appreciate any useful comments....

 

Very many thanks,

 

Lee

[rainerk 1]

You may want to try this:
"I have moved my default magdec.bgl to a high scenery layer so that it loads after all other sceneries and this seems to ensure that FS's intended settings survive."

(Advice from Flightsim Forum).

 

I followed this suggestion and never had the problem again.

 

Step by step:
- Create a new folder (I named mine "_MagDec")

- in that folder create a subfolder named "scenery"

- copy the file "magdec.bgl" from the folder G:\Flight Simulator 9\Scenery\BASE\Scenery to the scenery folder you just created

- register your new scenery entry and make sure it is the highest entry in your scenery.cfg

 

You may also want to check if the file "magdec.bgl" is the FS9 default one. If so it should be dated 04-Mar-03 and weigh 128 kB.

[BAW9DV 2]

Hello Rainerk,

 

Ok I have tried this and I have placed the default Cessna on runway 22R at KEWR which is where I took off from on the second sector.

 

I seem to remember that the runway heading yesterday was showing 205 but now it shows 218 which is closer to the actual runway 22R heading as it should be.

 

I'm going to try to repeat the KEWR-KCLE flight later today to see if this cures it.

 

One more question - do you copy the MagDec.bgl file into the new folder, register it in the scenery library and then leave the original file in SCENERY\BASE\SCENERY folder?   Or do you delete the original file from SCENERY\BASE\SCENERY folder after you have copied it?

 

Obviously, if I leave it, I'll have loaded two copies of the same file possibly needlessly....

 

Cheers,

 

 

Lee

[rainerk 1]

You're right, the copy in the BASE folder can be deleted.

Or better yet - rename it, so it is not loaded but still there if the need to access or check the file arises.

I usually rename those files - mostly FS9 default files I'm reluctant to delete - to *.bgx.

So in this case "magdec.bgl" becomes "magdec.bgx".

[BAW9DV 2]

Ok Thanks,

 

We'll see how it goes ....

 

Take care,

 

 

Lee

[rainerk 1]

ERROR ALERT! ERROR ALERT!

 

Do NOT - repeat do NOT- delete or rename the file "magdec.bgl" in the BASE folder.

If you do your FS9 may be unable to start and produce the message "Your computer has run out of memory ..." (the dreaded OOM message).

 

Leave the file in the BASE folder, and you'll be OK.

Having both files active seems to be no problem.

 

Sorry for the confusion.