Be careful with some aircraft.cfg lines from repainters

[Boeing or not going 578]

FYI The aircraft.cfg may have invalid lines created by repainters. The atc_flight_number= cannot have letters in it, it must be numbers only. 185L and LH200 are examples in a KLM 772 and Lufthansa Cargo repaint. - David Lee

[Guest]

I'm interested in this - are you referring to ICAO mandatory standards or referring to what it can do in the sim - by way of throwing errors, etc?

I have a BA repaint of the 777 which is quirky to say the least - unlike my official PMDG BA Livery one which behaves perfectly.

Edited March 21, 2018 by Guest

[Mike777 163]

4 hours ago, ganter said:

I have a BA repaint of the 777 which is quirky to say the least - unlike my official PMDG BA Livery one which behaves perfectly.

Hi ganter,

Take a look in the aircraft.cfg file. It is editable with notepad.  There will be an entry for every livery installed.  Each one starts with [fltsim.[number, starting with 0]} Look at the entries for the PMDG-supplied British Airways entry and then compare it to the entries for the 3rd party repaint.  Be sure to back up the aircraft.cfg file first.

You will probably find mistakes in the 3rd party livery entry in these lines.  They affect how FSX's ATC calls the aircraft:

atc_airline=SPEED BIRD
atc_id=G-STBB1
atc_flight_number=16

Mike

 

[Guest]

Thanks Mike. Is that the only error it throws; Default ATC addressing you incorrectly?

or does this cause errors as a result that go further and potentially cause a freeze/ crash?

 

[Mike777 163]

15 minutes ago, ganter said:

Thanks Mike. Is that the only error it throws; Default ATC addressing you incorrectly?

or does this cause errors as a result that go further and potentially cause a freeze/ crash?

I would be surprised if it caused a freeze or crash, but you never know with FSX,

What issue are you having?

Mike

 

[Guest]

Well Mike,

I installed the PMDG official Livery of BA into my sim a while back.

Whilst flying on my VA's Live ACARS I noticed the name of the aircraft type was displayed as "PMDG 777 British Airways Fictional".

I thought that looked a bit cr*p so I copied the aircraft and renamed it in the aircraft.cfg as "Airframe: PMDG 777LR British Airways"

 I flew that one a couple of times and had CTD's or black screen freezes so just started putting up with the former aircraft when flying as it works superbly. I don't fly using Default ATC apart from a quick tuning of the ATIS after loading up AS16. I fly online on Vatsim most of the time - well, when I'm flying tubeliners.

It may just be coincidence. My sim was a bit kranky at the time anyway. That's why I asked you if erroneous descriptions in the aircraft.cfg could cause problems. Your original post triggered that memory and I wondered if there might be a link.

Jim

[Mike777 163]

47 minutes ago, ganter said:

Well Mike,

I installed the PMDG official Livery of BA into my sim a while back.

Whilst flying on my VA's Live ACARS I noticed the name of the aircraft type was displayed as "PMDG 777 British Airways Fictional".

I thought that looked a bit cr*p so I copied the aircraft and renamed it in the aircraft.cfg as "Airframe: PMDG 777LR British Airways"

 I flew that one a couple of times and had CTD's or black screen freezes so just started putting up with the former aircraft when flying as it works superbly. I don't fly using Default ATC apart from a quick tuning of the ATIS after loading up AS16. I fly online on Vatsim most of the time - well, when I'm flying tubeliners.

It may just be coincidence. My sim was a bit kranky at the time anyway. That's why I asked you if erroneous descriptions in the aircraft.cfg could cause problems. Your original post triggered that memory and I wondered if there might be a link.

Jim

Hi Jim,

I don't know all of the possible entries in an aircraft.cfg file but I don't recall ever seeing a line that starts with "Airframe".  Also, the usual format has an "=" sign, e.g. "atc_airline=" followed by an airline's name.  So it is possible that putting a non-standard instruction in the cfg file caused a crash.

I also don't know where the ACARS program is getting its info from, but you might look and see if the word "fictional" appears anywhere in a BA entry in the aircraft.cfg file and try deleting it.  A BA livery for a 777-200LR would be "fictional" as British Airways does not have any -200LRs (200ERs & 300ERs yes, 200LRs no).  Looking in the Op Center, I see that PMDG does offer a fictional livery for the 777-200LR, so if you installed that, perhaps the word "fictional" is included somewhere in the aircraft.cfg file entry for that livery.  If the word "fictional" appears in the "title= " line, if you remove it you will lose all your saved flights with that livery, but it shouldn't cause a sim crash.  If you find it elsewhere it probably won't cause any issues, but back up the aircraft.cfg file just to be safe.

Mike

EDIT:

OK I just installed the United Battleship Gray fictional livery for the 777-200LR, and the word "fictional" appears in the "Title = " line and the "ui_variation= " line.  If you make any changes in the title line you will not be able to load saved flights that were saved using the former title, but if you change it in "ui_variation" you should not have a problem.  In either case, the aircraft and installed liveries should continue to work just fine.

 

Edited March 21, 2018 by Mike777
additional information

[Rickie Welsh 27]

Hello Mike,  I am an old timer,looking for some sympathy.  Re your last reply, I am not sure if I am on the right tack or not but am I right in thinking that when I compile a route  and save it the system also saves the  aircraft I used for that purpose.  Ordinarily when I save a route I select beforehand the aircraft i.e. 737ngx and whatever livery I fancy at the time but later on when selecting that  aircraft  and that route I just select a livery that takes my fancy.  All in all I don't get any problems. Regards.  Richard Welsh.

Edited March 22, 2018 by Olympic260

[Mike777 163]

1 hour ago, richard welsh said:

Hello Mike,  I am an old timer,looking for some sympathy.  Re your last reply, I am not sure if I am on the right tack or not but am I right in thinking that when I compile a route  and save it the system also saves the  aircraft I used for that purpose.  Ordinarily when I save a route I select beforehand the aircraft i.e. 737ngx and whatever livery I fancy at the time but later on when selecting that  aircraft  and that route I just select a livery that takes my fancy.  All in all I don't get any problems. Regards.

Hi Richard,

I think we've corresponded before.  You are a little older a timer than me but not all that much!

AFAIK, routes are separate from the aircraft.  You could create a route in the Delta livery of an NGX 737-800, save it, and use it with a KLM 737-900 NGX or really any PMDG plane (there is a particular route format for all PMDG aircraft).  Note that there is a difference between saving the flight plan (route) and saving the flight situation. 

I believe that when you save a route, you have the choice of the NGX flight plan folder or the generic, shared folder.  If you put it in the shared folder it will be available to any PMDG plane.  You could certainly create a route in an NGX FMC, save the route, and then load it and fly it with a 747 QOT.  Other parameters like fuel, cruise altitude, etc. would need to be changed, but you should be able to fly the same flight plan.  

If you look in the folder,  ... FSX\PMDG\FLIGHTPLANS you will see flight plans available for all PMDG aircraft.  You will also see a subfolder for each PMDG aircraft you own.  Inside each there will be flight plans for that specific aircraft type.  But you can copy them to the general FLIGHTPLANS folder and they will be available for all aircraft. 

It is true that if you save a flight with a flight plan loaded (may need to be activated), and then reload the flight, the flight plan will be reloaded too.  This is very useful if you saved a flight in mid-cruise.  But if you had also saved  the flight plan separately in any PMDG aircraft, it would be available for other types of PMDG aircraft to use. 

Finally, what I said also applies to flight plans created using the FSX flight plan function.  If you save an FSX flight plan, it should be available for every aircraft in FSX.  Opening a saved flight will also open the flight plan that was loaded when you saved the flight. I'm not sure whether you can avoid saving a flight plan you created using FSX's flight planner.

Hope this helps rather than creating more confusion!

Mike

[Rickie Welsh 27]

Hello Mike, Thanks very much for clarifying my question, I knew if anyone had a sensible reply it would be you. Regards. Richard Welsh

[kevinh 409]

On 21/03/2018 at 10:09 AM, Boeing or not going said:

FYI The aircraft.cfg may have invalid lines created by repainters. The atc_flight_number= cannot have letters in it, it must be numbers only. 185L and LH200 are examples in a KLM 772 and Lufthansa Cargo repaint. - David Lee

This makes it sound rather alarming but it’s only a problem if you use default ATC. 

You can always get around this by changing the flight number when you load the aircraft. P3D and FSX will remember the change next time you load that livery. In FSX you need select “Details” after you select the aircraft to view the flight number, registration, etc. 

Edited March 22, 2018 by kevinh