FSX-MS Maddening Fuel Issue PMDG 737 NGX

[Mike Hawkeye Hawkins 0]

So, after learning how to fly the Wilco Feelthere 737, I decided to step up to the Big Leagues and purchase the PMDG 737 NGX 800/900 versions.

It's been quite the learning curve over the Wilco plane. I think I've just about got enough info to get this thing into the air, but I'm hitting a MAJOR snag! No matter how much fuel I put into this plane, I run out of fuel either before getting to the runway, or very shortly after takeoff.

I HAVE to be doing something wrong, I would imagine, but I cannot figure out what.

This is hugely frustrating, but for those few seconds of flight I AM getting, I'm enjoying this bird.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

[Jim Young 2,356]

We have some experts who visit AVSIM from the PMDG Forums (hosted by AVSIM) but mostly they stay in the PMDG Forums so you might want to ask your question there.  Running out of fuel before getting to the runway is indicative you might have a fuel leak programmed but you would have had to turn that on via the failure settings in the FMC.

[ESzczesniak 128]

Any chance you’ve forgotten to turn on the fuel pumps? If I recall correctly, they should be largely gravity feed, but you’ll be prone to loss of fuel flow and flame out if they’re not on. Or are you changing fuel with the FSX/P3D menu? Because this won’t work for the PMDG, so you may see strange effects. 

[Bob Scott 7,716]

5 hours ago, ESzczesniak said:

Any chance you’ve forgotten to turn on the fuel pumps? If I recall correctly, they should be largely gravity feed, but you’ll be prone to loss of fuel flow and flame out if they’re not on. Or are you changing fuel with the FSX/P3D menu? Because this won’t work for the PMDG, so you may see strange effects. 

To expand on this--you set fuel via the PMDG Options page in the FMS, NOT with the regular FSX aircraft menu.

Regards

[Mike Hawkeye Hawkins 0]

1 hour ago, w6kd said:

To expand on this--you set fuel via the PMDG Options page in the FMS, NOT with the regular FSX aircraft menu.

Regards

To kill two birds with one stone, here, I'll answer two questions here. The fuel pumps are on. I got used to doing that with the Wilco bird I flew, previously. I also checked my failures, and cleared them out in the FMC. I also change all fuel through the FMC. The game kinda forces me to, because for some reason, when I load up the bird, it bounces around because FSX overfills it with fuel for some reason. So, I have to slew it to get it to quit bouncing, and then go with a standard fill through the FMC, all while the bird is "cold and dark".

To further expand on this post, I was able to fly my last flight with normal fuel flow last night. I haven't tried to repeat this process again, today, but I will be soon. I am COMPLETELY unaware of what I may have done to make this work, but for that one flight, it did. Hoping for more of that!

[Bob Scott 7,716]

If, by "run out of fuel" you mean that your fuel tank quantities go to zero, other than the common mistake of using the FSX menu to change fuel load in the PMDG panel, I couldn't imagine what would do that.

On the other hand, if you mean the engines are shutting down due to fuel starvation, another possibility might be that you have an axis assigned to the mixture controls and it is spiking (even momentarily) to zero.  A noisy pot in a hardware control can do this...and sometimes unwanted "phantom" axis assignments are made automatically by FSX (e.g. a thumbstick on a gamepad connected to the PC) and you can have that axis sending spikes or other unwanted inputs to the sim.  Check the controls menu for unwanted devices and/or axis assignments and remove those you don't intend to be there.

Regards

[James Smith 4]

you should post this here https://www.avsim.com/forums/forum/432-pmdg-737ngx/

[Mike Hawkeye Hawkins 0]

Just wanted to say I figured the issue out. I'll explain.

Sometimes, and I'm sure others have experienced this, when FSX loads the plane, it is loaded at like 10 times the gas that the plane can actually hold, which causes the plane to bounce when it loads. I would "fix" this by immediately slewing the plane to arrest the bounce, and then go into the FMC and load it at "2/3" or "1/3" full. Two things were happening at that point. One, it really wasn't loading at 1/3 capacity. It was actually more like 10%, and it was also causing the center fuel pumps to show a failure, so I wasn't getting really good flow at all, causing the problems I had told you all about.

When I ensured that the tanks were filled to proper capacity, which sometimes takes a reboot of FSX, and loading another plane first, that issue stopped happening.

If you guys know how to mark this as solved, please do so! Thanks for all the input!

[Dio 8]

It is mandatory that your default flight is the trike. You have to read the manual. You cannot select 737 after you have finished a flight for example with an airbus 320.

Another approach is to put the Total Fuel Amount where it says Total 1 Left LSK. Also PMDG has a fuel calculator from downloads/miscellaneous/737NG Fuel Planner if you don't own one.

Regards.

Edited June 16, 2018 by Dio