When to try out the Longitude today and had some massive problems getting the engines to start.  When I loaded in and turned the batteries on, the engine switches under the cover were already both in RUN and pressing them wouldn't toggle them off.  Having never ever loaded into the aircraft other than in the Hangar I didn't think much of it.  Followed the checklist, pressed the starter, N2 spools up, fuel goes active, nothing. Hmm that's weird.  Go look at video on YouTube, yep looks like I didn't miss any buttons like fuel tanks or bleed or whatever. 

Finally figured it out.  I don't know if this is a random bug or what, but I had automixture turned on still as I getting back into things after a couple years away and wanted one less thing to deal with.  I noticed in the props though I could still use the slider axis on my X52 that I bound to the "mixture axis" (vs individual engine mixtures for if you had a multi-engine plane).  Normally I just leave it at 100%. 

Seems it caused a loading bug and the engines wouldn't fire up like this.  If I pulled the slider back both engine run switches turned off then I could toggle them individually.  Putting it back to full turned them both on, but again I could still then toggle them.  I then tried a few combos of switching auto-mixture on/off and reloading the flight, loading a new one, etc. and never had this happen again.  I guess I figured I'd mostly post this in case in anyone has the same problem I did and can't figure out what's going on.  This is the first time since release I've had this happen and I've been using the A320 quite a bit and some attempts at the 787.  Never had any engine start problems in those though. 

I decided to leave auto-mixture on until I can get the upcoming Honeycomb throttle (and a yoke to match of course) and re-bound the slider to the prop axis for when I'm flying adjustable prop aircraft.  I'm hoping that ends up being a safer option, and I can't accidentally bump the slider during flight and kill the engines in a jet.

Edited September 10, 20205 yr by flyinion

Thank you!!!

This was driving me nuts until I found your post.   I have a lever on a CH Yoke bound to mixture (-100 - +100) axis and the run/stop buttons were always in run and the engines would not light.   Moving the mixture lever to the fully lean position allows the buttons to function normally and engines can be started.  Note: There is also a mixture (0 - +100) axis binding option but I am not using that and don't know if that matters for this workaround.

This applies to both the CJ4 and Longitude:

- Mixture lever in fully lean position: Engine run/stop buttons in the CJ4 and Longitude work normally and engines can be started

- Mixture lever in any other position:  run/stop buttons are always in run mode and engines cannot be started (except with ctrl-E autostart mode)

- Moving mixture lever to fully lean from any other position: sets run/stop buttons to stop mode and stops engines if they are running.   Run/Stop buttons will work normally.

- When starting from cold and dark I have to move the mixture lever rich and then fully lean once to reset it, otherwise it will be in the "always in run but engines won't start" mode.

Edited October 3, 20205 yr by N7470

I had the same problem - yes, you can make the Engine Buttons under the cover STOP by pulling back the hardware mixture lever.

But there is another - easier - way to make them STOP and then RUN: Just click the Buttons after opening the cover TWICE - the first click makes it STOP, the second click RUN, then press the starter - and voila - the engines run up :-)