Autopilot initiates a spiral dive

[Bert Pieke 7,590]

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

[RobJC 2,073]

23 minutes ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

I saw something similar. I was on AP and decided to use active pause. When i took it off spiral dive. It could be a feature. 🙂

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

1 hour ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

Nope, I get it also, usually on descent to final. It makes no difference whether I use either FSUIPC7 or default controls, nor does having the latest G1000 mod either installed or not make a difference.  What I've noticed is that simultaneously, one of two things happens. Either the throttle goes to full rich or the elevator trim goes full nose down. Patch 3 made the autopilot a little more reliable, though. I can usually fly a complete flight without a glitch, as long as I avoid using settings that have previously been reported as buggy.

[sd_flyer 6,087]

1 hour ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

It happened to me when airplane weight exceeds take off max gross weight.

[rockme 0]

Have the same issue!! AP on and my plane dives down to the right side.

[F1Fan 123]

Me too, I thought it was just me.   Really struggling with these aircraft.  I know they are more modern than the old FSX/P3D aircraft so it could be something I am doing wrong but they are sure sensitive to fly. 

[Slides 1,552]

Luckily, never had this happen so far.

[Sigwolf 222]

Happened to me last night in the A320, which had been operating perfectly for many flights before that.

[RamonB 449]

2 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

Nope. Known bug for few/some/many. Since before launch. (What triggers it? Is unknown to me.)
Search for "autopilot spin", "autopilot bug"  or "suicidal autopilot" in the MSFS forums.

Edit: Can happen anytime, even without hitting active pause.

 

Edited October 1, 2020 by RamonB

[kerosene31 349]

I get this anytime I use active pause.  I've learned to never use it, otherwise when I un-pause the plane is completely out of control.  

Otherwise, I've had sudden loss of power that causes the AP to mess up.  Was the plane stable when hand flying?  I know in the Cessna 172 I'll just be climbing slowly and the stall horn will blare and the AP can't hold it (but it is the loss of speed causing the issue).  

[Mike S KPDX 598]

2 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

Bert, try this.  Please turn off (via slider) airliner and general traffic densities.  Then try your complete flight.  I have stated elsewhere on these forums that there is an issue here that can be easily reproduced.  This has to do with 'ghost' manipulation of the controls/switches.  It seems that if you are within a certain radius (either in the air or on the ground) of a same or similar AI controlled type, those AI actions also effect your aircraft.  So you may be overflying an airport that has these types of planes.  I can sit in the TBM at a midsized airport, turn on the battery (this seems to activate the AI operations) and then turn it off.  If I wait about 5-15 minutes, multiple switches will suddenly start flipping on/off or changing in random order, including the AP.  Maybe I screwed something up in my install, but this is definitely a reproducible error on my set up.

That is my thought at least, would love to know if this effects others.

 

[ErichB 3,651]

2 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

No, I have had this too.  

[PurdueKev 159]

6 hours ago, Bert Pieke said:

I have been experiencing this for a while... happily flying on autopilot, GPS NAV mode and without warning, the autopilot puts me into a spiral dive.

I have not seen a lot of comments about this on the forum.. is it just me?

I have had it once in about three flights since the previous patch. I haven't fired up 1.9.3 yet.  But exact same behavior as you describe.

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

@Mike S KPDX has hit upon the commonly suggested workaround, but that workaround also eliminates AI traffic, which seems to be equivalent to giving MSFS a lobotomy. Then again, the AI Traffic is pretty bad right now, so maybe the lobotomy is justified in order to cure the patient. Just to note, there is a similar bug with the MSFS scenery library, which has showed up with FSDT's wonderful payware KEYW. Naming certain Community folder scenery files with the same name supposedly causes interactions between the two pieces of scenery that are unintended,like missing buildings and floating cars and SimObjects.

It's baffling that such simple mistakes were overlooked.

[jabloomf1230 2,445]

Here's a discussion of the error that was originally affecting KEYW and how to avoid it:

https://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/texture-issues-on-some-systems.449298/#post-857834

Too many freeware developers were calling things scenery.bgl and modellib.bgl.

Edited October 2, 2020 by jabloomf1230