I have been trying to learn how to land this giant and SOMETIMES i am able to lower the gears and do a landing.However, most ot the time the gears refuse to open up and drop down. I am well under the max speed for lowering the undercarriage (Which is 270 knots according to the info on the kneeboard), i have done many attempts to try to find out HOW to extend the gears (different speeds, different flap settings etc) but they refuse to pop out. Once i was scraping the 747 against the runway @ Arlanda, THEN the gears dropped down - into the ground.There is no logic clue as to why they work and why they dont, i cannot find any related switches/settings/speeds that explain why and now i am beginning to feel like it is a bug.If anyone have any idea why, then PLEASE post.Thanks in advance.

In FS9 747, I lower gear after flaps 10 are extended,at about 170 knts, 24% fuel load.Peter Sydney Australia

Hi!A thought: Are you using the keyboard keys or using the mouse pointer on those occasions?I always use the keys for gear and flaps, but sometimes when I try to turn a switch or a knob on a FSX panel using the mouse pointer, nothing happens!I switch to another panel and back again and then everything will work. Sometimes it's enough to close the ATC window!Just a thought!I hope that your problems will be solved!Haraldh F.

I know gear extension speed is 270K but that doesn't seem to work. Try 200K. It works for me.

Your airline bosses would not be in love with you if you always dropped the gear at 270 knots, that's for sure :-)Although you can certainly do it, and most Standard Operating Procedure manuals would probably tell you so too (if you needed to lose speed after a late descent clearance for example), those same S.O.P.s will probably also have recommended speeds at which you actually 'should' drop the gear to avoid strain and wear on the mechanisms. As boring as it may sound, most airline pilots have to consider stuff like that, as airlines want to wear out their aeroplanes as little as possible (the high-cycle budget airlines are replacing their jets after as little as five years' use these days). They also prefer 'firm landings' too incidentally, as it wears the tyres out a lot less, since they don't skid as much.You might want to try assigning a key press for the gear to your joystick or yoke, that might solve things, particularly if you have a different USB port for the joystick. Personally, I use the 'G' key when flying from my computer and it seems to be okay. And, incidentally, I don't rely on FS2 Crews' co-pilot for the 747 as he has on occasion reported 'gear up' after take-off, only for me to discover that they were actually still down, and in fact i had to abort a flight once and return to the airport because of that, since by the time I had discovered it, they were jammed down (so much for the co-pilot making life easier). If only they had added an announcement in the FS2 Crew 747 add-on which allowed you to say: 'Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Manchester again, sorry about that, but if you would like to lynch the co-pilot, whose fault it was, he's at exit L2 right now'. So if you are using the FSCrew add-on, that might be your issue.In any case, there have been several problems reported with the default 747, (livery changing while in flight, MCP refusing to allow setting changes etc, etc) so it may very well not be anything you are doing wrong at all.

I have assigned the key to the joystick and tried that too, but no joy on that, neither if i push the key on the keyboard or if i pull the lever down in the virtual cockpit (VC) - the gears wont budge.The lever just go down in VC, but when i switch to exterior view, they are still up.

Fuel load you say.. going to try to burn some and see if that helps.

I have switched views alot (I have to so i can see if the gears have lowered themselves).

Well... they should have popped out at 145 then (just over the runway @ final approach).

There seems to be another problem with the 747! On the VC the V/S and Alt buttons don't seem to function, they do work in the 2D cockpit!

I did 5 more landings with the 747 from my inflight savegame.I applied full flaps, pulled the nose up hard and lowered the gear lever. Every time the gears popped out at 210-220 knots and i could do a successful landing.It looks like they are more "armed" to pop out at that speed. 270 is just "in theory". Why the didnt go off at lower speed (when i tried landing earlier @ 145 KIAS) i dont know.. but at least now i know how to get the gears out when doing final approach.Just have to make sure that i do the "slowdown" earlier then i can lower flaps+gears to use that as drag to lower the speed at that time instead of the speedbreak then apply throttle to keep above stall speed.Anyway, thanks for the tips.

I'm not sure why you're even trying to extend your gear at such speeds. Speed restriction below 10,000 feet is 250kt IAS max. Ideally you should be doing no more than 210kt on downwind, 180kt on crosswind until ILS intercept. IRL, ATC will often ask you to maintain 180kt until the outer marker. But once within the OM, you should be reducing to your final approach speed which for a typically loaded 744 is, what, 156kt? I typically extend gears once over the OM and never above 180kt.http://www.commerciallevel.com/base/suppor...46supporter.jpg

Why? Its called being curious. If i get a manual and a proper instruction on how to fly, where is the fun in that? To explore every airplane and its characteristics is part of the fun. Like a test pilot.I just did a transatlantic flight from De Gaulle to JFK, (40% fuel left, Woow - the range is INCREDIBLE!!) time was 5.5 hours @ around 300 knots. Unfortunately, arriving at JFK the descent speed were too low so i got a bath just before i hit runway 4R :(I did lots of landings today from different distances and different altitudes just to see how the plane behaved and to learn landing, but it seems like i need some more practice. Ahwell, one more experience to add to memory :)

Speed restriction below 10,000 feet is 250kt IAS>max.Common misconception. It is for aircraft that can safely operate in that range. IIRC the 747 is not part of that group along with 777, DC-10, MD-11 and maybe the A340.