iniBuilds A300-600 has been released! (reopened)

[DaveS 146]

another thing I noticed it the animation of the gear retracting in external view was extremally slow. I was passing 3,000ft before the doors fully closed. Granted I don't normally fly in external view but with a new plane I like the check everything out

[regis9 4,039]

1 hour ago, sd_flyer said:

Wasn't 310 had  "rain wipe effect" with wipers that actually wipe rain? Oddly enough no such feature in 300

I had it today while at the gate, once I started moving it went away though.

[regis9 4,039]

19 minutes ago, DaveS said:

another thing I noticed it the animation of the gear retracting in external view was extremally slow. I was passing 3,000ft before the doors fully closed. Granted I don't normally fly in external view but with a new plane I like the check everything out

I noticed that too, it also means that the “thump” of the gear doors closing is quite a bit later than expected…on my first flight I thought I had a compressor stall or something, I wasn’t expecting a series of loud bangs that long after take off.

[Mace 1,955]

10 hours ago, MikeyOnTheFlightDeck said:

Can anyone suggest some good and realistic routes to fly with this bird?  Most current ones seem to be freight only which is great, but any good passenger examples or ways of looking up the history of some routes that used to be operational?

Flight Scheduler is an app from a few years back, which has hundreds of real-world routes -- see below

https://www.dropbox.com/s/h3yjkzpgkx8estn/FlightScheduler_1.7.zip?dl=0

You can also Google "Flight Scheduler 1.7" and there are some old Reddit posts about it from the author etc. etc.

[Flic1 1,000]

1 hour ago, Bob Scott said:

Sounds--the volume and balance between engines and environment is pretty boogered-up.  The engine sounds are really loud at idle, then the engine volume decreases as you power up to takeoff power, and then it almost vanishes as you climb through the teens.  When you reduce power back to low/idle power in a descent, the engine sound comes roaring back in.  The sounds themselves are good, but the weird volume and mixing really detracts.  The A310 suffers the same issues, but since this one isn't suffering from the curse of MS marketplace encryption, maybe FTSIM+ or someone else can get hold of it and fix this.

Spot on with this.  Really some strange stuff going on with the sounds.  I had to turn Environment sounds in EFB all the way up to get get wind noise. The engine sounds....well, that varies so much so I haven't really found a happy medium....maybe a little above mid-setting in EFB.  They are super loud at idle so I find I have to keep messing with my speaker volumes as well throughout the flight.  I do have it sounding good on climbout and the engine sounds fade out nicely in the teens.  There is also that odd 'spatial' effect where you turn your head and the sounds fade out.  I have FSR so I use it to add some additional Windscreen noise and ground roll sounds. I am not sure why no one seems to bother with the ground roll sounds.  Only FBW have done it on the A32N. I hope they can fix these things because otherwise it ha been a nice couple of flights.  I have not had the bug with 'Direct-To' yet.

I also agree on the LNAV...super smooth, I am not sure why PMDG cant get that right on the 737....??

Edited December 29, 2023 by Flic1

[Bob Scott 7,748]

38 minutes ago, DaveS said:

another thing I noticed it the animation of the gear retracting in external view was extremally slow. I was passing 3,000ft before the doors fully closed. Granted I don't normally fly in external view but with a new plane I like the check everything out

Indeed.  Here's a video of an A300 departing KMIA.  At ~2:41 in you can watch the gear retracting...takes about 6 seconds.  It's probably 3-4 times that in the ini bird.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IprvsQiOnE

[Mace 1,955]

1 hour ago, Bob Scott said:

Flight dynamics--severely underpowered performance at altitude.  Climb performance is largely a function of thrust-to-weight ratio.  A fully loaded 747-400 with four of the same CF6 engines as the A300 has a thrust-to-weight ratio of ~0.26, and can climb through the high 20s at 2000-3000 fpm.  Contrast that to a 280,000 lb A300 with a MUCH higher thrust-to-weight ratio of 0.43--the A300 should be able to climb at 3000-4000+ fpm through the high 20s, not the really wimpy 700-800 fpm I'm seeing.

Did you have ISA + ++ temps on your flight?  I saw 2000+ fpm climbs in the high 20's with the postal cargo load and a decent amount of fuel.

I'll have to try some more flights and see if I run into wimpy climb rates.

[Bob Scott 7,748]

Just now, Mace said:

Did you have ISA + ++ temps on your flight?  I saw 2000+ fpm climbs in the high 20's with the postal cargo load and a decent amount of fuel.

I'll have to try some more flights and see if I run into wimpy climb rates.

I had 75K lbs of cargo and 30K fuel, TOGW was ~284K, which is a relatively light gross weight (MTOGW is 376K).  Temps didn't look aberrant.  The "postal load" selection just determines what kind of containers are in the back--are you sure you had any mass loaded?  That'd be in the weight and balance section of the EFB.

[Zangoose 1,634]

v1.0.1
Update has been pushed out: https://forum.inibuilds.com/topic/20551-inibuilds-a300-600r-airliner-for-msfs-v101-released/

Edited December 29, 2023 by Zangoose

[Mace 1,955]

33 minutes ago, Bob Scott said:

I had 75K lbs of cargo and 30K fuel, TOGW was ~284K, which is a relatively light gross weight (MTOGW is 376K).  Temps didn't look aberrant.  The "postal load" selection just determines what kind of containers are in the back--are you sure you had any mass loaded?  That'd be in the weight and balance section of the EFB.

Hmm...now that's a possibility (that I didn't have any actual mass loaded) and I'll pay closer attention next time.   I didn't realize the load section didn't actually put "physical" weight back there.  That seems strange, and not how I would program things.  If I selected postal load, I want the weight, too, not just a pretty picture.

[Krakin 5,841]

v1.0.1 of the iniBuilds A300-600R Airliner for MSFS has been released. This update fixes a variety of issue from block and ZFW fields not clearing on turnarounds as well as VNAV ToD improvements, including the DCT to bug causing crash bug. 

This update can be downloaded via the iniManager.

v1.0.1

Fixed - Turnaround flight, block and ZFW fields not automatically cleared
Fixed  - DCT to bug causing crash bug fixed
Fixed - SFPI Speed brake light does not illuminate when speed brakes are extended 
Fixed -  TRP Should switch to GA at Slats extension
Fixed -  different F speed appears (depending on the 15/15 or 15/20 condition) 
Fixed - Wrong logic with the PRE-SET speed activation: Should only activate that speed when LVL/CH or ALT Selected or in ALT*
Fixed - ARC ILS rotation issue
Fixed - GSE items moving with rudder 
Fixed - Engine EGT reacts to fuel lever when engine is not started 
Fixed  -EHAM Runway degrees bug
Fixed - Pressurization gauges
Fixed -  Sim ATC reads COM3 by default
Fixed - Double P.DES FMA
Fixed  - Spawning on the RWY has no GW showing 
Fixed - GPU Indication issue 
Fixed - VNAV T/D improvements 
Fixed - Manual VOR/ADF tuning fixed 
Fixed - Above/Below waypoint constraints reversed on vert rev page
Fixed - Temperature limit in FMC fixed 
Fixed - APU low fuel pressure ECAM should go if any of the left hand pumps are on and isolation valves open
Fixed - Cabin Alt jumping up for seemingly no reason
Fixed - Active fix should be white on ND
Fixed -  Returning from pause can cause engines to cut out
Fixed - Green FMC glow present in C&D
Fixed - Cargo CONT knob issue fixed
Fixed - Spoilers in flight fixed
Fixed - Radio not working with Pro ATCX
Fixed - [v1.0.0] Yoke Movement
Fixed - FO sun blind isn't flipping down
Improved positions of light on tail  & fixed flipped turnoff lights 
Added commands for rudder via keyboard 
Removed CG autofill for erroneous GWCG calculation

[chapstick 2,762]

1 hour ago, Bob Scott said:

I had 75K lbs of cargo and 30K fuel, TOGW was ~284K, which is a relatively light gross weight (MTOGW is 376K).  Temps didn't look aberrant.  The "postal load" selection just determines what kind of containers are in the back--are you sure you had any mass loaded?  That'd be in the weight and balance section of the EFB.

I'm at 297klbs at FL280 climbing at about 1500FPM at mach .78,. Is that more in line with what you're expecting?

[rick celik 1,251]

My climb profiles not kicking in until I select a DCT to first waypoint or any other waypoint. Not too familiar with the quirks of the a300 but I’m assuming it’s a bug? Will read more into it.

[Bob Scott 7,748]

51 minutes ago, chapstick said:

I'm at 297klbs at FL280 climbing at about 1500FPM at mach .78,. Is that more in line with what you're expecting?

I just re-flew the flight...I saw 900-1000 fpm in a 325 KIAS profile climb at FL270 and close to the same weight as you.  At FL280 the climb was little better, but that's because the profile climb switched over to constant mach number, where the climb rate will increase as it starts trading IAS for climb rate.  Temps were ~ISA-5.

I'm gonna go find some hard tech data on the plane to confirm my belief that it's not climbing like it should.

I did do a couple direct-tos, and had no catastrophe, so maybe that nasty bug is in the rear view.

35 minutes ago, rick celik said:

My climb profiles not kicking in until I select a DCT to first waypoint or any other waypoint. Not too familiar with the quirks of the a300 but I’m assuming it’s a bug? Will read more into it.

I think (not sure) that the climb profile can't be engaged until you're past the programmed acceleration height.  Unfortunately, without any kind of decent documentation, we're all classmates in the Ray Charles School of Flight, tapping our white canes as we try to work our way through the maze...

[Bob Scott 7,748]

OK, found a performance manual.  Time to climb to FL200 with a brake-release gross weight of 308,000 lbs (140MT) is 9 min.  To FL270 it's 13 min.  So average climb rate between FL200 and 270 should be 7000/4 = 1750 fpm.  Not as high as I would have thought, but still a lot (more than 50%) higher than what I'm seeing.