Some questions

[Guest mikealpha]

First of all thanks for 4.01, RC4 is even more a pleasure now. Also great to read the review here at avsim and the planned 4.1 enhancements. A few questions :1. To enhance the fun flying in Europe and with 4.1 maybe some months away, I try to extract several airport names from the control wav-files. If all goes well, that could lead to around 30 new airport names. Now also Graham has made some nice enhancements (big thanks for the NorShuttle, just BTW !) and some are recording new voice sets. What is the best way to coordinate all this ? 2. I was flying a SID at 6000, which also was my transition level. Now with a whole series of turns involved, the airplane slightly dropped below 6000 and compensated by getting slightly above 6000. APs are not that perfect to hold altitudes in turns. At every pass of 6000 I heard 'altimeter check', summed up to around 10 times. Would it be possible to get this altimeter advice only once during climb and once during descend ?3. I like that feature of unexpected weather dependent holdings. But I am at around 50 flights with RC4 now and never got one. I have read the conditions in the manual and the visibility/ceiling should have met this conditions more than once. Am I just unlucky ? Or would it be possible to sharpen the conditions somewhat ?Mike

[Guest daniel.alm]

Mike,Regarding your 3rd question. Do you have a VOR within 10 miles of your destination airport, set up as waypoint? If you don't, you'll never get a hold, even if the weather is very bad.By the way, I've sent you an email a few days ago, did you get it?Regards,Daniel

[Guest mikealpha]

Hi Daniel,>> Do you have a VOR within 10 miles of your destination airport, set up as waypointYes, I have that whenever possible, also to get the 'cross 40 miles from XXX at" crossing restriction. Did you get holdings due to weather ?I checked my Email, nothing received. Could you resend ?Mike

[Guest daniel.alm]

Hi Mike,>Yes, I have that whenever possible, also to get the 'cross 40>miles from XXX at" crossing restriction. Did you get holdings>due to weather ?Hmmm, that's strange. I've got holds twice when the weather was bad, both times at UNNT during heavy snow.>>I checked my Email, nothing received. Could you resend ?>>MikeOk, I will.Regards,Daniel

[jd 57]

1) yes, graham has done a nice job. he impressed us with his abilities, and now he's a beta tester, working with the voice sets.2) that's on the list. what is your altitude deviation set for?3) there is a page in the manual that explains the odds. but unless there is a vor in the flight plan, as the last checkpoint, and within 5 miles of the arrival airport, you won't be heldjd

[Guest daniel.alm]

> but unless there is a vor in the flight plan, as the last>checkpoint, and within 5 miles of the arrival airport, you>won't be held>>jdIs it 5 or 10 miles jd?Mike, I've sent it again to the Skylink2000 adress, is that still the correct one?

[jd 57]

you're right. my bad. it is 10 milesalso, if notams approach is checked, you won't be heldalso, if this is a terminal enroute flight (80 miles) then there will be no holdingjd

[Guest mikealpha]

jd and Daniel,thanks for your answers. As I said, I use an Airport VOR whenever I find one. If I do get the 'cross 40 NM from XXX at', that's an indication for that, if I understood correctly. Also no NOTAMs, no terminal enroute flight, so maybe I'm just unlucky regarding that 'percentage chance' for a weather holding.Regarding the repeated 'altimeter check' call when remaining at or slightly around the transition level : My altitude deviation is set at 200 ft (I had also tried 500, but it's the same). The altitude oscillation caused by autopilots during turns is far less than that though (I'd estimate +/- 50 ft). Daniel, Email received !Mike

[PeteP 2]

>Regarding the repeated 'altimeter check' call when remaining>at or slightly around the transition level : My altitude>deviation is set at 200 ft (I had also tried 500, but it's the>same). The altitude oscillation caused by autopilots during>turns is far less than that though (I'd estimate +/- 50 ft). Mike,I'm surprised (and very disappointed) to read about this problem because it was fixed months ago during beta testing. It became obvious that there was a problem with altitude oscillations as soon as we introduced the European TA/TL system where - unlike that used in the US - the Transition Altitude can be used as a cruising altitude.After a lot of testing and experimentation, a compromise solution was reached which covered all the likely circumstances. If you're interested, the co-pilot should not call "altimeter check" until the aircraft passes TA +300ft going up and actual altitude of TL -300ft going down. As you can see, if this was working as it should, you would not have received multiple calls for deviations of +/-50ft!If you've only noticed this with version 4.01 and not 4.0 then it's possible that something was "broken" while jd was working on the new bits - it's not at all uncommon in computer programming for this to happen. If you have the time, perhaps you'd be kind enough to repeat the flight, this time with "Debug" on and send the files to jd - he needs to check this out.BestPete