martinlest2

After take-off and Auto Flight mode is engaged, ATC at some point turns me towards my flight route. I am a bit confused though, because if I am in HDG mode, the a/c will not turn towards the heading I have selected, in fact it turns in the opposite direction. The a/c only responds 'normally', arriving at the heading value I have entered, if I select TRK (pulling the HDG/TRK knob in all cases) I don't understand this. Is it me or the a/c that is at fault here? Shouldn't the a/c turn and then maintain the heading shown in the instruments when I am in HDG mode?

Hmmm, if anyone knows how this works? It's unlike any other a/c I have flown. My QNH sticks on one value the whole flight and I cannot change it manually. When I get to FL180 or whatever transition altitude is, the only way I can get 29.92 is to switch to QFE. Not even sure what the difference is to be frank (but I can Google that). Also, the Barometer set button never responds to my 'pulling' or 'pushing' it. Ti set STD I have to go to QFE, as I say, then use the outer ring. Do others have the same thing? Or can you change your pressure setting at will in QNH mode?

.. well, FS9, but whatever.... Yes, the UFOB value in the FMC and that in the FS9 menu agreed. But what I wasn't doing was making sure that I set the same figure in the Load Edit window. This flight I have made sure that the fuel entered in the Load Manager is the same as I choose in the PMDG menu/fuel. All the figures, everywhere now match. So at take-off, although this a/c still gives me the impression of wanting to go too nose high (if I follow the FD, speed starts to drop off, but that may be correct - next time I have to check that I am in fact going no faster than V2_10 at that stage. Perhaps I am and that is why I get a nose-up attitude: I am trying to get the nose down when the a/c wants to remain nose high to cut the speed a little. Could be - as I say, I didn't actually get the figures this flight: next time I'll check that carefully. On the whole then, I'd say this is sorted. Unless things go wrong on my next flight. Thanks for all the suggestions en route.

Hi. Actually I checked that last thing last night and the fuel shown in the FMC agrees with the FS9 (not FSX) menu exactly. I did mention the FD (post #33 above) but I am going to fly a few shorter flights later today and just let the aircraft do its thing and see what happens. There was no disaster when I did this yesterday, though the pitch is rather amazing (at least compared to say a b767 or whatever). Will have to be in FS9 to answer the cfg question - I looked carefully yesterday and saw no issues, but I'll check again and post what's there.

Another little issue. I have noticed that on descent, the QNH value gets 'stuck'. No matter how I try to change it, with the dial or pressing /pulling the 'Baroset' knob - the numbers try to change for a fraction of a second but they jump back immediately to whatever the value they are stuck at. It may be that they sometimes 'stuck' at the correct value (today yes, but yesterday no, the QNH I couldn't change was very wrong), but whatever, I have never flown a plane where the pilot cannot change the QNH setting even so. Is this a 'feature' of the MD-11? Thanks for comments and a 'fix' if appropriate!

I only get 15 degs nose up by intervening with the yoke and trim, as I say: otherwise it is quite a bit higher. I'll try leaving it alone again next flight and see what happens. After two days the '20% fuel bug' has corrected itself somehow.... responding normally now

I always go to the PMDG menu and load the fuel (and set the panel state) and save it (yes, I know that the fuel setting is not saved in the aircraft.cfg, I see the warning every flight), and I set it afresh every time. If the fuel is not loading properly, that is not due to an error on my part. Actually, you saying that reminds me - I have been noting something odd recently which may be causing my problems (though see below re. pitch). Even when I set the fuel to zero in the PMDG manager (and save the setting), the FS9 onscreen menu (Shift+Z) shows 20% fuel in the aircraft. Any idea how I could clear this? (I'll do some more tests on this tomorrow....) As for the pitch, well, in spite of a possible fuel problem, I now wonder whether I am under the impression that I have an issue when actually I don't. I felt the a/c pull nose up again, as usual (it seems to happen at the exact moment I raise the gear), but this time I just left it alone to do whatever, and the a/c certainly followed the FD without much input from me. From the exterior the plane looks very nose-up, but maybe that is how it flies. Certainly nowhere near the stall I was expecting, though the speed did drop off for several seconds before it very slowly stabilised at about V2+10

Just to expand on what I asked earlier: My Load Edit shows this: ZFW=380.5; ZFWCG=14.1; TOGW=549.0; TOCG=19.1 When I come to the FMC INIT page to enter this, I enter LSK 6R first (ZFWCG); then I left-click LSK 1R - in this case I then get a UFOB value of 121.2. I then enter the ZFW value (380.5) into LSK 3R (BLST IN ZFW). That then creates a TOGW value in LSK 2R - but that is never the same as it was in the load edit window. There it was 549.0. In the FMC it is 500.2. Finally I enter the TOCG value taken from the SD. Why the discrepancy in TOGW? I am leaving the value as it appears in the FMC, rather than change it to the load edit value (I tried changing that value as well in earlier flights but it didn't seem to make a lot of difference in practice). The TOGW figure in the FMC is not in 'bold', heavy typeface though, like LSK 1R, 3R and 6R now are, which may indicate I have to do something else? The tutorial 1 pdf does not indicate anything needs to be done to LSK 2R or LSK 4R..

I have had the issue no matter what graphics driver I have had (over the years).

Thank you. Makes much more sense when they are min and max, rather than required, as I had assumed! I'll look again at tutorial 1 - I have it printed off somewhere. (Was there a tutorial 2 - announced as 'advanced' somewhere I think?).

It's the same as hitting whichever key on the keyboard is set up in assignments to operate the brakes and immediately releasing it. Learned to do that years ago from other posters with the same issue.

Last two landings, when I 'twitch' the brakes off with the associated X52 lever, and then (I also use the X52 for this) turn Autobrakes to 'off', there have been no problems. All I would say is it would be really good if anyone knew how to unlock the brakes when you've come to a grinding halt. It's programmed in like that somehow - as I said, even loading the default Cessna then back to the MD-11, the latter loads with the brakes still jammed on.

Oh, one other thing, going back to my first question in this thread in fact. I am still a bit confused about the flap indicators in the flight instruments. Where is this explained in the pdf files? I can find a description of the flaps in the systems pdf, but specifically (sorry if it's there and I have missed it) ... what is the significance of the orange or green colours? ... SE is 'slats extend', for the descent? That appears at 280KIAS. Is that right - it seems a high speed for slats ... what is GE in green at 260KIAS? Or GR and FR? .... what do I do as I pass 'F15'? and so on. If there is a document with all this explained, I'd like to get this clear in my mind. Thank you!

OK, great. The next thing to try.. though I just checked the file properties of the aircraft.cfg file and the file date is the same as when I saved the data from the load editor, so I guess it is saving OK. Worth trying though.

I don't know - I don't actually right click on the shortcut and choose that option. I need to be doing that then? If so, I'd forgotten that point... I usually choose Random Freight or load relatively lightly (as I think I said, I rarely fly the PAX version, as none are in service now and I'm a bit OCD about flying a/c that no longer fly in the real-world!!) with 1/3 fuel or less (usually rather more than I need for my flight, which are short or medium haul on the whole). I could try loading up more cargo, (maybe putting it in forward holds - though the programme would doubtless compensate for that of course). I wonder if the a/c would be so keen to climb so fast if it were quite a bit heavier... Shouldn't really make any difference in practice with this plane though, surely?

Hi, and thanks... I don't think I said I set the weight manually (not even sure what that means) - I can't find any comment like that. I did say that I managed the systems on the overhead panel manually... Yes, I use the MD-11 Load Manager. However I am using it slightly differently from the way you describe: I set everything there before I load up the MD-11. Since there is the button to save the info to the aircraft.cfg file (is that optional or - I assume - essential?), nothing saved to that file after loading the MD-11 would be read (would it?). I presume the PMDG programme uses the data saved there at some stage. (Or not??). I tried CI at 50 just now and I also switched the systems to automatic on the O/H panel, to see what happened. But no change, still I really have to push the nose down after take-off. I only read your reply a little later, so I am not sure what the FD was doing - I'll pay more attention next time, but my feeling is that if I follow the FD I'll be going up vertical, like a Saturn 5 rocket (not for long though!). But I'll check. Maybe not. It looks catastrophic though from outside - I never see an a/c at that attitude (except on 'Air Crash Investigation'!).. The pitch problem, I repeat, is only apparent jsut after TO. The rotation is quite normal, there no question of tail scrape or whatever. And once I have pushed the nose down to under 20 degs and tamed the trim way down, the aircraft flies just great by hand, and also after, on AP. Yes, PMDG's detailed work on this is VERY impressive, a work of art really, I agree. What is "PMDG MD-11F Short Ground Turn", BTW? Oh, one more thing. When I enter the values from the load utility into the CDU on INIT p2 (the ZFWCG value into 'ZFWCG' and the ZFW value into 'BLST IN ZFW', the TOGW value that shows is always different from the one I noted down in the load edit utility. Do I over-write the value in the CDU with the one that I copied down from the load edit window? :wink:

Not as far as I know, but you may be right. Whatever, if I don't follow the MD11 touchdown regime very closely (and even then, as I say, I sometimes find it doesn't make any difference) I end my flights on the runway where the a/c stops... I'll search other threads about this again and see if I can find the ones I recall.

OK, sorry if I am not being clear. Part of the problem is that I set all this up some years ago and have been living abroad for some years in the interim (without my FS PC), so now I am back in the UK what might have been obvious once upon a time is now a bit hazy! Dull as the UK is compared to India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and so on, where I have been living, being able to fly FS again makes coming back a lot less difficult! :smile: Er, OK, moving on - yes, I have all my a/c functions set using the FS9 menu/assignments page. The only problem with this (and it's apparently a 'known' issue') is that occasionally something, somewhere within FS9 (I wish I could find out what) resets the keyboard functions within FS9.cfg. One day Ctrl+E starts the engines, for instance, next day that assignment is blank in the setup: one day 'D' opens my a/c doors, next day it doesn't and I find that no option is set for that in the FS9 menu, and so on. Infuriating. I found restoring a backed up copy of fs9.cfg very oddly did not restore my FS9 assignments and people suggested that I only use FSUIPC in future (a route I have not gone down). But that's off topic here: the X52 buttons and switches are simply programmed to reproduce the same key strokes selected in the FS9 assignments menu. Quite a few people have posted with the same 'brakes lock up on landing' issue, as you are of course aware, so it's not something I am doing per se, I think

OK, yes, you're right. I'll keep testing this with different entries in the FMC though first, as I say.

Hi again. The problem there is that I have no such issue with any other a/c, including other PMDG planes, only the MD11. The X52 is calibrated fine, I believe, with or without FS9 running, I checked this just yesterday. I probably need to make a Saitek profile specific for the MD-11... if I delete elevator axis globally, that will 'mess up' other a/c (which currently respond just fine to the X52 when I rotate and thereafter: actually the MD-11 rotates fine too, it's afterwards that things go slightly awry). If I also delete elevator control for FS9 assignments, as you suggest, then you mean I need FSUIPC to take over this function for all a/c? The bottom line is that I doubt all the changes to my X52 and flight control setup can really be necessary (the areas you describe I am not at all confident about in any case - I am pretty sure I should just end up with a/c no longer responding to any elevator commands!), because last time I flew the MD11 regularly (a long while back, as I had been living abroad until very recently, without the MD11 on my temporary, 'better-then-nothing' FS9 laptop setup), I know I didn't have this problem. And even last week, I flew it on some days with no such issue either, with my hardware settings just as they are now. I will carry on trying to fix this with settings in the software for now, anyway. Thanks for the advice. Always appreciated.

Oh, OK! I was sure I had read somewhere that this entry was degs F, but perhaps not. I know (I said that somewhere above), but in practice it makes little difference for the purposes of this discussion, as for the past several flights, (with the nose-up issues), I have been adding the current temperature in FLEX, in degs F, i.e. about 55. Is it the difference between the FLEX entry and the OAT entry that has an bearing on the thrust, or is that difference between FLEX and the ambient temperature in the PMDG model not relevant, thrust being purely based purely on the FLEX value one enters? In other words, I have been using about 55 for FLEX and 10C or so for OAT. If I use the same figure for FLEX but change OAT to, say, 45 degs C, would that impact the TO thrust? I have been assuming yes.. (Always referring to what's modelled in the PMDG, rather than real world). I am going to try changing the CI, as that is one thing I have been doing differently...

Well, I am totally confused. This didn't use to happen, as far as I recall. Still the plane wants to go very nose high as I hand fly it - I can keep it within OK limits with yoke and trim as far down as possible (I ran out of trim this time). Why does the a/c want to pitch up like this - I am gentle with the roll and try to maintain under 20 degs of pitch. (The MD11 flies more nose up than most planes, I think, so it looks a bit worrying from spot view, even when all is OK). With Autoflight on, then everything becomes controllable. Maybe I should try some different values in the CDU entries? What would make a difference. Oh, I am entering a high CI value (just thought of this this moment, as I am typing here!) - 120. That could cause the problem, no? I should try 50 next time .... Martin

FS9, as I say, not FSX... I use the Saitek simply to 'bump' off the brakes after landing, with the assigned lever. If I can avoid this in FS9 by using (registered) FSUIPC, I'd be glad to learn how. Thanks.

The FLEX is always entered in degs F. The tutorial pdf suggests entering 54 (that wouldn't be degs C). If you enter a higher than ambient temp, thrust is reduced. The OAT can be either but you have to format it with either C or F after the figure. I haven't assigned any controls at all to FSUIPC. I use the X52, which is programmed to use the FS9 keyboard commands, for elevators and pitch control

FS9 and via the Saitek programming software, not FSUIPC.