John Pavey

For the past two years, I have had no problems using Honeycomb's BTQ in P3D V4/V5, MSFS2020 and XPlane 11. Yesterday, I attempted a flight in MSFS2020. After it loaded, I noticed that the throttles were fluttering approximately mid-way through their axes in the simulator. I attempted to move the throttles using the BTQ and while they did move in the simulator, it wasn't through their full range nor could I get the throttles to move to their close position and stay there. I attempted closing down the sim and computer, then restarting and reloading a flight. The same problem occurred, I tried loading flights in both P3D and Xplane to see if the problem was isolated to MSFS. The same problem occurred in P3D but in XPlane the throttle were in their closed position when the flight loaded and movement was fine.An I also tried: a) detaching and attaching the BTQ to my system. b) calibrating the axis in using first the windows game controller setup and then calibrating the axis in both P3D and MSFS; c) loading different aircraft in both P3D and MSFS - again, no change. Any suggestions before I try uninstalling and reinstalling MFS2020? I

Hi Folks - well it looks like Rob was on the right track re panel states. I performed a number of test cases flying to TNCM as well as 4 other destinations using both the default and 777 Long panel states. In most cases, the brake overheating issue occurred only at TNCM and only when I loaded the 777 Long panel state. There were no issues when I loaded the default panel state and flew to TNCM. I fed the test results to PMDG and this was their response: "John I suspect this is one of the issues we discovered with the saved panel state files. There was a problem with the release version of the 777 that caused a lot of strange behaviour with saved panel states but it has been corrected for the upcoming SP1 update. Hopefully that will be released shortly. Let me know if you see this issue again after the SP1 update."

Well it looks like something's wrong with the simulation at my end. Just tried landings at three different airports - Toronto (CYYZ), New York (KJFK) and Ft Lauderdale (KFLL). In all cases, the approach config was the same (Autobrakes 2; Flaps 30; Spoilers armed and Autothrottle armed with speed set at 140. In all cases, I had the Gear screen displayed so I could check the brake temps - After landing, disengaged reverse thrust at 50 kts. Nothing out the ordinary guys - the highest brake temp was 0.8! Went back and tried the landing at St Maarten and you guessed it - brake temp reaching around 7.0 before I shut it down. Looks like I'll have to check it out with PDMG.

As an update, I've applied most of the really helpful comments above, but so far, my results are as follows: Approach configuration Speedbrakes armed Flaps 30 Autobrakes 2 Autothrottle On - speed set to 138 kts On touchdown: confirmed that speedbrakes are deployed Reverse thrust engaged I deliberately keep my feet off the rudder pedals and let the autobrake do its work T7 slows to about 90 kts at which point I note the tires begin to heat up At 79 kts, tire temperature readings for the left main gear are above 5.0 while the right main gear are in the 2.0 ranges (Note that I still have not applied any manual breaking) At that point I have no choice but use the CDU Maintenance cool tire option otherwise tires will overheat and the tires explode I also tried a landing without the autobrake set, applying manual braking on the pedal and got similar results. Again, I don't know why this occurs at TNCM as I usually have no problems landing at other airports. (Incidentally, I tried another trip to TNCM, this time taking off from MDPP in Puerta Plata. It's interesting, (probably not coincidental) that on the take off roll, tire heat averages began to rise significantly to the point that just prior to lift off, I did get both a BRAKE TEMP and TIRE PRESS warning displayed and notice that the temperature averages for both the left and right main tires was rising above 5.0. Fortunately, the plane was rotating at that point and I cooled the brakes at that point. My take off procedure was no different than usual - Toes on the brakes, thrust levers smoothly advance to 55% N1 at which point I engage TOGA and commence the roll. On all other take offs, I have never had a problem with overheating tires.) So I don't know whether there's a bug in my computer or what, but I will try further tests using both TNCM and other airports to see if I can understand what it causing this. In the meantime, thanks for all your helpful comments -so even provided me with information I never knew existed about the T7 brakes.

Ok - some progress - this time I set the Autobrakes to 1; on touchdown once the autobrakes kicked in, I applied reverse thrust and at about 90 kts, disengaged the autobrakes, disengaged reverse thrust around 80 knots and let the 777 slow before applying the brakes gently till we slowed so I could do a 180 at the end of the runway, Just prior to the turn, I did get a BRAKE TEMP warning. Coming out of the turn, brakes were off but I noticed the temp was still increasing (albeit very slowly) so at that point, I used the cool brake option under the CDU's Maintenance page 2 and that addressed the problem Don't know why this issue occurs at St Maarten and not the other locations I've landed the 777 (could it be that the runway at St Maarten is overheated due to the sunny climate? (don't think that PDMG would have that degree of realism but hey who knows!!). At any rate, I will try replicating my typical approach procedure at another airport with a similar size runway (about 7200 ft) and see if this problem reoccurs. Thanks to your insight - it really helped If anyone has actually flown a 777 into St Maarten I would love to hear if they need to employ similar braking technique to avoid the brake temp and pressure problem Cheers

I'll check that out when I fly the route tomorrow. Thanks

It's the default FSX airport.

I encounter a braking problem whenever I try landing at Princess Juliana Airport (TNCM). Essentially, after touchdown, and after retracting thrust reversers, the parking brake is "supposedly" activated and the 777 freeze stops on the runway. I can't disengage the parking break. The following are details. Usually I depart from Toronto (CYYZ) with 98,000 lbs fuel and a ZFW load level in the 90% range. On approach, I have configured the aircraft as follows: Spoilers Armed Autobrake set to 2 (sometimes 3) Flaps 30 Speed 140 On landing, I apply reverse thrust, let the autobrakes do their work, disengage the reverse thrust at 80 knots and tap the breaks around 60 knots. Around that point, for some strange reason, the parking break is activated! (That is to say, the lower right indicator on the screen says the parking brake is active, even though the actual parking brake is not engaged on the lower pedestal!!). Once this occurs, the aircraft freezes on the runway. I have tried the following and am unable to get the aircraft to move: 1) press period to disengage the parking brake; 2) apply the toe brakes on my Saitek rudder pedals. 3) Click on the parking brake on the lower pedestal to engage the parking brake and then click on it again to disengage the parking brake; 4) try cooling the brakes by clicking on this feature on Screen 2 of the ground maintenance screen on the CDU. The only action that clears it is to replace the tires (by using this feature in the ground maintenance page of the CDU). When I do this, the parking brake indicator on the lower left screen disappears and I can then move the aircraft off the runway, It should be noted that this anomaly occurs only when I land at TNCM - at all other locations, my landing procedure is similar (I seldom use autoland) and I don't encounter this problem. Any ideas or suggestions to avoid this annoyance would be appreciated.