PilotManChase

Your site is looking good. If you still need help with staffing, please feel free to contact me. I have experience as a staff member at a few virtual airlines and I would be happy to assist.

Some users are experiencing incorrect weather updates from FSX. I was one of those people. There are plenty of weather alternatives. Just research and find the one that works best for you! :) I am pretty sure Jeppesen is done with FSX, but I could be wrong... I heard a lot about it, but I could be wrong. Doesn't REALLY matter because it was never great anyway. A bit annoying though...

Is it random? Or are you pushing a button and it goes off? There are display controls.

As some of you know, I have been I England and France this past week. Well I'll be back in good old Memphis, Tennessee soon enough, but I wanted to share with you some of the thoughts I have had while I've been away. First I want to say that if you ever need to come up with new development ideas, just travel. Your brain just needs to be take. Away from the computer screen sometimes. Really. Here's the plan for the future of my development: I want to link up my projects (Chase's MD-80) with my organization (Midsouth Virtual Air). I have renamed MSA to Midsouth Virtual Aviation in order to accommodate for this move. I want to do this so I can have a development group behind me. For now, it is just me though. I will discuss MSA in a later post. I want to start projects for FSX. I don't know exactly what I can do yet, but I'm pretty optimistic about future FSX development. I MAY try to make an FSX version of the MD-80 if I can port my model over easily. I don't want to rebuild the whole thing. We will see. I am also learning Simconnect, so that will help me develop programs as well. I'll try to keep you posted on the status of the project and of MSA as best I can. Soon my website will be back up and information can be found there. Thanks, Chase

Yes, exactly! Thanks, Chase

Basically what it comes down to is reading procedures for the airport. I'll give you a quick way to pick a runway if you don't like FSX ATC (I don't) and there are no VATSIM/IVAO controllers in your area. Check the wind. You always land into the wind if you can. Pick the runway most aligned with the wind direction (i.e. If the wind reports 12006, land on runway 12. Or whatever is closest and of appropriate length). Is this how it always works in the real world? NO. Here's why: Many airports (all airports?) have proceedures for choosing the safest/most effective active runways. For example, an airport may be landing/departing North with southerly wind if it is less than say 5kts (just an example). As far as landing and departing runways, that's based on an airport flow if there are multiple runways. Look it up is basically all I can tell ya here. So, to keep it simple, just pick the runway based on wind. Or you can kick it up a notch and do some research for the airport! Thanks, Chase

Be sure you are setting LNAV and VNAV on the MCP. Thanks, Chase

Hello! It seems to me that your issue could be one or a combination of several things. It's hard for me to tell what this issue is exactly from those pictures, but I will tell you what I think is likely the issue: First, check your MCP or Mode Control Panel. This is the "Autopilot" panel built into the glare shield. The ALT needs to be set to the highest point you want to authorize the plane to climb. This is basically the end all to the autopilot/FMC system. This makes sure that the plane doesn't do anything more than you want it to. If the plane reaches an MCP ALT before the CRZ ATL in the FMC, it kicks off VNAV and goes into ALT HOLD mode. Second, make sure you can even cruise at FL300. If you cannot, the CDU should say something like UNABLE ALT or the like when you first enter your CRZ ALT. You can verify that you have selected an invalid cruise altitude by going to the VNAV CRZ page in the CDU. It will have a place that says something like OPT and MAX. The MAX is the highest it can go with the current Weight and CG. Remember, don't get confused by the 4 engines; this is an older aircraft and doesn't have the performance of a 777. I hope that helps your problem. Of not, report back and I'll make up some more stories See you in the skies! Thanks, Chase

I hope everyone is having a wonderful day! I'd like everyone to know I am making a good deal of progress on the MD-80. I have had to take a small break, but I hope to have the release ready quite soon. More updates to come. Thanks, Chase

Yes! Thank you for this news! I'm so excited to see SP1 much like most everyone. Mim glad you take so much time to iron out the issues. I'd rather have a great product later, than a broken one now

That's exactly the realization I came too. Thanks all for the help! My landing was spectacular! (scenery wise that is! :blush: ) Blue Skys, Chase

Update from FL320: So far, so GREAT! Textures are now loading in nicely. I am seeing a higher VAS, but this is to be expected since the textures are actually loading now. (PMDG T7 + FTX Global = lots of resources) I see the CPU working hard (usually 60-90% range from Process Explorer. I'd say it averages 75%, but it isn't uncommon to see 90%.), but not the straight 95-98% it seemed like I was seeing before the BufferPool=0 trick. The GPU is much more active now, taking a load of roughly 40% in Process Explorer. Performance has dropped slightly. That is to be expected though, I know. I am back to being a happy 777 pilot! Hope this helps others! Remember to set AffinityMask correctly! Don't just jump in with whatever you think! I sure did see a performance increase with the AffinityMask=84 (heck the CPU averaged probably 55%), but those blurries where TERRIBLE. Just to restate: on MY SYSTEM AffinityMask=14 and BufferPools=0 are the best settings. From the Wonderful World of FSX, Chase PS: I'll give one finial update after landing. If all is still well, I will call this SOLVED! Thanks again

True, true. Still, from my tests with FTX Global so far I have gotten good results. Stupid Affinity Mask! I'm trying it out now with the T7 KMEM-KMSP. Cause I am the pilot and I make the rules! I'll let you know the results. Always yours, Chase

Thank you all for the replies. I decided to revert back to the US UTX and GEX stuff. By doing that, I noticed similar loading issues with textures. Hmm... I could've sworn that they look great before. I have Youtube videos to prove that. So I decided to investigate. I redid my cfg. That helped some. I had to do so many flight tests that I can't remember the specifics of that action. Long story short, I changed one of my "tweaks." I had set AffinityMask=84 for my quad core system. Previously this had helped ease the CPU load and make my flights smoother. In combination with BufferPools=0 (adding GPU load), I thought I had found a setting that worked... WRONG (from what I think I found). I reset the AffinityMask to 14, and now I see sometimes high CPU loads, sometimes not. Just depending. The blurries seem to be greatly reduced, however. I really only get them bad when flying say maybe 1000ft at 280kts+. But when do you do that? Hardly ever. So, I am pleased right now. I will continue to test my sim and report back as I learn if this worked. I am currently reinstalling FTX Global. Fingers crossed. Your XC Pilot, Chase

Okay, so I know there have been several posts about the "blurries" in FSX. But I have decided to start my own topic for this reason: I can't find an applicable answer to my problem anywhere. Sure, this COULD be because I haven't looked hard enough, in which case I would ask you to kindly refer me to the place I should be. However, I feel as though the more likely case is that I have a rather unique situation... I'll keep it short and sweet. Here goes... I used to be able to run FSX at the settings that I wanted (with some sacrifices naturally). No issues. Used some tweaks. They worked magically. Fast-forward to now. My scenery won't even try to keep up it seems! From the time I leave the departure field, the scenery blurs and never grabs back hold of itself. I can pause to let it catch up. This takes around a minute to work. A full 60 seconds AT LEAST of just sitting there. After that, the same issue. I leave that area and it won't catch up. Period. Now to try to answer some of your questions early. Do I use intense addon aircraft? Why yes I do, thank you. I love to fly the PMDG 777. Best purchase I have made. Simple as that. Not the issue. Or at least I don't think so. I have been flying intense addons for a while. Including back in the good ole days when everything "just worked." These include various Captain Sim products, PMDG products, GEX/UTX, ect... So nothing new here. I just can't get my head around it. I have tried the trusty delete-the-cfg-and-thank-me-later approach, but it doesn't seem to cut it. I may have to start unistalling scenery packages to see if this is the issue. I used to use UTX/GEX for the US. I then upgraded to FTX Global. Or maybe I actually downgraded if it turns out to be the issue. I am open to all suggestions, but bare in mind that I haven't applied any new tweaks since the issue started, so that is likely not the problem. I may post my cfg later if needed. Right now I am on a different computer getting ready to count some sheep. :Sleepy: See you with the morning light, Chase

I see. Well let me know if you have any luck. I would help, but I don't have that hardware. I may play around some more. I will let you know what I find. Thanks, Chase

I am not sure if I had the same problem as you are describing, but I was flying the T7 YSSY-KLAX, and I had it set to fly while I was asleep. When I woke up in the morning, my plane was going absolutely crazy. It was spinning and displaying a number of warnings. I am not sure what started this. I always make sure that the AP is engaged when I leave, and I am careful not to touch the flight controls so as to not disengage the AP with a manual override. Oh yeah, and my aircraft ended up over ANTARCTICA! When I looked at the flight log from FSX, it looks to have been off course for a long time. The farthest it goes back is to my aircraft heading southbound over New Zealand. I should have never been around there. I am also confident that I did not put the points in incorrectly. Any ideas?

Thanks for your interest. There really isn't much to what I did. I don't know much about advanced programming, so I am not really the one to ask when it comes to stuff like that. However, I did discover how to use the custom controls feature in FSUIPC for the T7 based on my settings for the NGX. There was no need to move any files at all. I simply launched the Sim and proceeded to test different custom controls until I got my overhead panel mapped correctly. I won't send a complete set of custom controls here unless you want me to, but one example is the custom control for the Right Landing Light is 69656. I hope this helps. If I knew more about programing, I would certainly dive deeper than what I have. I still need to get all of my Goflight gear working! :blink:

As some of you may know, I have developed an aircraft for X-Plane called Chase's MD-80. Well, I should say "am developing." I have decided to use this blog to help me communicate to the community my progress and my experiences. I don't have much free time, so I am not sure how this will go, but I will certainly try it out. Here goes. Everyday I seem to wake up and get my MD-80 Project on my mind. I think to myself, "Okay, I'll just go finish ____, and then I'll be done for the day; I can just go fly after that." Well, that hasn't really been happening recently. My routine has been more like: get up, drag myself to the shower, throw on some clothes, shuffle up the stairs, turn on my computer, launch blender, edit ONE thing in the 3D cockpit, launch X-Plane to see if it worked, go back to blender and repeat these steps. Each day I seem more inspired to follow this patter as I start to see the light at the end of the tunnel more and more clearly. Of course I then take a look around and see all that's miss from the plane that I still have to research, model, and texture. But that too is rather inspiring. I want to finish it so badly that I am making a real effort to do as much as I can everyday. I think I have made some serious leaps forward from my last release. That brings me to my next dilemma. I don't know how I should proceed to release this in the future. I mean, in the past I pretty much thought that as I fixed things or added things, I would pack it up and call it a 0.x release. I started off this way too. But as I got into some serious modeling, I reconsidered. I am leaning towards holding off the next release until it is "finished." By that I mean completely modeled and mostly functional. A 1.0 release if you will. It just doesn't seem to make sense to pack up an incomplete aircraft anymore. I am glad I did it originally though. I got lots of positive and helpful feedback from the community that way and also established myself as an MD-80 developer. Now I am stuck though. I have a 0.2 plane sitting in the downloads section of the X-Plane forums with something like 1600 downloads that is well out of date. The flight dynamics are primitive and certainly not characteristic of an MD-80. The fuselage is see-through. And the 3D cockpit is barely textured and almost completely unusable. It is nothing more than a preview. I could pack up what I have now for a release, but how do I clean it up without robbing these good people? I don't want to drop the 3D cockpit as it is the most improved area, yet still unfinished. Plus it would be one LESS thing than what the previous release had. That's no good. I really am struggling. I want to let them have a plane with the correct flight dynamics and such, but I don't think I am ready for that. Right now it looks like I am going to have to wait. I really think I am done with releasing things early as a preview. It makes a mess for me from a developmental standpoint. Now I understand the long wait times at PMDG Until next time, Chase PS: I'll try the picture posting thing now B)

I have launched my MD-80 project here: http://forums.x-plan...&showfile=19518 --PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS FILE HAS NOT BEEN UPDATED IN ABOUT A YEAR! IT IS NOT THE MOST CURRENT VERSION, I HAVE ADDED MANY IMPROVEMENTS AND AM WAITING TO RELEASE A MORE UP TO DATE VERSION-- 5/30/14 Currently it is a developmental stage. It has parts of a virtual cockpit so far and a simple 2D cockpit. The fuselage is completely modeled in Blender. I will continue to use the 0.X version numbers until the following minimum requirements are met: -Complete 3D Cockpit Enclosure -Realistic 2D Panel -More Realistic Flight Dynamics -At Least 2 Real World Liveries (Currently I supply a rough Delta livery and a Basic Livery I use for Modeling) What my goals are for the project as a whole are (regardless of version number, just where I hope to take the program before I'm through): -Fully Immersive 3D Cockpit -Photo Real 2D Panel -Photo Real Liveries (I have something of the sort currently with my Delta Livery. If synthetic proves to work better for me as far as quality, then replace "photo real" with "synthetic" ) -Extremely Realistic Flight Dynamics -Complete Interior Build These are just a few things I had in mind when I started this project a while back. Any of these things can show up at any time. I do have a list of priorities, but that doesn't mean that the Photo Real 2D panel won't come in the next 0.X update (no promises, just an example) or that it has to come before extremely realistic flight dynamics. I'll be sure to inform everyone the best I can of all the new toys that come with each release. I am currently a one man team, so you will have to bare with me and understand that flaws and glitches will arise. My goal is to get a new version done here and get it to you ASAP. That's why I released a 0.X version. I want you guys to help shape my project along the way and help me test it out! Just PLEASE do NOT edit my files at your computer! I have already put some serious time into it (even if it doesn't seem that way) and I couldn't bare to see it stolen from me If you are interested in coming on the team as a beta tester, please just let me know. Contact me here or send me a message on Skype: pilotmanchase. I need people to do extensive flight tests and such on the aircraft before it is released. PLUS it comes with a cool banner like mine! B) -IMPORTANT- While I do encourage people to make repaints for my aircraft... DON'T! The current set up for how the plane will read the textures is not the one that will be used in the future. And even then, it definitely is not optimized for ease... at all. Leave the headaches to me... seriously. You will find yourself in a world of hurt if you try to repaint it. Just sayin' -Release Thoughts- Here is a copy of a post I made in the X-Plane forums recently: Hello, everyone once again! I just wanted to hop in here to share some very exciting news! While preparing the MD-80 for it's next release, I entered a world of developmental opportunities. I decided to walk right on through these newly opened doors and am pleased to announce that I have made a significant leap forward in the developmental process. I will try to post pictures later. I was looking forward to pushing out a v0.3 release very soon, but I am now considering the option of waiting until it is v1.0 ready. I say this because it doesn't seem right to me that I release a product that is lost so deeply in the middle of not having advanced features and having so many advanced features that incompleteness makes it hardly usable. I will continue to consider a v0.3 release, but I am thinking that I will wait until the plane is finished. Here is a list of some of the big improvements: --FLIGHT DYNAMICS!!! (This was one of the most exciting things. I made the plane fly a lot more realistically, though I feel there is still a long way to go before I get the perfect MD-80 feel) --Animated 3D Cockpit (This is one of those things that is incomplete right now. It's coming along nicely though. I'll post pictures) --Stall Warning Horn Fixed (No more stall warning after rotation) --Center of Gravity Fix (I guess this is a flight dynamic, but this fix deserves it's own category. It isn't perfect, but it's better than the nose-smashing start that you guys are experiencing LOL ) --Custom Textured Cockpit (This is one of the cooler features. I am currently making good looking synthetic cockpit textures. I'll replicate the process for repaints in the future) --Optimized Cockpit (Not sure if it helps frames that much, but I cleaned up a lot of extra vertices) Still on tap: --I need to redo the bender model. I don't like it at all. Better than Plane Maker models, but still awful. (Not really terrible, but I need to fix the number of windows at least) --Cabin (I will die if I have to look straight through this plane much longer) --Plus much, much more that I can't think of at 4:00 in the morning.

Hey guys, just thought I'd chime in. It may be late, but I wanted to say that while the SDK isn't out YET, as mentioned earlier, the code base is similar to the NGX. You can use the NGX's SDK as a starting point for now. The buttons do NOT line up, but with some experimenting, you can figure it out. I have a custom built overhead panel. I used the other SDK as a starting place and simply used trial and error to get the comands I wanted. Now I have a fully functional overhead for the 777! If you need any help, I'd be happy to look at the custom control numbers I used and give them to you if you want. Keep in mind, those are the only ones I have. I too am eagerly waiting for the SDK so I can get my goflight stuff working!