engine on the cessna c172p won't start

[reble]

I have real world experience in small puddle jumpers. I was so close to getting my private pilot's license that I could taste it. I end up busting the last flight physical. So I did 20 years in the Civil Air Patrol as an observer, navigator and commutations officer. And I fixed radios, tv's and 2 way radios for a living.

Anyways I just installed the Flightgear Flight Simulator on a Gateway laptop model NV570P-18U, OS Win 10 Home 64 bit. The simulator opens to the default plane, a Cessna C172P, sitting on the end of the default runway. I know the 172 like the back of my hand. I have been in enough of them in my life time. Everything in the simulator 172 is alive. radios, interments, lights and so on. both mags are on, turn the key to start. The starter motor is turning over. BUT the engine won't start. You can sit there and crank it until the battery runs down. I have tried the primer, full rich on the mixture control, half throttle with brakes on. No go. There must be a problem in the program.


Steve

[Parnikkapore]

There's a primer in this aircraft for one.

First try Autostart (if that fails, then there is a problem with the program), then try following the checklist in the program. There are probably a few differences from your plane.

[reble]

Where do I find a list of all the keyboard commands? I must have hit a keyboard cmd by accident because I lost the cockpit display. All that I see is outside the aircraft.

[ludomotico]

Press "c".

Many keyboard commands can be found in the menu. Unfortunately, some commands are aircraft-specific and might overwrite the default behavior with something different.

There are many variations of the C172. Our C172P needs primming at least 3 times and no more than 5 and, if I recall correctly, about 25% throttle.

Follow the checklist to start the engine, even if you know the procedure by heart. Or "c172p->autostart" to have FG follow the procedure for you.

[Isaak]

Btw, the simulator hotkeys can be found under help > keyboard commands (or similar, I use a translated version of FG here)

The checklists are also under the Help menu

[ludomotico]

These old engines need a bit of love to start. Sometimes, a real engine won't start even if you do all things right and you have to try a couple of times. To prevent random failures that will create confusion for new pilots but still "feel like the real thing", our C172P is deterministic but specially rigorous with the initial state. i.e: it always starts when you do all things right.

For example, a real, hangared C172P that has being used during the last week probably has some fuel in the carburetor and primming won't be necessary. This feature would be great for advanced users, but confusing for new pilots ("last month, the c172p started without pressing that weird lever! something is broken!"). For this reason, our C172P always must be primmed 3 times.

[reble]

Well I got the engine started and crashed on takeoff. it is a joy stick problem, I haven't used it in a long time. The joystick needs to be replaced. I tried to change the airport to Richland (RLD) and I was crashed down into a big nothing. The view out the aircraft windows was a sandy desert type color with no buildings, no runway, no lights, just a big fat nothing.

Steve

[wlbragg]

Welcome reble, those of us working on the c172p would be really interested in you analysis of all things related. We have always attempted to keep it as realistic as we can and very much appreciate feedback from people with real life experience in the real world.

[ludomotico]

It seems you don't have the scenery for RLD.

FlightGear downloads the scenery automatically using a service named "terrasync". Make sure you have terrasync activated in the launcher. (Settings tab, option "download scenery automatically")

Alternatively, you can download and install the scenery manually. Some reasons for downloading the scenery manually instead of using terrasync:

- You don't have a good Internet connection. Terrasync needs a good internet connection to work optimal.
- Default scenery is quite good in Europe, not so good outside Europe. There is better custom scenery for some parts of the USA: http://wiki.flightgear.org/Suggested_custom_scenery

[reble]

I figured out the problem. It was night time (simulator time) and I didn't/still don't know the keyboard cmd to 1. turn the battery and gen on. 2. turn on the dash panel back lighting via the keyboard and 3. turn on the interments and radios via keyboard

Press "c".

Many keyboard commands can be found in the menu. Unfortunately, some commands are aircraft-specific and might overwrite the default behavior with something different.

There are many variations of the C172. Our C172P needs primming at least 3 times and no more than 5 and, if I recall correctly, about 25% throttle.

Follow the checklist to start the engine, even if you know the procedure by heart. Or "c172p->autostart" to have FG follow the procedure for you.

[reble]

I wounder if where I installed Flightgear had anything to do with RLD airport not coming up? Flightgear is in C:\games\flight gear then the scenery files are in a sub dir under the flight gear dir.

It seems you don't have the scenery for RLD.

FlightGear downloads the scenery automatically using a service named "terrasync". Make sure you have terrasync activated in the launcher. (Settings tab, option "download scenery automatically")

Alternatively, you can download and install the scenery manually. Some reasons for downloading the scenery manually instead of using terrasync:

- You don't have a good Internet connection. Terrasync needs a good internet connection to work optimal.
- Default scenery is quite good in Europe, not so good outside Europe. There is better custom scenery for some parts of the USA: http://wiki.flightgear.org/Suggested_custom_scenery

[wkitty42]

I wounder if where I installed Flightgear had anything to do with RLD airport not coming up? Flightgear is in C:\games\flight gear then the scenery files are in a sub dir under the flight gear dir.

no, that's only the default starting scenery in there... you have to enable terrasync for FG to download the scenery automatically as you fly around OR you can use a tool like terramaster or terrasync.py to download the scenery tiles for the areas you need... terrasync.py is a command line tool... terramaster is a GUI tool...

[reble]

The flight simulator came with 3 scenery cd's and 2 bonus aircraft cd's. How do I make the simulator read the scenery dir and read the bonus aircraft dir?

I wounder if where I installed Flightgear had anything to do with RLD airport not coming up? Flightgear is in C:\games\flight gear then the scenery files are in a sub dir under the flight gear dir.

no, that's only the default starting scenery in there... you have to enable terrasync for FG to download the scenery automatically as you fly around OR you can use a tool like terramaster or terrasync.py to download the scenery tiles for the areas you need... terrasync.py is a command line tool... terramaster is a GUI tool...

[wlbragg]

In the QT Launcher add an entry pointing to the location of your additional aircraft and add one for you additional scenery. For the scenery you may be able to use the "Install add-on scenery" option at the bottom of the same page as the image below (can't see that option in this image).

Like the examples in this image,,,

[reble]

I got the extra scenery loaded up and taken care of. But the bonus aircraft are in Zip files and the QT Launcher doesn't know what to do with Zip files. The QT Launcher doesn't even see the Zip files. I can manually unzip each file with Win-Pkunzip into it own dir (EA: 707 dir, 747 dir and so on). But there is no guarantee that the QT Launcher will see the files then. I don't know what format (dir wise) the QT Launcher want to see. What now?

In the QT Launcher add an entry pointing to the location of your additional aircraft and add one for you additional scenery. For the scenery you may be able to use the "Install add-on scenery" option at the bottom of the same page as the image below (can't see that option in this image).

Like the examples in this image,,,