Boeing 777 Erratic Behavior

[TwistTornado]

When ever I'm using the Boeing 777-300, I enter a route automatically generated from flightplandatabase.com into the route manager. I take off, and I enable autopilot and autothrottle. I use flight level change to get to my cruising altitude. However, when I'm cruising, the autothrottle will just randomly set my speed to zero. I'm able to put it back to my desired speed, but a few minutes later, it automatically is reduced to zero again. Can someone please help? Is it something I'm doing?

I'm using the Boeing 777-300 you get from the default hangar in the launcher, and I'm using the latest stable version of FlightGear.

[Isaak]

I should definitely look into this bug, it's been bothering people for too long. Sorry that I didn't do it yet.

Solution: Before takeoff, make sure to set the cruising speed to something suitable (e.g. 320) in the Route Manager dialog (top left box if I'm not mistaken). If it is at zero, some internal logic will at some point decide that 0 kts is the cruising speed it should select.

[Octal450]

I suggest just to check if the value is 0 (invalid) and then ignore that logic.

Kind Regards,
Josh

[GSteele]

Trying to fly LFLL (Lyon) to KBOS (Boston) in the default Boeing 777-300

A couple of problems:

With the Route Manager/Autopilot

I enter LFLL departure and KBOS arrival. Cruise speed 320 altitude 34,000 ft.
I activate the route.

1. I only get LFLL and KBOS no way points at all.
2. Other times I get a wonderful list of way points like DIJON, REIMS VORTAC etc.; I SAVED this from RouteManager
3. Other times using the LOAD button from RouteManager; it show up as a single blank entry 03 after 02 KBOS
4. I have LOADed a flight plan from flightplandatabase but then the AP and LNAV do not activate.
5. Other random times the Autopilot and LNAV work beautifully.

but I drop out of the sky with 0 fuel!

Fuel
=======
I run out of fuel somewhere South of Greenland after loading 660,000lbs fuel two times (in air refuelling! via truck).

Devs. keep up all your hard work!

Cheers,

--GS

[wkitty42]

With the Route Manager/Autopilot

I enter LFLL departure and KBOS arrival. Cruise speed 320 altitude 34,000 ft.
I activate the route.

1. I only get LFLL and KBOS no way points at all.

we need more step by step details here... it won't help with your fuel problem, though...
here's how i do it using the F10->Autopilot->RouteManager...
1. enter LFLL in the departure field
2. select departure runway (18R in this example)... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the runway
3. select SID default... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the SID... this gives me outbound way points
4. enter KBOS in the arrival field
5. select arrival runway (15R in this example)... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the runway
6. select arrival approach DEFAULT... again, yes, use the dropbox and actually click on DEFAULT... this gives me approach way points
7. select STAR [none]... yes, use the box and click
8. set cruise speed (400kts in this example)
9. set cruise altitude (35000 in this example)
10 in the route box you should now see at least

Code: Select all

000 LFLL-18R (18R)      000  LFLL-18R (18R)
001 18R-3               175   3.0nm 3800'
002 18R-6               175   3.0nm 6800'
003 18R-9               175   3.0nm 3900'
004 APP-6               296 3172.8nm
005 APP-5               270   3.0nm
006 APP-4               225   3.0nm
007 15R-12              135   3.0nm 4000'
008 15R-8               135   4.0nm 2000'
009 15R-GS              135   1.7nm 2000'
010 KBOS-15R (15R)      135   6.4nm

at this point, i would click on the 004 line for the first approach way point... then click on the [Route] button at the bottom of the dialog... that will fill in the route list by injecting way points between the 003 and 004 lines... they will also renumber... in my example, the 004 APP-6 line moves down to line 056... now i might add or remove some way points... otherwise i may save the route... when i have everything ready, then i will click the [Activate] button and do what i need to do to get to the runway for takeoff and turning on the autopilot...

[V12]

400 KTS at FL350 = M1.12 - too fast for 777

[Robertfm]

With the Route Manager/Autopilot

I enter LFLL departure and KBOS arrival. Cruise speed 320 altitude 34,000 ft.
I activate the route.

1. I only get LFLL and KBOS no way points at all.

we need more step by step details here... it won't help with your fuel problem, though...
here's how i do it using the F10->Autopilot->RouteManager...
1. enter LFLL in the departure field
2. select departure runway (18R in this example)... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the runway
3. select SID default... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the SID... this gives me outbound way points
4. enter KBOS in the arrival field
5. select arrival runway (15R in this example)... yes, use the dropbox and actually click on the runway
6. select arrival approach DEFAULT... again, yes, use the dropbox and actually click on DEFAULT... this gives me approach way points
7. select STAR [none]... yes, use the box and click
8. set cruise speed (400kts in this example)
9. set cruise altitude (35000 in this example)
10 in the route box you should now see at least

Code: Select all

000 LFLL-18R (18R)      000  LFLL-18R (18R)
001 18R-3               175   3.0nm 3800'
002 18R-6               175   3.0nm 6800'
003 18R-9               175   3.0nm 3900'
004 APP-6               296 3172.8nm
005 APP-5               270   3.0nm
006 APP-4               225   3.0nm
007 15R-12              135   3.0nm 4000'
008 15R-8               135   4.0nm 2000'
009 15R-GS              135   1.7nm 2000'
010 KBOS-15R (15R)      135   6.4nm

at this point, i would click on the 004 line for the first approach way point... then click on the [Route] button at the bottom of the dialog... that will fill in the route list by injecting way points between the 003 and 004 lines... they will also renumber... in my example, the 004 APP-6 line moves down to line 056... now i might add or remove some way points... otherwise i may save the route... when i have everything ready, then i will click the [Activate] button and do what i need to do to get to the runway for takeoff and turning on the autopilot...

This is has got to be the first explanation of the Route function I have read that I understand. Thank you until now I have used Flight Planner . I have now used it twice as you described. Far quicker than using FlightPlanner. Thanks again.

[wkitty42]

400 KTS at FL350 = M1.12 - too fast for 777

it was just a number for the example

what would be a better cruise speed for 35000ASL? 300kts? i'll fix it in the example (which might even get translated to the wiki)...

[wkitty42]

[...] at this point, i would click on the 004 line for the first approach way point... then click on the [Route] button at the bottom of the dialog... that will fill in the route list by injecting way points between the 003 and 004 lines... they will also renumber... in my example, the 004 APP-6 line moves down to line 056... now i might add or remove some way points... otherwise i may save the route... when i have everything ready, then i will click the [Activate] button and do what i need to do to get to the runway for takeoff and turning on the autopilot...

This is has got to be the first explanation of the Route function I have read that I understand. Thank you until now I have used Flight Planner . I have now used it twice as you described. Far quicker than using FlightPlanner. Thanks again.

you are quite welcome i developed this orderly practice after quite a while of using FG... i have found that sometimes things have to be done in a certain order even if the UI allows differently... in some parts of this dialog, things might appear to be in position but they're not... it needs some work but i understand that it will be changing when the current PUI stuff is finally removed... but yes, it finally clicked and all came together for me after numerous months...

[Robertfm]

Interestingly when you enter waypoints manually it works the other way round. You add it below the last SID, in your example 3 and so on.

[wkitty42]

Interestingly when you enter waypoints manually it works the other way round. You add it below the last SID, in your example 3 and so on.

yes, manually adding way points you click above where you want to enter it... like i noted above, the flow is a little weird at times and really needs some love and attention... this will all come in due time...

[tdammers]

400 KTS at FL350 = M1.12 - too fast for 777 :)

it was just a number for the example ;)

what would be a better cruise speed for 35000ASL? 300kts? i'll fix it in the example (which might even get translated to the wiki)...

Above FL290 or so, you'd typically use Mach numbers rather than airspeeds. Typical cruise Mach numbers for the 777 would be .83-.84.

[wkitty42]

what would be a better cruise speed for 35000ASL? 300kts? i'll fix it in the example (which might even get translated to the wiki)...

Above FL290 or so, you'd typically use Mach numbers rather than airspeeds. Typical cruise Mach numbers for the 777 would be .83-.84.

while that might be true, we're talking about the route manager here... AFAIK, it doesn't accept Mach stuff... only kts...

[Doorknob747]

When ever I'm using the Boeing 777-300, I enter a route automatically generated from flightplandatabase.com into the route manager. I take off, and I enable autopilot and autothrottle. I use flight level change to get to my cruising altitude. However, when I'm cruising, the autothrottle will just randomly set my speed to zero. I'm able to put it back to my desired speed, but a few minutes later, it automatically is reduced to zero again. Can someone please help? Is it something I'm doing?

I'm using the Boeing 777-300 you get from the default hangar in the launcher, and I'm using the latest stable version of FlightGear.

The route manager speed is what the aircraft uses. To be honest with you ... no aircraft in real life comes with a FlightGear route manager, real aircrafts use the CDU. Unfortunately the best CDU in all of FlightGear is on the A320 <--- Which still is not perfect. The best CDU for Boeing aircrafts from the standard FlightGear Addon Library, is on the Boeing 787.

The 777 has the second best Boeing CDU in flight gear, and the third best overall.

The problem is that for some odd reason people rarely want to push an update to the Add-On library, even when the update is ready.

Like I already have had a ready 757 update to add 3 new 757 types to flight gear add-on library, informed people on the mailing list about this sometime in September or October..... and nothing happened.

[wkitty42]

Like I already have had a ready 757 update to add 3 new 757 types to flight gear add-on library, informed people on the mailing list about this sometime in September or October..... and nothing happened.

perhaps you should bump your topic about that, then? you really should follow up on things like this if nothing has happened in a month... it has been four months now...
did you and john williams (aka tikibar) ever get back together about merging your work with his since he is the maintainer of the FGAddon 757 craft?

[time passes]

you posted two threads on 2021 Oct 6...
[Flightgear-devel] I have made some updates to the Boeing 757-200 that I wish to be uploaded to main hangar.
[Flightgear-devel] In reference to earlier email about 757-200 freighter variants