OnCourse Software

Have a look at this please.

1. The last IFR flight I flew my co-pilot was reporting my altitudes 500' above my actual. With this latest VFR flight the same thing happened.

2. This time though the the VFR Radar Control got stuck in a circle as well.

It seems PF3 may be breaking down and needs re-installing, or, maybe, as usual, I am doing something wrong?

Log attached of the latest flight; Stansted to Brussels.

John

JohnY wrote:

1. The last IFR flight I flew my co-pilot was reporting my altitudes 500' above my actual. With this latest VFR flight the same thing happened.

You were at an altitude of about 7790 feet which got rounded to Flight Level 8000.
Remember to reset your altimeter to 29.92 (or 1013.25) above the transition altitude (ATC will then say "Flight Level 75" instead of e.g. "1 thousand 5 hundred".
I assume your altimeter was set to something around 29.67.

JohnY wrote:

2. This time though the the VFR Radar Control got stuck in a circle as well.

The default center altitude is 8000 feet. You should set your center altitude below your cruise altitude in Options #2 (or your cruise altitude at or above the center altitude). Maybe the fact that you scratched center altitude due to problem 1 contributed to this ping pong effect, but even without that you would receive more hand-overs than usual.

JohnY wrote:

It seems PF3 may be breaking down and needs re-installing, or, maybe, as usual, I am doing something wrong?

Even if above things would be bugs in PF3, a new installation would not fix them.

Is this "ping pong effect" the same issue I reported here?

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2261

Yes, looks like it.

Ok know its a sim and therefore you can do what you like but
I would question a: Why you would do a VFR flight from Stanstead to Brussels seeing as pretty much all of it would be controlled airspace. B. You must stay below controlled airspace in a VFR flight so your altitude was way way too high.
To penetrate controlled airspace for a VFR flight requires SVFR clearance (Special VFR) and PPR(Prior permission required). Usually by telephone. So in PF3 if you are about to fly into controlled airspace you need to advise PF3 and change your fpl to IFR.
You are also flying airways from KOKSY. Before KOKSY there are no waypoints at all as far as I can see. Quite how you managed to navigate from Stanstead and all the way across the North Sea as well. The weather had better have been CAVOK! If you go onto Skyvector it will show you all the altitude restrictions for VFR.

Next time you fly Stanstead to Brussels VFR you need to fly to Lydd via Southend. Cross the Channel via the "Light Aircraft Corridor" to Wimereux. Then because of so many airspace restrictions it gets complicated. Fly to BNE turn East contact Mervile Tower 119.07 for permission to cross their airspace. Stay North of Lille heading for Kortrijk. About 10 minutes before, contact Brussels information in order to cross the Belgian border. From Kortrijk fly 080 and contact Brussels Approach. Your best altitude for the whole flight would be 2,500ft.

Oh and make sure because you are crossing the English Channel (I bet you forgot in your last fpl!!) that your fpl contains number of souls on board and whether you are carrying life jackets (which must be worn) and/or a dinghy. If not your fpl will be rejected by ATC.

Very interesting as always.

But I'm afraid this:

vololiberista wrote:

contact Mervile Tower 119.07 for permission to cross their airspace.

is not supported by PF3, is it?

Would be a nice feature though.

Yes, well, all this is very interesting.....but.

The VFR flight plan called for an altitude of 7500 and at one stage the PF3 controller instructed an altitude of 7500'

I repeat. If my altitude was 7500' exactly, why was my co pilot reporting it as 8000? And before anyone repeats it, I was checking my altimeter all the way across especially when she was reporting the wrong altitudes! I eventually moved up to 8000' to get her to report my proper altitude of 7500' which she did.

None of the answers address the problem that she was also calling the wrong altitudes during the previous IFR flightwhen I was also checking my altimeter regularly and flying a different aircraft.

Also, a minor point. After a while I was instructed to fly using my own navigation which I did using the GPS of the flight route which was given in the simulator as KOK,MAK,DENOX and finally EBBR.

Neither does it address the problem of the PF3 controllers going round and round the mulberry bush and then when over the continent not once transferring me to a Belgian controller. I know this is a subject for the next revision but apart from going to the default is there an easy way around it for PF3?

Sorry, but there's something wrong somewhere, and from what I've seen in your replies, in this case it wasn't me.

John

Regarding the controller "ping pong" take a look at the topic I mentioned above. It includes some kind of workaround I use.

Regarding the wrong altitude callouts:
I remember having read some time ago something about the sim having a worldwide transition altitude of 18000 ft. So flying in Europe between the correct TA and 18000 ft. might be a problem if PF3 reads the altitude from the sim (FSUIPC?) and not from the aircraft's altimeter.

Your VFR fpl altitude was too high. You crossed in and out of controlled airspace. Your fpl anyway was incorrect. You would never be allowed to fly such a distance over water VFR. My suggestion is to redo the fpl at a more realistic VFR altitude and route. If you are then still experiencing the same problems submit your logs along with the "Flight" folder. That way we can check to see if there any regional anomalies