OnCourse Software

Hello...

Please explain me if I am doing something wrong or what that was?
In P3D flight from London Luton EGGW to Manchester EGCC. Checked ATIS for weather in Luton, runway 6 landing and departing. Created flight plan.
Taxi instructions given for holding point runway 24 (buy the way, there are no such runways 6 and 24 in Luton in Navigrapgh charts, there are 7 and 25???).
When reached holding point, taxi guidance deactivated, but was not handled for tower. Then started to taxi to the end of the runway to turn around, only then handed over for tower. I guess in real world, would need to get permission to enter the runway, right? Ok, that was not the biggest issues.
Biggest issues where, that instructions for take off in Luton and landing in Manchester were opposite to what other aircrafts were getting and I took off and landed head to head with other aircrafts. By the way, approaching last way point for Manchester, was regularly checking ATIS (key 2 in PF3) and it was telling me, that runway 6R is in use (again it's runway 5R in navigraph charts). But after reaching last way point instructions were giving to approach runway 24L, while all other aircrafts were landing from opposite way. It's becoming annoying as this is not a first time this is happening.
Attached debug monitor for investigation.

Thank you in advance,
Viktor.

Firstly let me just say PF3 does not use data from Navigraph it uses data from your flight sim, so the runways in use for Luton are 8/26, not 6/24 as you state. Navigraph will be using more recent data than P3D which is using outdates information.

That being said the runway you were given at Luton was correct, according to the wind direction, as there was no AI detected at the time PF3 checked.

Quote:

12/5/2020 8:39:26 PM: 560 - Extracting Weather Data from EGGW
12/5/2020 8:39:27 PM: 160 - Visibility from weather station: 9
12/5/2020 8:39:27 PM: 160 - Wind DIR from weather station : 198

You say you used ATIS at Luton but that doesn't show in the log at all. Strange!

The runway assigned to you at Manchester was also correct and again it was determined by wind direction.

Quote:

12/5/2020 8:52:40 PM: 910 - Extracting Weather Data from EGCC
12/5/2020 8:52:40 PM: 910 - Visibility from weather station: 9
12/5/2020 8:52:40 PM: 910 - Wind DIR from weather station : 198

The ACARS Atis report identified the correct runway also -

Quote:

12/5/2020 8:52:40 PM: 920 - ACARS ATIS Requested:- 'Manchester Airport Information Juliet Weather at 0930 Zulu winds 198 at 8 visibility 9 miles. Sky condition 4 thousand 5 hundred Broken 10 thousand Scattered . Temperature 15 . Dewpoint 5 . Altimeter 1013 Runway 24L in use, Landing departing runway 24L . VFR aircraft say direction of flight. All aircraft readback hold short instructions. Advise controller on initial contact you have Juliet '

Hence you instructions from ATC -

Quote:

12/5/2020 9:14:26 PM: 180 - Transcript: 'Jersey 017 at Tango November Tango Descend and maintain 3 thousand 5 hundred on 1013 Cleared to final for Sierra Tango Approach runway 24 Left at pilot's discretion Contact Tower on 118.62 when established. '

There was only one problem I noticed and that was on your second ACARS ATIS report where it did indeed show an incorrect landing runway, so I will look into that some more. Having said that there is a major update due for release at the end of next week hopefully so that little glitch may even have been fixed already.

As for AI Traffic using the opposite runway... they got it wrong! I think that's because you have your surface speed set to zero and for some unknown reason if AI Traffic detects a wind speed of zero it wrongly assumes a wind direction of zero (or 360.)

Take a look at this AI aircraft being cleared to land at Manchester -

Quote:

12/5/2020 9:29:15 PM: 980 - Transcript: 'Pacific Express 7821 Winds 200 at 0 Gusty QNH 1013 Cleared to land runway 06 right '

With winds at 200 you wouldn't be landing on runway 6 would you, you'd be landing on 24L like you were instructed to do.

We don't control AI traffic, that's done solely by the sim and had PF3 detected any AI landing or taking off at the precise time it checked before giving you clearance then you to would have been given runway 6L, which would have been wrong.

So the short answer is, don't have your weather engine wind speed set to zero. If you do the AI traffic could end up landing on the wrong runway and that 'could' be the opposite one to you.

Good day Dave,

Thanks for you support. You knocked me down, felt a bit a looser
But let me defend a little as this might me useful for others also.

At first, I don't put any blame on product, most of the time I found out it was my mistake, but I need some explanation, as not always understand how things work. Yes, sorry, I mentioned runway numbers wrong, but you understood my issue so runway number +/- 1 makes no big difference Was just curios, why in flight simulator, which was probably built on real world data, runways do not match with navigraph charts, witch I know are based on Jappesen products.

So the way I do my flights is: at first I start my simulator, connect to ATIS to check what's the weather and then go to create the flight plan. This is the reason why there was no ATIS checked on PF3 before flight. I assume nothing should have changed while creating flight plan and when sim is in pause mode So after creating flight plan, loading and connecting to sim, I was not rechecking ATIS through PF3.
But I think your point about wind speeds makes sense and there's no reason to dig deeper until I will repeat the flight and check it.
By the way, I am using very simple setup in P3D. As add-ons only Carenado S340 and PF3, so for weather I use default engine, which, if to be honest, is a little bit crap. But my goal is to look more in to instruments on the flight, not enjoy the view of spectacular sceneries and clouds, so I keep it simple.

Thanks again for investigating my situation, appreciate it a lot!

Ok Dave, you were right.

Had a same flight, with winds not set to 0 and everything went smooth this time.
Well, I need to say, default AI in P3D is a b******! On finals, about 7 nm from the runway, another aircraft intercepted ILS just in front of me. As it was faster, we managed to land both safely with separation, but I guess that is not very realistic
AI never flies SIDs and STARS, and sometimes they ruin nice approach. I was wondering if any 3rd party AI is any smarter, or that is the problem with internal simulators ATC as PF3 does not control AI in the air?

Edited:

Great, thanks for letting me know

PF3 does attempt to keep a separation between you and AI aircraft behind you during approach, but sometimes one gets through

Be sure to use at least some form of weather engine, even a free one like "p3dwx" . It's a great alternative to to other payware engines. That way you will be able to get winds on your arrival airports.

dmarch wrote: *

Sun Dec 06, 2020 12:09 pm

Having said that there is a major update due for release at the end of next week hopefully so that little glitch may even have been fixed already.

Oh boy, Cyberpunk and PF3 update in the same week? This will be awesome!