Erratic Throttle Bahavior

[alexrubio]

Hello Peter,

I'm experiencing an issue that I cannot figure out and thought maybe you can help me out on. I built a B737 sim using PM Software, for MCP I'm using CPFlight hardware with latest updates. For the throttle quadrant hardware I'm using Dragonet's hardware (http://www.symulatory.com/english/produrottle.htm).

After engaging or disengaging the A/Ts, one of the throttle levers becomes inoperative and the other lever takes on the task of both engines. The inop lever gets forced by the servos to idle position and does not move from there (unless you physically hold it with your hand, and if you let go it returns to idle). Sometimes this behavior starts even if the A/Ts are not used. Sometimes the bad throttle is the left one sometimes the right. I have not been able to accuratly reproduce it, it does it whenever it feels like it, believe it or not, hehe.

I have checked with PM software and they seem to think the trouble is with the TQ's controller card and/or driver. I'm not sure if the card and driver is to blame because I've been talking to a gentleman from Germany running the same TQ but with a different card and driver and is experiencing the same exact issue, he even has the same MCP and setup (Just in case it makes a difference).

I was looking around the FSUIPC module and noticed some throttle settings, not sure if maybe they should be set differently or changed in any way.

I'm really at a loss as to what to do here, I hope that maybe you have some ideas of what can be done, your help and comments will be GREATLY appreciated.

In advance THANK YOU!

Alex

[Pete Dowson]

After engaging or disengaging the A/Ts, one of the throttle levers becomes inoperative and the other lever takes on the task of both engines. The inop lever gets forced by the servos to idle position and does not move from there (unless you physically hold it with your hand, and if you let go it returns to idle). Sometimes this behavior starts even if the A/Ts are not used. Sometimes the bad throttle is the left one sometimes the right.

I assume there's some third party software driving the throttles? Else how does do the servos get operated? Sounds like there's a mix-up between how they are driving the throttle controls in FS to start with. There are so many ways of doing it, and I really haven't a clue without more information.

Have you talked to the folks who produce/provide the driver?

I was looking around the FSUIPC module and noticed some throttle settings, not sure if maybe they should be set differently or changed in any way.

No idea. What do you mean by "some throttle settings"? FSUIPC can be used to assign and calibrate single or multiple throttles, reversers, and map one or two throttles to three or four. But it does none of this without your say-so. There are also throttle sync facilities, but again user-instigated.

On the other hand a client program to FSUIPC can do almost anything, whether via axis controls or directly into the thrust lever positions understood by FS, bypassing the axis inputs. It can also disconnect axes as it likes (used for instance for Fly-By-Wire). Project Magenta's MCP uses the direct method, disconnecting and reconnecting the axes appropriately, and even optionally watching them for enough movement to indicate user-instigated auto-A/T disconnection.

I'm really at a loss as to what to do here, I hope that maybe you have some ideas of what can be done, your help and comments will be GREATLY appreciated.

Without more information it's impossible for me to say anything I'm afraid. Someone associated with your throttle installation must know how it works, what it does. Don't they provide any support at all?

You could try using the FSUIPC Logging facilities to see what it does. If it is writing directly to FSUIPC throttle offsets you'd need to have IPC write logging enabled. For the servo operation it is presumably reading them, so that's IPC reads. It may well be using normal axis inputs for throttles, in which case the Axis Event logging. But the problem is you are going to have a HUGE log, and with PM running, really really huge, with most of it being irrelevant. It would take hours and hours of analysis to finds the relevant bits and tie them together.

Without some help from whoever designed / built / supplied your quadrant system it is going to be very difficult, near impossible, unless you can make it go wrong with no PM modules running, no other FSUIPC clients at all. THEN it might be worth looking at the log.

Regards

Pete