FSUIPC5 P3Dv4 sudden flap extension

[elcapitan]

Hi there;

Sometimes I get these uncommanded flaps extension (5 or full) during a flight which is quite concerning.  I have been noticing this behavior for a while and I looked everywhere online but I haven't found any relevant posts. 

I am running Win10, P3D v4, PMDG NGX 737-800, and ChasePlane.  The flaps extension happens occasionally when the sim comes out of idle mode.

Is there any way I can pinpoint which plugin is sending flaps 5 or flaps full commands to the sim through FSUIPC?  I tried the log but I wasn't able to find anything.

 

Thanks for your help,

Mustafa 

[John Dowson]

Hi Mustafa,

you can try logging 'Events (non-axis controls)' to see what commands are being sent (from the FSUIPC logging tab), but this won't tell you what is sending the command. Maybe also 'Buttons and Key operations' to see if anything is being triggered. That this only happens 'occasionally' is suspicious....

Have you tried the PMDG forums?

Cheers,

John

[John Dowson]

If you post your ini file, I could check if you have anything there that would be sending a flaps control.

[elcapitan]

Thanks John;

I will turn on logging and check it out, I attached my ini.

Is the logging persisted to a file somewhere? the logging window usually scrolls rather quickly with all the demands being sent during flight.

 

FSUIPC5.ini

[John Dowson]

The log file is in the same folder as your ini file.You should activate logging of 'Axis controls' as well, as you have assignments to AXIS_FLAPS_SET.

[elcapitan]

I looked at the log and I see the command below whenever the behavior happens.  I deleted all flaps commands in P3D button/key assignments, although controls were already disabled from before:

  2831312 FS Control Sent: Ctrl=65759, Param=0 FLAPS_DECR

Also, on a separate but related note; the log file is full of these two commands, any idea why?

  2910765 *** EVENT: Cntrl= 66587 (0x0001041b), Param= 382 (0x0000017e) ROTOR_BRAKE
  2910765 ***  AXIS: Cntrl= 66162 (0x00010272), Param= 3 (0x00000003) COWLFLAP1_SET

Thanks,

Mustafa

[John Dowson]

Hi Mustafa,

so something is sending a 'decrease flaps command', but I'm not sure if thats related to your issue if you are seeing 5/full. You do have a button on your yoke assigned to this. It would be helpful to see the whole log (with appropriate activations) to try to determine where that originates (ie from your button assignment or not).

As to the other events, many add-on aircraft re-purpose P3D events for their own use, so they may be internal to your PMDG add-on. These are generally 'noise' in the log and can be excluded using he 'DontLogThese' parameter (see bottom of page 13 onwards in Advanced User Manual).

John

 

[elcapitan]

Hi John;

I have done a ton of testing and deactivate some of the culprits starting with SpadNext used for my Saitek panel, SmartCARs for VA networks, and some joysticks that I don't need.  I double checked that PMDG to make sure it is not sending any commands from Key Assignment feature in the FMC.  I was able to identify a behavior where the flaps are always extended to full whenever I open engine 2 start lever through a button click on my Saitek throttle during the engine startup process.  You can see that after line 611 of the log (attached), I mapped the engine 2 start lever through FSUIPC offset event (70321) to PMDG.

Also, I am experiencing some weird behavior on one of my joysticks that was working fine up until last week, the joystick is B737 in the INI and the buttons and axis on it is not corresponding to the right mapped controls.  I only thing I remember doing this past week is unplugging all usb devices to troubleshoot a PC problem i was having.  After that this joystick stopped responding to the appropriate controls. 

Thanks,

Mustafa

 

FSUIPC5.1.log

FSUIPC5.ini

[John Dowson]

Hi Mustafa,

firstly, you are using quite an old (and unsupported) version of FSUIPC - can you update to the latest version, which is v5.151 - you are using 5.124.

I think you may be getting erratic behaviour with your PMDG aircraft as in your B737 profile you have your Aileron, Elevator and Spoiler axis assigned in FSUIPC as 'Send direct to FSUIPC Calibration'. For PMDG Boeings, you should assign to 'Send to FS as normal axis' and not calibrate in FSUIPC.  The PMDG aircraft intercept the FS controls, in the same way as FSUIPC does for calibration, and use them directly. If you use “Direct to ...” (or even FS controls and then calibrate in FSUIPC) then after calibration FSUIPC sends the controls on to the sim at a lower priority level (to avoid the infinite loop). This results in two, probably different, values arriving in the sim and maybe at slightly different times, causing issues.

Therefore please try switching your PMDG axis assignments to 'Send to FS as normal axis' and do not calibrate in FSUIPC. Also still leave controllers disabled in the sim.

Btw, even though you currently have these axis as 'Send direct to FSUIPC Calibration', you have not actually calibrated them, which can cause issues. Please make sure you actually calibrate any axis that you send for calibration.

As for your joystick problem, this is because your joystick ids have changed and you are not using the 'Joy Letters' facility (see page 21 of User Guide). You should correct the joystick ids first, and once you have your device(s) working correctly, you should either manually assign letters to your devices or set 'AutoAssignLetters=Yes' in the '[JoyNames]' section of the ini (as explained in the User Guide).

To correct your joystick ids, you will need to determine what your original ids were. Looking at your 'B737' axis assignments, you have these:

    10=6X,256,D,1,0,0,0    -{ DIRECT: Aileron }-
    11=6Y,256,D,2,0,0,0    -{ DIRECT: Elevator }-
 

However, you have no corresponding device with id 6 in your '[JoyNames]' section. If these axis were assigned to your 'B737' device, then you would need to change (with sim closed)

    7=B737
    7.GUID={A79B84E0-1B33-11E9-8001-444553540000}

to

    6=B737
    6.GUID={A79B84E0-1B33-11E9-8001-444553540000}

When you restart FSUIPC, it will try to update the ids for you. If this doesn't work, you need to use the JoyIds program to update the registry (see FAQ entry 

However, in other profiles you have things assigned to device 7, e.g. in '[Axes.Barron 58]' you have:)

10=7X,256,D,18,0,0,0    -{ DIRECT: PropPitch2 }-
11=7Y,256,D,13,0,0,0    -{ DIRECT: Mixture1 }-
12=7Z,256,D,14,0,0,0    -{ DIRECT: Mixture2 }-
 

So its not clear to me what the id number should be. If 6 and 7 are the same device, you could manually update all references of one to the other. To do this, best to leave the ids as currently assigned, and then change all references to device 6 to device 7. Alternatively, you will need to manually re-assign/calibrate that device again.

Once you have everything back to working as it should, you should then start using the 'Joy Letters' facility to prevent such problems in the future.

Cheers,

John

 

[elcapitan]

I did exactly as you said and everything seem to be working just fine.  I fixed the axis to be normal, and calibrated the direct ones, followed the [Joy Letters] documentation and set AutoAssignLetters=Yes, removed joystick 7 as it was a duplicate, and everything seem to be working just fine now.  I restarted a couple of times and tested the engine start procedure a couple of times and no unwanted flap extensions.

Greatly appreciated John.

Cheers,

Mustafa

 

p.s.: I ended up not needing the JoyId software, nevertheless I couldn't download it even if I wanted to as the airgroup51.net link for it from Pete's post requires you to be logged in to download the attachment, and airgroup51.net are not accepting new registrations.

[John Dowson]

Hi Mustafa,

great, glad you got it sorted.

Yes - I checked that link after I posted and found out that it is no longer available from there. Its on my list to rectify when I get a chance - I'll try and find out where this can be found an either update the link or attach directly (license permitting). Thanks for the heads-up though.

Regards,

John

 

[Stephan R.]

Hello John

I did read your post, but I still have a little problem, that I coundn`t solve by myself.

I have Saitek Yoke, 2 Throttle, P3Dv4, newest FSUIPC 5.512. I did configurate my Throttle as follow:

Throttel 1: Lever 1 for Spoiler, Lever 2 for Engine 1, Lever 3 for Engine 2                                                                                                                                                                                                                  Throttle 2: Lever 1 for Engine 3, Lever 2 for Engine 4, Lever 3 for Flaps

I did configurate the Button on my Throttle 2 for the Engine 3 to Cut off. Everythings is working, but when I press this Button Cut off, the Lever from Throttle 3 will increase. Not full, just a little bit, like step by step, when I press the Button. For every press on the Button, it will increase more and more.

Sorry for my bad english.

I attached you the .ini file as PDF.

 

Thank you for have a look on that and your kind help.

Cheers

Stephan (LSZH)

FSUIPC Configuration.pdf

[Thomas Richter]

Hi,

the INI file shows only for ENG3 CUT that you use a Macro, not part of the INI file:

4=R1,1,CM1:3,0 -{Macro PMDG747: cut3: cut3}-

Did you check that nothing in P3D Controls is assigned to the Button and the Macro has the correct PMDG control?

Thomas