Engine Out Procedures, Dreamfleet Baron?

[rhodges]

I posted this a week ago on the Dreamfleet forums and have gotten no response. I thought maybe it would get more exposure here and someone might have already had a similar experience. If not, for anyone who has this fine bird, I would appreciate it if you would give engine out procedures a try and reply with your results.

My first discovery was that cutting the mags off will not kill an engine, so I just ignored that and pretended that I had lost my right engine.

1. Went to the firewall with everything (Throttle, Props, and Mixture)

2. Tried to lean mixture to zero. Found that if I was very careful, I could slowly lean the mixture to a point by clicking the mouse on the prop leaver one percent at a time ("throttles and trim window"). However, upon reaching a certain point, the bird took it away from me and advanced the mixture back to the original setting.

3. Same thing with the prop control. Could not reduce the RPM setting to zero. In the process of pulling her back one percent at a time, it would take it away from me at some point and advanced the leaver back to the original position.

4. Discovered that with my CH Joystick, if I leaned the mixture on both engines to zero killing both engines, reduced the prop RPM setting to zero on both engines, and closed the throttle on both engines, that I could then advance each slowly on my left engine. (My virtual good engine).

5. All engine gauges then read as expected for one dead engine, one good engine, and the aircraft performed as expected.

Is the DF Baron really not designed for engine out procedures, or am I just overlooking something here? I don't know if it is the aircraft or just a short between these old ears.

Am I also correct in assuming that the props do not have full feathering capability? Never flew a Baron, the real thing may not either but it would surprise me a bit. Clarification by a real world Baron pilot would also be appreciated. Even with the prop control down to zero, I was still maintaining about 700 RPM (Throttle closed, Mixture also leaned out to zero).

Above all, please do not read this post as a flame against this product. This issue is certainly no biggie and I would highly recommend the Dreamfleet Baron. The only problem I have had with it was with the Garmin provisions when I upgraded to a 64bit OS (Same thing with the Dakota in FSX). However, switching to the stand alone Garmins directly from RXP work fine as a replacement, so that became somewhat academic.

Respectfully:
RTH

[EivlEvo]

I don't know anything about the dreamfleet, but I know about the real baron. The propellers are in fact full feathering, but not autofeathering.

Turning off the mags is not an advisable way to shut down an engine in flight. Pulling the mixture is the best way to go about it. (Which obviously ur having an issue with... hmm...)

I don't have a POH handy and can't picture the cockpit right this second as I've just climbed out of the Seminole... sometimes it does take a few seconds to feather the props fully... it can be almost 15 seconds with some unfeathering accumulators which most Barons have, but some have them disabled (tho I doubt you'd see that in FS)

There isn't like a setting that you have turned on that prevents pulling the mixtures or whatnot? Like with the dreamfleet or whathaveyou?

Also... you aren't below your VMC speed when trying to fail your engine are you? The product may prevent against that?

[tatest]

If you have mixture for both engines assigned to a single slider on your flight controller, the mixture control on the panel will be set by the simulator based on the controller position. If you try moving the control on the panel, the sim will eventually notice a discrepancy and move it back to what the controller says.

Same for prop and throttle.

If you want to change settings on just one engine, with a hardware controller, you either need to have enough levers to separate the two engines, or use the engine select keyboard command (which doesn't always work well).

I don't fly the Baron, thus don't know the control details, but for many multis with feathering, there is a separate feathering control, it is not done with the prop speed lever, which is more usually mapped to the range of governed RPM.

[jeroen79]

Regarding the baron's engine controls, there are three 'sensitive' areas for each control(throttle, pitch, mixture). You can control them with mouseclicks (right=down, left=up) or the scrollwheel.

One is at the base and controls the setting for both engines.
Two are located where the handle's knobs would be in the full position, they control the setting for each individual engine.

These sensitive areas do not move! Don't follow the lever's knob with the mouse.
http://i50.tinypic.com/2885u68.jpg
Left engine is all full, right engine is all zero.

You can feather the props by moving them past 0 down to -25%.

I did a testflight.
When you cut the fuel the prop will windmill untill you feather it.
Then it will stay still untill you give it a push with the starter.

[EivlEvo]

Does using the starter depend on your forward speed? When you do an airstart on an aircraft that uses an unfeathering accumulator you should be able to put the throttle to about 1/4 inch open, mixture rich, and prop full forward and the propr should begin to flip and eventually kick on. This depends on a few things obviously... but in general.

[rhodges]

Thanks for the replies folks:

Appears that the only way to shut down an engine and get her to play fair is to cut off the fuel to the engine one wants to kill.

Works like a champ then.

See the same post in the AvSim FS2004 forum for another reply that was of some help.

Happy flying:
RTH