Electrical problems with PSS XH558

[MikePotten]

Firstly, thank you for reading my post!

Having drawn a complete blank with the PSS site I thought it best to ask the real experts, the users.

I downloaded and installed PSS Vulcan XH558 some months ago and have, to date, spent many many happy hours flying her. The other day, however, I went to retact the gear and nothing happened. It took me a couple of moments only to check the electrical failures section of FS2002 and yes it had a cross in the electrical failures box.

I cleared it and tried again, same problem, looked at failures screen and cross was back in the box. Exited FS2002 etc. etc. but nothing would clear the box. I even selected removed the cross and in the same session selected 'randon failures' but with o instances. Came out of failures screen and back in, guess what, a cross in the box and electrical system not working.

In short, no matter what I do the cross cannot be removed and I am stuck with a permanent electrical failure affecting not only the gear but all comms of course as well.

What's strange is that this only affects the Vulcan, all other aircraft are OK?

I've companred the aircraft.cfg file with other aircraft not sharing the problem and the electrical setting is =0 the same as all the others so drew a blank there.

Any ideas welcomed please to get my XH558 back in the air!

Thanks in advance.

[ajmitch]

I suspect you have a dead battery.
In FS2002, when you drain the battery it will cause an electrical failure. The only way round that is to reset the flight. However, if you created and saved a flight in cold and dark shutdown mode with a drained battery, no amount of resetting the flight will restore it.
You need to open up a flight that has the engines running, or another aircraft that doesn't have the 'problem' then change aircraft to the Vulcan, shut her down then save the Vulcan flight as whatever..

Tony

[Thakillah]

I believe FSUIPC has an option to extend battery's life

[MikePotten]

My thanks to you both for trying, however, I have always had FSUIPC and am aware of the old battery problem. I have the option set to =0 for never ending battery life, so I don't think this is the problem.

The affects the Vulcan only, all other aircraft are OK, strange.

Have looked through Vulcan *.cfg files but can't find anything in there that could be causing this and having not set any failures myself can't understand why or how an X appears in the box still.

You have made me think, however, I checked the Vulcan aircraft.cfg file but not the panel.cfg, so off to look at this now.

Thanks again. Will post my results in a moment.

Rgds

[ajmitch]

Mike, I replicated your fault tonight.
If you try to start the Vulcan from a complete shutdown, you will experience what you described.
For example, if I load up a Cessna and shut it down and switch the master battery switch off, then change to the Vulcan, I can start the engines and take off. Even the wipers work. But...
no lights... and when I select gear up, I get a steady three reds and the wheels stay down.
The reason is that PSS didn't include a master power switch and didn't put any reference in the manual as to how to start from cold and dark.
What you need to do before anything else is 'shift+M' which is the FS default keys for Master Battery/Alternator ON/OFF.
Once you've done that, everything is fine.

PS. Doing this cold dark start, in the dark at Waddington, looking at the Vulcan from the front, I discovered that you can see the red strobes through the engines.

Tony

[MikePotten]

Thanks Tony, really appreciate the obvious efforts you are going to for me.

I had played with this idea i.e. I knew one of the problems was no Master Battery but I have assigned Ctrl-B as Master Battery. As you say there's no button so you don't know if it's on or off when you hit the buttons so I was using the lights to confirm this. i.e. select battery on then go outside and toggle the lights on and off, if they came on then the battery must be on. Next you you have to tackle the problem of no Avionics switch. Again I have a key assignment for this but as you will know, as the Avionics panel is 'anologue' there is no visible indication as you would get in the Cessna for example. A radio check to ATC would normaly confirm this but, with the electrical failure anyway I would be wasting my time.

So, I knew that the lack of a battery switch was an issue but I thought that by using a key assingment for the Master Battery is should work, but, of course it didn't.

Off now to try your Ctrl-M option, will report back as soon as I have done so.

Once again my sincere thanks for your efforts in assisting with this problem.

Rgds

[ajmitch]

>Off now to try your Ctrl-M option, will report back as soon
>as I have done so.

That's Shift-M Mike
It seems that no matter what you assign for Avionics master switch, avionics are always on. Even using the Shift+M option to switch the master battery/alternator on/off, makes no difference to the avionics. The 400Hz is always there as are the two master warning indicators. I think that's just the way PSS programmed it.

I also have Shift+A assigned to Auto cross feed for the fuel tanks, otherwise the engines cut out when the center tank empties.

Tony