Collins memory function bug?

[FloB]

The manual says:

 

"The ACT annunciator flashes while the transceiver is tuning to a new frequency, and a short audio tone indicates the active frequency has been changed.

 

NOTE: If the ACT annunciator continues flashing, it indicates that the transceiver is not tuned to the frequency displayed in the active display.

 

The STO button allows up to six preset frequencies to be entered into memory. The button is pressed after presetting the frequency to be stored. The channel number (CH 1 through CH 6) of available
memory is displayed in the upper window; the lower window continues to display the frequency to be stored. The MEM switch may be used to advance through the channel numbers without changing the
preset display."

 

I'm unable to get the memory function to work like intended. I've never seen the CH1 - CH6 indication at all and storing and loading the frequencies is quite randomized - if working at all.

ACT flashing also not to be seen but I don't care. A working mem function would be nice though.

 

Is this a bug or is it me?

 

Flo

 

 

 

[JGregory]

Flo,

 

Thanks for the input.  When I coded the Collins radios we had limited documentation. I now have all the necessary information and have been working on the Collins radios for the Citation.  There are some significant differences compared too what is currently in the Saab.  After the Citation is released we will be looking at retrofitting the Saab with the new radios.

[enchantedloom]

Is this related to the problem I'm having? Sometimes flicking the XFR switch up swaps NAV frequencies, as it should, but then all of a sudden flicking it up recalls the memory instead, and flicking it down now swaps frequencies. And then it'll randomly change back. So I get my freqs all lined up ready and then at the critical moment it wipes my standby frequency with what was in memory! I rush to punch the numbers back in and try again, and half the time the thing chooses that moment to revert to normal and I lose my standby frequency a second time. "Guess which way to flick the button" is a great game for passing time enroute, but a bit frustrating in the middle of a STAR!

 

I'm having manipulator problems elsewhere, too. The VS adjuster is very finicky (and it's hard to see if it has moved), and clicking and dragging the altitude selector only gives me a couple of hundred feet change before I run out of screen, which means selecting a descent from FL250 is a pretty lengthy operation!

 

Any ideas?

 

- Steve

[Goran_M]

I'll let Jim reply to your radio issue.

 

Re the VS adjuster.  You'll need to look closely to see if it has been moved as it is a spring loaded adjuster.  Meaning it will move, I think, about 30° either way and stop.  Holding it there will continuously move the VS numbers up or down on the EADI.  Letting the mouse button go will snap it back to center.  

 

The altitude selector had to be animated so as to leave enough room for people to select the altitude correctly without overshooting due to the speed of the adjustment.  It's a real pain when trying to select, for example 22 000 feet and not being able to hit that number on the selector due to the speed of the numbers.

[Lawnmower]

Re the VS, I had the same trouble also.

Much easier to assign 3 buttons on the yoke, VS mode, VS up and VS down, works perfect.

[JGregory]

Is this related to the problem I'm having? Sometimes flicking the XFR switch up swaps NAV frequencies, as it should, but then all of a sudden flicking it up recalls the memory instead, and flicking it down now swaps frequencies. And then it'll randomly change back. So I get my freqs all lined up ready and then at the critical moment it wipes my standby frequency with what was in memory! I rush to punch the numbers back in and try again, and half the time the thing chooses that moment to revert to normal and I lose my standby frequency a second time. "Guess which way to flick the button" is a great game for passing time enroute, but a bit frustrating in the middle of a STAR!

 

I'm having manipulator problems elsewhere, too. The VS adjuster is very finicky (and it's hard to see if it has moved), and clicking and dragging the altitude selector only gives me a couple of hundred feet change before I run out of screen, which means selecting a descent from FL250 is a pretty lengthy operation!

 

Any ideas?

 

- Steve

With regard to the radio XFR/MEM switch…  if the animation of the switch  is "reverse" to the direction you are dragging then that is an XP manipulator problem that we have no control over.  If the animation is correct (moves in the direction of the drag) but the functionality is changing intermittently then that is another problem.  Let me know which it is.

[enchantedloom]

Thanks for the replies, guys. 

 

With regard to the radio XFR/MEM switch…  if the animation of the switch  is "reverse" to the direction you are dragging then that is an XP manipulator problem that we have no control over.  If the animation is correct (moves in the direction of the drag) but the functionality is changing intermittently then that is another problem.  Let me know which it is.

 

Aha! I just tried it again and it depends on where my head is (I use TrackIR). If my eyeline is even slightly below the switch then when I drag up it moves down and recalls the memory. If I'm above the switch then it moves the way I drag it. So I guess that's an XP issue. Either way, now that I know this I can easily work around it. My mom always said I should sit more upright!

 

 

Re the VS, I had the same trouble also.

Much easier to assign 3 buttons on the yoke, VS mode, VS up and VS down, works perfect.

 

Good idea! I'll do that.

 

I'll let Jim reply to your radio issue.

 

Re the VS adjuster.  You'll need to look closely to see if it has been moved as it is a spring loaded adjuster.  Meaning it will move, I think, about 30° either way and stop.  Holding it there will continuously move the VS numbers up or down on the EADI.  Letting the mouse button go will snap it back to center.  

 

The altitude selector had to be animated so as to leave enough room for people to select the altitude correctly without overshooting due to the speed of the adjustment.  It's a real pain when trying to select, for example 22 000 feet and not being able to hit that number on the selector due to the speed of the numbers.

 

There's no chance of me overshooting by an inch! :-) If I put the altitude selector in the very middle of the screen at normal zoom (i.e. my head behind the throttle quadrant) and then drag left or right to the edge of the screen it gives me about a thousand feet if I'm lucky. Dragging vertically gives me nothing and at 45 degrees I get two or three hundred feet. So in absolutely ideal conditions I can get to cruise altitude in 20-odd careful mouse movements. Is that the kind of change I should expect? It seems awfully slow compared to other a/c. Good thing I haven't tried it on PilotEdge, because I'd never be able to respond to altitude instructions quickly enough. Come to that, ALL the manipulators are really slow - a half-screen drag on the radios gives me one or two digits of change. So might TrackIR be causing me grief here too? I should have tried without, but I've shut XP down now. I'll fiddle with it next time and see.

[JGregory]

Come to that, ALL the manipulators are really slow - a half-screen drag on the radios gives me one or two digits of change.

The radio frequency manips are "drag and hold"… at which point the frequency will continue to increment until you let go. No need to keep dragging.

[Goran_M]

There's no chance of me overshooting by an inch! :-) If I put the altitude selector in the very middle of the screen at normal zoom (i.e. my head behind the throttle quadrant) and then drag left or right to the edge of the screen it gives me about a thousand feet if I'm lucky. Dragging vertically gives me nothing and at 45 degrees I get two or three hundred feet. So in absolutely ideal conditions I can get to cruise altitude in 20-odd careful mouse movements. Is that the kind of change I should expect? It seems awfully slow compared to other a/c. Good thing I haven't tried it on PilotEdge, because I'd never be able to respond to altitude instructions quickly enough. Come to that, ALL the manipulators are really slow - a half-screen drag on the radios gives me one or two digits of change. So might TrackIR be causing me grief here too? I should have tried without, but I've shut XP down now. I'll fiddle with it next time and see.

 

The Altitude Selector shouldn't be going that slow.

Can I ask what your FOV is set to?  If it's set too low, making the panel appear closer to you, then it will be slow.  If it's set to a higher number, making more of the panel visible, then the numbers should move a lot faster.  The values of the manipulators I set in each animation are calculated in meters across the different axes of the screen and were tested using an FOV of 75.  That's why if your FOV is too low, the distance from 1 end of the screen to the other is a lot shorter than if your FOV was set to a higher number.

(Hope that all makes sense)

Edited April 1, 2014 by Goran_M

[FloB]

Was the "pixel drag axis" ever implemented in X-Plane? It sounded like a good idea to get rid of the annoying XP drag axis behavior - but drag manipulators are still a mess IMHO.

 

http://developer.x-plane.com/2012/04/manipulators-and-the-scroll-wheel/

Edited April 1, 2014 by FloB

[Goran_M]

We did numerous tests with the pixel drag axis but we found a small issue.  While moving, say, the heading indicator knob on the center console, the heading bug would skip 1 spot on the EHSI and this spot would get bigger and bigger the more often the knob was dragged back to that spot.  We're not sure if this is an X-Plane bug, something to do with the code or a Blender animation issue, but we were not able to fix it after 3 weeks of attempted work-arounds.  

Edited April 1, 2014 by Goran_M

[FloB]

Too bad, what does Laminar say?
As they were well aware that the current drag axis was no good I would expect them to get the "pixel drag" right.
With the growing number of system-heavy aircrafts this should be high priority IMHO.

 

Anyway, thanks for the answer.

 

Flo

Edited April 1, 2014 by FloB

[enchantedloom]

Oops, I seem to have hijacked this thread - sorry :-\ Great plane, BTW - I look forward to it becoming my default, once I can turn the damn knobs!

 

The radio frequency manips are "drag and hold"… at which point the frequency will continue to increment until you let go. No need to keep dragging.

 

So they are. Mea culpa. I think I'm starting to see phantoms! I'm a dev myself and I should take more careful observations!

 

The Altitude Selector shouldn't be going that slow.

Can I ask what your FOV is set to?  If it's set too low, making the panel appear closer to you, then it will be slow.  If it's set to a higher number, making more of the panel visible, then the numbers should move a lot faster.  The values of the manipulators I set in each animation are calculated in meters across the different axes of the screen and were tested using an FOV of 75.  That's why if your FOV is too low, the distance from 1 end of the screen to the other is a lot shorter than if your FOV was set to a higher number.

(Hope that all makes sense)

 

FOV is 0.70, although it seems about the same on 0.75. It turns out it IS TrackIR, though! I just tried using a fixed view of the panel instead of the shift-9 "3D cockpit command-look" view that's used with TrackIR and it works just fine in that! Whoosh!

 

Interestingly, but perhaps not surprisingly, it also suffers from the same issue as the XFR switch, in that the direction is reversed when my eyeline is below the knob. That might explain the apparent randomness of it. Yesterday I said I was getting no movement at all when I drag up or down, but today I could get about the same vertically as horizontally. It depends crucially on the angle I view the knob. Someone's got their quaternions in a tangle somewhere! There isn't any head position that gives me a decent rate of change, though. If I sit right back in First Class I get no more movement. So it's something to do with that cockpit view, at least when using TrackIR. Something messing with the metrics, maybe. I just loaded up my Jetstream for comparison and there does seem to be a small difference in rate between fixed and TrackIR views but it's less than a factor of 2 and far less pronounced than in the Saab.

 

Thanks for all your help. At least I can sit up higher and set a joystick button to give me a fixed panel view when I need it.

[JGregory]

As they were well aware that the current drag axis was no good I would expect them to get the "pixel drag" right.
With the growing number of system-heavy aircrafts this should be high priority IMHO.

The pixel drag works much better.. it just requires a different setup by the developer.   We will revisit this.