Mystery of the Vanishing Maule

[Phiz]

The Maule, long one of my favourites, is a must for my new computer.  So I download the latest version, carefully follow install instructions, fire up fs9 - and no trace of the Maule  in the aircraft selection list.  Rush back to the fs9 aircraft folder, and there it is, a perfect install of the entire bunch of files. So how do I kick-start it into action?

[Hagar]

Well, if it's not listed on the selection menu it's obviously not a perfect install. If you're certain it's installed correctly & not hidden inside another folder the first thing I would do is to open Aircraft.cfg in Notepad to find out how it's actually listed on the menu.
ui_manufacturer=

[Midnight_LS1]

I noticed the same thing when I tried to install additional textures for the Meljet 777 series.

Open up the aircraft CFG file, under [flight.0], [flight.1], [flight.2]...etc

Make sure the "title=" is not the same as the another texture of aircraft in the FS9.

Like if it was this:

[Flight.0]
sim= blah blah blah
title=Meljet 777 MKIII
texture=MJ

and the next entry is like this:

[flight.1]
sim= blah blah blah
title=Meljet 777 MKIII
texture=WT

it won't show the next aircraft because both titles are the same!

If I took the [flight.1] section and added or changed the title name like this:

[flight.1]
sim= blah blah blah
title=Meljet 777 World Tour
texture=WT

it shows up!

[commoner]

Almost certain to be a typo somewhere......

[Phiz]

Thanks folks. I've checked for typos, and none there. Reinstalled, no difference. Maddening, because I've installed the Maule several times over the years with no problem. One thing strikes me: usually with a multi-purpose aircraft like the Maule [taildragger, tricycle, tundra, wheel-ski] you have a master folder in the  fs9 aircraft list, ie
                   Maule
which contains the variants. But not with this one.  Simply

Maule taildragger
Maule tricycle
Maule tundra
Maule wheel-ski

Could it be that without a master folder, fs9 gets confused?

Usually I'd contact the plane's creator for advice, but the Maule ReadMe offers no contacts.

[commoner]

mmmm.....mine are all in the seperate folders too and it works fine, so maybe better look elsewhere for the problem..................commoner

[TSC.]

Hi Phiz,

This is how the Maules look in my Aircraft folder, hope it may help:

Cheers,

TSC.

[RollerBall]

Hmmmmm, strange........extracted zip to a temporary folder, copied the contects of the sound, effects and gauges sub-folders to the respective FS2004 folders, copied all of the folders contained in the aircrfat sub-folder to the FS2004 folder, fired up the sim, found the Maule with a large range of variants, chose the tricycle version and flew it away. No problems whatsoever.

I spose you are talking about MauleM7_260.zip?

[Phiz]

Cracked it!  The troublesome download came from Flightsim.com and was allegedly an updated version. I looked for the original version, and found it right here, in Simviation. This time, no problem...[and yes, there is a master folder!] Thanks, everyone.

[commoner]

...glad you found an answer but strange that you have a master folder.............mine has no master folder and my readme installing instuctions  say they will all be in seperate ones...mm.....

[Phiz]

Master folder? Look at theysellcoke's shot of his files, above. That's what I have now. Instructions? Mine are 'use Winzip and extract to fs9 root folder.'

[Hagar]

Instructions? Mine are 'use Winzip and extract to fs9 root folder.'

I wouldn't advise that either. In my experience with troubleshooting installation problems (which I've been doing on a daily basis for several years, both on this forum & by E-mail) this is the most common cause of all problems people have with installing addons to any M$ sim.

[Phiz]

That's really interesting, and could explain many of my hassles over the years. Merci beaucoup.

[Hagar]

You're welcome.
Read RollerBall's reply. This is the way to do it.

Hmmmmm, strange........extracted zip to a temporary folder, copied the contects of the sound, effects and gauges sub-folders to the respective FS2004 folders, copied all of the folders contained in the aircrfat sub-folder to the FS2004 folder, fired up the sim, found the Maule with a large range of variants, chose the tricycle version and flew it away. No problems whatsoever.