Sometimes tower sometimes approach, why ?

[Emmeth]

Arriving at airports sometimes you can choose to comunicate with the tower and therefore ask for permission to land and then receive evetually the clearance.

Some other times you can only talk to the approach only and I really can't understand why this fires you every time into the hell, but this is another story.

Doing every single time an instrumental FP why does this happen ?

I have to say that this seems to happen despiting the distance, I mean even if I ignore the approach I can't never talk to the tower later on until landed. On NY Kennedy airport for example even once landed I was trying to talk to the tower starting from parking but there was no chance to talk to the tower therefore I was forced to TO completely by myself without permissions or similar things.... That's weird indeed IMO. Of course neither the Ground was available. I am pretty sure I am plenty of saves about that.

This of course happens also despiting the fact the airport has an ILS or no no ILS, of course, anyway AFAIK the NY JFK is supposed to be ILS equipped.

Of course I also forced into my com 1 the tower freq and I tried to activate and deactivate and then activate the com 1 again trying to desperately " reset " the radio but this was useless. I also tried to set the tower freq on com 2 switching to com 2 but of course I obtained nothing. The tower must talk to me despiting it hates me  :)



Thanks in advance

[Daube]

Hmm I do not remember for sure, but I think this happens only at major airports: you must contact the approach first, in order to get the appropriate vectors to the localizer and line up with the runway with ILS and so. Then you get transfered to the tower that gives you the final landing authorization....

Also, one thing I noticed in my FSX is that sometimes, the ATC window gets late on the choice proposal. For example, when a controller tells you to contact another controller, and you confirm, it takes a little while before the controller appears in the list of choices. I don't know the reason, but anyway...

[Emmeth]

Hmm I do not remember for sure, but I think this happens only at major airports: you must contact the approach first, in order to get the appropriate vectors to the localizer and line up with the runway with ILS and so. Then you get transfered to the tower that gives you the final landing authorization....

I agree this seems to happen at major airports only.

Told that there is another problem , I tried to follow their insane approach instructions just to try as you pointed out to advance to the tower comunication. Here two huge problems surface :

1 ) The approach path takes into consideration your FP altitude therefore even if you are close to the airport you are ordered to reach for example 20.000 feet, ridicolous indeed.

2 ) Even if you follow the approach instrcutions you will never be able to talk with the tower until you are, of course, oredered an handoff due to insane path.

I like FSX but I think the ATC must be improved really a lot and it is also bugged just like when starting a new flight from scratch you are allowed to talk neither with the Tower or the Ground.

I have save games to witness that.

If there is a well hidden secret please tell me

[Daube]

The ATC has some bugs for sure. I think heavy AI traffic is not helping, too. I do not fly at major airports like NY or stuff like that, I prefer "medium" internationnal airports with more interesting scenery and landscapes around, and I never had problems like that.

However, I had sometime some strange ATC behaviour, like ordering me to follow a direction away from the airport, so much away that I was almost out of reach (seveal miles that is). I found that I was flying much too fast. Since I started flying at 200 (or less) during approaches, the ATC reacts better.

[Emmeth]

The ATC has some bugs for sure. I think heavy AI traffic is not helping, too. I do not fly at major airports like NY or stuff like that, I prefer "medium" internationnal airports with more interesting scenery and landscapes around, and I never had problems like that..

I am inclined to that too to avoid bugs but this is a limitation cause sometimes it would be better to fly also over big airports also because MS told that few of huge FSX hubs are better modelled than others.

However, I had sometime some strange ATC behaviour, like ordering me to follow a direction away from the airport, so much away that I was almost out of reach (seveal miles that is). I found that I was flying much too fast. Since I started flying at 200 (or less) during approaches, the ATC reacts better.

When dialoging with the tower I am always @ around 200 KIAS but despiting that that the tower fires me in a direction that never is the same of the airport where I want to land,just like you wrote.


IMO these are huge bugs, why the hell MS left them inside FSX despiting the SP2 ?  

[Daube]

I found that the controller sending you away from the airport is not ALWAYS a bug. I have done recently a flight in Corea (I think it was near Osan airbase, because I had installed some nice military AI there). I set up an IFR flight to a nearby airport (30 minutes flight or something like that), and the controller sent me very far away from the airport... but then, he ordered me to turn and I found that I made quite a nice and easy (although a bit large) approach to get lined up with the runway.

During this approach, I have really been wondering if the controller was still remembering about me, but in the end everything was alright. I think the main source of the problem is that FS doesn't know anything about the real approaches that are assigned to the real airports. The program just generates an approach depending on the runway and wind direction in a generic pattern, not very nice for us, but much easier for the ATC to handle the AI flights.

For example, Buochs is a nice airport located next to a small hill and in front of a lake. In real life, you should arrive facing the lake, pass behind the hill and then around it in order to line up with the runway, and the overall distance is very short. In FS, the approach is nothing like that.

[Emmeth]

I found that the controller sending you away from the airport is not ALWAYS a bug. I have done recently a flight in Corea (I think it was near Osan airbase, because I had installed some nice military AI there). I set up an IFR flight to a nearby airport (30 minutes flight or something like that), and the controller sent me very far away from the airport... but then, he ordered me to turn and I found that I made quite a nice and easy (although a bit large) approach to get lined up with the runway.

Assuming 50% of times the aprroach could be right it still remains the other 50% and when approaching I can't take the risk or at least I can't waste 40 minutes turning around the airport hoping the second try will be good.
I have to land despiting the tower is with me or against me, therefore I am forced to ignore it to workaround a possible random bug.

Every single time I ignore the approach I can safely land with no problems. Every time I can talk to the tower asking for permission I can safely land. When I decide to choose the dark side of the moon listening to the aprroach my flight is a nightmare and I have never brought " my passengers " where they have ticketed to.

I am forced to avoid the possible bug...BTW do you know if a FSXI will have some real betatesting ?

Thanks