With super assistance from Dave

1. OVER-SENSITIVE CONTROLS: The aircraft appears over-sensitive, almost like a fighter. It would seem that more movement of the joystick would be required in turns for a heavy aircraft like this.

ANSWER: Some joysticks seem to make all aircraft appear over-sensitive. There is a parameter to "de-sensitize" joystick inputs. In the FS9.cfg [CONTROLS] Section, add the following statement: stick_sensitivity_mode=0

This will make your joystick inputs more like a flight yoke.




2. ADI: What is A.D.I. and how and why is it used.

ANSWER: A.D.I. is the abbreviation of Anti-Detonant Injection. This is the injection of water or a mixture of water and methanol (70/30, 60/40, 50/50) into the engine at high power settings (typically greater than 40" MP). This allows for the use of leaner mixtures (best power mixture), higher manifold pressures and results in increased power for takeoff. At high power settings on those engines the carburetor would provide more fuel to the engine than it needs for efficient combustion and this extra fuel prevents overheating and detonation.

A.D.I. or water methanol injection allows the engine to be leaned to the best power mixture with the vaporization of the water/methanol fluid providing the cooling effect that the excess fuel had at richer mixture settings.

Detonation is the instantaneous and explosive burning of the fuel air mixture that causes damage to the pistons, rings and cylinders. Severe detonation can actually burn a hole in the piston crown, and that is an event that is guaranteed to increase your heart rate and the adrenaline level in your blood if it occurs on takeoff with a heavily loaded airplane.

On civilian airplanes, A.D.I. is normally used only for takeoff, and usually armed by a switch in the cockpit, after which the injection process is automatic depending on the power settings. A typical system would be armed by the pilot, and when the power setting exceeded a specific manifold pressure, then injection of the water/methanol fluid would begin.

The checklist item to turn the A.D.I. on before takeoff and off after takeoff refers to the arming switch. The switch can be found over the ECU. "Douglas K"

 

3. Tail Wheel (FS2004 Only): The aircraft is hard to steer without pedals. Can I convert the castoring tailwheel to a steerable one?

ANSWER: You bet! Open your aircraft.cfg file with Notepad. Scroll down to the Contact_Points Section. You will see the following:

//point.0 = 1, -38.815, 0, -1.1, 1574.803, 0, 0.667, 60, 0.3, 3, 0.5, 3, 5, 0, 194, 220

//Replace contact_point.0 below with the one above if you want a steerable tailwheel

point.0 = 1, -38.815, 0, -1.1, 1574.803, 0, 0.667, 180, 0.3, 3, 0.5, 3, 5, 0, 194, 220

Replace the above lines to look like this:

point.0 = 1, -38.815, 0, -1.1, 1574.803, 0, 0.667, 60, 0.3, 3, 0.5, 3, 5, 0, 194, 220

4. VC is too Dark in Shadows: The VC get very dark during the day if you are facing toward the sun. Is there a way to brighten it so instruments can be read?

ANSWER: There is a daytime VC light. You will find the switch just above the Audio Panel in the VC. Meant only for daylight operations, be sure to turn it off when panel lights are on at dusk, dawn, or at night.



 

5. How are the curtains opened?

Known Problems

1. Blurry Scenery Textures: For FS2004 only, if you feel this is a problem for you when flying the Howard 500, download this file of revised textures, unzip to a temporary folder, then copy paste the textures into the Howard textures folder. Original Civilian version only. http://www.flightsimonline.com/downloads/hwtxtup.zip

 

2. Missing FX files: For FS2004 only, Cabin lights fx missing are fx_D7cbn1 and fx_D7cbn3. Download, unzip, then copy paste to the FS9/Effects folder. (Note: If you have our Dash 7, you should have these files.) http://www.flightsimonline.com/downloads/hw5fx.zip

 

3. FS2002 Cargo Version Landing Lights: For FS2002 only, landing lights pointing downward, not animated for FS2002. Failed to retrofit animation. Download, unzip, then copy paste the replacement hw500c2.mdl to your FS2002/Aircraft/hw500vc2/model.cargo folder. http://www.flightsimonline.com/downloads/fs2k2mdls.zip

 

4. Right Rear Rudder texture mapped incorrectly: If you use repaints of the Howard 500, you may need to download the appropriate model (.mdl) upgrades. See below.

A Texture Mapping error to the right rudder inside on all models will require a model (.mdl) update for all versions of the Howard 500. If you repaint (or use repaints of) the Howard's rudder/tail sections, you must instruct users to download the model updates. The model updates are listed here and simple installation instructions are included.

FS2004/FS9 - http://www.flightsimonline.com/downloads/fs9mdls.zip

FS2002 - http://www.flightsimonline.com/downloads/fs2k2mdls.zip