Reversible propellers have a discing/zero thrust pitch which is different for
every model. Pilots use beta range to adjust their taxi speed. The RPM should
begin from idle and increase up to a certain limit (95% for the PT6 engines).
What I see in MSFS is that initially my RPM decreases and then starts going up
to the limit I set in the prop tables. As an example, for the Kodiak, we have
the following reference values: Low idle RPM: 1080 +/-20 Prohibited
Prop Operation RPM: 450-1050 Max reverse prop RPM: 2090 What I’m
getting in the sim: Low idle RPM: 1080 +/-20 Minimum RPM during beta
cycle: 790 Max reverse prop RPM: 2090 In the MSFS debug tools I
observed that when the propeller beta is between beta_min and reverse, power
absorbed and efficiency revert to a hardcoded 0.1 which leads to unrealistic
RPM (and thrust). The propeller decreases speed and almost always enters
underspeed mode. I am using legacy tables and even though I can explicitly set
the Cp and n, both are completely ignored and the sim reverts to these default
values. So it would be great if this hardcoded behaviour is removed in one
of the next sim updates, which will allow us to flesh out our propellers and
turboprops fully.
Sylvain, Eric, @FlyingRaccoon @EPellissier I am experiencing the same issue as
Alex… more over because I do not use legacy tables the behaviour is even
worse. The engine and prop thrust continues to spool up forever causing Prop
RPMs above 4000 despite the maximum RPM should be around 1900 on reverse. The
behaviour varies with different blade pitches, for an instance on my engine
between 5.9 to 6.0 triggers the behaviour, spooling the engine RPMs up to
82,000 RPMs when the maximum configured is 37468 RPMs. This causes the RPMS to
go too high (4427) and the thrust totally out of scale.
stop this behaviour, overriding the Prop:RPMs and Engine RPMs have no effect
on the thrust output, so the airplane keeps accelerating pretty much to take-
off speed and the engine debug continues to display the same figures as above.
The problem repeats again at -1 Degrees pitch… but everything works fine
between 2 and 3? which makes no sense. The picture below shows the results
when you move the blade 1.07 degrees out of the 6 degrees zone, is too weird:
I also tried limiting the fuel
to the engine via TURB ENG CORRECTED FF, but it doesn’t work either since the
airplane continues to spool up. What Alex and I are trying to do here is to
simulate the correct behaviour of PT6 engines, where during beta range the
prop blades pitch changes to a very fine pitch slowly until the pilot
continues to push the thrust level to full reverse, at which point full
reverse is engaged. During this stage (Beta Ground operations) the pilot is
basically adjusting the pitch blades manually to adjust the taxi speed. The
engine stops using the governor and instead uses fuel flow to control the
propeller RPMs so they don’t go over the max RPM or under RPMs. Ideally, we
also need the ability to control fuel flow properly to code the behaviour
correctly. If we could have something like we have with forced prop beta, to
implement forced fuel flow, perhaps we could prevent the engine from going
nuts like this?. I am leaving here attached the description of these
operations from the PT6 engines. fdocuments.net_pt6a-engine-
explanation.pdf We would really
appreciate your help with this subject, both me an Alex have several new
projects using PT6 engines which are affected by these behaviours, and we
would like to find the best way to be able to move such projects forward.
Thanks in advance for taking the time to look into this. Best Regards, Raul
Morales CEO Flight Sim Technologies www.FSReborn.com
Looking at Raul’s post, at 5.89 degrees of pitch his Cp (power_absorbed) is
very small, which causes the RPM to go crazy high. With beta less than 5
degrees (other photo) his Cp and efficiency are both 0.1 which is the
hardcoded behaviour I also noticed. Given that I’m using legacy and he’s using
modern, there is one common problem in both cases: the propeller has hardcoded
Cp and n for certain ranges, which seem to be between -3 and +5 degrees of
pitch. The other problem has to do with the “modern” modern propeller (not the
one from v1.0) which completely miscalculates the performance when it comes to
Turboprops. Additionally, the two modern propeller models seem to have weird
behaviours for reverse pitch, leading to propeller overspeed when you go into
full reverse. Without getting too technical, the PT6 engine in particular has
two behaviours worth observing, per the maintenance manual:
- Initially, the propeller RPM increases because it goes into finer pitch (lower Cp) and of course, N2 increases. The fuel control unit adjust the fuel flow to keep the Ng at idle during that time.
- As you pull the power lever further back, the propeller pitch starts going below ground fine and towards reverse the more you pull it. Np increases up to 95% of the max governed value. At the same time Ng begins to increase, but the FCU controls Ng so that Np will not increase past 95% Np
What is happening in MSFS is odd:
- Using legacy tables, one can limit the propeller to 95% Np. Ng will be dragged along by the propeller, so retaining idle Ng during the initial beta stage is impossible without some custom coding. Ng will be limited by propeller speed. When beta reaches -3 to +5 degrees, hardcoded behaviours cause the propeller to underspeed and not produce correct thrust, ignoring the tables completely.
- Using the modern flight model and no forced beta, any throttle setting below 0% will immediately take the propeller to full reverse pitch. Ng is then used to scale the thrust produced by the propeller. The issue is that the propeller will overspeed well before maximum Ng is achieved.
- Using the modern flight model and forced beta will yield both problems at once. You will experience propeller underspeed between -3/+5 degrees and overspeed when you go into full reverse.