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FSX Jetway not moving (yes I know...)

T

theFiddler

Messages
26
Greetings,

first my apologies for beating this very dead horse again.
But I did my homework (trawling through this forum back and forth, and reading all posts found by a search for "jetway" in FSX).

Moreover, I have already successfully added an animated default FSX jetway to the terminal at my test airport in the middle of the Sahara; so I do know the principle how it is done.

But now I am trying to add one to a terminal at an English airport, and am stuck:

First the jetway there remained invisible. Known issue, FSX bug: animated jetways on top of exclusion rectangles won't show up; and there was such a rectangle in my scenery. OK, sorted.

Then, jetway still invisible, this time due to the Orbx FTX England landgrab = covering all of England with huge exclusion rectangles, which of course were not visible in ADEX.
OK, also sorted (by imitating the fix for UK2000 Leeds for my area).

Jetway is now visible. Good.

But it will not activate on crtl-J. Even if I position the (user) plane* via the menu (World > Goto Airport > Parking NN), I keep getting the message "You must be in an airport parking space..." etc.
* default 738, thus exit entry in aircraft.cfg is OK!

I know FSX is finicky about this; and there are some tips here on the forum, and also a Youtube video by "wouterboy2" (who says the jetway symbol in ADEX must reach into the green circle for the parking spot), but nothing seems to help.

Is all this a matter of pure trial and error, or are there some known conditions or rules about the precise jetway placement and orientation, relative to the spot/plane, so that it works?
Or are still other parameters involved? It must be a GATE of course (or else you can't add jetways at all). But does e.g. the size also play a role?

Thanks in advance for all tips.

Cheers,
Martin
 
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Just checking - you did add it by choosing the parking spot, then right clicking and choosing Add Jetway?
 
you did add it by choosing the parking spot, then right clicking and choosing Add Jetway?
Click to expand...

Yes, of course, it is an animated jetway.
(Fair question though, thanks! ;) )

As reported, it did do the "invisible" thing at first (because of the exclusion rectangles below it), and AFAIK that happens only with animated jetways.
The problem now is "only" that it does not activate.

I have now started to remove other BGLs from the same folder, because I read somewhere that the problem might have to do with the sequence in which stuff is loaded. (Someone apparently had success when removing some AI traffic BGLs.)

In my case, no conclusive result, so far.
I have within that airport another tiny "pseudo-airport" with a very short runway, to be used by an AI helicopter. When I remove the separate AFCAD2 file for that pseudo-airport, the jetway (which is in the main airport AFCAD2 file, of course), stops responding to ctrl-J altogether, i.e. it doesn't even bring up the "You have to be in a parking space" message any more.
All very strange.

Thanks for the comment.

Cheers,
Martin
 
The parking spot and the jetway must both have the same gateName and parkingNumber. This is required to uniquely identify a parking location.

You highlite the parking spot such as Gate_A, Number 1. Right click the mouse to add the jetway. ADE will assign the proper data to the jetway XML.

<Jetway
gateName = "GATE_A"
parkingNumber = "1" >

Check your parking spot and your jetway to be sure they have the same parking data.

I know FSX is finicky about this; and there are some tips here on the forum, and also a Youtube video by "wouterboy2" (who says the jetway symbol in ADEX must reach into the green circle for the parking spot), but nothing seems to help.
Click to expand...

The jetway symbol does not have to reach into the parking spot. If the Jetway is too far away from the parking spot the Fault Finder will tell you.

It must be a GATE of course (or else you can't add jetways at all).
Click to expand...

Jetways can be added to all the following type parking spots.

DOCK
GATE
GATE_A to GATE_Z
NONE
N_PARKING
NE_PARKING
NW_PARKING
SE_PARKING
S_PARKING
SW_PARKING
W_PARKING
E_PARKING
 
Thanks for your comments, Jim.

I have indeed created the jetway with the procedure you describe.
And to be safe, I have now decompiled the resulting BGL again, and checked the XML: Both parking spot and jetway do have the same name (GATE) and number.

In the meantime I have created a small airport from scratch in the vicinity (so that it would be subject to the same potential Orbx England surprises, etc.).
I then installed an animated jetway here, and it works just fine.

So the reason must be somewhere in my scenery (which is rather complex, with a lot of legacy stuff etc.). While jetway placement certainly is critical, it cannot be the sole cause of the problem, as the near-by simple test airport shows, where the jetway works.

If I find out anything useful, I'll report back.

Cheers,
Martin
 
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[FSX] SOLVED: Jetway not moving (yes I know...)

Problem solved!

Eventually I was able to pin the cause down: It is indeed that second ADEX file for the "heliport" (sitting in the same scenery folder as the "main" ADEX file).

When the "heliport" ADEX file is present, I get the "You must be in a parking space..." message after ctrl-J.

As soon as that file is removed, the jetway works fine. No error message, even though the plane is sitting in exactly the same spot as before...

I tried renaming the file in order to influence the loading sequence (I read somewhere that it goes in alphabetical order of file name), but that didn't make a difference. The "heliport" ADEX file really has to be thrown out.

But that is not too big a deal; perhaps I can work around it by giving the heliport its own scenery folder.*

Thanks for your help, gentlemen! It may not have provided a direct solution, but these prompt responses from the gurus** themselves are always encouraging and keep one trying. Much appreciated!
(And that goes also for your posts in threads started by other people, but from which posts I, too, always have profited immensely.)

Cheers,
Martin

* Update: Unfortunately, that does not work: I made the "heliport" a separate scenery with its own folders, but as soon as it is active, the jetway in the main airport scenery is on strike again, i.e. I am told the plane is not in a parking spot.
Which is very strange: That "heliport" is situated within the main airport perimeter all right, but it's not at all close to the jetway (1400 m distance between them).


** (you wont know me, but I have been familiar with your names for years, of course -- as who in the scene(ry) hasn't... :) )
 
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If there are two airports very close to each other, sometimes the sim will "switch" airports without any warning. So the sim now thinks you are taxiing at the heliport, rather than at the airport. Since the heliport has no parking spot by that name, you get the error message. Some have tried moving the reference point of the heliport further away, but usually you have to move it further away from any runway at the airport.

Hope this helps,
 
tgibson said:
Some have tried moving the reference point of the heliport further away, but usually you have to move it further away from any runway at the airport.
Hope this helps,
Click to expand...

Yes it does, splendid! Thanks, Tom.
At the time I had thought keeping the ARPs of heliport and airport closely together would be a good idea. Apparently it wasn't; we live and learn... :)

Moving the heliport ARP 1500 m away from the main airport ARP did the trick: Now I have a working jetway and don't have to give up the AI helo (of which I was rather proud :) ).

And this very helpful tip also solved another mystery: When selecting the airport on the "Free Flight" page, the "Current Location" field would then show (wrongly) "Heliport"; that is now also fixed. And also (not yet tested) potential confusion for the GSX services which did not offer the main airport gates, but only the one parking spot of the heliport.

Excellent, many thanks again!

Cheers,
Martin
 
Glad the easy fix worked in your case. :)

One thing to watch out for - if the AI Helos now "switch" to the main airport since the Heliport ARP may now be far away from the Helo parking places, FS will crash.
 
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