Big stutters when leaving the landing runway - solved!

[Ray Proudfoot]

A mystery that’s been bugging me for a long time has finally been identified and solved. I used to select my gate once below 10,000ft / 250kts. But despite the approach and landing being stutter free there was always a big one when exiting the runway.

I’ve finally worked out what is causing it and how to fix it. GSX is the culprit. Sorry Umberto. 

To prevent it happening do not choose your gate when airborne. If you wait until you leave the active and have temporarily stopped choose the gate then. There is no stutter since you are stationary.

Simple solution but one that’s been bugging me for a long time as I thought it was scenery related. I’m assuming the stutters can’t be resolved by GSX as it would have happened by now.

[virtuali]

I’ve finally worked out what is causing it and how to fix it. GSX is the culprit. Sorry Umberto. 

GSX is not the "culprit". The "culprit" is, of course, is the fact the simulator doesn't create Simobjects in the background so, obviously, GSX MUST create its objects at some time, and that's not any different than, for example, UT Live pausing for 15-20 seconds AND stalling the whole simulator, while it creates its own traffic.

There are several reasons why GSX objects are not created more in advance, for example when you select the gate in flight:

- To know were the gates are, GSX must loads the scenery .BGL and it loads only one file, the one for the airport closest to your position. But if you select the gate in flight, the closest to your position might not be the one you are going to land on. Another .BGL might be the closest one and GSX might have already loaded its jetways for it so, in that situation it would have to first make a PAUSE to *destroy* the jetway of the closest airport and, when you decided the gate for the remote airport, eventually re-create them again if you still in range of an airport that used GSX L2 jetways.

- When you are far from an airport, the terrain mesh is completed only very close to your airplane, but it's uses a way lower resolution further away, so if we tried to place objects on ground from a distance, they would end up placed on the "wrong" mesh, so you see floating objects.

So, if that pauses concerns you, just don't pre-select a gate in flight. I was never a fan of that feature, because I knew it would come with complications, but users were so vocal about it, that we added it anyway.

[Ray Proudfoot]

My post wasn’t intended to complain about GSX. Simply point out how to avoid the big stutters. I appreciate you’re hampered by the limitations of the sim. These objects have to be loaded sometime.

Am I right in thinking you create them when either a lower speed is reached or a big change in heading indicating the aircraft is turning off the runway? If so, then both can be avoided by doing as I found and leaving the selection until stationary.

Keep up the good work Umberto. It’s still a great addon. 

[virtuali]

Am I right in thinking you create them when either a lower speed is reached or a big change in heading indicating the aircraft is turning off the runway? If so, then both can be avoided by doing as I found and leaving the selection until stationary.

We do that for some of the animated traffic in our sceneries, like KMEM, not creating anything if the user is moving.

But we are using the same method for GSX objects because, the original usage pattern was that you usually call for GSX as soon as you leave the runway after landing, so you are continuously taxiing, and it wouldn't be very nice if we popped out a message asking something like "please stop the plane so we can create the GSX objects", because without that alert, you might arrive at the gate, with no object there unless you stopped.

[Ray Proudfoot]

I use Radar Contact v4 for all my flights and when it detects my speed has reduced sufficiently after landing instructs me to vacate at the next high speed, hold and then to contact Ground. So coming to a halt is convenient as it also allows me to reconfigure things after landing.

I know in the real world they probably don’t stop completely but then they have a co-pilot to help. I don’t.

[Captain Kevin]

I use Radar Contact v4 for all my flights and when it detects my speed has reduced sufficiently after landing instructs me to vacate at the next high speed, hold and then to contact Ground. So coming to a halt is convenient as it also allows me to reconfigure things after landing.

I know in the real world they probably don’t stop completely but then they have a co-pilot to help. I don’t.

I've never used Radar Contact before, so the only time I've ever stopped was when I was waiting for the controller to tell me where to go if one is online since I fly on VATSIM. Otherwise if there's no controller online or I already get instructions once I clear the runway, I just keep going.

[Ray Proudfoot]

I've never used Radar Contact before, so the only time I've ever stopped was when I was waiting for the controller to tell me where to go if one is online since I fly on VATSIM. Otherwise if there's no controller online or I already get instructions once I clear the runway, I just keep going.

So presumably if you have selected your gate when airborne you get the stutters? I enter the gate number into RC so just choose that from the GSX menu.

If you’re using VATSIM can you request your gate when airborne?