How to turn on the Autopilot annunciator panel in the default Beechcraft Baron

Question

I just recently bought X-Plane 11 (until that I used MFSX).
The first few flights the panel showed the status of the autopilot, if the Flight Director is on, ALT mode, Heading or NAV, etc.
Today it just stayed dark, while the Autopilot itself works flawlessly.
But I can't see which options are activated, the annunciator panel above the HSI stays black.
Closing and restarting X-Plane did not solve the problem.
I am using a SideWinder Precision 2, Saitek Switch Panel and Saitek Throttle Quadrant.

How do I turn the panel back on to see the AP status?

Thank you in advance, Peter

Answer 1

Hi Peter

I'm not with Laminar Research, just a fellow simmer in the UK.

I've had a look through the Pilots Operating Manual on my iPad and it appears from what I can ascertain, that the autopilot annunciator display is not referred to at all, so therefore not very helpful I'm afraid.

Having said that, could this lack of display problem possibly be related to any of the instrument panel dimmer switches i.e. the brightness level just needs turning up a bit?

Sorry, can't think of anything else and currently on vacation so can't fire up X-Plane 11 to check!

Regards

P.S. Has the display in question ever worked in your experience?

Comments

Hello Greengolfer,

thank you for taking the time to help!

It did work right after installing X-Plane. A few flights later when I started X-Plane and loaded the Beechcraft it stayed dark once of a sudden.

 Using the Instrument Panel light and hitting SHIFT+CTRL+. or SHIFT-CTRL+, multiple times does not make any change.

Is there any way to "reset" the plane?

Kind regards, Peter

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Hi Peter

I would probably be tempted to delete (or save elsewhere) the default Beechcraft Baron folder via Windows Explorer/File Manager and then run the X-Plane Installer application.

By so doing, the installer app will scan your X-Plane 11 file structure, recognise that the default aircraft folder is missing and then download/install the relevant files again.

This is the only way I can think of to 'reset' the aircraft so to speak and it will be quicker than redownloading the whole X-Plane 11 file structure again.

Be careful though, I'm not sure which version of X-Plane 11 you are running, but if you use the installer app at any time, then you will get the latest iteration of X-Plane 11 only and won't then be able to roll it back to an earlier version if you have one!

Hope this helps and if so, perhaps you would be kind enough to consider giving my response a positive upvote as per the suggestion on the Q&A webpage.

Kind regards and thanks in advance

Paul

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Hello Paul,

I deleted the Beechcraft Folder and the Installer (Steam Client) replaced the files.
Unfortunately nothing changed.
Is there any config file you know of where X-Plane might store plane specific info outside the planes folder?

With having spent a whole day to set up everything the way I like it I am hesitant to reinstall the whole simulator.

To be honest...  I am stunned that things break that easily and unfixable in X-Plane.
:-(

I did do the upvote, I am sorry I did not think of it when doing my first reply.

Kind regards, Peter

PS: I spent the last hours testing and it seems the AP panel breaks when i use the light switches for the Instrument panel light and the one labelled "Flood".
Looking at the plane folder i saw there are LUA scripts for the lighting System.
Apparently there is a fault in the default  Beechcraft Baron.
I did test it with a complete reinstall and the Saitek Panels disconnected.
So apparently I downloaded almost 60 Gigabytes for Nothing.  :-(