Bonanza fuel still not fixed?

Twice today flying the Bonanza between Florida and Dominican Republic and back I ran out of fuel and couldn’t switch to the other tank in time. The first instance I wasn’t at my PC and put it down to a poor calculation.

The second time the sim said I had plenty of fuel left… 18 gallons in one tank, 12 in the other - an hour left to fly at 16.8 gph.

The 18 gallons gradually dropped to about 5 and the plane started to fall out of the sky. I stabilised the thing but when looking down to switch tanks it got away from me and overstressed.

The fuel gauge showed in the yellow - I was waiting for a low fuel warning before switching back to the 12 tank, but nothing popped up - and the gauge was solidly in the yellow for both tanks.

Doubly annoying when the sim itself had been silky smooth for over four hours each time.

Are you flying the Improvement project version? Performance and fuel is way different, much nicer interior too.

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I don’t believe I am… Will look it up, thanks.

The developer is an active member.

There is one on flightsim and dev/beta builds on github.

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Grabbing from flightsim.to now - thanks. Too late to fly again tonight (02:38) but will play around tomorrow! Thanks again.

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The last time I flew the default one I was shocked by the fuel flow and mixture behavior.

16 GPH would be like sea level at full throttle! If you fly “with oxygen” you can do about 11 gph.

Have to admit using automixture - 9000 feet, full throttle, 2500 rpm - I read somewhere else on here that that would seem right for cruise… Will study it more with the improved aircraft.

I remember comparing the real published figured against the improvement project and they were near spot on. At 9000 feet I would guess about 12-13 gph if the mixture is set proper.

I like working the mixture on long flights. It gives me something to do.

It’s late there, are you in the UK? What airport did you fly to in Florida?

London, yes. Although spent all day yesterday being flown to Detroit via New York and DC…

I departed KTIX and flew back into KDAB. Gave the Improvement a quick flight around Orlando down to Disney and back. Huge improvement, feels and looks great - thanks for the tip!

KSC is a cool place to check out with the VAB/Falcon Heavy mod.

The UK is one of my favorite flying locations! Every airport there is a unique gem, full of character.

I mostly fly BizJets, but trying to expand my horizons and I’m starting to fly the Bonanza a bit. I’ve had a couple of longer flights where the engine just seems to stop an hour into the flight, definitely with fuel remaining. Is it likely that i needed to switch tanks? Haven’t flown any planes where this piece isn’t automatic. Obviously it’s difficult to have forensics on what really happened.