Hi, Love the program, it's a beauty. Still having problems with destination weather though, even after installing the latest patch and ensuring the settings are as recommended in the update both with the program and FSUIPC. Weather still changes within the last few miles of the airport, usually on final approach. Read in your update about a forced update at 200nm but not sure what this is accomplishing exactly. The Suppression Ceiling, no matter what I set it at, never appears to prevent updates. If I try with the suppression update feature off, it still is changing weather repeatedly as I near the destination. Hmmmm, I wonder if I understand the suppression feature properly. It doesn't appear that this feature actually "blocks" further weather updates, maybe only lessens the effect or something to that effect. Is it possible to have a feature in the setup which would COMPLETELY block weather updates when inside a certain radius of the destination airport? Is it possible that the program could recognize the airport code and "lock" itself to the appropriate weather about 100 miles out? 100 miles is pretty safe since FS2004 ATC usually starts vectoring well within that range. Maybe even 90 miles out. I'm heading back to the manual to see if there's something I'm not getting. As other users have reported, things are very smooth now wind-wise. Great job on improvements in this area. Hope you can help, Keep up the good work, John HaleyThunder BayCanada

John,Is the weather changing or is the visibility changing as you desend?JimActiveSky Support

Hi Jim, thanks for your help.I believe it's both. The weather definitely changes, I've been on approach with no precipitation and good visibility, the next thing I know it's snowing and there's very limited visibility. It changes quickly and almost instantly. When this happens, I've noticed that it's not always the destination airport code the one that scrolls across the screen with the appropriate weather. Sometimes, its a nearby airport. That would make sense in that the program is picking up some weather station close by and displaying the information on the screen. But I didn't think that should happen with the suppression ceiling function activated.And to boot, This type of problem happens when suppression is both on and off. I did suppression off after reading a recent post that setting should be left "un-checked". That didn't make sense to me but I tried it anyway, and there was no change. I'm not getting something and I apologize for that but there must be others experiencing the problem. I'm going to try the suppression feature back on with the latest update and see if that makes a difference. I'm afraid I don't understand what this new feature does:- Added automatic refresh at 200 miles from destination to prevent problems with destination weather settings and route-based wind smoothing. Appreciate your assistance, as always. John HaleyThunder BayCanada

John,Keep us posted to your findings.JimActiveSky Support

Hi John,Weather still changes within the last few miles of the airport...What is your local suppression setting and local suppression range? Note that this is different from update suppression. Local suppression holds any changes to the "global" weather area and any station WITHIN the local suppression range, so that you will not see changes to nearby areas.. only areas beyond your visual range (you will thus fly into that weather).Update suppression prevents any update from occuring BELOW the suppression altitude (except when on the ground).With local suppression on and set at the recommended 80 miles, and your cloud draw set to 80 or below (recommend lower for better performance, i.e. 60), you should never see ANY changes to weather while you are airborne. Keep in mind that an instant visibility change as you climb or descend through the visibility ceiling is NORMAL and something that we CANNOT prevent. We try to improve this by matching the vis ceiling with the lowest cloud layer, so the "breakout" effect is better.If you DO have local suppression on with the ideal 80mile range and lower cloud draw setting, and you DO see cloud formations changing, there is definately a problem somewhere. AS2004 probably is not the culprit in this case. Something else changing the weather? Do you use squawkbox? Also another common thing is FS9's own management of cloud layer draws depending on resource load. As documented, FS9 will limit the amount of clouds drawn when other things are demanding resources, such as scenery, aircraft, autogen, etc. So if your detail settings are too high to permit the cloud draws to go "wide open" it is common to see certain clouds disappear and re-appear (only certain clouds, not the entire sky). So if this partial cloud shift is noticed you need to turn down some detail settings.Many folks have asked for a destination "LOCK" feature, but this does not work in a station-based environment. Remember, with station-based weather, weather is SET ahead of time to each FS9 weather zone (a 2nm circle around the station) and what you see from there is simply the depiction of different weather - any changes mean you are flying out of a certain weather area and into another, and this transition should be very realistic. By locking weather to the destination, that really means going back in technology and using GLOBALIZED ONLY weather. I can't see why anyone would want that, but since many users have asked, I am considering adding it (essientially making it work like wxRE when in range of the destination). Note that this kind of solution WILL result in a very sudden shift as you get to the destination area as ALL weather in the FS9 world is immediately set to the destination.Hopefully this post helps detail the way AS2004 and FS9 weather works a little more, and can help us in troubleshooting any issues in this department.Again, with local suppression working, NO CLOUD FORMATION CHANGES should occur with the exception of FS9 resource management draws as discussed above, and the only solution to that is to free up more resources by turning down settings and/or turning off unnecessary apps. If the ENTIRE sky changes all of a sudden (talking about CLOUDS here, not visibility ceilings transitions which is normal) then there is indeed a further problem which we need to address, and any more information in this regard is much appreciated.Hope this helps, and I look forward to feedback on this topic!-Damian

Hello Damian, Thanks for your replies to my many questions. A couple more test flights but still having updates near the airport, almost always on final approach or very close to it. My "use update suppression" is checked range set for 80nm, ceiling suppression has ranged from 10,000 feet down to 5,000 feet, it doesn't seem to matter, the updates still occur.Today, I flew from Montreal to Atlanta and saw that I was picking up weather from a nearby airport on approach, not actually KATL. No huge thing in this case, because the airports were pretty much the same type of weather. No squawkbox or anything like that, I have FSPUIC set up exactly as recommended. Just me, FS9 and AS2004. Can't really say that the cloud formations are changing on approach, in today's case it was clear so it was hard to say, I think its mostly a visibility thing, I think it's the way the program is. However, and I know you're likely not thrilled, I like this idea of having destination airport weather locked from say 100nm out or so. Well I realize this may not be realistic, but at least you know you're getting the airport weather for the destination. I can't say for certain that the weather to reflect KATL changed by the time I landed, I suspect it did, but I hardly noticed, too busy on flying to say for sure. I have just started to use the Ctrl F12 function to check the weather enroute for the destination and find that it is accurate, is there a way to force the weather to lock to the destination from that screen?Hate being a nuisance, just want to make sure that things are set up properly. I really do enjoy the program, and appreciate your help. Thanks again,John HaleyThunder Bay Canada

>Many folks have asked for a destination "LOCK" feature, but>this does not work in a station-based environment. Remember,>with station-based weather, weather is SET ahead of time to>each FS9 weather zone (a 2nm circle around the station) and>what you see from there is simply the depiction of different>weather - any changes mean you are flying out of a certain>weather area and into another, and this transition should be>very realistic. By locking weather to the destination, that>really means going back in technology and using GLOBALIZED>ONLY weather. I can't see why anyone would want that, but>since many users have asked, I was about to ask for destination lock until I read your explanation of what is really happening in FS2004! ;-)I am somewhat confused by the 2nm circle around the station - I would expect that to be larger ...What I would like for you to consider is processing that existed in AS1 but is now gone - in using Radar Contact, the destination would be automatically set in the FORCE weather box and once within the destination lock the destination METAR would be displayed.In AS2 we do not get this information even when using the import flight plan feature.I would like to have a capability whereby the destination METAR automatically displays in the force weather section once I am within a specified range of the destination. This is not a biggee - just a convenience! ;-)-michael

Yes precisely Michael. Pleased to see you also are interested in the forced destination weather issue. If I read the information correctly, would it be the 2nm radius that is leading to the change in weather? It would explain why on final approach the weather is changing, because I'm inside that 2nm. But I thought that wouldn't happen with the suppression ceiling set to a certain value. I figured weather shouldn't be changing once I'm below that value, yet it is changing always as far as I can tell. I would just would like to get the most up to date destination weather and have it stay that way on approach and landing, even during descent would be great. I realize arguments can be made that this isn't very realistic. But please, I think an argument could be made that abrupt changes to weather on final approach isn't very realistic either. Jeez, hope I don't sound like I'm complaining, I read a post the other day about the award recognizing these developers for their outstanding work. Another post also thanked them for their excellent support. My thanks to everyone who makes this program a reality. Take a big bow!John HaleyThunder Bay Canada (eh?)

Guys, Is it safe to say then that the forced destination weather will be included in the next service update? Flew Atlanta to Montreal today, the weather was flawless. Smoooooooth the whole way, for some reason, no jump at destination this time. Hmmmmmm.John Haley