Hi Jim.As much as I love ASE, this program sometimes causes me a lot of headaches, most likely because I either don't understand how it works or how to use it properly to get the desired results, even having read the PDF a few times. Anyways, here is my situation and maybe you can help me figure out how to get what I am trying for.Typically I fly using the regular on-line downloads for real time condiditons, however sometimes I crave some good overcast stormy looking conditions, so I try to either use a prebuilt theme or create my own using the WX Config button.Here's what the problem is though. I will open ASE and let it load up. Then I will go to the briefing section and enter my flight plan. Once thats done, I then go to the map view and drag and drop my theme or a theme that came with ASA into the airport that I am departing and also drop a theme into the arrival airport. I have crated and saved a theme with 1000 AGL Cumulonimbus, overcast, visibility 50SM, application range 50 miles . I'm trying to get a very defined bottom and dark sky, however when I drop the theme into my departure airport, I will get those conditions for a few minutes, then after about 5 minutes or so, I start getting open spots in the sky rather than having a complete overcast. The other problem is that when I drop the same theme into my arrival airport, when I get to it, its clear, then after a few minutes it begins to get the condiditons of a complete overcast.I have set the Dynamica Rate of Change to 0% and have DWC turned off as well as visibility graduation and smoothing turned off. Frankly, I cant understand why I cant get a complete overcast with cumulonimbus with a low ceiling to stay in place rather than starting that way then having holes in the clouds open up.The other issue I am having is that when I make a theme in the WX Config and save it, when I load it later some aspects of it have changed. For example I saved one I call test2. It has a one cloud layer at 1000' AGL, thickness of 10000', and Cumulonimbus clouds visibility range 50. When I re-load that them it comes up Cumulous clouds rather than Cumulonimbus clouds, a different thickness, and visibility range of 10 rather than 50 that I saved it with. So, I need to edit it back to the way I want then apply. I cant figure out why after I save it, it loads with slightly different conditions.Thanks in advance for the help. I am assuming that there is something that I need to check or uncheck, but at the moment I don't know what it is that I am doing wrong. I just want to be able to drop a theme into my arrival airport like a complete overcast with a well defined bottom layer around 1000' agl and have it be there when I arrive, rather than 5 minutes after I arrive, and on top of it I want it to stay that way and not start to open up with patches of clear sky above.Regards

Hi,Situation 1 is quite system dependent and if you system is being taxed too much, the first thing that FSX starts to remove is clouds. The same on your arrivials. It just takes your set-up a bit more time to display things.The second situation is because only the conditions that are in the METAR data are saved when you save a theme or file. Thicknesses are not saved. Cloud types are not saved. And visibility inside a cloud layer is not saved. Those would need to be adjusted each time.

I have problems with overcast aswell, and I think my system is on the high end of the scale, if I go to a location that is overcast it starts off perfect but then the clouds start to clear up after just a few minutes, this has progressed through the last few builds.

Hi,Situation 1 is quite system dependent and if you system is being taxed too much, the first thing that FSX starts to remove is clouds. The same on your arrivials. It just takes your set-up a bit more time to display things.The second situation is because only the conditions that are in the METAR data are saved when you save a theme or file. Thicknesses are not saved. Cloud types are not saved. And visibility inside a cloud layer is not saved. Those would need to be adjusted each time.

Thanks for the reply Jim.However, I don't think in this case its because of my system being taxed too much because if I set the weather in FSX manually using the FSX theme Major Thunderstorm and then manually turn off the rain, and set rate of change to zero, then it stays like that and doesn't become clear over time. Another reason I dont think its my system is because this happens at regular small airports when testing with just the ultralight and no AI around and FPS in the 40's and higher. I also have the cloud draw set to 60 miles and cloud density turned all the way up. Lastly, one more reason I dont think its my computer getting overloaded is because when using normal online downloaded weather and arriving in an area with a strong overcast, it stays like that unless the weather updates and is different.What else can I try to get my arrival and departure airport to stay like a theme? Do I need to turn on DWC and visibility graduation and smoothing to get it to work better? In other words I can't figure out why when downloaded weather calls for those conditions I get them on arrival, but when I drop those conditions into the map or edit the station manually it takes some time.As far as the other thing, your explanation clears that up so now I understand.Now I just need to work with you more to see if there is anything I can do about getting a better overcast when I place one manually. I will check back and see if you have any suggestions for me to try out and I will post some screen shots of my ASE screens if you need to see what I have set, just let me know.Regards

Thanks for the reply Jim.However, I don't think in this case its because of my system being taxed too much because if I set the weather in FSX manually using the FSX theme Major Thunderstorm and then manually turn off the rain, and set rate of change to zero, then it stays like that and doesn't become clear over time. Another reason I dont think its my system is because this happens at regular small airports when testing with just the ultralight and no AI around and FPS in the 40's and higher. I also have the cloud draw set to 60 miles and cloud density turned all the way up. Lastly, one more reason I dont think its my computer getting overloaded is because when using normal online downloaded weather and arriving in an area with a strong overcast, it stays like that unless the weather updates and is different.What else can I try to get my arrival and departure airport to stay like a theme? Do I need to turn on DWC and visibility graduation and smoothing to get it to work better? In other words I can't figure out why when downloaded weather calls for those conditions I get them on arrival, but when I drop those conditions into the map or edit the station manually it takes some time.As far as the other thing, your explanation clears that up so now I understand.Now I just need to work with you more to see if there is anything I can do about getting a better overcast when I place one manually. I will check back and see if you have any suggestions for me to try out and I will post some screen shots of my ASE screens if you need to see what I have set, just let me know.Regards

Another thing you can try is going into your fsx cfg file and changing CLOUD_COVERAGE_DENSITY the highest value set when you do it through the fsx GUI is 8, you can change this value manually, I set mine to 12, it does give you more clouds, but after you set it if you change any settings again it will reset it back to 8 so you will have to change it back to 12 again in the cfg file. I still think most of these depiction issues comes down to simconnect, I can fire up AS6 and test out an area reporting overcast and its perfect and it remains that way, I will then fire up ASE and test the same airport and it will not even remotely depict OVC as good as AS6 in FSX. The only difference is I use WideFS and fsuipc to make the connection. I wish that the developers would make it possible to use widefs and fsuipc to make the connection to FSX instead of simconnect, that may be the key. But overall I'm very happy with ASE and can't even imagine the work that has gone into coding trying to fix the problems fsx has with depicting weather.

Hi,Is it at an advanced interpolation airport you are trying this at?

Hi,Is it at an advanced interpolation airport you are trying this at?

LOL, you've got me on that one. I don't even know what interpolation is. I have tried it at KORD, KDFW, KJFK, LSZH, LOWW, LOWI, and a few others and the same thing happens. For whatever reason I can get the solid overcast using FSX weather and set the rate of change to zero so that it stays, but if I try to manually set similar conditions in ASE for that airport and even put the range to 50 miles and rate of change to zero, it still starts off like I want, then after a few minutes I start getting the breaks and holes in the sky. Also if I look straight up, it's usually clear over my head after a bit.Maybe I need to try some different settings in ASE?One other strange thing that happens at a airports once in a while that I have been meaning to ask about fot the longest time, but never get around to, is that I can be at one end of an airport and have IFR condidtions with visibility at around 1 mile then as I go down the runway all of the sudden towards the end of the runway I will suddenly have clear visibility. I can even press the slew button and back up and will drop back into the lower visibility. This I have had since ASA and sometimes I still get it in ASE as well. For the life of me I dont know how an airport can be IFR or low visibility on one end and much improved visibility on the other end or other side of the airport, especially if the weather station is on the airport. I would think that if it reporting 2 miles vis, then the whole airport should be 2 miles vis, not just certain ends of it.

Hi,Is the visibility changing in AS or only in FS?

Hi,Is the visibility changing in AS or only in FS?

The visibility was changing in FSX not in AS. The report for the airport would indicate 1 mile visibility, and while I would get that in some parts of the airport, other parts of the airport would have much greater visibility, like 5 or 10 miles. But, like I mentioned before, if I was landing and touched down with 1 mile vis, during rollout I would pop into better conditions. Then if I hit the slew key and backed up, I could go back into the low vis conditions.Maybe this has something to do with my other issue of not being able to keep a solid overcast?

Hi,Quite possible.What are your FPS locked at in FSX?

Hi,Quite possible.What are your FPS locked at in FSX?

It depends on what type of a/c I am flying and how complex the scenery.For example, if I am flying a small GA a/c that normally gets really high FPS then I will lock it at 28FPS, but if I am flying something more complex like the PMDG 747, JS41, or LDS 767, then I generally leave the FPS set at unlimited. When I am in one of those a/c and have the FPS at unlimited they usually stay around 20 to 30 FPS without fluxuating much below 20 FPS or higher than 30 when in a dense area, but when in one of those a/c I find that I generally get a smoother experience leaving it set at unlimited than I do when locking the FPS. I usually only have problems being unlocked when FPS start swinging from the 30 FPS into the 60 FPS and then I have to lock it at 28 FPS.

Hi,I realize that you might not agree with me, but I still feel this happens if your system is overtaxed and clouds are the first thing that FSX removes. Lock your FPS around your lowest average and fly a bit and see what happens.

Hi,I realize that you might not agree with me, but I still feel this happens if your system is overtaxed and clouds are the first thing that FSX removes. Lock your FPS around your lowest average and fly a bit and see what happens.

Hi Jim.I couldn't help but chuckly a little when I read that since you already knew what I was thinking.I will however give locking the FPS and see if it makes a difference.I will say this however as to why I don't thinking its my computer getting over taxed. Usually if I run into problems like the computer getting bogged down I start getting really bad FPS, like sub 15 FPS, and the ground gets blurries. In those type of situations I could see that FSX could be removing the clouds, however even in those scenarios, I have never noticed it. When I am getting the situation that I have been describing, it has always been with good FPS, crisp ground textures, and a very fluid flight. Is it possible that the computer is overloaded? Possibily, but judging from the way the sim looks and feels as far as motion it doesn't feel like it. I could see if I was chugging along with 14 FPS and blurred out textures that clouds may drop, but when I am in the mid 20's to 30 and above the sim seems fine. Generally when flying complex a/c into dense areas that are know to be hard on FPS, I may back down the scenery complexity slider a bit prior to entering the area so that I avoid geeting FPS that bad anyway. I also only run the DXT clouds and the 1024 resolutions since I cant really tell much difference in the HD clouds.Anyways I will try what you said and lock the FPS and report back. I may also take some screen shots of my ASA settings for you to take a look at since maybe I have something set wrong that could be causing this. If I have enougn time I will take some screen shots showing the same a/c and location with my overcast theme by ASA and the same theme manually set in FSX so you can see the difference.