Prepar3d and the Weather

[BlueStar 323]

To the Developers of Prepar3d,If this has been addressed earlier, my apologies and please direct me to the appropriate.thread.I have been flying in the military and commercially for over 40 years. Needless to say I have spent my fair share of time in simulators startinig with the Link. My current home based PC based simulator is FSX with ASE and FSUIPC to eliminate some of the weather anomolies. FSX is enjoyable and I have found some of the add-ons to be very good. What I am looking for in a PC based simulator is a good flight model and a good weather model. I hear complaints about the FSX flight model, but it is better than some of the DC10 and B747 simulators I flew back in the '90. The weather engine and its effects on the aircraft need improving in my opinion. The improvements in the weather engine I would like to see include better representation of inflight icing including rime and clear icing. The effect of runway icing needs to be improved. When is the last time an FSX aircraft slid off an icy runway? Another improvement in FSX is the simulation of thunderstorms. In the summer time I see tops above 50,000 feet or greater, but I have not seen this in FSX. If there is any turbulence associaed with the FSX thunderstorms I missed it. The addition of wind shear would be nice. If I purchase a commercial license, does that include all future upgrades and updates? Thanks for your time,Bill Bridges

[Comanche 417]

Hi BIll,I agree with some of the items you would like to see implemented. Better weather dipiction and its effects on aircraft performance would be nice. Im sure Lockeed has big plans for P3d in the furture, but where this will fall into to their plans, I have no idea. We can only hope. In the mean time, there are other weather programs that will work to put real world weather in the sim, but most of this will not add the features your looking for. There are some addon aircraft that simulate in flight icing. The flight1 Mustang comes to mind. Ice on th erunways that causing slipping would be nice!As far as purchasing a comercial license, I would ask that question to LM. I dont want to give out wrong info. I dont know at what point you would have to pay for updates or what the pricing would be.Rob

[Highiron 21]

Hi Bill,I agree with your vision as well. Currently in the near future REX (Real Environment Extreme) will be releasing a product that is designed for use in Prepar3D. It will have many features that hopefully address some of your concerns. As you already are likely aware, cloud tops are often based on where the Tropopause sits. This varies greatly with season and latitude. In FSX and Prepar3D, under default weather, the Tropopause is at a fixed altitude regardless of latitude, and if the height is changed, it is a global uniform change, no variation. A program such as REX is needed to be able to calculate the varying temperatures with height thus establishing cloud tops based on weather reporting stations and observations. To accurately depict cloud tops is based on temperatures with altitude the current Environmental Lapse Rate and the amount of Relative Humidity in the air mass. This requires constant information that is outside the scope of Prepar3D's goal. Lockheed Martin is making the platform so others (third party developers), can make such things possible as you have requested, so I believe it is unlikely you will see such feature available from a stock install of Prepar3D.As for the purchase of a commercial licence, I believe if I understand the statements from a member of the development team John Nicol correctly, you are covered for updates up to but not including Version 2.0. Currently the version is 1.2 and would guess 1.3, 1.4, etc etc, will follow. Versions 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 , etc etc, would require an additional update purchase. I have seen no pricing details so I believe it's still in the works. I would find it likely the upgrade to a new Version would be less than the 100% cost, but those are just my thoughts.