I've seen mentions in other threads of setting up winds to acheive certain things - landing on the little lake, backwards landing, practicing crosswind landings etc, How is this done? Unless I'm missing something all I can change is weather scenerios, season, and time of day. I don't see anywhere I can set up a xxkt wind at xxx direction.

From the Map,Select Free Flight.Flight Conditions.That should give you what you have been missing.

From the Map,Select Free Flight.Flight Conditions.That should give you what you have been missing.

That only lets you select certain weather scenarios. No custom weather.

Sorry I misunderstood the first post.But the different weather themes do give you different amount of winds. For instance, with "Among the Giants" you generally get fairly consistent 19 knot winds. The direction is mostly random, so there's a 50:50 chance that you'll have to make a cross wind landing.

That only lets you select certain weather scenarios. No custom weather.

Hi,A more straightforward answer is: no, you can't specify exact conditions. Not now at least. Perhaps we will get a weather control module.

To the degree that Flight appears to model windflow over the terrain, it may not even be possible to specify specific wind vectors at specific altitudes, which is why that option is not available. That may also be why a "real world weather" option is not there.Hypothetical musing: You could specify conditions for one location, say, an airfield, as a starting reference, and let Flight figure out the rest based on that reference. Then players would complain about how they set conditions at the departure airport and they were different at the arrival airport. You know they would.Furthermore, any weather modelling in the game would make hash of any attempt to specify precise wind conditions from the surface on up, at every town and airport, which is what real-world weather would require.And honestly, I find it more realistic to only be able to specify general conditions (replicating the "Do I want to fly today, or not?" question) than to pick and choose exactly what winds and clouds I get at different altitude bands.

I feel the missing of the real world weather option....even if FSX was never on the spot to reproduce the local weather.....if I had sun FSX reproduced fog, if I had wind I had no wind within FSX.....because the site where FSX grabbed its infos from was definitely not reliable, at least for Europe.

I think getting the possibility to set custom weather should be the #1 feature they should add. Why?If you look at GA magazines like UK Pilot or US Flight,appart from juicy articles on glass-cockpits, newest Garmin, newst AC and the "yearly" how does the Cessna 152 perform in the used market... they almost always have (good!) articles on flying in variable weather... crosswind landings, accident reports, pilots learning from flying in that weather. Weather is the one topic that doesn't seem to get old after following those mags for a few years (altough I love reading about every new plane!).I think the same goes for flight. You get a new plane, playing around with it for a few days, then investing several hours to feel you truly master it. You get jobs for cargo, live cargo and passengers, they will keep you buzy for a while. Aerocasches are a really good way of keeping the explorer-spirit fresh in the same terrain. However... for true lastability of the product you need the varying weather to keep it fresh.There are only so many weather themes in Flight, even if you rotate them on jobs, it doesnt seem like they generate random wind-direction, so mostly you'll be flying the same kind of cross-wind on landings on that airport. If you could set up the weather for that day in dialog that would get the important parts right (wind from 110 degrees, broken clouds, etc) without frightening new users (not dewpoint and wind rotation), then Flight would keep the interest for so much longer, even while waiting for new AC and scenery content (hint, hint).I think real world weather is maybe less important than custom weather, because many days the real weather can be less than memorable. In one "trip" to hawaii the FSX the real weather stayed almost the same (dull winds, 3/8 high clouds) for 2-3 days. To set up something dramatic is more fun.-

To the OPThe weather themes are not customizable within the FLIGHT UI. Although, MS might end up overhauling the whole weather system together.

There are only so many weather themes in Flight, even if you rotate them on jobs, it doesnt seem like they generate random wind-direction, so mostly you'll be flying the same kind of cross-wind on landings on that airport.

That is actually true and correct for Hawaii. The trade winds are normally blowing, so you are almost always using the same runway at each field.

In one "trip" to hawaii the FSX the real weather stayed almost the same (dull winds, 3/8 high clouds) for 2-3 days.

Also normal. The only reason to look at the weather in Hawaii is to get the surf report.

 

To the OPThe weather themes are not customizable within the FLIGHT UI. Although, MS might end up overhauling the whole weather system together.

Yes, that was my thought, that they should do an overhaul, or at least a small update. They said MS Flight was released earlier than planned, so I was guessing they might be still working on improving the core program. If themes are the only way of adjusting the weather it's very restricted, and so it quickly get boring. If I could adjust the weather so I had wind from the north, for crosswind landings at Dillingham it would be very nice :)...Roboray: If that's true I won't complain that much. But when we get to Alaska I'll demand some more weather action! Snow-storms whatever! -

There is much to do to have a good weather engine and I hope MS is at least aware they did 10 but the target is 150.Real world weather and a dozen of weather settings are mandatory and still missing.I hope this aspect will be taken into the proper consideration sooner rather then never.

Roboray: If that's true I won't complain that much. But when we get to Alaska I'll demand some more weather action! Snow-storms whatever!

Take a good look at the map. Notice how the airports with single runways all tend to have them in a SW-NE orientation? And the airports with multiple runways tend to have the longest ones running SW-NE? There are some exceptions, mainly on the leeward (SW) sides of the islands where the prevailing wings get disrupted by the mountains, but the general rule is to expect trade winds out of the NE.The weather in Hawaii is quite boring. Nearly perfect, which is why so many people love it, but little variation day to day. I remember seeing "7 Day Forecasts" on TV where the highs and lows were all +/- 2° across the entire range, and "partly cloudy" every day. After living there about a year I realized "This is silly" and stopped worrying about the weather. You do get occasional periods of rainy overcast for days as fronts come through, mainly in the winter, which is the rainy season. You'll also have the trade winds die down for several days at a time, and the wind becomes a lot more variable, but usually light, and even then it tends to come more from the S to SE than other directions. That's when you get the hazy vog rolling up the chain from the Big Island. No trade winds is miserable in the summer heat.I haven't played around with the seasons in Flight yet but, if they've modeled things correctly, you might find more variable weather in the winter.

Thanks for the insight, I live far north so Alaska-type weather is more like what I get. Dark winters, low overcast sometimes for weeks, mountains and cloud icing... There can be long time between "vfr" conditions, and its risky to use planes without proper ice-protection (love the Cessna Grand Caravan) In real life it seems like Hawaii is a better home for small planes ar least for beginning pilots :)-

Truly customisable weather would interfere with multiplayer sessions. As I understand it when you just drop into multiplayer you get a server with the same season, approx time and weather theme as the other players?I suspect the MP 'social' side is more a priority for MS than the sim side...CheersKeith