I use ActiveSky2012 on a networked machine. A group of us were flying to an airport with a ceiling of 400 feet as reported by AS2012.

 

When I arrived, I broke out at 1,100 feet.

 

I was using DWC, have the cfg "cloud density" set to 12.

 

What might have been wrong and what can I do so I receive the expected weather at the destination?

 

Brad

We all have same problem. It is more an FSX issue that HiFi has so far not been able to overcome. Seems FSX will usually only display an opaque overcast down to about 2000 agl, but will create broken scattered down to 1000 agl. It is possible to manually create low overcasts by coupling the low cloud overcast layer with a layer of zero (1/16 sm) visibility.

 

Left alone, however, FSX display will gradually change to clear skies while still retaining the correct visibility unless the cloud commands are periodically resent thru simconnect. That was what the latest fixes for ASE and AS2012 are doing if you use "STANDARD" mode. DWC works differently by using averages and then randomly creating clouds enroute which I find unrealistic. You can select option: "force destination wx zone" and it WILL hold correct wind/temp/visiblity but precipitation and cloud cover is very inconsistent.

 

FYI, there were so many threads complaining about the inability to display correct overcasts that Damian and Josh stopped using this forum as a suport platform...too many unanswered complaints. And to our chagrin they are currently very unresponsive with trouble tickets regarding cloud cover. I still use AS2012 since there are not any other viable commercial options to depict realistic weather, IMO.

 

If it want to practice RW-like IMC conditions I have to set up my destination airport manually and then using the visibility layers, I am able to produce real overcasts down to any altitude and get a realistic effect on approach. Even then, however, I have to periodically go to the weather menu and reselect/reconfirm my advanced weather settings to prevent FSX from gradually eroding to clear skies and no precipitation.

 

Despite the "real as it gets" hype, I do believe that FSX was really intended for a much less sophisticated "gamer" type user -- more concerned with "eye-candy" rather than realisim. But the market place has definitely matured over the years and more and more sudent pilots, former and current pilots, along with serious pilot wanna-be's are demanding more and more realism and sophistication in the simulation. Developers have stepped up to the challenge but unfortunately FSX is stuck in time and it's design flaws are proving a major detriminent to many of these developers. There is amazing realism in the FSX atmosphere model when it comes to pressure and temperature lapse rates but the weather-generating engine itself has very limited capabilities and seems to be purposely set to default to Standard conditions with clear skies and calm wind.

 

I credit Damian and the Active Sky team for the tremendous effort they have put in over the last years in thier attempts to tackle this seemingly unsurmountable task. I have had many long tedious discussions with both Damian and Josh over this cloud depiction issue having first assumed it was due to flaws in their program design. We really need a new FSX!!! I have not given up hope, however. I monitor this forum looking for that day when I will one day see an anouncement of a new upgrade that finally will produce correct cloud depictions in FSX including Cumulo-nimbus and true low overcasts down to IMC minimums.

The thing is also unlike real life flying or whatever where conditions can also change at the blink of an eye, we are flying on computers here. If you have a 400 ft ceiling reported and break out at 1100, how much time was between when you got the dst wx report and was on short final just out of curiosity? What is the time interval of the wx downloads`? Just like the infinite amount of hardware setups and the almost infinite amount of setting combinations in AS or in any wx program, I dont think there is any way to actually get a dead nuts accurate depiction of wx unless we are getting a constant live stream to the minute of actual wx data, and the reporting stations would have to be pumping that out also for it to even work. Some stations update every 10 or 15 minutes and some others maybe every hour or more. Way too many parameters. Its almost like trying to get blood from a rock. I'm glad though it has gotten this far. I looked at a cover today from FS II for the C-64 which I used to fly on a 12 inch B&W TV. That was state of the art back then for the home computer user. I still can't believe how many hours I spent flying over pixie stix and was happy with it. LOL

Since we are flying computers and this is not RL, I would expect to find reported weather. In my RL experience as a flight instructor, I find real life metars to be generally accurate.