My ASN weather radar gauge for FSX (&P3D?)

[Bryn 72]

Hi,

 

I wrote a simple weather radar gauge for FSX that uses the ActiveSky Next API.  It has a tilt and range function, and displays areas of precipitation ahead of the aircraft.

 

You can download it at gum.co/bryn (it's free, but you're welcome to support the coffee addiction I developed writing the gauge).

 

Let me know if you run into any problems with it, or have any thoughts and suggestions about how to improve it.  I could add gain, and make it prettier.  

 

Here are a couple of early version screenshots (the changes since these versions are minimal though you'll see the 747 image didn't have tilt nor range, and you can just see the cessna only has range).  

 

Finally a reason to use the route offset!

 

 

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[nelsly 0]

I have used this gauge in P3D and it is awsome. Works as advertised. Great job Bryn

 

Nelson

[AirborneZed 168]

Awesome work, Bryn.

[AirborneZed 168]

A suggestion, other than a gain function, maybe a gauge with the grey borders to accompany the NGX. Or perhaps some way to color the outside border of the gauge.

[Bryn 72]

A suggestion, other than a gain function, maybe a gauge with the grey borders to accompany the NGX. Or perhaps some way to color the outside border of the gauge.

 

At the moment it's just using the stock bitmap that ships in the FSX SDK!  I know a bit about getting code to work, but I know really nothing about illustration and graphic design... do you like my little plus and minus buttons?  Cutting edge graphics there... took me forever to get them right in MS Paint.

 

Anyway, I'll have a crack at changing the background image... it will also give me an opportunity to learn a bit about embedding more than one gauge in the file. 

 

I have a problem with the gain function, though.  I'm not really sure what the logic should be. 

 

At the moment, each pixel on the radar is essentially a number between 0 and 255 that HiFi gives me through their API.

 

I had a look at the dbz numbers at wikipedia.org/wiki/DBZ_(meteorology), and used that as a bit of a guide for the cutoff levels for green, yellow and red on my weather radar.

 

My code looks a bit like this:

 

if (radarPixelReturn > 153) Color = Red;

else if (radarPixelReturn > 115)Color = Yellow;

else if (radarPixelReturn > 60) Color = Green;

 

So my question is this: Does the logic of gain just boil down to lowering and raising those cutoff numbers?  Or is there something more sophisticated going on?

 

Bryn.

[AirborneZed 168]

At the moment it's just using the stock bitmap that ships in the FSX SDK! I know a bit about getting code to work,

 

 

So my question is this: Does the logic of gain just boil down to lowering and raising those cutoff numbers? Or is there something more sophisticated going on?

 

Bryn.

I was actually referring to the outer border that resembles the panel of a 747 or 777. I was thinking in maybe a way to change the border outside the display to resemble the panel of another plane not the display itself.

 

 

When we talk about gain it's not just increasing the amount of cut off for each colorcode, it's actually revealing more of the green as well, or showing areas of green precipitation that are really just thick clouds. But then again the cut off is also altered to a more sensitive setting.

[Bryn 72]

Yeh, that outer border is a stock FSX SDK image, which is what I'll work on changing.

 

I'll try lowering the cut-off numbers using a +/- button to see what that looks like.  I'll distribute it when it's done -probably a bit later today (Australia time).

 

Cheers,

 

Bryn.

[Mike_CFII_MEL 788]

Hi,

 

Why not remove the border, if that's not possible... make the border transparent, then you can resize/place the gauge over any CDU in any aircraft.

 

Don't know if this is possible... If so, this would be a nice addition to ANY aircraft.

[Bryn 72]

Michael, I'll do that in tomorrow's update - it's possible and very easy.  I should've done it from the beginning, but I was just cutting and pasting SDK code trying to learn it as I went, and I guess it just stayed there.

I've updated the radar.  I think I fixed a problem that Fr. Bill found when he loaded the gauge without and ASN installation.

 

I also added gain, and a little panel changer window.

 

Let me know how it goes. Here's a pic of gain in action.

 

[Lashrathius 49]

Wow this is fantastic! I just had a flight with it on the 777 and loving it. Just need some tweaking on the tune/tilt; if you run into anything code-wise or graphics, feel free to give me a shout.

[Bryn 72]

Hi Hank.  Thanks for that. What do you mean about tweaking the tilt?  Cheers, Bryn.

[RWFeldman 159]

Free? Free if you donate? Cant get past the donate screen.

[Lashrathius 49]

Hi Hank.  Thanks for that. What do you mean about tweaking the tilt?  Cheers, Bryn.

 

There are some occasions where storm clouds a little over 1000 ft below go undetected. I tried adjusting the tune (down to at least 10 and back up) but the storm passed and the radar screen was blank. It only detected another formation of storm clouds while I took off. Most of the time, even though the ASN moving map screen showed intense yellow / red / blue returns underneath my aircraft, the screen stays blank the entire flight (not a single return) until I land at JFK, which gave me some green returns at 3000 ft on glideslope.

[Bryn 72]

The tilt is -10 for downward pointing 10 degrees, and +10 for upward pointing 10 degrees.

 

Pointing down 10 degrees (-10), stuff that is 1000 feet below you should show up on the radar if it is at least 1nm ahead of you.

 

I'm about to do a flight myself, so I'll test this a bit more too.

 

Bryn.

[devgrp 1,233]

Is there anything special I need to do in ASN because mines does not work. Nothing shows on my gauge