Hi

I noticed recently that with some 3rd Party Airports that have custom runway lighting, such as Longyear ENSB, that the lights are off during the day, even during bad weather. This makes doing approaches and landings unrealistic. There's an old tweak for the prepar3d.cfg file, where you can specify the light duration by adding a couple of entries.

Well, if you set them as follows:

[GRAPHICS]
DAY_THRESHOLD=65535
NIGHT_THRESHOLD=0

...then this tells the simulator to keep the lights always on. That might at first seem a strange thing to do, but it does solve the problem of landing in poor visibility conditions. Also, I found that flying or taxying around an airport on a dull, grey day seems far more realistic when you can see lights on in the buildings, rather than having everything dark. Interestingly, if the weather is bright and sunny, you can't see the lights when they are on, so I figured why not leave them on?

I guess there is a performance hit for that, and I haven't tried this in version 5 yet, but so far its made a world of difference flying around Europe.

Edited April 30, 20206 yr by JasonD210

29 minutes ago, JasonD210 said:

Hi

I noticed recently that with some 3rd Party Airports that have custom runway lighting, such as Longyear ENSB, that the lights are off during the day, even during bad weather. This makes doing approaches and landings unrealistic. There's an old tweak for the prepar3d.cfg file, where you can specify the light duration by adding a couple of entries.

Well, if you set them as follows:

[GRAPHICS]
DAY_THRESHOLD=65535
NIGHT_THRESHOLD=0

...then this tells the simulator to keep the lights always on. That might at first seem a strange thing to do, but it does solve the problem of landing in poor visibility conditions. Also, I found that flying or taxying around an airport on a dull, grey day seems far more realistic when you can see lights on in the buildings, rather than having everything dark. Interestingly, if the weather is bright and sunny, you can't see the lights when they are on, so I figured why not leave them on?

I guess there is a performance hit for that, and I haven't tried this in version 5 yet, but so far its made a world of difference flying around Europe.

I have issue with CYUL.....while landing I see absolutely nothing...no PAPI's nothing (dusk, dawn, night). Once on ground everything looks nice.....So how to make runways more visible...? at least from 3000ft..

And where to make that change?

Edited April 30, 20206 yr by cyyzrwy24

10 minutes ago, cyyzrwy24 said:

I have issue with CYUL.....while landing I see absolutely nothing...no PAPI's nothing (dusk, dawn, night). Once on ground everything looks nice.....So how to make runways more visible...? at least from 3000ft..

And where to make that change?

Sorry, no idea. If it's add-on scenery, then make sure it's installed correctly. All this tweak does is determine when the simulator swaps textures for night time ones.

I've seen this tweak before but as I understand it a larger number for day threshold should turn the lights on earlier in the evening. I just tested values between 40000-55000 and the lights turn on at the exact same time. I must be doing something wrong.

2 hours ago, JasonD210 said:

Hi

I noticed recently that with some 3rd Party Airports that have custom runway lighting, such as Longyear ENSB, that the lights are off during the day, even during bad weather. This makes doing approaches and landings unrealistic. There's an old tweak for the prepar3d.cfg file, where you can specify the light duration by adding a couple of entries.

Well, if you set them as follows:

[GRAPHICS]
DAY_THRESHOLD=65535
NIGHT_THRESHOLD=0

...then this tells the simulator to keep the lights always on. That might at first seem a strange thing to do, but it does solve the problem of landing in poor visibility conditions. Also, I found that flying or taxying around an airport on a dull, grey day seems far more realistic when you can see lights on in the buildings, rather than having everything dark. Interestingly, if the weather is bright and sunny, you can't see the lights when they are on, so I figured why not leave them on?

I guess there is a performance hit for that, and I haven't tried this in version 5 yet, but so far its made a world of difference flying around Europe.

 

Sent you a PM....

Hi Stein-Ove,

Here are some screenshots. Let me know if these are OK or if you need better ones.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/uen39ud70scxtx3/Lights.zip?dl=0

Everything works as expected and the lights are a huge improvement! I wouldn't do any more, I think it is enough.

Taking into account visibility is an improvement on the default settings, but it still doesn't allow for dull or cloudy days, and as I mentioned before the buildings are dark. This of course is a problem on all airports in p3d and FSX, and for that reason I am currently having the lights on all the time in the simulator. Will your lights work without the scripts, if I delete the dark textures?

Jason

 

 

 

 

5 hours ago, JasonD210 said:

Hi Stein-Ove,

Here are some screenshots. Let me know if these are OK or if you need better ones.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/uen39ud70scxtx3/Lights.zip?dl=0

Everything works as expected and the lights are a huge improvement! I wouldn't do any more, I think it is enough.

Taking into account visibility is an improvement on the default settings, but it still doesn't allow for dull or cloudy days, and as I mentioned before the buildings are dark. This of course is a problem on all airports in p3d and FSX, and for that reason I am currently having the lights on all the time in the simulator. Will your lights work without the scripts, if I delete the dark textures?

Jason

 

 

 

 

 

Looks ok to me.

 

If anyone interested in this package, just send a pm. 👍

 

 

Edited May 5, 20206 yr by Bakern

Sorry I had meant to send those to you as PM. Explains why I couldn't find the post.

Edited May 5, 20206 yr by JasonD210

25 minutes ago, JasonD210 said:

Sorry I had meant to send those to you as PM. Explains why I couldn't find the post.

Np...😅

Hi

I justed tested your lights in version 5. For some reason they are all offset by about 30cm. I can send screenshots if you are interested.

 

Hi,

That's weird, just checked here, in place at my end. 🤔

 

 

 

 

I don't understand it, but when the scenery firsts loads up they are all offset. I have enhanced atmospherics on also. They look OK now, apart from the PAPI lights which you didn't alter. How do your PAPI lights look when you are near them?

Jason

Edited May 9, 20206 yr by JasonD210

Have not touched papi lights at all, controlled by scenery\P3D...