Weather issue

[tonicfan]

I have a question.

I am using REX as my weather add on for P3D/FSX when I use those to fly. I noticed today that ATC seemed to have different weather METAR data than what REX produced for me. I am using their live weather. So what to do in this situation? Since PE doesnt have its own weather server as of yet (correct?) how does one fix this? I had to change my weather to clear skies so I could see a bit better, but then again part of that was my fault for not being familiar with the airfield i was going to. I hadnt actually landed there in several years. But none the less, the weather itself differed from what ATC had apparently. The airfield really wasnt in view, it was too hazy to see on my end but according to ATC i should have had no problem seeing it.

I normally would use Xplane, but Ive been having some issues with it crashing on me and until I resolve those, I am forced to use either FSX or P3D and obviously I would like the weather to be accurate unless of course I am simulating conditions.

Never had this problem on Vatsim, so I am not sure what the solution is. I am sure this doesnt happen that often but I'd like to prevent it from happening again because all it did was increase the stress level and that's not good.

[Ryan B]

Not sure how REX works but OPUS doesn't always update me on the fly... sometimes you'll have to update the weather in flight before you get to destination - that's what I do.

Just tell the controller you're simulating IMC or whatever and ask for an approach.

[tonicfan]

You can set REX to update and it was updating. But I was only flying a 20-30 min flight so it would have only updated a few times.

I guess I was more concerned with the weather matching what ATC has. I noticed that PE has a weather setting inside the software that isnt operational. The controller just seemed confused that I didnt have the same weather as he. I dont know. Next time if i am in the same situation I'll just call for an instrument approach no matter what. I was probably out of my league today anyway, I did something I dont normally do. And that was my error, but the weather difference didnt help, it only confused things more.

[Peter Grey]

Hello,

I can't speak to the weather program you are using.

What I can speak to is how we handle weather on PE. We will issue the real world weather unless you indicate that you have your own weather (either by stating so at the appropriate time or a remark in your flight plan). We will also issues runways and approaches based on real world weather. If your weather doesn't allow for the runways/approaches we are issuing you should request the approach/runway you require and we will accommodate you.

We have no way to know your internal weather so if you don't indicate you have your own weather we will issue the real world weather to you. Obviously if you've set something different what we issue won't agree with your sim. Trying to sort this out with the controller won't be possible as we ONLY have access to real world weather.

The weather setting in the plugin is disabled as we don't sent weather to your simulator.

[tonicfan]

Right, well I thought that REX was giving me real world weather. It either didnt update properly, or the haze that i was seeing was not reported via METAR to you guys. My guess is that REX messed up. Its very hard to trust weather programs as being 100% accurate. Its possible that for the given area it didnt update itself, who knows. I never said that you guys should know whats going on with my weather in MY sim. I was just trying to figure out what happened.

I will try flying again and see how it goes. I'll just chalk this one up to REX being the culprit. Next time if I am getting something different I will make the appropriate request. For all I know it could have been related to my graphics driver which has been causing some framerate issues and even some freezes for me lately. I have just fixed that issue I think...

A good idea would be to try to develop some way for PE to send the weather to the SIMs so that we are all on the same page. That would be very cool.


Thank you for the info.

Hello,

I can't speak to the weather program you are using.

What I can speak to is how we handle weather on PE. We will issue the real world weather unless you indicate that you have your own weather (either by stating so at the appropriate time or a remark in your flight plan). We will also issues runways and approaches based on real world weather. If your weather doesn't allow for the runways/approaches we are issuing you should request the approach/runway you require and we will accommodate you.

We have no way to know your internal weather so if you don't indicate you have your own weather we will issue the real world weather to you. Obviously if you've set something different what we issue won't agree with your sim. Trying to sort this out with the controller won't be possible as we ONLY have access to real world weather.

The weather setting in the plugin is disabled as we don't sent weather to your simulator.

[Keith Smith]

I always figured that the payware weather engines were far more capable of setting the weather in the sim than any attempt we would make. It is a non-trivial problem. This is why we don't make any attempt to set the weather in the sim.

Also, remember that a large percentage of the users of PilotEdge are real world pilots who are building their skills for r/w flight training. In many cases, they want to set their own weather in the sim. At the commercial usage level, it's almost unheard of to have real world weather turned on (for better or worse).

[tonicfan]

The only reason I care about the weather is for realism. But I am not really using PE for the weather, I am using it for ATC practice and thats really it. The flying part isnt as important because I can do that without ATC. But I am interested in practicing different scenarios where ATC is utilized, so when the weather isnt the same or I am seeing something different than they do I will have to alert them to the difference and go from there. I have used several payware weather programs over the years. Active Sky, Opus and REX. And each one has had its limitations. Either by accurate updates or by getting the forecast correct or by saying its raining in the program but in the sim its not raining. So they aren't perfect by any means. I do like X-plane's real world weather quite a bit. i find that to be pretty good. To each his own I guess. I do realize that people use PE for different things and as I am sure you do as well. One doesnt need PE to do the weather, I get that.

[wmburns]

Sounds like you would like "REX 4 Weather Direct".
http://www.rexdirectexperience.com/weather.html

[tonicfan]

Ya right now I do have REX but its the Essential Plus oVerdrive version which has textures. And the textures can really mess up the flight at times. They are beautiful dont get me wrong, but they really lag the computer.