Forum Navigation
Please or Register to create posts and topics.

WX Radar Request Discussion

Page 1 of 2Next

(Original thread started on 11-28-12 by Eric Williams)

Someday downrange if this would be possible to integrate- WX Radar! Personally I use the REX remote client on my console but its clunky and doesn't work for anyone with a scale console. I use it a lot and find it really dials up the immersion factor when I can look that far ahead.

 

(Posted by Rick Trantham on 07-21-14)

I have a program that simulates a Collins weather radar called SA_WXR for FSX2004, so I suspect it would be possible for FSX or Prepar3D. It's just a matter of getting the weather data from multiple points horizontal and vertical and using that to generate an approximate image in real time. It definitely wouldn't be easy. Since the third-party dynamic weather programs do this to generate the weather, that data is somewhere in their program and it would be nice if that data was available for use. I'm a bit surprised they haven't done this as an add on, probably not worth their time.

 

I found this link and it seems they are already working on something:

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/threads/weather-radar-for-developers.429362/#post-667780

 

(Posted by Eric Williams on 07-21-14)

Just a thought, my REX has WASys Weather Avoidance Radar which I love greatly. We know it is indeed possible- even if you take a simpler route:

 

- Use real time weather online sources for radar returns on the MFD

- Use any real time weather engine in the SIM (such as REX)

 

If the stars align- we would likely end up with something that matches most of the time. Not the best method but someone taught me many moons ago- don't let perfect stand in the way of better.

 

I suspect there is indeed an easier way though. If Project Magenta and other 3rd party aircraft can do it- I suspect others could too.

 

(Posted by Rick Trantham on 07-22-14)

Yea. There's a govt. website with open access, I think, that generates the weather data as XML to use. I might try to construct a simple program that generates an image file (jpg, bmp, png...) from the data. It would be updated and overwritten on a regular basis and then stored in a consistent place on your PC. The file could be used by other programs as an overlay I would think. PM was able to use the SA_WXR image files (.bmp I believe) that it generated as an overlay in their flight displays.

 

The FSX METAR data doesn't include precipitation, so I can see why nobody has come up with a solution. That info is apparently buried elsewhere. I need to try with REX or AS activated to see if they add-in METARS that include the additional precipitation info. That would save some work having to get the data directly from a govt. weather server.

 

(Posted by Eric Williams on 07-25-14)

I forget where it points currently- It used to be VATSIM but I remember that got suspended for awhile. If I get some time I'll fire mine up and check in the config.

 

Check this out:

http://www.realenvironmentxtreme.com/news.html

 

This sounds like something the people here might be very interested in:

"The WX Advantage Radar will be freely offered as a customizable gauge to 3rd-party aircraft developers. The add-on developer can, for the first time ever, modify not only the color, texture and text, but also the model of the gauge to fit within their paradigm and methodology."

 

(Posted by Ron Rollo on 07-25-14)

That's pretty cool. I wonder if this is something that we can do ourselves (modify the gauge) or if it is something that can or should be implemented into Jet45?

 

(Posted by Eric Tomlin on 07-28-14)

Jason is aware of this, but right now CDU/FGC is priority.

Has there ever been any development (since 2014)  in integrating WX data into the MFD gauge?
I use HiFi Active sky, it would be so great if the xgauge weather gauge could be integrated.
Another option I was thinking about is to display the xgauge on a separate weather radar screen, not being the MFD.
But then I have to run the xgauge from my main fs pc which I do not want.

 

There has been no new WX Radar development over the past few years with the exception that I have created a WX Radar Panel v2.0 drawing.  You can find it in the BUILDER RESOURCES page.  It is designed to be ran using a single Arduino Nano.

As for the software side of the problem, we are currently in a "Wait and See" mode with the new MSFS 2020.  There are high hopes that the new flight simulator has a descent default WX Radar system that programmers, like Jason Hite at FlightDeckSoft can easily tap into and create a WX Radar page for the MFD.  It would then of course be controlled by the WX Radar Panel that I have designed which is an exact model of what is found in the Lear45.

So lets see what the new MSFS 2020 brings us in a couple of months and keeps our fingers crossed it is good news!

Have you heard anything about a Lear45 will be available in FS2020?
Yes a WX gauge would be great, I am still think about an extra screen with just weather radar...

Of the list of known aircraft that have been developed for MSFS 2020, the Lear45 is not one of them yet.  My educated guess is that it will not be one of the aircraft to make the debut of the new release.

The reason I say this is because all the aircraft that appear to be included in the new sim are highly detailed in the way they operate, systems, aerodynamics, flight models, graphics, you name it.  The MSFS 2020 team is working with real world pilots and engineers that fly and build all the known aircraft models that we suspect will make it into the initial release of the new flight simulator.

Bottom line?  With this simulator, they are not just going to throw in a bunch of extra aircraft just to pad their selection numbers.  I see this as a good thing!  They are putting in tremendous efforts to get this sim right and the aircraft that will be available to us will be near perfect.

So the Lear45 most likely will not make the first cut, maybe not even the second round of additional aircraft, but at some point, I do see them adding a highly detailed Lear45 model.  And that is exciting!

The other good news is I have heard and read that we should have the ability to "port over" FSX aircraft, which means we can use the Lear45 model we are using now in FSX and P3D.  No problem.

The other option we have is to modify the Citation CJ4 or any other small business jet that MSFS 2020 has modeled.  I have read that the ability for the end user to modify the aircraft flight models and config files will be easier than ever.  So in theory, we will be able to use the highly detailed flight characteristic of another aircraft, modify it to mimic the Lear45 closer and then with the Jet45 avionics suite, we will have our Lear45.  The only thing about this method is it would not look like a Lear45 when viewed from the outside.  (This is our back up plan)

I think you are right!
But it would be good news to use FSX airplanes in FS2020!!

 

Hi guys, I have looked into an accurate WX for some time. As said above, I am hoping that FS2020 has a real weather interface.  FSX etc. had too little data available to generate an accurate weather picture in the software.  I am looking forward to the release to see what data is available, I want that "WX" button on our EFIS to work!

Jason Hite FlightDeckSoft

Hi all,

I am super excited that this thread is alive and ticking over. I have no inside information but maybe the new P3D v5 out next week may have the required acccess to weather data ?

I suppose with the world temporarily turning to crud in the medium term, that would be too much to hope for.

But.

If our wishes were granted and the new P3d was still alive utilising the WX button, the next hurdle will be the DX12 requirement. I want to be corrected by anyone happily, but that means all of us Win7 people will have to upgrade to Win 10 and probably the hardware whilst you are at it.

At least with all this lockdown, I can still venture out to the 'Hangar' , fire up the Lear and fly wherever I want to. Keep building you lot, it's well worth it.

Cheers

Mark S.

I have my whole rig (4PCs) running on windows 10 without issues. All of the “required” updates are a little frustrating but I can just take them off of the internet and quickly solve that issue.  Jet45 doesn’t really seem to care too much between windows 7 or 10 so I’m happy!  Only item to note is on new versions of Jet45, you have to run as administrator to allow the software network access to share data between modules.

Jason Hite FlightDeckSoft

If there ever will be WX data available in FS2020 of Prepar3d v5 , will it show up in Jet45 MFD then?

Isn't it possible to integrate WX data from 3rd party vendors like Active Sky to integrate in Jet45 MFD?

Before I used the iFly 737 suite where MFD on networked PC  integrated with AS.

Is this hard to code?

 

Page 1 of 2Next