|
Post by kronzky on May 7, 2013 13:14:52 GMT -5
I think we're off to a pretty good start (even though we might need a bit more publicity), so with the experience of two races behind us, here are some thoughts on things that might improve the series a bit.
Weather Currently the weather conditions can have a great influence on your race times. If you are lucky (or patient enough to wait for perfect conditions), favorable winds can give you a big leg up over the competition. In addition, FS-Duenna is also not very good at keeping track of the actual weather status (it either gives false positives or false negatives on the FS weather settings), and it is also possible to change the weather once you're into a run (either from inside FS or via an external weather program). I saw mentioned somewhere (can't find the link anymore though) that during some DC-3 RTW race they somehow ensured that everybody had the same weather. But is that really possible? I can't really imagine how, unless everybody flies at exactly the same time. Considering these factors, and in order to get a level playing field, we might have to turn the weather off altogether. I know, it loses a lot of the unpredictability that weather brings with it, but this is a race, after all, and your results shouldn't be determined by outside factors like the weather.
Scheduling Currently we have a whole month to finish the race. Which is nice, as it allows anybody to schedule it whenever they have some free time. Unfortunately, it also takes some excitement away from the race. If one person races one week, the next person races a week later, and yet another in a third week, then that's not much of a race — it's more a "do-your-own-thing" time trial... I know, most of us probably have real-life schedules that we have to fit things into, but how about we still keep a whole month for the complete race, but the actual racing for each leg has to be done on certain weekends? So — you could announce the next leg at the beginning of the week, so people can practice a bit, and then, during the following weekend, all race results for that leg have to be submitted. You'd still have two days to squeeze in a half-hour flight, so that should be doable. Plus, due to the compressed schedule, it also brings a bit of the excitement of "head-to-head" racing back into it.
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on May 7, 2013 20:51:59 GMT -5
Agree, a few pilots more wouldn't be a bad idea. > I saw mentioned somewhere (can't find the link anymore though) that during some DC-3 RTW race they somehow ensured that everybody had the same weather. That may have been the yearly DC-3 Airways' World Rally. There, pilot are all using the same weather by downloading a saved flight situation (incl .wx file) for each flight. Providing a (challenging ) flight situation for each flight may be an interesting option indeed. Not a bad idea. I personally very much appreciate to fly with real weather. Makes the sim flying more real, and immersive. And I don't have an issue if pilots wait for suitable weather. Checking (real-world) weather before a flight and deciding on the right time to fly is just another skill that makes a good bush pilot, so it is relevant that such practice is valued in this race environment. I agree that wind can have a quite large impact on race results though. If on your second flight you'd have had just an average 2 kts headwind like me, and not about 9 kts like you did, your flight would likely have been almost a minute faster, huge difference. I don't like the idea of completely turning off weather. This would remove a significant part of the challengs. Another way to have the same weather for all pilots would be to all fly together online in multiplayer (e.g. using FSHost). Weather of all pilots participationg to a session can be set from FSHost . Now that's something that would be a lot of fun ! Imagine a bunch of bush planes lined up in a meadow in the mountains, taking off on a signal given by teamspeak, and racing together through the mountains. Maybe something to try out out for one of the future legs ? I'm sure flightsim.com multiplayer group would be delighted to provide their server for the sim session and teamspeak if needed. However, setting up for multiplayer may need some preparation, and all pilots will not be available or interested to fly at the same time. So there always would also have to be a ackup option that pilots fly the legs offline.
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 11, 2013 14:24:15 GMT -5
On the issue of no new signups, I wonder if hiding the race sections of the forum is part of the problem. Plenty of people seem to come to the forum (highest count I've seen was 29 guests), but if they only see the public stuff, they may assume there's not much happening here - just some generic discussions about what could or should happen with the league, but no real "action". If they would be allowed to see the race postings, it'd be obvious that there is actually some racing happening here, and more might be enticed to sign up.
Update: Now that I'm an admin myself, I've done this today as my first task. Let's see if it'll help...
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 16, 2013 14:08:13 GMT -5
On the issue of no new signups, I wonder if hiding the race sections of the forum is part of the problem. Plenty of people seem to come to the forum (highest count I've seen was 29 guests), but if they only see the public stuff, they may assume there's not much happening here - just some generic discussions about what could or should happen with the league, but no real "action". If they would be allowed to see the race postings, it'd be obvious that there is actually some racing happening here, and more might be enticed to sign up. Update: Now that I'm an admin myself, I've done this today as my first task. Let's see if it'll help... Well done. Can't hurt. Although I've wondered whether part of these counts (here and elsewhere) aren't bots.
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 17, 2013 12:40:23 GMT -5
Although I've wondered whether part of these counts (here and elsewhere) aren't bots. Yeah, that could of course be, but let's think positive! BTW - I noticed you started a different scoring calculation on the spreadsheet, that includes the relative wind. I think we definitely have to do something about the weather, but I'm not sure using the FS-Duenna wind info is adequate. While I don't know exactly how those numbers are generated, it seems that he's just using the wind direction relative to your heading, and averaging that. This works fine if the wind comes straight from the front or the back, but it treads crosswinds as neutral, which I think is wrong. A wind that comes at you at 90º angle may not directly affect your traveling speed, but it still has a significant indirect effect, as you will have to point your plane into the wind, and thus go sideways, instead of straight, losing absolute ground speed in the process. I actually had a perfect example of that happening to me this weekend, where I had some crazy 60kt crosswinds, and Duenna claimed that this gave me a +0.4 kts assistance! Where, in reality, it nearly caused me to run out of fuel, since I had to fly at some ridiculous crabbing angles, and all my power was wasted fighting the wind... I still think we should either use a stored weather configuration, or have all competitive flights done on the weekends. This would make the competition a bit "tighter", and it would limit the variations in weather. But I've actually never used stored weather before, so it'd be a bit of a learning curve for me. Did you? Or do you have any other ideas how we could equalize the weather?
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 17, 2013 20:45:24 GMT -5
Yeah, that could of course be, but let's think positive! It's just my inquisitive mind. And even if it's just you and me I feel I'll have all the challenge I need. So far you've always flown an little tighter and cleaner than I, shaving a few 10th of a mile off the flight pass. Congratulations ! I've got to try harder next time. BTW - I noticed you started a different scoring calculation on the spreadsheet, that includes the relative wind. I think we definitely have to do something about the weather, but I'm not sure using the FS-Duenna wind info is adequate. While I don't know exactly how those numbers are generated, it seems that he's just using the wind direction relative to your heading, and averaging that. This works fine if the wind comes straight from the front or the back, but it treads crosswinds as neutral, which I think is wrong. A wind that comes at you at 90º angle may not directly affect your traveling speed, but it still has a significant indirect effect, as you will have to point your plane into the wind, and thus go sideways, instead of straight, losing absolute ground speed in the process. I actually had a perfect example of that happening to me this weekend, where I had some crazy 60kt crosswinds, and Duenna claimed that this gave me a +0.4 kts assistance! Where, in reality, it nearly caused me to run out of fuel, since I had to fly at some ridiculous crabbing angles, and all my power was wasted fighting the wind... I still think we should either use a stored weather configuration, or have all competitive flights done on the weekends. This would make the competition a bit "tighter", and it would limit the variations in weather. But I've actually never used stored weather before, so it'd be a bit of a learning curve for me. Did you? Or do you have any other ideas how we could equalize the weather? Agree, if we want the races to be pilot against pilot we should try to eliminate the variability introduced due to weather/wind as much as possible. As is, head/tailwinds tend to dominate the race results. But we should do so without lessening the interest that real-world (-like) weather brings. I've done the few tests in the spreadsheet to see whether impact of head/tailwind can be reduced from the race results by using the Duenna wind data. Seems to make the results closer together (and I believe you have flown better than I on most flights as indicated above, so am not surprised that youre faster on most). Distributing weather situations for each flight is indeed another good option. In fact I like the idea, it would allow to create interesting and challenging situations (including dusk/dawn start time) that may enhance the interest of the flights (low ceiling, visibility, crosswinds ect. on occasion) I have only created a weather situation for an event once. At that occasion I had distributed a saved flight situation: created a flight with a default plane at the start airport, adjusted the weather, saved, and distributed the (FS9) .FLT and .WX files to the participants. Creating the weather can of course be done in the weather settings from scratch (for both FS9 and FSX with the same parameters). However, it may result in more realistic and interesting weather if an interesting weather situation is created/searched in an addon program like Active Sky. Then the weather settings that have bene set by the PW program for a single station can be determined in the advanced weather dialog (click a single station on the weather map), and be used as a template to manually create the same (global) weather in both FS9 and FSX. We can try it out. It's just a question whether the author of the circuits has the time to spend.
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 18, 2013 21:01:32 GMT -5
I've done some experimenting today with saved weather situations, and I'm afraid it's going to be way too complicated. Most likely people will have separate flights saved for each leg, and they probably update them a lot, as routes are tweaked. So that means, every time a flight is saved you have to make sure that you overwrite the WX file with the one we provide. And, of course, make sure that all the filename are correct, and that you don't lose any in the process. That just sounds like way too much hassle and an invitation to screwups... I couldn't really think of anything easier and more fool-proof either, so I was nearly considering writing my own WX saver/injector (it shouldn't be too bad, but I've never done any SimConnect programming, so I'd have to get over that first learning curve first). But then I came across this little free weather program, that seems to do exactly what we need! It's called FSXWX, and can inject historical weather into FS. It does that for the whole area around you, and is really straightforward. So perhaps that's the answer we are looking for (that is, if it works in FS9 — I only tested it in FSX). The site is here: www.plane-pics.de/fsxwxAnd the download here: www.plane-pics.de/fsxwx/download/FSXWX.zipSo, we might want to do a check on two different system, to see if the results really are identical. I've done a test today, with the new route, on autopilot at 3,500ft (so I can just let it run by itself), and I had winds of about 10kts for the first leg, and then they increased to about 15kts - coming from between 110-140º. To use the WX program run the downloaded EXE (that's it - no installation; just a single file), select the historic weather for 01.01.2013 22 UTC, and press "Wx Reset". You should now see a 7kt wind from 110º. Try running the new route on autopilot, and see if your results match mine (I ran mine at 4x speed - you might want to do the same, just to be safe.) I've attached a KML file with a detailed wind log, which should look like this: (yellow arrows: <=10kts, red ones: > 10kts): (If you have FSRecorder, I can send you the program that creates this kind of KML file from a log.) Update: Looks like the attachments don't work (or at least not reliably) on this board, so you can download the file from here.
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 19, 2013 16:13:30 GMT -5
That looks interesting ! I think I will be able to test it on FS9 tomorrow. will keep you updated.
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 20, 2013 16:48:23 GMT -5
Tested in FS9 and FSX. Installation (none required!) and operation could not be easier indeed.
Unfortunately it seems to use simconnect to communicate with FS, without alternative path via FSUIPC, so it doesn't work with FS9. Can not connect to FSX.
Out of interest I fired up FSX and positioned an aircraft at 3500 ft over the off-airport landing spots of the circuit, recording (magnetic) wind heading and speed from the Shift-Z information popup line. Good correlation between winds measured and your winds logged for these locations in the .kml file. True wind heading +/- 1+ (taking Magvar into account) wind strength +/- 1 kt And the weather generated was pretty nice - low cloud layer hanging in the mountains... interesting program. I'll have to try this with the Pablo Diaz clouds...
So this could work in FSX...
I believe I am the only pilot using FS9 so far (?) I could try to fly with FSX and pretty low slider settings (otherwise my FSX is a slideshow).
We could try this approach.
Others could maybe download the program and give their opinion how the weather looks compared to other quality FSX weather generators (installing is really extremely easy, fast and unintrusive - for a quick test it's enough to just start the downloaded .exe !).
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 20, 2013 16:51:23 GMT -5
> If you have FSRecorder, I can send you the program that creates this kind of KML file from a log.
Btw, I'd be very intrested if you could send me the program ! This looks like it could be very handy for flight tgracking and analysis in GE. I'll send you my email.
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 20, 2013 18:32:57 GMT -5
Unfortunately it seems to use simconnect to communicate with FS, without alternative path via FSUIPC, so it doesn't work with FS9. Oh well... I guess the FSXWX name should've been a clue... I tried emailing it to you (as a zip file), but it bounced, so I put it up on my server instead, and you can download it from there: www.kronzky.info/fs/FRCWinds.zipHopefully it'll for you. I only cobbled this together quickly when I was testing the new FSrealWX beta, and it worked ok for me. When creating the FSRecorder log, of course, you have to make sure that you actually log the wind there (I’m not sure if it’s on by default). You can record it at the lowest possible frequency (1 sec), and once you're done export it via FrcConverter (in case you don’t have that, it's in the zip file as well). Then just drag the converted TXT file only FRCWinds.exe, and it will create a KML file in the same folder it read the TXT file from. The exact coding for the arrow colors is - White: =<1kt
- Green: >1kts
- Yellow: >5kts
- Red: >10kts
Good luck, and let me know if you run into any problems!
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 20, 2013 19:11:47 GMT -5
P.S. Wasn't there a program called FSMetar for FS9 that also allowed you to use historical weather? It seem the download location is dead though, and I couldn't find any mirrors, but you've been doing this for a while already, so perhaps you already have a copy somewhere, collecting dust... Might be a feasible alternative (if we can find it).
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 21, 2013 3:08:48 GMT -5
I don't have FSMetar, but I can load historic data into my Active Sky. I'll try to see what wheather this gives (though I doubt that winds will be exactly the same, but worth a try).
If it does not work out I have no problem to fly the next circuit with FSX. It's been a while I'm asking myself if I shouldn't spend a little time trying to optimise it. Maybe I can get it to run halfway decent after all. There are so many interesting scenery and aircraft for that out there that I have been looking over the fence longingly for some time now.
|
|
teson1
Commercial Pilot
Posts: 243
|
Post by teson1 on Jun 21, 2013 17:41:54 GMT -5
Hmmm... I can't connect to the AS server to download weather. Using ASv6.5 for FS9. Have to look at this more in detail, but somehow I don't believe it will work out.
|
|
|
Post by kronzky on Jun 21, 2013 20:39:13 GMT -5
Of course, we could just go the really simple route, and take advantage of the fact that the Microsoft/Jeppesen weather server doesn't deliver any real-time weather anymore, but only some snapshot of the past. For example, I've been watching my local weather (CYUL) for the last few weeks, and it's been exactly the same since May 31st (when I started watching). The weather that was downloaded at that point was overcast, rain and 50º, even though in reality we had absolutely clear sky and 90º! This one is three weeks old, and today I still got the exact same weather. Actual METAR from today: CYUL 220100Z 23009KT 30SM OVC250 23/13 A3017 RMK CI8 SC TR AC TR SLP216 DENSITY ALT 800FT So perhaps, if the MS servers keep delivering static weather (from some "historic" date), then that would be all we need.
|
|