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Smoke turning to light sprites

Tako_Kichi

Tako_Kichi

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ca-ontario
Hi folks,

I have hit a problem trying to set up a smoke effect on an aircraft for a friend and I am hoping someone here can help with an answer. I have fully read the FSX SDK section on effects (many times)and played with numerous settings in the effects tool repeatedly but the problem still persists.

Basically the smoke is turning into light sprites in tower view only at dawn, dusk and at night It is fine during the day in both spot view and tower view.

Initially the smoke gave this problem in spot view in daylight and I eventually solved that problem by drastically reducing the 'lifetime' value then discovered it existed at dawn, dusk and night so I played some more and eliminated it under those conditions in spot view but for some weird reason it still persists in tower view in anything other than full daylight.

Although the effect has been created using the FSX SDK effects tool the effect will be used in both FS9 and FSX and the problem exists in both sims.

I have attached a screenshot below showing the light spites flowing from the engines in tower view at dusk. Sorry for the severe crop but as this aircraft is still under development (and it is not my project) I thought I'd better not reveal too much. ;)

b_130905.jpg


The next shot shows the settings I have in the FSX effects tool.......

130807.jpg


I am hoping someone here can spot just what is causing this problem as I am now at my wits end after spending hours trying to solve it unsuccessfully. Any help/suggestions will be very gratefully received.
 
Hi,

Your problem is the Z particle velocity, I think. I had the same problem using FS9 effects in FSX.
Try using temperature instead.

Roby
 
If you use the [LIGHTS] section of the aircraft.cfg file to try and create smoke-type effects, you will always experience this type of "burning smoke" at dawn/dusk/night. It is a known bug within the Effects engine, and as far as I am aware there is no fix. :(

However, a possible solution is to place your effects in the [SMOKESYSTEM] section instead. This may be possible if you are not already using the [smokesytem] section in this model.

(Be aware that a limitation of the [smokesystem] section is that you can only run one instance of any smoke effect. In other words, the smokesystem effects can only be either "all on" or "all off" at any moment in time.)

UPDATE....
The last paragraph above is not true...the following recent post has proved that you can have multiple smoke effects running independently under the control of some XML...and therefore you no longer have to suffer from the "burning smoke" problem by having to use the [lights] section for smoke-type effects ever again...I hope...
http://www.fsdeveloper.com/forum/showthread.php?p=94093#post94093
 
Last edited:
Thanks for the info Voodoo. The project is on indefinite 'hold' at the moment so I am not sure when we will get back to sorting this problem out.
 
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