Peter wrote:
Does anyone know what minimum time the Autorouter imposes between present time and the filed EOBT?
AFAIK, the Autorouter doesn’t impose any minimum time at all. It justs sends the flight plan to the IFPS. Any time limits are applied there. But I don’t know about any such limitations either. Formally, the limit is 60 minutes but the only ones that seem to enforce is are AROs. E.g. the Swedish ARO portal will refuse an IFR flight plan submitted less than 60 min before EOBT.
I can’t remember the exact parameter but if you try and file under a certain amount of time before EOBT it gives a warning (possibly 15 mins?). It is however possible to ignore this and I have filed it once recently whilst sitting in the aeroplane, and I called for start literally about 10 seconds after confirmation and the tower had it and approved start fine.
Peter wrote:
I have a vague recollection of successfully filing FPs (using the AR) c. 15 mins ahead, but never tried it any tighter.
I filed FP with 5 min ahead time from the aircraft because I messed up the date on previously filed FP and learned it from guy in the tower when I asked for start up.
I can confirm that filing in a few mins does work fine 
The Autorouter has an issue with delays on tafs and metars:
It took me a while to realise that it probably downloads them (probably from ADDS in the US) once an hour, whereas the actual reports come out 2x per hour.
But I am not sure it is simply that. Here is another one:
On a flight this week on which i really needed latest wx, I managed to get more current wx via a private site I have…
I have looked at ICON wx many times (on windy.com) and usually it is spectacularly wrong I would not even try the AR ICON GRAMET… the current (GFS) GRAMET is good when it is good…
On windy.com I use ECMWF the whole time now.
On windy.com I use ECMWF the whole time now.
And it’s usually the most correct forecast.
However, these profiles are of no use for downloading during a flight.
The AR is getting itself confused when trying to route LDSB-LFRK. I am seeing a lot of stuff like this
It did do a real route after a long time.
