David Brady medal 5000 12 years 292 days ago
first of all not sure if this is really technical or gameplay assistance and its possibly quite difficult to answer
Take for example a race starting at 8pm, setup locking at 7:30pm if its dry all day then starts heavy rain at any point before setup is locked the track will be wet, is it any "wetter" if the rain starts at 2pm or 7pm or does the track only start become affected[effected] once setup becomes locked
Andrew Wiseman medal 5000 12 years 290 days ago
The weather and track surface for all tracks is simulated 24/7 (based on a real weather data feed). This simulation continues even if there are no races running. So yes, if it has been raining all day, the track will be wetter than if it has only just started raining at the beginning of the race.
In the exact situation you mentioned there wouldn't be much difference though. I.e. if there has been heavy rain for 30 minutes before the start of the race (or qualifying), the track will be just as wet as if it had been heavy rain for 6 hours. In both cases the track would be more or less as wet as it can be.