Geezer

This is a very interesting thread. Does the software also recognize subsystems such as oil coolers or radiators?

Ya done good! Love the skull decal.

Spent the morning experimenting with some of the propeller art developed by various modders, then comparing the results to photographs. The photo images were dependent on camera angle and shutter speed, combined with propeller rpm so I eventually settled for plain vanilla art because it sorta/kinda worked in any situation.

Slowly grinding my way through the endless details. Got a small graphics pack off to some testers and now I'm fooling around with props and other details. Still can't get the rudder and elevators to work.

On the subject of the Dauntless, here is an interesting story. First shot shows the Northrop BT-1, which was a development of the early 1930s Northrop Gamma. For most of the 1930s, Northrop was a little mom and pop airplane company. Northrop sold the BT-1 design to Douglas to get through a financial rough spot, and a young Douglas engineer by the name of Ed Heinemann upgraded the design to create the Dauntless. So.....the great grand daddy of the Dauntless was the Northrop Gamma - I flipped the second shot to better show the similarities. EDIT: The Squadron/Signal pub on the Dauntless describes the development process in greater detail.

Good work - thanks!

Looking good! Looks like you are experimenting with weathering? Shot below may be helpful - it shows the upper surface midnight blue to have faded and grayed-out just a bit.

Took a break from the DATA file and slapped on the unfinished 3-color skins to see what they look like ingame.

Slowly grinding my way through the long list of things that need tweaking. Finally got the transparencies working right. One problem that does not show in the screenshots is developing the DATA file. When gamer-flown, the CR42 maneuvers well and trims out nicely in level flight. When flown by AI/autopilot however, it tends to porpoise a bit along the pitch axis. Pitch damper is already set at 0.5. To preserve maneuverability, I would prefer not to mess with the pitch damper. Does this mean I need to alter the 3D model's center of gravity?

Gterl is still tinkering with it, so we might see an update someday.

Snippets from a PM on the subject: Geezer: The 30/303 rounds fired in WW1 could devastate early aircraft, but lost effectiveness when fired at more modern aircraft with metal structures and improved systems. The Osprey pub CR42 Versus Gladiator points out that early production batches of both aircraft had self-sealing fuel tanks, but lacked pilot armor or bullet resistant windshields. Unless you got lucky and hit vital parts, such as pilot/fuel valve/oil pump/etc, you had to pour a LARGE number of rifle caliber bullets into a CR42/Gladiator to bring one down. If an experienced pilot closed to WW1 gunnery range - less than 100 meters - he could probably hit vital parts. Many historical accounts suggest that is what happened - one careful burst and the target went down. But you had to get CLOSE. Again, the 1940 desert war was more like WW1 than WW2. While still a novice with TW data files, it looks to me like there is no good way to simulate the effectiveness of short range gunfire as opposed to long range gunfire. Any ideas? +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ LloydNB: From memory there may be a way to reflect the effect of firing from close and long range by changing the stability of the guns in the data files. I think that the 303s on a Hurricane produce a cone of fire that is less effective at range and this done through the vibration caused by firing. That vibration means that not every bullet flies down the same path as the one before it, no mater how steady the aircraft is in flight. But I might be wrong. The cone seems to be determined by the accuracy set for the gun. Higher accuracy produces a smaller cone. I've been thinking that one of the reasons that early fighters seem too effective in the game is how synchronized gun fire is (or rather isn't) represented. You set the rate of fire for each type of gun and then in the aircraft data.ini file you set that a particular gun station is synchronized. Problem is that setting a gun as synchronized doesn't seem to effect the rate of fire and it should lower it significantly. Important for CR42s that fire through the prop arc. To get the 12.7mm Breda-SAFAT to fire at the correct rate it might be necessary to produce gun.data entries for a synchronized version. As a guide, I have seen a reference to the wing mounted guns on the Gladiator firing at 2.5 times the rate of the CR42's synchronized guns. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Geezer: Woodman's Early Aircraft Armament touches on the rate of fire problem in several places that describe the various synchronization systems used in WW1. While the different systems used by different countries varied in efficiency, they were all similar in that they were an interface between the engine and the guns. The synchronization systems didn't regulate the rate of fire, the propeller speed did because the guns had to shoot between the spinning propeller blades. The higher the engine rpm, the higher the rate of fire with efficient systems - the inefficient systems arbitrarily limited the rate of fire regardless of engine rpm. The introduction of three-bladed props in the 1930s sometimes slowed down the rates of fire because of the "extra" prop blade. At the end of the day, we may have to just arbitrarily reduce the rate of fire of some aircraft? Does anyone know of a file tweak that varies machine gun rate of fire?