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Free at the point of delivery. Unless it's dental.

Well, knowing some of the unemployed around here, it does make some sense. Do quad bikes count as second vehicles? I'm just kidding really. None of the unemployed around here have any insurance at all. Bugs the hell out of me that industries like coal, steel, ship building, car making, can all go to the wall with barely a whimper for the Government in support, but when the Banking Industry loses a fortune as a direct consequence of its one greed, it just opens it's fat gob and the government pours in billions. How fair is that?

I think history is best found out rather than taught. People telling you history too often have their own agenda lurking beneath the surface. Listen by all means, but dig, check, take nothing for granted. Read the 'loser's' side of the story.... Also read George Orwell's 1984. Edit Yes Conrad B, poigniant comments. But you have to remember whose side those manipulative capitalists are on. Butler may have found his paymasters activities and moral politics weren't to his liking, but how patriotic would he have felt if the Soviet or Chinese Big Business had opened up South America and built up their financial muscle right on America's doorstep? If you take the King's shilling, you march to the drumbeat.

Don't think for a minute I'm defending Hitler or antisemitism, but in Europe at the turn of last century, Hitlers attitude towards the Jews was hardly uncommon, but all too common throughout most of Europe. I'm not talking about the grotesque inhumanities which came to pass, but earlier, before the true monster within revealed itself. Isn't it the basis of all preudice that it stems from a fundamental ignorance?

When Hitler moved to Vienna he was upset by the antisemitism he saw there. To quote Mein Kampf - “For the Jew was still characterized for me by nothing but his religion, and therefore, on grounds of human tolerance, I maintained my rejection of religious attacks in this case as in others. Consequently, the tone, particularly that of the Viennese anti-Semitic press, seemed to me unworthy of the cultural tradition of a great nation", Now the context of what Hitler said in Mein Kampf is open to question, particularly in the light of what subsequently happened. Was he genuine? Hard to believe he was. And Cptroyce, don't forget the remarks were based on US involvement in WW1. EVERYTHING was different when WW2 came along, not least the UK being left to fight alone, and the material support from the US was much more important. Don't forget too, the US backing in WW1 which the quote refers to made the war winnable instead of extended stalemate. Nobody could have predicted the consequences at the time.

I agree it doesn't sound like the thing Churchill would say, but the reporter tried to sue Churchill when he denied saying it, but got nowhere because he was the British PM. Even if he did say it, it still seems like it lacks wider context. I know Churchill did find the Americans frustrating. My favourite quote on the subject from Churchill was "The only thing worse than fighting a war with allies is fighting a war without them".

The decline of the British Empire would have taken a different course too, but that's a can of worms all by itself. I'm not so sure that Fascism and Communism were inevitable by 1917, but perhaps they were. It's a hard one to call whether we live in a better world because of what happened, or whether the better world was destroyed. I don't think the issue of Jews was an issue for the Nazis in their early years. Hitler himself didn't start out as an antisemite, but the Nazi ideology needed a scapegoat for people to hate and the Jews fitted the criteria. I don't believe the grotesque proportions and extermination which their hatred of the Jews came to become was a founding principle, not in the beginning anyway. Having someone to hate has a very unifying effect on a population you're trying to influence. To be an 'us' you need a 'them'. It's not a pleasant subject, but antisemitism didn't begin with the Nazis. It was already well established throughout Europe for many years before the Nazis came along. I should point out, the issue of American involvement was a matter which Churchill was alleged to have raised. The speculation about peace in 1917 wasn't my own.

UK National Health Service. - Free hospital treatment paid for by your taxes.

Fingers crossed Tranquillo. Hope it all goes well.

Hi new Moderators. I hereby renew my undertaking to behave myself at all times and not to require your services. You should now have all things you lucky devils! I've often heard you get all things in moderation. There must be shelves stacked full of 'things' everywhere, for miles in every direction... Wow....

I believe you Dave, absolutely. Circumstances do conspire against us and it really is unfair sometimes, but in the same breath, the OBD guys could only act on the information they had. I too thought a forum going offline and corresponding failure in supporting emails was unusual. Personally, I suspected either ill health or family disaster was a factor, (I'm glad it wasn't that Dave), or a disgruntled ex-wife changing all the passwords. It's happened, it's done, and we'll all know better next time. Truth be known, and please don't pick up on it guys, I really don't want this issue to fester, my personal opinon is the OBD guys could have made change to SimHQ a provisional contingency arrangement until it became clear what had happened to the CA forum. I'm not saying they were hasty in coming to their judgement, nor am I saying they were wrong in the judgement they came to, but I am left wondering quietly why it had to be such a permanent move straight out the trap. Personally, and it is just my personal opinion, I'd have liked to have known more before making that particular call, (just in case it was a family tragedy). CA is and has been very good to us. Now the OBD guys perhaps had issues and discussions I'm unware of, and it's quite possible knowing the same things, I'd have come to their exact conclusions. We can speculate on whether there were other factors involved. To an extent, the CA forum was already established, and who's to say launching into a different forum doesn't usher in a whole new wave of people and potential customers. There is a product release heading our way gents... I don't know fellas. I'm sad at what's happened, but if we don't lose our heads, we can see how things develop going forward. In the meantime we pick ourselves up, dust ourselves down, keep a stiff upper lip and carry on....

As I said in another forum, we need to remember that we are not the OFF community, but only part of it. We are the OFF forum community. We are blessed with a knowledge of internet geography and know where to go to find stuff out about our Sim and it's rivals, but new blood / fresh customers don't automatically have that knowledge. They have one point of contact, and that had gone down and seemed to be staying down. It doesn't matter whether CA was down for 3 days or a month, the problem which couldn't be ignored was the guys here didn't know if it was gone for good and had to do something. Just speculate for a moment, say the CA forum was down for good, (and who knew better? - it could have been), how long would you have waited to find an alternative location to interact with your customers? I like the CA forum, I always have, and for all the reasons people have said, but I hope both forums survive. But before we all nail our colours to the CombatAce cause and swear undying allegiance, I hate to do it, but I have to point out just one single little email from the CA board telling somebody OBD what the problem was would almost certainly have avoided this change in forum location happening in the first place. That's not disloyalty saying so, that's simply what happened, by direct cause and effect. Was OBD too hasty in coming to a permanent decision? Not for me to judge. I suppose it depends on whether emails weren't answered either. Perhaps it wasn't just a forum issue but complete communication meltdown. Think about it - that does suggest something more terminal than the forum going offline. OBD has a history of making the right decisions. I'll support both forums, but if push comes to shove, I'm sticking with them.

Just goes to prove it's what you say that gets you banned, not who you are. Be civil to people and you don't need the cloak. Manifestly it IS possible agent Uncleal, - and as far as I know that's all anybody ever asked of you.

Give us this day our daily CombatAce.... Hi fellas, nice to be back complete with picture avatars. And thank you CA admins. Sounds like the 'perfect storm' happened for you guys, but I'm glad you're back, and whatever wrong footed you, I hope it's something you can avoid happening again.

Don't think I've ever seen RoF looking better, but not sure about the film in close detail. Didn't Brown dive on MVR rather than pursue him in level flight, and have to pull away or risk hitting the deck, leaving MVR to pursue May for a few shots before he suddenly turned and landed, fatally wounded, but alive when the troops reached him, if only for long enough to utter the word Kaputt? It's a beautiful film, and very well made, but I don't think he'd seen Podkin's map of the incident.

Dolphin was a bruiser Buggsy, in full production prior to the armistace, but already had 1500+ chassis built and awaiting French engines. The Dolphin isn't more famous because it run out of war to establish it's reputation, but it was already on its way to doing so. You can read about the kill ratios in Wiki, but those who flew it liked it and stayed alive.

Good point Buggsy. There were a lot of decent enough aircraft didn't get that far, so it must have been a reasonable aircraft at the very least. In the same way, they obviously felt earlier models were worth ugrading too.

Looks great! And very military. Not sure why they called it a Dolphin, but it looks very aggressive and certainly means business. Over 2000 built, but only around 500 delivered due to a backlog in the supply of French engines according to Wiki. Feel an old argument coming back - a field modification tested had two incendiary firing machineguns mounted on the lower wing outside the propellor arc just like a WW2 fighter. So you could do it and live with the increased drag. Na na nana na Uncleal, wherever you are! Nice pics too Tonyo-Legion.

I feel odd thinking about such topics. Whatever way you look at and interpret data and formula, the pilots who actually flew these aircraft are surely the voices we need to listen to when trying to determine which was 'best'. Put yourself in their shoes - would you rather go into battle with a plane you knew and trusted, or a new plane you didn't know with unknown characteristics? I reckon I would only want a 'new' plane if I'd become dissatisfied with the old one and and was reliably outclassed by my enemy. I wonder whether pilots trusted the manufacturers, or lacked confidence in their reputation. Would you trust your plane to dive after similar planes have torn off their wings? Whatever the paperwork says, knowing a plane is good in a dive is all down to some brave or foolhardy pioneer finding out. When you hear Battle of Britain pilots talking about their war, the talk is always which plane could out turn another, which suggests to me in a battle it was turning capacity which mattered to them. It's less distinct in what I've read about WW1 pilots, but I think the defining issue for them was power, - both firepower and horse power. But then again, perhaps those are just the complaints of the living.

What I find odd is the context. "Hi chaps, don't mind if I film you tinkering with the engine and guns in your Spitfire do you?" "Not at all, Old Bean. Carry on. It's not as if it's a front line weapon system or anyth.... err". In Wartime Britain there were foreigners locked up just for saying V instead of W or not knowing what a 'tanner' was. (A sixpence). I wouldn't like to be the chap caught filming this by his WO. They'd have transported him to Australia most likely, held him upside down over a barbeque all the way there.

I think another factor was the reluctant British attitude towards portraying its pilots, particularly ace pilots as celebrities. Its perhaps only now we're beginning to review these remarkable actions in a more dispassionate context and recognising features which didn't get the recognition they deserved. Where Voss is concerned, I have always interpreted the account of his SE5 encounter as mark of his superior ability as a pilot. I confess I'd never heard of Robert Little taking on 11 enemy aircraft. Now that I have, more than ever, I can see a pattern to the exchanges, which may or may not be accurate. The third wing gave a triplane greater lift and passage of air over control surfaces, but the extra wing also created drag to slow it down. As you notice in WW2 sims, greater speeds are harder to manouvre due to the drag on control surfaces. In my minds eye, I am now seeing the triplanes as nippy little 'stunt' planes which can quickly roll or turn out of trouble, but equally quickly roll back in to fall in behind an overshooting energy fighter and squeeze off a burst as it departs. Flying like this, I can see the alert triplane being very hard to hit, but getting frequent although brief and fleeting beads on targets. Perhaps it's easy to clip an enemy, but more difficult to sustain an attack to bring one down. It's this I mean when I say potency. The success of the Sopwith impressed the Germans because the issue of power (or lack of it to drive yourself out of trouble), made this manouvreability a telling factor, but when the DR1 came along, the fighters it faced were more powerful relative to itself, and I suspect it would be difficult for a Dr1 pilot to persuade an enemy aircraft to engage in a turning dogfight. The British pilots would surely know how the Sopwith Tripes flew, and be aware of it's manouvreability, and how to avoid giving them the initiative in battle. I know the Dr1's made numerous kills, but it would be interesting to know how many were bounces on unsuspecting targets, and how many were successful full-on 'jousts' with an alert enemy.

But the Sopwith Triplehound had the same advantages over the Albatross III in December 1916, and so inspired the Germans they held competitions to create their own triplane. Then there's the famous "Black Flight" of Canadian Triplehounds, B Flight, 210 squadron, claiming 87 German kills in three months. Did I say famous? Prior to my OFF enthusiam, I'd never even heard of them. Truth be known, I'd never even heard of a British Triplane!! While popular and successful during its short service life, I can't help feeling the RNAS or RFC recognised the limitations of the design and characterisitics, and discontinued their interest in subsequent developments. A noteable problem being wing stability and excess drag in a dive, the same problems which blighted the Dr1. The whole world knows the bright red Dr1, but hardly a soul outside of WW1 interest groups knows anything about the black nosed Triplehounds which in large part inspired the creation of the Dr1. The Sopwith was superseded before the Dr1 appeared, and it's hard to imagine how the Allied engineers could have seen the Dr1 as anything other an obsolete design, - perhaps as an updated and powered up concept, but an obsolete concept all the same.

On a closely related subject, despite it's iconic image, I've never understood why the DR1 was so revered. Manouverable yes, I get that, decent climb from low level, ok I get that too, but it was slow and a bit outdated in my opinion and a good number of aces were also killed, or at least died while flying them. I get the impression the German Jastas were more impressed with the DR1 than the allied pilots were, and think the appeal of the manouverability was helpful for surviving a dogfight, but it gave the plane limited edge or potency as an all out fighter / interceptor. Iconic yes, but was such status ever fully deserved? Not convinced it was. Albatross was always the work horse, and the DVII was much more competitive adversary, and incidentally there were 10 times the number of D7's built as DR1's. It was also playing catch up to the Sopwith Triplehound, so surely the RFC or RNAS were aware how tripes flew and fought. Edit I wasn't thinking it at the time, but Voss survived for a time against what, 6 SE5s wasn't it? Putting rounds into all of them, (but not shooting any down). The little DR1 was good for getting out somebody's gunsight, but a limited threat to a faster and more powerful aircraft. Is that an unfair summary?The Sopwith Tripe is hardly famous at all outside limited WW1 circles, but yet in it's day was much more of a handful for the Germans, than the DR1 was for the Brits.

Food for thought exactly Pips. I don't know. I do know despite being inferior that some WW2 Hurricane pilots preferred the Hurricane to the Spitfire. Both could out turn a 109, but it's less well known that despite common acknowledgement the Spit was the superior aircraft, during the period of Battle of Britain specifications, a Hurricane could also out turn a Spitfire. It's an interesting subject to consider why a pilot may love or hate an aircraft in spite of it's performance. In the WW1 context, the RFC had the Bristol M1-C first flying in 1916, which was a far superior aircraft to the Fokker EIII Eindecker, but despite glowing reports from pilots it was rejected for front line service because the British Air Ministry didn't trust the mono wing construction. In fact, now I could be wrong here, but a little voice is telling me that the Hurricane was the first monowinged British aircraft adopted for service as a front line fighter.