Bullethead

Call me drunk, weird, or whatever, but prefer the Fee :).

AFAIK, the reoriented railyards are in the add-on and not out yet.

Yeah, some DH5 screenies would be nice

Looks nice :). Now, about that pilot figure you promised me.....

As things are in the game, I have to agree with Hasse Wind. What breaks wings in OFF is excessive Gs, not excessive speed. Now, I grant you that in real life, excessive speed could twist off single-spar sesquiplane lower wings, or so the word as come down to us. As I hear it, very high speeds would cause sesquiplane lower wings to rotate about their single spar until the leading edge twisted up enough to tear off. Hence the Alb D.Va's little strut from the main V-struts down toward the leading edge. However, in OFF, most planes can't go fast enough, even in a full-power 0-G dive, to reach this point. Too much "built-in headwind". It's been a while since I've flown Nupes, but IIRC they can't go more than about 130-140 knots no matter how hard you try. Considering that their max level speed is about 100-110 knots, this shouldn't break them even if their wings twisted. HOWEVER, if you yank the stick while going this fast in a Nupe, you will break it. So, how fast can you go in an Alb D.II? If you can't reach 200 knots, you're not going to dive away from a Nupe very easily.

You need to fly Nupes so you can learn where they break under human control, and thus know how fast you need to dive to escape them

But here's the thing..... Even the rather primitive petroleum-based oils of the WW1 era (and indeed up to about 1930, according to the papers of lubricant engineers that I've recently read in pursuit of this answer) worked fine in stationary engines. Now, "worked fine" is a relative term, so I'm talking about pre-1930 standards here. These oils were total crap by today's standards. You could run the engine hard (but still mostly within its operational parameters) every day, but you'd have to overhaul it at the end of the year. New piston rings, new liners perhaps, maybe new crank- or camshaft bearings. IOW, the sort of things you only have to replace these days after 200,000 miles or so, assuming you can still get parts. Back then, however, motor companies built the same engine for decades so this wasn't a problem. With castor oil, OTOH, if your motor diidn't have a total loss oil system, you had to tear it down and remove the gunk and varnish after every few hours if you wanted to maintain peak performance. This is why castor oil was associated with racing back in the day, because they tore down their engines after every race anyway. If you only run the motor on weekends, you can afford the downtime on weekdays. So essentially, the racers used a total loss oil system, only the total loss was manual and happened as a result of disassembly after a run. As a result, they could use the enhanced lubricating properties of castor oil in their very hard running during races without suffering (much) from the gunking effects. This is why I favor the "immissibility theory" over "better lubrican theory". If castor oil was the only thing that worked well enough for high-performance combat engines, then every airplane would have used castor oil. OTOH, if rotaries could have used anything else and not blown up too frequently, then rotaries would have used petroleum-based oils and the Austrians would have used them. I noted in one of the erudite articles I read on this subject that the US planted massive fields of castor beans in WW1, despite the supposedly successful test of various petroleum-based oils in rotaries. Damn, I haven't talked to Bletch in years. I hope he does show up here.

Me ol' gov's a retired petroleum engineer. He won't fly OFF but thinks it's cool and really likes reading about WW1 planes. Anyway, he was reading my book about Austrian planes and noted how it says many times that the reason the Austrians had so few planes with rotaries was because they could get neither castor oil nor the German Voltol substitute. That set his oil-based mind wondering why rotaries needed castor oil, so he started researching and bothering me with his results. That got me curious, too, so I've been looking into it also. Problem is, neither of us can find a definitive answer as to why rotaries needed castor oil. Everybody seems to agree that castor oil was a better lubricant in many ways than the mineral-based oils then available. Being polar, it bonded to the mdetal better, so was more likely to remain between moving parts. Also, its viscosity was more stable over a wider range of temperatures. However, castor oil has some bad properties, such as polymerizing when heated, thus forming gunk and varnish in the motor. This means that unless you have a total loss oil system like a rotary engine, what you gain in wear protection you lose in downtime. Thus, some experts argue that this was the reason for using castor oil in rotaries. You got the benefits of using the best oil then available while dodging its bad properties. The implication here is that all engines would have used castor oil if they could have affiorded the downtime. Other experts, however, say that castor oil was actually required for rotaries precisely due to their total loss oil systems. In rotaries, the oil has to enter the engine along with the fuel. Petroleum-based oils are diluted by gasoline so lose a lot of their lubricating ability in this way. Castor oil, however, doesn't mix with gasoline so remains intact. Those of favor the 1st theory discount this 2nd theory by saying that there are many instances of petroleum-based oils working in rotaries. They mostly cite US work in 1917. However, champions of the other theory say this was only possible with oil from Pennsylvania, which was only available in the US, and note that the German Voltol substitute (made from coal) wasn't really that effective (as in lots of engines failed due to insufficient lubrication). So, I'm at a loss here. Both theories have their merits, but if I had to choose, I'd say it was really because of the immissibility of castor oil and gasoline. Anybody here know the real answer?

C'est la guerre, and c'est la apres-guerre. That's not an atrocity, it's necessity. In many cases guys are killed trying to surrender, or shot after being captured, due a host of situational factors. Everybody who's been on the firing line knows this, and I'd say the vast majority of vets have been involved in such situations. But very few folks talk about it afterwards, because most don't want to think about it again and all know they can go to jail for it even years after. Because vets don't say much about it, everybody else thinks it's an uncommon atrocity. Nobody likes taking prisoners. First, if the bastards don't give up at the get-go, usually they've taken out some of your buddies before they give up, which greatly increases their chance of being shot when they leave cover. Second, as you say, there's the logistical problem of dealing with them, even if they're healthy. Third, you usually can't leave them unsupervised in your rear. And fourth, those who've dealt with prisoners before usually don't want to do it again, unless they just like shooting them (and every unit has at least one of those). So, to anybody who might be on the firing line in the future, my advice is never report that you have prisoners up the chain of command, EVER. The first your boss should know about it is when you walk into his CP with the prisoner in tow. Up until that point, as far as he is concerned, you don't have any prisoners, so if you have to cap them somewhere along the way, no harm no foul. But if you say you've got some and then can't deliver, it's your ass.

Yup, the wind makes you use different amounts of rudder all the time. On any given mission, the wind will be from a different direction at a different strength than it was last time, and during the mission it's likely to change both direction and strength at least once. Plus, you change directions all the time. Thus, you might be all trimmed out while heading for a waypoint, but once you turn there you'll have to do something with the rudder to account for the different direction you now are to the wind.

Couple of questions... 1. How fast were you going while the Nupes were still able to keep up with you? 2. How far did you try to extend away before reversing back at them? Just a brief dive (a few hundred feet of altitude, a few hundred yards of horizontal distance), when starting from the lower end of what you consider your fighting speed range (say 60-70 knots), is only going to put you in the upper end of your fighting speed range (say 100-110 knots). It will do the same for any Nupes following you, and they can handle that much speed no problem. The whole "dive away and come back" thing isn't a dogfighting move, it's hitting the reset button. You end the fight your're in now and start a rematch at a later time (as in 5-10 minutes later) once you've got your E back. You have to dive away enough to disengage from the fight. You have to reach a speed considerably higher than the enemy can reach, or go rather lower than he wants to go, before you can open up enough distance to zoom back up or turn around safely.

I think it was closer to 80% than 70%. Whatever, the WW2 U-boats definitely had by far the highest casualty (and highest KIA/MIA to WIA) ratios of any service that wasn't deliberately suicidal. Probably, when you consider all the folks in the kamikaze corps who never flew due to the A-bombs, the U-boat men had it even worse than official suicide units. The Soviet penal battalions seem to have come close, but I don't think they surpassed either the U-boats or the kamikazes. I think they should sell a combo pack of Das Boot and The Cruel Sea. Both sides of the coin, both sides in Hell. Yup, Band of Brothers is also good and realistic. I just don't put it on my list because I don't like the focus on "elite" units, to the extent that they were the only guys who had that sort of esprit de corps or faced such horrific situations. Not to disparage the achievements of the airborne troops, mind you, but I'd rather be dumped behind the lines with just light weapons and mucho disorganization than conduct a frontal assault through hedgerows or in the Huertgen Forest, or fight at Stalingrad or Okinawa on either side.

Welcome aboard Av8er! New guy buys the drinks . There's no moeny EVER wasted on OBD products. All the OBD guys work day jobs and only make WW1 flightsim goodness in their spare time. That's a nice way of saying that the more money we throw at them, the more stuff we'll get in the future. Few sales = end of development. But note that despite this, OBD has given away a huge amount of stuff since BHaH came out early this year. Sure, it had problems that they've fixed, but most "patches" have actually added new features and content, especially the 1.32 superpatch. I'd have paid for all the stuff in that one. So, consider your investment in OBD products safe. No matter when you plunk down your money, you'll end up with a lot more than you paid for over time.

My favorite war movies cut through the subsequent propaganda and false heroics to show things pretty much like they really were. Naturally, my list is short, and it includes a few things that might surprise you all.... #1: Ride with the Devil. Only a non-US stuido could have made this one. #2. The Cruel Sea #3. Saving Private Ryan. YES, I know it was just King Arthur's grail legend set in WW2, but all the details were spot-on, from the protagonists being sent and getting killed doing a silly-ass mission ordered by some paper-pusher back in the States right down to the way all the guys had the skin peeled off the backs of their hands assymetrically, which is diagnostic of hitting the deck while holding a rifle. You rate combat pay just for seeing that movie. It gave me flashbacks the whole time and for a while after. When I saw it the 1st time in the theater, not 1 swinging Richard got up until after the credits were long over. #4. Das Boot. From what I gather, that was pretty much how it was. You can quibble about the ending, but wars ARE tragedies, so having the classic ending of a tragic play, with all the characters piled up dead on the stage, is quite fitting. Besides, it's Germanic, and all Germanic heroes are supposed to die at the end of their sagas. How else do they get to Valhalla? You didn't see Beowulf living to a ripe old age, did you? I like a bunch of other war movies, but they either burden the real history with the love interests or whatever of their fictional main characters, or are just pure hogwash (but still good entertainment). This is a long list, however, so I'll not type it.

There's no such thing as a premature ej--Oh sorry, wrong forum

My condolences . As they taught me long ago, "be courteous to all but have a plan to kill everybody you meet." So for years I've gone through life with imaginary Terminator-style targetting reticules dancing across my retinas, tracking everybody and looking for stuff I can use as weapons if need be. OFF didn't do that to me, but it helps maintain the habit

Hehehe, that recent abortion is a movie I love to hate. If I'd been directing it, it would have been all the same (out of Hollywood necessity) until the very end, when it would have had an ending like Das Boot. I know it's painful to do, but please try to recall how this dog of a movie ended. The shot-up B-17 staggers in and lands back home. 100-octane aviation gasoline is pouring from innumerable flak and bullet holes, "self-sealing" be damned. And every crewman still able to stand, plus a platoon or 2 of ground personnel, all huddle up in or adjacent to this inflammable cascade and all its surrounding fumes, and LIGHT UP SMOKES! And thus, the Das Boot ending . As the credits roll as an overlay atop the carnage, a few flame-enveloped figures stagger out of the huge fireball, run around for a bit, then fall, twitch a bit, and go still. And guess what? This would have been just as true to history as the rest of the movie. Shame they didn't do it that way

Thanks. I didn't know about this . Lou needs to put that "winter reading list of his" in that thread, too.

HAHAHA!!!! I get to beat Widowmaker to the Python snippet Sabash and huzzah for me!!!

Hehehe, they didn't call it the Great War for nothing. Even such a relatively small aspect of it as aviation requires a library to get a handle on. All you can get out of a single-volume treatment is the bibliography, which you use to get the the bibliographies of the books it cites, which themselves are still within 2 or 3 removes from what will really tell you something useful. So I suggest you search this forum for previous threads on books (which IMHO need to be compiled and stickied in a recommended reading list). There are way too many good ones to list them all.

Hmmmm. Any chance of talking you call into a "N.24 (early)" ?

OK, I'll take your word for it. But there's still the question of whether the N24/27 will have 2 flight models, one with crappy ailerons and 1 with good ailerons?

OK, so the N24 entered production in early 1917, so that by May 1917 it was the only Nupe fighter being built. Seemingly it was not well-received due to problems with the aileron control caused by the strips, but by late-Aug to early-Sep 1917, they had figured this out and a cure was in hand. Thus, it appears there was a period of at least several months in there when N24s had bad aileron response. Will that be reflected in the campaign? Also, to confuse the issue, it appears that the N27 didn't come out until 1918. This was identical in game terms to the N24, the only difference apparently being modified landing gear. However, the N27 seems to have come with the strips installed, even though the problem had been noted months before. So, assuming the N27 shows up in the game, would it also revert to crappy roll response or would you assume that field units immediately cut the strips off upon receipt? Or did it just take well in to 1918 for all field units to hear of the solution to the problem and take a knife to the strips?

From what I've gathered in my recent crash research program on French planes, it's actually a bit more confusing than this. This is all pretty new to me, too, but I think I'm getting a handle on it. So as I currently understand things, the N24bis was actlually the 1st model in production and service, and was just an interim type until the N24 could come online. What Nieuport was doing was trying to wring all the performance it could out of its basic sesquiplane design in an effort not only to match the Albatros D.III, but also be at least equal to the SPAD 7 which was threatening to take over Nieuport's fighter business. Due to the time pressure, Nieuport couldn't do a new design from stratch so could only add streamlining and bigger engines to what was a rather old design by that point. Nieuport's goal was to make what eventually became the N24, with rounded fuselage, tail, and wingtips. However, the main assemblies of new wing, tail, and fuselage became available at different times, so a number of interim types were built with various combinations. The new fuselage was first, then the wing, then the tail. Apparently, Nieuport was building several types at once as parts became available and some types were built in only small numbers, so the planes didn't all arrive at the front in numerical order. As best I can determine, things were like this: N17: N16 with bigger square wings to handle weight of 110hp motor, plus some minor streamlining on fuselage N23: N17 with 120hp and different interruptor gear (few built) N17bis: N17 with round fuselage and 130hp (few built) N24bis: N17bis with larger wings with rounded tips but retaining square N17 tail (not many built) N24: N24bis with larger, rounded tail (replaced all the above in production from mid-1917) N25: N24 with 200hp (very few built) N27: N24 with modified landing gear (few built) N28: completely new design worked out while all the farting around from N17-N27 was in progress

I have a qestion regarding the ailerons of the N24... The other day, I came across this interesting tidbit: The book goes on to say that the N25 and N27, which were just very slightly modified N24s, also had these strips, at least as they came from the factory. I'd never heard of any of this before. In fact, I'd always heard the V-strutter Nupes were all pretty maneuverable. So my question is, how long did it take to figure out the problem, and how common was it to remove these strips in frontline service? Will the OFF N24 have them or not? Or is this whole thing bogus and unfounded?