Olham

Wow, impressive research you have done, Sitting Duck. I am running almost the same CPU, and the same vid card as you. I would like to ask you for some screenshots, to see how it all looks your end now. And if you could make a screen capture of your CFS3config ("overrides" and "texture info")? Thanks in advance.

Yup - much more an aviator, a flyer with a deep connection to his craft, more like Udet, than like MvR.

Sir, I really wonder, if your morning coffee might have been a nuance too strong for you?!

An interesting mix of fine air combat paintings and naive, but also very illustrative pictures about that time. And I enjoyed it whilst having a fired egg with HP Sauce and a mug of fresh brewed coffee indeed. Thanks for sharing, Widowmaker.

It is always partly guesswork, when you try to determine colours from B/W photographs. Here is the Fokker F.I with Werner Voss in the cockpit. Draw your own conclusions.

For all newbies, who don't have any books of fighter pilots yet: Manfred von Richthofen: "Der Rote Kampfflieger" http://www.archive.org/stream/DerRoteKampfflieger/RichthofenManfredFreiherrVon-DerRoteKampfflieger1917203S.#page/n0/mode/2up and the English translation of the book: "The Red Battle Flyer" http://www.archive.org/stream/redbattleflyer00rich#page/n9/mode/2up

A great find you share here, Bullethead. I was searching for Siney Perley's old book "Historic Storms of New England", and it's in there! Thanks!

Ironhat, on the Bristol, you got to fly behind and right of the enemy, to line up gun and his craft. Or try gunsight (F6, I think it was?)

UncleAl: Even Fire a couple Rockets at Big Ben ( Yanks Only ) And vott about uss Dsherrmans???

No, I never have that happening, or I am perfectly used to it and don't notice anymore. I find the Albatros fighter is one of the easiest craft to land. Even when I pull back throttle, it will glide fine and stabile. But for any landings, I would hold the stick with awareness, and pull, if that happened. UncleAl, I'm not sure if it is a young Albatros, but it is definitely cute!

I'm not sure if he made victories in the E.V, but he had 6 victories in the time of it's service (possibly late July and August). Here is his page from "the Aerodrome" aces: http://www.theaerodrome.com/aces/germany/osterkamp.php

You may be right there, Hasse Wind - maybe it was really a work of the big Reichsarchiv, before the NS regime took over. Thank you, Lou; just found the book is still available. I'll get "Wind in the wires" as soon as I get some bills paid. And later, "Sagittarius rising" will follow.

Yes, these REICHSARCHIV books are inclusive folded military maps. Now the question is, how much they might be "coloured" in a pre-WW2 German spirit; or in other words: how historically authentic are the books? I really don't know. The price of 435,- Euro would be okay for such a mass of books. Lou, I have one "unfair" question to you: if I would only want to read one book about the British side of WW1 air combat (and I'm more interested in the pilots' views than in the strategic ones), which ONE book would you recommend before all others? (Hope this won't cost you a night of sleep now - Lol!)

Ironhat, I admire your exploring spirit! You must be the first pilot I saw here, who tries to get somewhere with the Bristol. I tried it several flights, to see how I could beat it in my Eindecker. Once I had tried it, it was simple: don't let him get bind your right rearward angle. Carry on, and show some reports/pics.

Cripes, Lou - slow as I read, I would need the rest of my life to get through with all these titles! What a great library you collected, Sir!

Here are some more finds I just saw - I show the links without recommending the books, cause I don't know them myself, nor do I know, who released them, and in which spirit. Reuter, Ludwig von: Scapa Flow http://www.antiquariat-biebertal.de/detail.php?nr=1424 Stöwer, Willy: Kaiser Wilhelm II.und die Marine http://www.antiquariat-biebertal.de/detail.php?nr=1420 Schlachten des Weltkrieges, 38 Books REICHSARCHIV: Bd. 1 - 36 MARINEARCHIV: Bd. 37, 38 http://www.antiquariat-biebertal.de/detail.php?nr=1105

Well, if you search Google for "pages from Germany" = "Seiten aus Deutschland", you may get a lot more of this specific field of German military literature. So, without wanting to belittle your find, Lou, I show for Hasse Wind and all an address with this particular book, and maybe much more to find there. When searching there, make sure you click on "Bilder und weitere Informationen". http://www.antiquari...ail.php?nr=1428

UncleAl, since you have the hardware already, you can download the TrackIR 5 software for free. I did that, and it works. It runs smoother somehow.

A great old book found it's perfect owner!

Ironhat: Man what thinking, a machine worth more than a pilot ? Yes, that was the thinking in those days - a low ranking man was not worth much. The Germans were not any better there than the British. They only gave out parachutes, because they suffered severe losses of qualified pilots after three years of war against most of the world. So now, they also recognised the value of the pilot.

Using TrackIR 5 myself, I only regret one thing: why I haven't bought it earlier. You can sit lower, as long as the three reflectors on your cap can be "seen" by the device on your monitor; there won't be a problem. (The device can be turned L/R or up/down a little, so no problem). You have a command "re-center",which I put on a thumb button of my stick. So you will never get out of adjustment, no matter how different you are positioned after a while - you just re-center, and it works from that position now. For very "nervous" craft, there is another command "precision"; works as if you stiffen your body and mainly your neck (TrackIR reacts much less agile now, so you can aim and shoot better). After aiming and firing, you press it again, and your full agile headmovements are back. Very important for all who think of buying it: don't expect you had to learn anything here! You just set it all up, adjust/center, and OFF you go. You look, where you wanna look, and you will see, what you want to see. No need to worry about anything tricky, and best not to be described, as it would only complicate it. You will simply get, what you want to get. It doesn't take long to get used to it, and then it's like riding a bicycle. Before you could, you were very afraid of it. Once you knew how to do it, you couldn't imagine anymore, why you were afraid.

This could have been perfectly ME - I have a hand for such things, Lou - no need to be ashamed! Have a close look at the S.E.5a at "Vintage Aviator" (S.E.5a walkaround) - it also had two firing buttons.

Wonderful to see: the Japanese have humour!

Vyrago, your first shot is an epic battle scene - very nice! You can get it even nicer, if you load the picture into "Paint", draw a rectangle around the part you want to keep and leave out the "spot view" line that way. Then you save it as JPEG. foreigndevil, that is "Onkel Theo's Bumble bee". Theo Osterkamp was an ace in MFJ I, and survived the war. He was a fighter pilot and ace again in WW2.

I knew there was a demo, but I must admit, that I have so far never got me the demo yet, as I have no idea of Navy strategies at all. Could you report about how easy or not it is to understand and handle/learn this way of fighting? I understand this is not against a forum rule, as this sim is no competitor to OFF? And yes, I also begin to get more interested in other aspects of WW1.