El Hadji

Just for the record, LNS have a qualified MiG-21 pilot on their team. My bet is that the behaviour of the DCS MiG-21 isn't too bad compared to the real deal. Then again I haven't flown it IRL and never will so who knows. About Novak Djordjijevic:

There is a way but of course your warranty will be void if you mod it... http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=133199

The gearbox was always the weak spot for SAAB. It was common to get the standard gearbox replaced with what we called "Police boxes" here in Trollhättan (where the cars were made). SAAB had a division that converted standard cars to emergency services versions and they had more durable gearboxes. They were a bit too noisy to fit the average customer but they worked great. A buddy of mine had a Viggen convertible tuned by Nordic Uhr with almost 400 bhp and a bigger Garret turbo. Worked great with the "Police box". Almost mach speeds. Almost... :D

The Viggen is a war machine. It's not supposed to be pretty. Eventhough I prefer the splinter camo, I still think this bare metal AJS 37 looks pretty good: http://www.e-pic.se/keyword/AJS;viggen/ I'm pretty sure the plane in those pictures (civilian registration SE-DXN for the plane spotters) is the AJS that Leatherneck will get most of their data and characteristics from. http://swafhf.se/37-se-dxn.html

Care to upload a track so that we common mortals can learn a thing or two perhaps?

Thank you for sharing!

+1 for a full range of SAAB Cold War era planes. But as you say Skjold, the Pacific scenario needs more planes and the Corsair needs other than AI opponents. And all WW2 scenarios needs bombers...

Could possibly be a coincidence. Wasn't aware of either F7 Viggens visiting Poland or that Poland wanted to buy Viggens though. And just a clarification for the international audience: the JT8-D upgrade to RM8 was made by Volvo. You know the old saying: "The fastest SAAB is powered by Volvo". This was especially fun to use in my hometown of Trollhättan where the SAAB plant was located and where Volvo Flygmotor (Volvo Aero Corporation when I worked there and today GKN) converted the engines. Fun fact: The industrial area of Stallbacka in Trollhättan is really all built around providing aircraft for the Royal Swedish Airforce. If you look at it from the air the purpose becomes very clear. First you have engine production at Svenska Flygmotor (Swedish Aircraft Engines). These are then moved to be fitted in the planes at SAAB or Svenska Aeroplan Aktiebolaget (Swedish Aeroplane "Limited/Corp/Gmbh") and then flown to the end user from the airfield which today is our local Airport. The attached image shows todays buildings but my added text shows the original layout of the area before SAAB started building cars and needed more room.

I just found a small notice in DN (Dagens Nyheter newspaper) published in October 1998. It is about Poland expressing a wish to buy old Viggens for their airforce as they were about to become a NATO member. In the article Polish minister of defence at the time, Janusz Onyszkiewics is quoted. Could it be that Sweden actually displayed the 37 i Poland in 1998 in relation to this?

Except from the small issue of revenue... I doubt any 3rd party dev are willing to give away their work for someone else to make profit from. In the end we are talking about business here.

Only exchange I know of with Viggens involved in Poland was when SWAFRAP AJS 37's took part in the exercise "Strong Resolve" in Powidz, which was a Partnership for Peace exercise. Could the film be from that? Only seen grey AJSF's from this occasion though. [ame]http://www.fht.nu/bilder/Flygvapnet/Flygvapennytt/fv_nytt_1_2002_pff_ovningen_strong_resolve.pdf[/ame]

It is also mentioned in "US Marine Corps Fighter Squadrons of WWII" by Barrett Tillman (Osprey Publishing). Here are quotes from page 78 and onward from this book:

Perhaps JG7 got better planes and engines than JV44 then... As for wanting their pilots to stay alive, that was probably true for every pilot unless they were part of Gallands inner circle of fighter aces. They and Göring had a mutual hate for eachother. Can anyone recommend any reading about war time 262 fighter training? I have read about Buchner and Stiglers training but that was very short and mostly took place in twin prop planes or mockups as far as I can tell. It would be interesting to know more.

Most JV44's 262's were "factory fresh" since the pilots brought their "own planes" to the cirkus. Stigler actually stole his first plane straight from the Messerschmitt plant... A Jumo 004 lasted 28 hours + another 10 after refurbishment so "factory fresh" is a pretty relative term here. Especially if you set the scenario to March or April 1945 when most of the famous 262 flights took place. My concern is that our 262's will be little too fresh... I still think the 262 will be pretty challenging to portray correctly in a sim like DCS. If you read what the actual 262 pilots have said about the plane there is one thing that keeps coming back: The 262 was a very dangerous plane to fly. And given the political climate in Germany at the time (most pilots in JV44 including Galland, Steinhoff, Trautloft and many others were put there because their chance of survival was minimal. It was better to have them die as heroes than having them killed by firing squad as probably Göring and others wanted) I'm pretty sure any problems that could possibly be lethal with the Me 262 wouldn't be mentioned in official manuals. Personally I think it would be amazing if the DCS 262 would be just as hazardous as the real plane was. :pilotfly:

As Franz Stigler put it: "It won't always kill you. It will kill the next guy." (About the 262 in reference to fan blades cracking after engine cool down on the ground when he briefed his fellow pilots in JV44 about the plane.) Another thought on the 262: will official Luftwaffe flight manuals be of any real use for the 262? One thing is how the engineers wanted it to work and how the plane worked in theory. But from what I have read about first hand encounters with the 262, the reality was kind of different. According to Stigler, Steinhoff instructed pilots about go-arounds when missing an approach. Or more precise, that there was no way you could throttle up quickly and give it another shot. When on final approach the pilot had to commit, stick with it and try to land since moving throttle quickly would be suicide. Again because of the Jumo 004's tendency to snuff out.

Exactly what I mean Otto. On one hand a fully functional, flawless jet fighter will ruin the WW2 experience (especially in mulplayer if the number of 262's becomes great. Did JV44 have more than 10-12 planes operational at once?). On the other hand it will ruin the entertainment value if the 262 crashes all the time. Not an easy thing to get right... Another famous 262 crash was that of Johannes Steinhoff JV44. That wasn't a engine failure either but a blown tire during takeoff. Amazingly enough Steinhoff survived the inferno. Badly burnt but alive and could continue his military career after the war.

The mission name is obvious: Whisky on the rocks! :thumbup:

All planes have failures but according to a lot of sources (Franz Stigler, Hermann Buchner etc) the 262 was more prone to fail than other planes they flew in combat. New technology not tested enough in combination with poor materials because of the war made the Schwalbe pretty dangerous. My thought is that if the 262 behaves like a flawless, almost modern, jet fighter, realism will suffer. Don't get me wrong, I love this plane (hence all the books I've read about it and the pilots who flew 262's) but I think it must be a pretty hard thing to get right from a gameplay perspective.

Just finished the book "A Higher Call" by Adam Makos (recommended read if you haven't already...) where a large portion is about Franz Stigler who was attached to JV44. He was one of the few pilots in "Cirkus Galland" who actually had some real training on the 262. In the book he mentions all the problems with the plane and how using the throttle at altitude was a no-no because of fan blades being made from inferior quality metal which made them sensitive to changes in temperature etc. I wonder how this will be taken into consideration in DCS? I mean realism is key in DCS and if the 262 will be as reliable as say the 109K-4 it won't be very realistic. But on the other hand, if players suffer from random flame outs all the time I doubt it will be very fun from a gaming perspective. Any thoughts?

My main concern here is not map pricing (but I do think NTTR is rather expensive for what you get though) but the fact that charging money for scenarios will divide a small community even further. I would have preferred ED to take the helm and sort of "dictate" the general direction of DCS. As an example we see that Pacific planes and scenario are planned for WW2 eventhough Normandy is far from finished etc. And when both scenarios are released the small WW2 fanbase will be spread thin... With that said, I'm sure all scenarios will be great and I will spend most my flying time over Sweden once LNS gets that map out. It is a long time flight sim dream becoming true!

It's not a problem using the default footplates with a heel-on-floor approach. I do it all the time when flying the helos. Just adjust the angle of the footplates to make it comfortable.

Also, the idea wasn't to keep all of them operational at once. Sweden used the Israel/Egypt six days war as a warning example. The Israelis basically destroyed Egypts airpower on the ground. The Swedish system was an attempt to make similar attacks difficult.

Perhaps this changed when transiting from Bas60 to Bas90? Down here in the region of "Aircraft carrier Västergötland" I have only seen the wider ones.

These bases were only meant to be used as reserve bases and there were quite many of them across the country. Bas60 was the first system used for this. The idea was to move away from the permanent bases to wartime bases in case of war. The wartime bases were scattered around the country and each had reserve road bases attached to them. The command and control of these wartime bases was placed in fortified bunkers several kilometers from the actual runways. Ground control was led from mobile "TLF-kärror" (Trafikledning i Fält/Field Traffic Control wagons). Each base had sub-terrainean fuel storages and there were connecting points at hook up comms to the central airtraffic control/command center. Some had hangars built in the Swedish granite rockbed. At the temporary bases you also had "Framoms" (Främre klargöringsområde/forward clearance area) which provided some cover from the elements: The Bas60 system was later developed into the Bas90 system but the basic principle for how everything worked was the same. From page 18 and onward in this document you will find a list of bases: [ame]http://www.flygbas.se/bilder/973.pdf[/ame] Note that this document also includes reserve airfields (NOT road bases), training airfields and civilian airfields that could be used by the military. It also includes some planned but never completed projects.

VTB_init.lua is the file to edit I believe. It is located here: ..\DCS World 2 OpenAlpha\Mods\aircraft\M-2000C\Cockpit\VTB