britgliderpilot

FEAR, Il-2 1946, CS:Source, and SWAT 4 with SSF3.1. Oh, and of course I suffer the onerous task of finding fault with the Ka50 . . . . Used to play SHIII, but time constraints prevent me from doing that anymore. Shame, I hear the GWX mod has made it even better.

If you'd missed the recent story, a Royal Marine was found to be missing following an assault by British forces on a Taleban fort in Afghanistan. Four Royal Marines strapped themselves to the wings of an Apache and flew back into the fort in an attempt to find and rescue him. Tragically he was already dead - but the mission demonstrates the lengths the Marines and Army were ready to go to get him back. The MoD has just released footage - think it's guncam from the second Apache - of the missions, showing Marines strapped to the Apache. See here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_6280000/newsid_6284400/6284429.stm?bw=bb&mp=wm

Such an eventuality is rather unlikely, but I'd like to think I'd respond in the same way regardless of whose model it was ;) It's an interesting point regarding the positioning and shaping of 3D shapes not obviously visible on a 3-view, pylons on the wings etc - would it not be possible to find these accurately from sufficiently detailed drawings and photos? Remember, at least one person has done it.

I'm by no means an expert, but I've seen shots of 3D modelling in progress where the 3D model is overlaid on a plan of the aircraft in question and it matches exactly. Two people using the same drawing and working to the same standard of detail, with outlines exactly matching, would logically come up with models that matched! And to correct you on one small point - both versions of this model are the AV-8B. DE-Espona mislabel theirs the AV-813, they must have misread. The Harrier II family covers the AV-8B, the Harrier II Plus, the Harrier GR5,7,9 family, and so forth. The difference isn't the B, it's the Plus.

I get the distinct impression they're running out of space for instruments :P

They could just both be superb models - you do TRY to get it as close to the real thing as possible ;) The pointy nose is to do with the radar - the Harrier II Plus has a Hornet radar stuck in the nose, the vast majority of Harrier variants have a laser rangefinder and no radar. DE-ESPONA's mislabelled Harrier also has some form of pod on the tail. And I'm fairly sure that that angle is as far open as the airbrake goes. The Battleship is, as clearly labelled, the RM Roma. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vittorio_Veneto_class_battleship Not visible in the Espona list.

Yup :) Although it may look daunting, once you're airborne I reckon it's actually easier to engage targets in the Ka50 than the Su25T. Programmable flare dispensers make attack runs in threat-rich environments simpler, the true moving-map mode gives you a better idea of where you are, and hovering outside MANPADS/AAA range actually gives you better survivability than the fixed-wing method which necessitates overflying the target. Cold starts are a challenge to begin with, but now I've got used to them I'm cracking them out in short order. There's only so many things an engine needs, and the switches are always in the same place.

You sure they have an AMRAAM copy? I know they've got a Sparrow copy (that would seem to fit for size on that photo) . . . but I've not heard of a Chinese AMRAAM, thought they went straight for the RVV-AE.

If you remember the TBS videos, an RAF Harrier was in them, tonking along quite happily. Any model seen in TBS' engine is directly usable in Lomac/FC/BS, so that suggests ED have a GR7 model ready to use if they choose to. I don't think it was a Harrier II Plus variant, though - that one has the radar, right? Sigh - just when a Harrier II airframe with AMRAAM finally becomes available, the MoD decides to retire our original Sea Harriers and not replace them. Bummer. A Spanish carrier to drop those on would be deeply cool - a Sea Harrier and an Invincible-class carrier would awesome, too.

Are you complaining about the heat haze effect existing, or that it's malfunctioning? With the exhaust effects turned on there is meant to be a shimmering effect behind the engines below 500km/h - it's a feature. It might look a little unusual in the screenies posted, but I can't put my finger on anything specific . . . . Nice skin on the Su30, btw.

I don't believe an official announcement has been made yet. As such . . . . any answer's pretty much speculation, we don't know for sure :) Look at the ways Flaming Cliffs was distributed (NOT Lock On Gold, just Flaming Cliffs), and for now just guess they won't change the system too much.

I'd be interested to find why the Su33 is classed in the "not for 5-10 years" section - I thought it was really very similar to the Su27 in terms of systems? Is there something that's been overlooked, or should that perhaps read Su35? Either way, useful list, cheers :)

Spot-on. Most of the switches, you won't need to touch in a combat scenario. There are weapons panel switches, but I haven't had a problem yet of needing three hands to flick them around in a combat zone. Wiki sums it up fairly well: Usually, you'll either be flying, fighting, or navigating. Never all three at once.

You can see from at least one of the Ka50 videos that yes, the ABRIS is available in English as well as in Russian - so don't worry on that front :) The ABRIS is very detailed, yes, but you don't in fact need to understand every function in order to use it satisfactorily. The simplest thing (and IMO the most useful) is just to leave it in moving-map mode. The rest of the avionics remain marked in Russian, but there are English tips available to remind you which switch is which :)

I'm going to assume you're not being serious on this one :P Somewhere there's a fresh report on the Raptor's latest wargames - 144 kills for no losses, only three were WVR. None of those three could tell the Raptor was there ;) It's a hell of a machine . . . . .

IIRC the .rn file does control where the runway is placed. It lives in Lomac\Bazar\Terrain\Vpp\ There should be one for every airbase. I think I'm right in saying you can't add a new airbase (it needs a unique CLSID referenced in the code), but you can play around with the .rn files to move the runway co-ordinates - the scenes files should just move the scenery associated with the base. How exactly it's formatted and what section controls what . . . . you need Birdy or someone, try a repost in the Mods forum. A hex editor might help you read the file. Which airbase do you want to move to where?

I hope he's remembered the very first Unbreakable Universal Law of R/C Model-Building: Your Pride And Joy Is Going To Crash! I just hope it flies for long enough for it to have been worthwhile - that thing is a beast. On the one hand, I'm deeply envious of his drive, commitment and resource in building such a thing. On the other . . . I dunno . . . is it nerdier than flightsimming? :P

Unfortunately . . . . you can't. There's no such object, and you can't place static objects aboard the carriers. You can set up a couple of AI flights to land-on, though.

Meh. Padlock yes, but not if you're one of the fortunates who both own a TrackIR and can use it without anyone you live with laughing at you . . . . . The problem isn't padlock (once you obtain a target . . . um . . . yeah?), it's padlock spamming. I have acquired targets I wouldn't have otherwise picked up by use of padlock, and it does give an advantage, especially against smaller aircraft.

. . . . does this mean that you have information on how the dual-engagement capability should work? Has been a bit of a bone of contention for a while, would be good to find out :)

Two issues to take up with that, really. Firstly - the safety rules tend to be set by the people hosting the airshow. The display must be approved by them before being flown, there are strict rules, and the display can be stopped at any point by the ground controller if he feels it's becoming unsafe or is breaking the rules. Most of the "Russian" crashes have occurred outside Russia. The Americans display at the same venues under the same rules. If the Le Bourget/Fairford/Farnborough rules allow for the Russians to do it safely, they should also allow for the Americans to do it safely. Secondly, I'm really not sure the Russian display routines have caused crashes. There's been a minimum of two, probably three pilot error crashes for the Russians (Su27UB in Lviv, the two MiGs colliding at Fairford, the Su30MKI in Paris), a birdstrike (MiG29 at Le Bourget) . . . . don't know what caused the Su33 airshow crash and I can't remember any more at the moment. The Thunderbird crash was pilot error - the pilot forget to reset his altimeter to field height. The Nighthawk crash was structural failure. The famous B52 crash was pilot error. There's been at least one more F-16 airshow crash due to pilot error. The USAF is not immune to these things either . . . . All display routines are occasionally subject to bad luck or pilot error - the Russians have high publicity crashes, but I'd really question that they are caused by unsafe routines.

Ouch - hope they all survived OK, helicopter crashes tend to be nasty . . . . The one that always amazed me was the clip of the news chopper crashlanding on a rooftop in the US. . . . . . these things break far too often for my liking.

Mine's now happy at 2.66GHz. It'll boot at 2.8GHz with the Vcore high enough, but according to the ABIT software it's both under-reading compared to the BIOS, and wobbling significantly. And won't Possibly due to my, um, interim PSU . . . . will delay efforts to reach higher speeds for now, then. Works very nicely at 2.66GHz, though. A lightly OC'd E6600 - dare I say it - might finally be enough to take on Lomac and win?

Oh, it does. Just not in the way they might want, article here: http://www.confusionroad.com/article.php?article_id=107

It's ALL a conspiracy. Be sure! Um - now what are you talking about again?