Any way to?

[ndicki]

Is there a way to drop fuel tanks selectively? The WGr 21 tubes on Bf109s could apparently be jettisoned after use to reduce the drag on the aeroplane; so obviously, that's where I want to go. Fire the grenades, drop the tubes, get on with the job. But I don't want the tubes to drop off when I release the tank, or vice-versa. There must be some trick somewhere...

Any ideas?

Edit - I've tried the ways I can think of, and they don't work. Now if I could double up each hardpoint, so it has two at position 1 and two at position 2... It would work. Bloody stock stuff...

[Pat Pattle]

How about modelling the tube as a 'bomb' so it can be released, then have the grenade as a separate weapon at the same location and which can be fired independantly of the tube.

Does that make sense?

[greycap.raf]

I thought of that but killed the idea because it would necessitate two wing pylons per side and there's only room for one. One option would be to model a fuselage pylon with nodes on the wings but it would kill the fuel tank option because there's only one fuselage pylon available and two kinds of payloads can't be carried on the same pylon.

[ndicki]

Which just about sums up the extent of my testing. It didn't work - either I could drop the tube but it didn't fire the grenade, or it did fire the grenade but stayed where it was. If you assign two weapons to one hardpoint, it simply ignores one or the other.

[greycap.raf]

Damn. I think I have an idea.

How about building a pylon for both tubes and mounting it on the port wing? The hardest thing is getting the positions correct. Then build another pylon on the starboard wing and mount both rockets on it. Heavily asymmetrical pylons. Not outside my Gmaxing skills, and it would have the benefit of being able to use the GC tubes "as is" as the pylon would control their positioning.

[ndicki]

Or simply use two tubes on one hardpoint and two dummies on the other... Don't forget I now have the source file for the GC tubes...