Hello Ivan,
OK, Thanks. Iīd already thought it was along those lines! Will check the link!
Hello Smilo,
I meant I was glad that your sim machine was working...
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp.
Hello Ivan,
OK, Thanks. Iīd already thought it was along those lines! Will check the link!
Hello Smilo,
I meant I was glad that your sim machine was working...
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp.
right...actually, it always has worked.
the problem has been the main monitor
of a two monitor system.
i like to use a 48" led tv for the main.
it puts the panel into a more realistic perspective.
not to mention, enlarges everything for these tired old eyes.
the problem was, my old lg 48" slowly crapped out.
the right side had trouble staying focused.
i recently removed and replaced it with a used samsung 48".
it, too, is starting to fail, but, at least for now,
it seems to warm up in a few minutes.
i test flew the do17 with the new dp and air files.
made the mistake of engaging ap while climbing.
it was like a bucking bronco...whahoo, hot fun.
i disengaged ap and settled her down to straight and level,
then reengaged ap. she seemed to want to fluctuate altitude,
plus or minus ten feet or so.
i left for a bit to go have lunch.
when i returned, the sim was at the free flight introduction screen,
which is an indication that the plane crashed.
i'll look into it more later, i've got some chores to do.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Smilo,
Thanks for testing! The AP thing is a bit difficult to fix.
At 4x sim speed, the oscillation wanes to near zero if itīs not too strong, but of course thatīs no good anyway.
Letīs see if I can get it any better.
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
.....I am not. Certainly not as far as the Dornier 17Z goes.
Hello Aleatorylamp, Smilo,
I will still make a few comments along those lines though as if I were "The Expert" (Note the Caps!)
Some of the aeroplanes apparently had a MG151/20 20 mm cannon.
Most did not. It isn't even listed anywhere that I can find now.
For the CFS DP, I would just presume we have the standard version with 6 x 7.92 mm MG15s.
Now the problem with doing this exactly the way it looks is that the Dornier had a very ineffective armament layout in my opinion.
6 MGs sounds like a pretty heavy armament and it probably was HEAVY, but the arrangements were not logical.
The top three guns good coverage for angles but the problem was that you have one may in a tight spot moving between three guns.
We already agreed that this is best simulated with a single swivel gun perhaps with extra ammunition, but this would be way more effective than the real guns were with their 75 round magazines and inability to track passing targets even with a wide field of fire.
Now I have already commented on this before, so why am I making the same comments?
..Because it was asked whether it would make sense for 4 swivel guns.
I think it would not for the simple reason that there were only three gunners.
There is no way that four swivel guns could be operational at the same time.
The Bombardier if he was doing his job would most likely be in the nose acting as observer / bombardier / gunner.
If he was next to the pilot, the swivel gun in the nose would not be functional.
My idea is to convert one of the swivel guns to a fixed forward firing gun in the DP.
Of the two bombardier guns, the least effective is probably the one next to the pilot.
With the asymmetric windscreen, if the bombardier were manning the gun next to the pilot, he would actually be a bit forward of the pilot and blocking the view to the right half of the instrument panel AND he would not be doing his job.
That is why I didn't think it made sense to put the bombardier in the cockpit.
Of the two bombardier gun, the cockpit gun has a fairly poor field of fire anyway..... But it does look cool.
I think it would have made more sense for the top rear and side guns to all be replaced by an unpowered turret type position.
At least then, the gunner would have some hope of tracking a target instead of having to jump back and forth between guns.
Regarding Autopilot, I will see if I can get it to work on my computer tonight.
Perhaps I will have better luck here.
- Ivan.
Hello Ivan,
Oh dear, Iīm so sorry! Silly question on the 4 swivel guns. Iīd completely forgotten about the decision about the armament and the reasons for it. Yes, now I remember that one of the forward guns would be a fixed one.
So similarly, maybe the dorsal one could be on a swivel, and the ventral one fixed then? Both rear firing guns being fixed is probably a bit too limiting, Iīd think.
Thanks very much for trying to fix the autopilot later!
Well, itīs past midnight here, and Iīm off to bed.
Hello Smilo,
Thanks a lot too, for doubling up your crews for the Do-17 panel + testing, AND for the Ad2k modified CubeFly tutorial!
It keeps one on oneīs toes a bit, doing two things at the same time, I suppose. Anyway, this doesnīt happen all the time!
Good night, guys!
Aleatorylamp
Hello Aleatorylamp,
A couple of my mechanics and a pilot decided to check out your Dornier 17Z.
The pilot came back after his first flight muttering something like "etwa unstabil".
The mechanics then did a few checks and here is what they found.
The Moments of Inertia were quite a bit off from where the mechanics had calculated.
The numbers they calculated were
27950 -- Roll
30200 -- Pitch
56766 -- Yaw
What they found was
48674 -- Roll
60982 -- Pitch
81478 -- Yaw
The chief mechanic's comment was that if something were a couple thousand off, it wasn't a big deal because the numbers are estimates anyway, but when the numbers are 50% to 100% off, they need to be corrected.
That by itself cured most of the Autopilot issue, but changing the Trim Pitch Effect per Notch from 0.25 to 0.30 made things become stable more quickly and did not seem to hurt anything.
The aeroplane still will not stabilize below about 3-5 feet per minute climb but that can be cured by setting the autopilot to descend and then quickly changing back to hold altitude. It is much like giving the TV a rap on the side and having things clear up.
The pilot also commented that he didn't like the way the Dornier was sitting.
There was a noticeable jolt as he entered the aeroplane, so the mechanics adjusted the ground angle slightly.
Let me know if my revisions address the problems on your autopilot as they did on mine.
Regarding Armament:
It isn't a matter of selecting three swivel guns.
It is a matter of there being ONE Dorsal Gunner, One Ventral Gunner, and One Nose Gunner who has to decide which position to occupy.
You ARE the designer though, so if you decide that your crew will be located differently with no one to man the ventral gun then who am I to tell you that you can't do it?
It is no more illogical that my declaration that my FW 190A would not be clean without any ETC racks installed.
Then again, I don't know that I have EVER seen any FW 190A in CFS with a bomb rack installed.
- Ivan.
for some reason, i'm unable to open the file.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Eeek!
I also can't open the other file.
I resent via email to both of you and attached another ZIP to this post.
I don't have WinZip on my laptop so this was done with 7Zip.
Hope it works.
- Ivan.
Hello Ivan,
Thanks for e-mailing the .airfile. I only have Winzip like Smilo - maybe I should install 7zip as well!
Thank your mechanics very much for the new MOIīs, the ground angle and the elevator trim.
Iīve just tested the aircraft and it flies nicely. The Autopilot, however, keeps doing the same thing as before, and requires a bit of manual damping with the joystick to reduce the oscillation, and it helps to go to 4x sim rate to quickly stabilize it to near zero.
I donīt want to argue, but I still donīt understand why you would like only one swivel gun.
With 4 guns and 3 gunners, one position would be unmanned, so I thought that was to be the only fixed one.
If we were bombing or operating the top front gun, we would have a bombardier/front gunner sitting next to the pilot, so the top front gun would be the swivel gun, and the lower one would be unmanned. The other two gunners would the rear gunners, ventral and dorsal one, so they would be swivelling too. Thatīs why I thought 3 swivel guns.
Thanks again!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
having a middle of the night,
old man moment...old men understand.
as always, am awake for an hour or so.
i don't think the issue with the air file download
is Win7. i have Win7 on my laptop
and couldn't open the file.
i got the email and am testing it now.
once again, i engaged ap while climbing.
got severe bucking.
throttled back to 80%
disengaged altitude hold
and manually leveled out to a very slight climb.
then, reengaged altitude hold.
am currently cruising at 6560 feet
with a very slight altitude increase.
i can live with that.
i am not using an ap gauge.
merely, keyboard commands
for ap master and altitude hold.
i have no doubt,
settings would be fine tuned
with an ap gauge.
thank you for your work, Ivan.
as you said, you may not be
an armament expert, but,
you're a hell of an air file technician.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Guys,
Try the second attachment It should work. I have no idea what happened to the first attachment.
It was created on a machine I normally use only for games. I don't know if I have ever used that copy of WinZip before.
Hello Aleatorylamp,
I think there is a lot of miscommunication going on here and I am probably the guilty party.
From your last post, it sounds like we are in pretty good agreement here.
I was just trying to point out the two aft facing gun positions manned but now I think you already agree there.
Hello Smilo,
It sounds like you first tried to go from controls deflected for climb to altitude hold by the autopilot.
That doesn't sound like a reasonable thing to do in real life.
Can you tell us what the proper keyboard sequence is for setting autopilot and altitude hold?
I would like to try it out also.
If you want to make the autopilot become stable quicker, the Trim effect per notch can be increased.
What I have seen in other aircraft is something around 0.80 to 1.00 or so.
My FDE notes (in the FDE Control File) say that 0.50 is a pretty normal value.
The value here started at 0.25 which also did stabilize but not quickly and would jump back and forth a notch or two even when stable.
That is why I changed it to 0.30.
0.40 worked about as well, but I thought that Aleatorylamp wanted the finer adjustment.
As the number gets bigger, the adjustment gets coarser but the autopilot finds the center more quickly so as usual, it is a matter of balancing one thing against another.
I am still wondering what is causing the slight climb that doesn't even register on the vertical speed indicator but can be seen in the altimeter.
- Ivan.
first off, the trim/auto pilot settings balancing act.
i take full responsibility for the fiasco.
early on, i complained about not being able
to fly straight and level.
(something i've always had difficulty achieving)
Stephan solved my problem
by making the elevator trim more sensitive
and it worked great. unfortunately, later,
when i tried to use auto pilot,
there was a problem with altitude stability.
it's a classic example
of one wanting his cake
and eating it too.
i can only say, i appreciate your efforts
at catering to my whims.
as a general rule, i usually have a functioning
auto pilot gauge on my panel.
with it, i can preset a desired altitude,
heading and climb rate, start the engine(s),
accelerate and take off and eventually,
reach my selected altitude and heading.
the aircraft maintains that heading and altitude,
unless i make adjustments to the gauge settings.
all pretty spiffy for long waypoint missions
and gnats ass accurate bomb runs.
okay, so, i have a basic auto pilot gauge set up
that hubba put together.
with it, you can engage ap,
engage and adjust heading,
and engage altitude hold.
BUT, can not adjust altitude.
next, you need to understand,
i'm a notorious keyboard assignment tweaker.
back in the day, i think it drove hubba crazy.
anyway, i've changed the settings so much,
i can't remember what the default assignments are.
if you go into settings/customize controls/assignments
scroll down to a section for Autopilot assignments.
you'll need to assign a key (i use z) for Autopilot master,
i've selected F9 for Autopilot altitude hold.
notice there is a heading hold option
and, if you scroll down,
Autopilot heading bug increment
Autopilot heading bug decrement
it's your call which, if any, to select.
here's where i have a complaint.
why no altitude increase and decrease options?
so it goes
finally, i forgot to mention,
why the auto pilot fiasco with the do17?
especially, if i use an auto pilot adjustment gauge?
well, i haven't installed an ap adjustment gauge
in the do17 panel, yet.
i'm less than ecstatic about using
the only stock one available.
the lear ap gauge.
another option is one i've downloaded,
the sperry mkIII, which is, at best,
cumbersome to try adjusting settings
and relies on heading and altitude hold.
it looks cool, though.
i'm still searching.
ramble on, milo, ramble on
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Smilo, Hello Ivan,
Intesesting information on autopilots, I must say. I was trying corrections in the opposite direction.
I had always had the wrong impression that what caused the porpoising was excessively high trim values that would overshoot the mark and make things progressively worse, but it seems the other way round, that excessively LOW values correct progressively later. It is still pushing in one direction when it should be pushing the opposite way to damp the oscillation instead of helping it.
Iīll experiment with higher settings then.
OK on the guns then - Clarified!
Cheers, and good night again!
Aleatorylamp
Hello Ivan,
Yes indeed, a higher setting of 0.40 works very well, and autopilot oscillation wanes quickly!
Strange, back in the days of FS98, everyone started complaining is values were above 0.25. Different Sim, different Values!
Thanks for your trouble.
Hello Smilo,
...and hereīs the .air file! I think it will be fine. I also adjusted the other values Ivan mentioned.
Enjoy!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
thank you, Stephan.
i'll check it out.
just to let you know,
Ivan, emailed his update a few days ago.
if i'm not mistaken,
the email was sent to both of us.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Smilo,
Yes, but the porpoising still set in, and afterwards he suggested increasing the elevator trim value to 0.40, which is what the .air file I posted contains.
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
okay...i'll download and install yours.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
am running a quick test.
when engaging ap altitude hold,
even in a steep climb,
the aircraft levels out quickly,
with a minimum of oscillations.
...and seems to hold altitude
with a mere 1 foot variation.
excellent work...well done.
if only i could do as good of a job
building a nose glazing bmp
for the bomb aimer panel.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Smilo,
That was thanks to Ivanīs suggestions and your testing!
The Do-17 is certainly getting better and better!
A nose glazing for the Bomb aimerīs panel... Of course, because the Baltimoreīs bomber panel is different.
I often cut and paste pieces from other panel struts... but my panels are quite rudimentary.
Anyway, I have to get some sleep.
Good night!
Aleatorylamp
yes, she is, isn't she?
i'm very pleased with how she's coming along.
like you, i usually cut and paste parts from other panels.
i've never created one on my own.
i have the basic glazing layout,
but, of course, am not happy with it.
add to that, i have other things going on,
so, naturally, it's on a back burner.
not, out of sight, out of mind,
but, not at the forefront either.
Last edited by smilo; February 21st, 2017 at 18:40.
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello Smilo,
I know the feeling when there are several things going on simultaneously,
added to other extra things like cleaning, shopping, cooking and driving...
No hurry!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
Hey Guys,
I just received a model of a Dornier 17Z that I ordered about a week or so ago.
Monogram 1/72 Scale.
Haven't had a chance to even open the shipping box yet. Been a busy day.
- Ivan.
that's funny, i have one, too.
i bought it years ago when a local hobby shop closed its doors.
is your model Monogram #PA214.150?
sometimes the magic works.
sometimes it doesn't.
Hello!
I remember building a similar model by Revell, the Ju-88 in 1/32 scale - with turning props and retractable gear - amazing technological advances in model building at the time! I never painted models, though. Plain shiny khakhi-green plastic, transparent canopies and lovely decals were better without my painting abilities!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp
Hi Smilo,Originally Posted by smilo
Mine has the same kit number new in the shrink wrap.
I already have the Matchbox kit but I was thinking that Monogram generally does a better job and the price on eBay wasn't bad.
I suspect this will sit on the shelf for at least a few years like all the other kits have been doing.
I haven't finished a kit since my Son was born and he is now 15.
Hi Aleatorylamp,
Monogram and Revell merged a few decades ago into Revell-Monogram.
My preference was always for the Monogram kits though; The mould quality / surface finish was better and they seemed more accurate.
Revell's 1/32 scale models were great though. I had a couple of those when I was growing up.
One was the Ki-43 Hayabusa and the other was the Me 109G-6.
I have at least one example of each kit down in my basement and probably should build them at some point.
Even a small fighter in 1/32 scale is pretty big, so that Junkers 88 must be huge!
My assembly and painting skills were never very good though I COULD build a pretty clean model if I tried.
The artistry of painting and weathering was beyond me.
All I ever did was follow the instructions and some of those ideas were pretty worthless.
I still have a few of the built up 1/48 scale Monogram kits from when I was a teen and even a few from my College days.
I always preferred the moving parts in the Monogram and Revell lines to the static stuff in everyone else's kits.
Some folks would say that those features detract from the accuracy of the model and make them toys.
To me, all the plastic kits were toys and I almost never painted any of them beyond the Canopy Frames, Pilot, and Cockpit.
Happy Modelling!
- Ivan.
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