Possible new Caudron G.4 Bomber/observer
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Thread: Possible new Caudron G.4 Bomber/observer

  1. #1

    Possible new Caudron G.4 Bomber/observer

    Hello Folks,
    I was trying out the 1915 Caudron G.4 bomber-observer model I had made for FS98 twelve years ago, testing it for
    bleeds, and despite all the struts, spars and wires, it seems they are within manageable limits, possibly even
    being improvable.

    Iīm planning to rig up the Caudron G.4 for CFS1 by putting in the two swiveling Lewis machineguns it had, one firing
    forwards and one backwards, and equip it with the bombload of 3 internal 83 lb bombs. The guns make this bomber
    an excellent candidate to be used with TG2, so it should be fun.

    As per one source:
    " ... Bombs were dropped by the observer through metal trapdoor shaped like door of a rolltop desk. Observer, using
    the "oculaire" or eyeball technique, could ease the door back to take pictures or drop 3 slender bombs that were hung
    on leather straps in the cockpit. ...".

    Then, from a technical point of view, this slow-flying aircraft (82 mph top speed) had very interesting engines, which
    work nicely in the CFS1 .air file. They are Le Rhône rotaries, whose animation also comes through very well.

    Driving 10-foot-diameter, fixed pitch wooden propellers, the engines were rated at 80 Hp at 1200 RPM, although factory
    specs state that maximum performance was 92 Hp at 1300 RPM. The necessary engine and propeller adjustments in the
    .air file yield a very satisfactory result at S.L. of 82.3 mph with 92 Hp at 1301 RPM and 28.9 Hg.

    Its climbing and altitude performance (13000 ft ceiling) was also very appreciable for the time, and this also comes
    through very well in CFS1.

    Hereīs a screenshot.
    I expect there could be some interest for an upload...
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Caudron G.4.jpg  
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  2. #2
    Looks & sounds good! Great there are still CFS1 designers! Hope you'll manage to give it a working vc.

    Thanks for all your good work, MUCH appreciated!!

    hertzie.

  3. #3
    Hello Herzie,
    Thanks for your interest.
    The Virtual Cockpits I can make donīt have working instruments.
    The panel-texture is only the bitmap made from a panel screenshot.
    Iīm still working on a few elements to clean up the VC view, and the
    observerīs head will be made to turn with the rudder, maybe!
    Then, Iīm also planning to put in the propeller blurs like the ones
    that Ivan makes.
    Hereīs a provisional pic.
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails VC.jpg  
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  4. #4
    Hi Sir,

    You mention a "thing" that I've always been curious about: how come that original Microsoft CFS1 aircraft, as the Spit and the Hurri, have working VC-gauges, and so many "non-Microsoft designs" (hope I'm obliged to call them so) don't have them ?

    Any ideas?

    All the best,

    hertzie.

  5. #5
    Hello Herzie,
    I didnīt answer before as Iīve been busy re-arranging and re-building the Caudron G.4, to get
    enough parts free for the machine guns. It isnīt easy because of the rotary-engine cowlings, that
    are all individually displayed insignia parts, (otherwise the engine-animation display wonīt work),
    and this lowers AF99 compilation limit.

    Also, cowlings still require a concave component visible from the inside, and there werenīt any parts
    left over for this. However, rationalizing construction by putting all the different wires into the strut
    components, (at the cost of losing the different colouring), as well as sacrificing animated control-surfaces,
    freed enough parts and components, so Iīm making a lot of headway.

    Anyway, regarding your comment on Virtual Cockpit Working Instruments:
    Strange... Upto now I hadnīt seen details or comments on the subject, other than the general comment
    you made some time ago.

    I remember NoDice making some beautiful gauge bitmaps, and Ivan programming the N2 gauge for the
    He-162 "Sparrow" (Eeeek! A jet!!). Then, Ivan also programmed a very complete set of rather excellent
    multi-engine gauges, and Smilo has done good work on panel instrument layout, but upto now, I donīt
    recall any talk about functional VCockpit gauges, so I donīt know if anyone has investigated if this is
    possible with CFS Add-On aircraft.

    It sounds like an intriguing line of reasearch. One only clue to start off with seems the following:
    There is a paragraph present in all CFS1 stock aircraft panel.cfg, which is absent in standard FS98 ones.

    It is labelled [Vcockpit01], sets up some viewing-window parameters, and locates the gauges, which
    seem to be the same gauges as for the standard panel.

    Of course, there is no panel bitmap, as [Vcockpit01] uses the virtual cockpit view. Also, obviously,
    gauge-location coordinates are different due to the larger field of view.

    Initially, one could expect that just copying the panel folder of a stock aircraft into a non-stock
    aircraft would work, but it doesnīt. Preliminary tests Iīve done just show the virtual cockpit view
    corresponding to the model in use, without any instruments.

    I wonder if anyone knows anything on this subject.
    Have you tried any strategies yourself?


    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  6. #6

    Biplane Struts / Wings bleed problem

    Hello all,
    Thereīs one specific type of bleed-problem Iīve been trying to deal with for years now, again and again,
    to no avail, namely the interaction on biplanes between wingstruts and landinggear struts, and the wings.

    The best solution is always to place the top wing in Canopy-High Wing, and have the struts in Wing Mid left/right
    and/or Inner Wing Mid Left/right, and the lower wing in Wing Low.

    However, there always seems to be one or two angles at which what is shown in the screenshot happens, and as yet,
    it
    seems totally unavoidable. Additionally, the more the wing curves downwards, (obviously), the worse it becomes.

    Other groupings with glue-sequencing without using Canopy High-Wing, can prevent this problem, at the price of worse
    things happening with other elements such as engines, cowlings, and also struts, but in different ways.

    So, it seems that we are landed with the lesser evil here, and some viewing angles simply MUST be avoided. A pity,
    because otherwise, these old vintage contraptions come out looking quite good in the simulator. Too bad, ...unless of

    course, there is something Iīm missing, that perhaps someone has succesfully tried out that I havenīt!
    ...but then, not many build biplanes nowadays...


    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Bleeds Struts-Wings.jpg   Bleeds Wings-Struts.jpg   Bleeds - more.jpg  

  7. #7
    Hi Aleatorlamp,

    Yes, I've tried a lot of things without any results. Like crazy things as putting the complete Spit panel map in a WW1 plane, which gives a perfect 2D Spitpanel, but the planes original static VC. Or messing around with the HEX-editor, also no succes. So there must be something that has to be done in the original mdl.-design, I suppose, but as I am not a designer I have no idea and as we don't have the original Microsofts sourcefiles I suppose we'll never know. But I'll put a post on the designers forum, you'll never know what will happen.

    And I have a plea, hope you're not getting mad at me, but would you please be so kind to change the backgroundcolor of your posts? It is so hard to read because it's light grey text on a little bit darker grey background, so almost no contrast.

    All the best,

    hertzie.

  8. #8
    Hello Hertzie,
    My posts are all dark-grey text on white background, so thatīs OK here.
    However, I believe it could be something to do with your user settings.
    Perhaps Smilo can explain how to put that right.

    As regards V-cockpit working gauges, Iīm afraid I havenīt got a clue about them.
    Sorry!

    Anyway, I found a different livery for the Caudron G.4, with more appealing colours.
    No. 7 appears to have been quite a famous unit from Escadrille 47, together with No. 9.

    Hereīs a screenshot. Slowly the bleeds are getting better too, but I havenīt got enough
    free parts for the drum on the Lewis guns. With Parts Count at 148.8 now, it will be difficult,
    but at least with the more rationalized construction style now, I got beyond the 145% AF99
    compilation limit, which is quite satisfying.


    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails newlivery.jpg  
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  9. #9
    SOH Staff
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    State of Confusion..... -8GMT
    Posts
    3,775
    my guess is you're in CombatFS/CFC view mode.
    try this, scroll to the bottom of the page,
    in the lower left corner click on the Quick Style Chooser window
    and select --SOH Default(fluid)
    sometimes the magic works.
    sometimes it doesn't.

  10. #10
    Thanks Smilo! Had never noticed the key nor that I was in a different mode.

    hertzie

  11. #11
    SOH Staff
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    State of Confusion..... -8GMT
    Posts
    3,775
    my pleasure, sir...enjoy
    sometimes the magic works.
    sometimes it doesn't.

  12. #12

    Getting there...

    Good morning, folks!
    Iīm glad that worked.

    Regarding the two machineguns on this machine, I found some rather interesting historical data:

    "To protect against attacks from behind, some G.4s were fitted with an additional gun mounted on
    the top of the upper wing and pointed rearward, but this proved to be ineffective, and it was frequently
    removed from operational aircraft. A number of G.4s had a second gun mounted immediately in front of the
    pilot on the deck of the nacelle, but more often the pilot and observer simply carried hand-held weapons
    to respond to attacks from the rear."

    Furthermore, and the unit with the red and white 7 on the cowls only had the nose machinegun.
    So, I had enough parts left over to make the drum on the Lewis-gun.

    For TG2 then, Iīll enable a rearward-firing automatic parabellum hand-gun to be used from the pilotīs position.
    Hereīs a new screenshot now.

    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Lewisdrum.jpg  
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  13. #13
    I did put a post on the designers forum with my question about non-working VC-gauges, but so far no replies.

    hertzie

  14. #14
    Hello Herzie,
    Hmmm... Itīs probably something nobody knows anything about (yet).
    The strange thing is that stock aircraft have it, but add-on aircraft seem to be excluded from
    this feature - at least I havenīt seen any with it.

    I donīt think itīs something managed by the .mdl file. Looking into it with SCASM de-compiler,
    I havenīt seen anything related to panel instruments, so it is probably something managed by
    the CFS .exe file itself.

    For a VC, the .mdl file deals with model parts made by the modelling program, and doesnīt do
    any calls to gauges. It would perhaps seem strange that stock aircraft .mdl files were to be
    so different from add-on aircraft .mdl files.

    On the other hand, stock aircraft .mdl files have a different format which is not recognized by
    SCASM, so maybe the issue IS something to do with the .mdl file, but stock .mdl files seem to
    be a closed environment.

    I wonder...

    P.S.
    I just tried writing in a [Vcockpit01] paragraph into an add-on aircraft panel.cfg, and as
    was to be expected, it didnīt bring anything. Then, I tried deleting the texture line in the
    paragraph - for the Stock P47d, itīs: "texture=$P47d". This blocked out the view of all the
    VC gauges with individual boxes, so one is led to believe that this line makes transparent
    windows for the gauges. Then, how to define the texture lines that start off with the symbol $
    for the [Vcockpit01] paragraphs, is also a mystery.
    Strange things, the stock aircraft VCīs.

    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; August 31st, 2018 at 08:06.
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  15. #15
    Hello Folks,
    Itīs nearing completion - so here are some more pics.
    Several bleeds with the tailplane, fins and wires were solved by re-instating separate elevators and rudders,
    which in turn has
    allowed animating these control surfaces again, at no extra parts cost, as they are all
    structures here.

    I had to give the aileron animation a miss though - on the real airplane it was done with wing-warp! Like the
    Wright Brothers. Not so easy to do with AF99, Iīm afraid. Iīd thought about moving a large triangular slice on
    the end of the wing, but the parts arenīt free anyway.

    The model is now packed with 30 structures and 30 components, and parts count is at 149.7%, by rationalizing
    contstuction even further, and also checking some more vertices on all the struts and wires.

    Some bleeds are unavoidable because of the way the original is built, with some parts overlapping into others,
    and there just arenīt enough components or structures available to separate them all.

    Anyway, Iīm just working on the RoC. It should average 492 fpm upto 3200 ft, going down to 327 fpm upto
    6500 ft, and at the moment itīs at 535 fpm and 486 fpm, so I have to try and adjust the corresponding graph
    point here.
    Nevertheless, service and absolute ceilings are correct at 13100 and 14100 ft.

    Anyway, hopefully everything will be ship-shape for an upload soon, or rather airplane-shape, as soon as Iīve
    done the SCASMed VC-view, where I hope to include an extra rear-firing gun-view for TG2 add-on programme.
    This should be fun for more than one simmer!

    Hereīs a shot of the VCockpit too, zoomed out a bit, with a few bleeds corrected.

    Update - Engine control:
    Actually flying this aircraft is quite curious. Being a rotary engine, thereīs really no throttle, and once started, it
    revs up to full-power. For descent, slow-down and approach to landing, they did what was called "blipping", i.e.
    switching the magnetos on and off.

    Now, there being only single-engine magnetos available, which is visible on the panel for the simmerīs, the engine
    has to be "blipped" by pressing first the "M" and "-" keys simultaneously until
    the Magnetos are switched off, and
    then "M" and "+" to switch them on again. This has to be done several times
    on the approach path to reduce speed.

    I could of course make it easier and do it the conventional way as for normal engines so as not to make it a pain
    for simmers, but that would be cheating, wouldnīt it?

    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails VC.jpg   Caudron4-2.jpg   Caudron4-1.jpg  
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; August 31st, 2018 at 11:25.

  16. #16

    Performance issues

    Hello all,
    As usual, there was contradictory information on propeller diameter, depending on the drawings, ranging from 7 to 10 ft. Nothing was quoted on the pages about the aircraft, even less anything on pitch angles. I used 20 degrees and 10 ft to start off with, but then I found some vintage wooden propellers being sold, and exact details were given:

    The Caudron G.4 used 2.5 metre diameter, 1.9 metre pitch propellers, which translates to 98 inches and 19.14 pitch angle at 70% blade length.

    Interestingly enough, the single-engined Caudron G.3 had the same engine, but was slower. It used a 2.6 metre diameter, 1.8 metre pitch propeller, i.e. 102 inches diameter and 17.53 degrees pitch.

    Further work on the propellers, to reduce the excessive RoC I was getting on the previous ones, proved futile, as was to be expected, and revealed the usual dilema: Adusting for correct level flight performance at specified altitudes and ceiling, came at the price of excess RoC. Alternatively, adjusting for correct RoC and maintaining S.L. performance, came at the price of very poor altitude performance.

    The propellerīs advance ratios for the different specified speeds are so close together that speeds overlap, but as RPM are lower at altitude, it was possible to make adjustments to the Torque Graph, to separate the powers for lower RPM. This fortunately helped correct ceiling performance and RoC higher up.

    However, at low and mid altitudes, level flight RPM coincide with climbing RPM, so here it is either one or the other. I chose to go for correct level flight performance, leaving RoC a bit on the high side. The flight envelope is more correct this way, I think, and maintains the airplaneīs general reputation at the time for good performance, especially at altitude. Anyway, RoC is only about 40 pm in excess, which is not all that bad.

    Thus, performance results have come out quite well, I would say.

    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 1st, 2018 at 22:42. Reason: spacing
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  17. #17

    Model Performance

    Hello Folks,
    Here is some tangible data on real performance compared to model performance, also taking into account data variations between sources:

    Performance Specifications:
    ---------------------------
    Vmax:
    Sea Lev: 82 mph, 92 Hp, 1300 RPM
    6500 ft: 77 mph.

    Service Ceiling : 13100 ft.
    Absolute Ceiling: 14100 ft.

    Rate of Climb:
    Av. RoC from S.L. to 3280 ft: 492 fpm.
    Av. RoC from S.L. to 6500 ft: 437 fpm.

    Model performance:
    ------------------
    Level Flight:
    _300 ft : 82.0 mph, 92 Hp, 1300 RPM (J=0.672)
    6500 ft : 76.4 mph, 63 Hp, 1223 RPM (J=0.670)
    13000 ft: 66.3 mph, 39 Hp, 1084 RPM (J=0.656)

    RoC anywhere from 300 ft upto 8000 ft:
    - With Autopilot RoC set at 550 fpm: 535 fpm, (at 92 to 56 Hp, 73.7 to 57.7 mph, and 1230 RPM to 1038 RPM, depending on height).
    - With Autopilot RoC set at 500 fpm: 488 fpm, (at 92 to 53 Hp, 74.5 to 56.6 mph, and 1238 RPM to 1018 RPM, depending on height).
    Note: This is a bit high, but unavoidable if other performances are to be maintained.

    RoC at 13100 ft Ceiling: 130 fpm, at 57.5 mph, 35 Hp, 983 RPM.
    RoC at 14100 ft Ceiling: 33 fpm, at 61.9 mph, 31 Hp, 985 RPM.

    At the moment Iīm working on the Virtual Cockpit with SCASM, to put in the Gunnerīs view when the spoiler key is pressed, leaving the default view as the pilotīs normal position in the rear cockpit. Update: Iīve been at it with SCASM all afternoon, but itīs not working yet - I had it working on the Ju52īs though, which even had two extra views, so this one should be simpler with only one. Iīll get it in the end, though.

    Unfortunately, there will not be any working gauges.
    However, at least it will be fun with the TailGunner Add-on Program "TG2", the pilot and gunner can (hopefully) be made to fire their automatic hand-guns in all directions, by the simmer pointing with the mouse at the selected enemy plane in Cockpit Chase View.

    Iīll be uploading the model when I finish. As always, any suggestions, ideas and comments are welcome.
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 2nd, 2018 at 13:39.
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  18. #18

    Two VC views

    Hello all!
    I managed to get the two virtual cockpit views in for the different gun positions:
    One for the pilot and one for the fore-gunner. I also found a much better way to
    toggle between the two views.

    The Nav-light switch "L" does not interfere with anything. It is more convenient
    than selecting with the landing-gear and/or spoiler button.

    It took a while to figure out the different SCASM code required, but works well!

    Now I have to clean up the fore-gunner cockpit view, to correct the display order for
    the different elements seen from there, i.e. struts, wires, cabin-floor, engine cowls,
    pilotīs head, windshields, fuselage spars, tail, etc.


    Anyway, it is coming out very well indeed!
    The Pilotīs VC view appears to be perfectly fine, and requires no extra work.

    Here are 4 screenshots of the pilotīs view for eye-candy that I know some like very much!!
    I find biplanes always have exciting virtual cockpit views.

    P.S. It looks like I still have to fix the texture bitmap for the rear engine nacelles...
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails VCPilot-OK1.jpg   VC-Pilot-OK2.jpg   VC-Pilot-OK3.jpg   VC-Pilot-OK4.jpg  
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 4th, 2018 at 03:17.

  19. #19

    Spanner in the works

    Hello, Folks!
    The engine animation display isnīt satisfactory yet seen from the rear. Viewed from the front and from the sides,
    it is rather effective-looking,
    but from the rear, despite the good rotating engine animation, the cowl-panels disappear:
    Their inner-view
    is not possible as panels are insignia parts facing outwards - otherwise the engine animation wonīt display...

    A partial remedy with a "collection" outboard half-cowl component showing the inner cowling-half in rear view. The virtual cockpit view was
    also OK, but there
    were short bleeds in the cowlings tops seen from the front, so the remedy was worse than the ailment.

    However, parts-count was "only" 147.6 %, without AF99 compilation or SCASM problems, although the limit wasnīt far off.

    Eventually, I found an elegant solution: Closing
    the rear-cowling with dark-grey panels was a clean way of solving the problem,
    keeping a good engine animation seen from the front and lower-rear. Finally,
    closing the cowl-bottom with a panel displays everything correctly.
    Parts-count is lower, at 145.2%, and thereīs no AF99 compilation problems, but it gives an error loading into SCASM!!
    Backtracking, I also discovered that only slightly simplifying the previous well working, thereīs also a SCASM error!

    Thus, Iīll I have to back-track further, to a previous build, to implement my latest improvements that look better.
    It SHOULD be possible to get SCASM to accept the build!

    Update: Modifying an earlier, well-working model build with a some of the recent modifications, but not the latest ones,
    also causes a SCASM loading error, so Iīm closing in on the culprit.


    It will be a while yet...
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 9th, 2018 at 12:54. Reason: simplifying a little...
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  20. #20

    "Redo from Start"

    Hello all,
    Strange, SCASM rejecting the Caudron .mdl files.

    It happens with any of the new builds, except the one I was working on for the VC,
    as long as that one isnīt modified any further. Of course this is of no use, as I have
    to modify it anyway to improve the engine animation.

    All earlier progressive modifications are also rejected, and it seems like the only one
    that works in SCASM is the original FS98 build I started out with, which must be improved.

    I also thought perhaps some components that include wires with the struts were too
    complicated for SCASM,
    but taking all the wires out of them did not help either.

    So it looks like it is a matter of "Redo from start", like the option the old Fdisk program
    on the floppy had, when you were
    partitioning a HDD!

    No rest for the wicked!

    Afterthought:
    "Redo from start", i.e. modifying the original build with the necessary modifications
    will expectedly lead to the same result - i.e. SCASM error.
    Thus, this job will require modifying the modifications,
    to circumvent SCASM reluctance.

    Cheers,

    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 10th, 2018 at 07:58.
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  21. #21

    Basic Deficiency

    Hello Folks,
    Unfortunately there is some basic deficiency in the model, coming from my original FS98 build, whereby any modification is an obstacle for SCASM, seriously hampering any re-work on it. It will not even allow any simplification on the pilotsī head structures, for example, to free some parts needed elsewhere, which seems contradictory.

    Iīm sure it has to do with the 34 individual insignia panels needed by each engine cowling to display the rotating engine animation. This raises the complication level, and even though AF99 compiles, SCASM wonīt have it.

    I could of course build an uncowled Caudron G.4 that had 100 Hp Anzani radial engines, but this would take away whole reason for building this complicated sequiplane. Without the compensation of a decent rotary engine animation, the momentary bleeds between struts/wires and wing surfaces
    do away with any pleasure the model could supply.

    So, what I have achieved is sadly not up to the quality standard I was aiming for, and Iīll have to throw in the towel. Iīm terribly sorry to disappoint anyone who would have enjoyed having this model upgraded for CFS1.
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  22. #22
    Gee, I'm terribly sorry for you, doing so much work and then being blocked. Hope this will not stop you making future models. I can send you a handkerchief to dry your tears, but suppose that's not much of a help .

    By the way, did you see my post on the designing forum about the non-working VC gauges? Also no results.

    All the best,

    hertzie.

  23. #23
    Hello Hertzie,
    Yes, I saw your post about the non-working VC gauges on the designerīs thread.
    Probably, the reason for the lack of response, is the lack of available information.

    Thanks for the moral support! It doesnīt often happen that I have to give up on a
    model because of excessive complication. The last time it happened, was when I tried
    to upgrade my FS98 Caudron G.3 for CFS1.

    This was the single-engined observation sesquiplane that the G.4 was based on,
    and I couldnīt get the desired results for CFS1 either. I should have remembered that!
    It is technically a simpler build than the G.4 twin, but I forget why that one fell through.

    Well, Perhaps my next endeavour will be a new build. Upgrading old ones seems to be
    getting a bit heavy.
    We shall see...
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  24. #24

    Another possibility, another chance.

    Hello all,
    I was quite disappointed at the impossibility of supplying a properly SCASMed Le Rhône Rotary powered Caudron G.4 for reasons previously expressed, and that my other version, the FS98 Anzani Radial powered one, was a bit boring-looking, lacking the attractive feature of the animated rotary engine.

    The Anzani engines on my old model were made with the same 12-sided cross-section structures as the Rotaries, with an engine bitmap on them, but donīt turn and are un-cowled. A model with this kind of engine-build would (most probably) not be rejected by SCASM, but would look rather dull, and that was the reason for my reticence for the job.

    However, now I remember the very good-looking radial engines I built for the Stearman 45 series, with instruction from Ivan. They were made out of 2 components, with properly shaped cylinders and crank-case, in 7-cyl and 9-cyl versions.

    Here is a screenshot of my old Anzani-powered model with its
    bitmapped, circular structure engine, compared to the Stearman PT-13 with the component-built engine - also bitmapped.

    I find the properly built radial engine sufficiently attractive to warrant a try at a CFS1 upgrade of the Anazani powered Caudron G.4. Being un-cowled and not animated, it will most probably not present any modification problems.

    So, possibly, we WILL get a CFS1 Caudron G.4. This change in plans, at least for me, and probably also for some, is very pleasing indeed!

    P.S. It will be an interesting engine to build - 10 cylinders in two rows, so alternate cylinders are staggered, and thereīs a split exhaust ring. Letīs see how that comes through on the engine component.
    The performance increase due to the 20 Hp extra engine power thanks to the extra cylinder, although not documented in any sources, comes through in the simulator as an overall gain in speed of a little over 3 mph, which is interesting and probably to be expected.
    A large numbers of Le Rhône rotary powered Caudron G.4īs were re-engined with Anzani Radials, but how many, is unknown.

    Also, twelve Anzani-engined units were apparently licence-built in England in 1913, reportedly giving very good results.
    A 1913 article in "Illustrated War News" described it as an "immense improvement in the construction of British aircraft" and that "...it can climb very rapidly and attains high speed.".

    Anyway, letīs see if it comes out nicely!
    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Attached Thumbnails Attached Thumbnails Anzani Caudron.jpg   Anzani-10.jpg  
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 11th, 2018 at 04:24.
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

  25. #25

    Quite uncanny - no good either!

    Hello all,
    This is getting very uncanny and quite unnerving with the mods. SCASM still wonīt have it!

    Parts-count on the uncowled Anzani version during improvement work, as yet WITHOUT the engine components, has never been over 125% parts, and after fitting out the model with the gun and crew, I got the same unnerving SCASM error messages after Aircraft Animator had animated the model:

    -> Invalid BGL EOF Byte
    -> .MDL File format not recognized

    As before, although I hadnīt mentioned it yet, this happens with the animated model file.
    The non-animated model is accepted by SCASM, but thereīs no point in that, is there?


    Obviously it had nothing to do with the many cowl-panels on the other model, because this one hasnīt got any.
    Evidently it is something else, and it must be something that can be tracked down step by step during the modification work, but will involve tedious testing for SCASM errors at every step.

    Consequently, in theory at least, BOTH models should be possible - the rotary engined one and the radial-engined one with the planned new sophisticated engine components, unless SCASM has a personal grudge against twin-engined, strutted fuselage type sesquiplanes!!
    ... although SCASM does accept both of the original, unmodified FS98 animated .mdl files.
    I just want to improve them and put in a Lewis gun!!

    Well, this is not just a normal CFS1 upgrade of a FS98 model, but quite a challenging project, which MUST be possible!
    Anyway, I have no other interesting model to work on at the moment, so Iīll see if I can beat the darn thing, even if it takes a long time!

    Cheers,
    Aleatorylamp
    Last edited by aleatorylamp; September 11th, 2018 at 11:29.
    "Why make it simple if you can also make it complicated?"

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