SOH P-61 project

[warchild]

I think the big difference between us and a payware site, isnt that we're doing freeware.. Youve got a team of world class people building this thing who have all done payware before. The difference is that Payware products for much part are driven by a time schedule and the dollar bill. We're driven by achieving a level of excellence above anything we've each done before. Our tools arent the newest (whos got 5 grand for max?/ ) and the data has been hard coming and thinly populated.. After several months non stop full on drive though, it can get a little hard to do without a vacation. The most discouraging thing though is for myself at least, knowing that when its done, the very best i can say is that i believe its right or as close as it can get without it being a real plane. I "think" we will have it there, but, no one knows for sure.. That can be a bit demoralizing.

[HvyEng]

<TABLE id=wn><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top>Noun</TD><TD vAlign=top>1.</TD><TD>labor of love - productive work performed voluntarily without material reward or compensation labour of love
project, task, undertaking, labor - any piece of work that is undertaken or attempted; "he prepared for great undertakings"
See also :SOH P-61 Project

© 2003-2008 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

[stansdds]

I think the big difference between us and a payware site, isnt that we're doing freeware.. Youve got a team of world class people building this thing who have all done payware before. The difference is that Payware products for much part are driven by a time schedule and the dollar bill. We're driven by achieving a level of excellence above anything we've each done before. Our tools arent the newest (whos got 5 grand for max?/ ) and the data has been hard coming and thinly populated.. After several months non stop full on drive though, it can get a little hard to do without a vacation. The most discouraging thing though is for myself at least, knowing that when its done, the very best i can say is that i believe its right or as close as it can get without it being a real plane. I "think" we will have it there, but, no one knows for sure.. That can be a bit demoralizing.

Yes, it can be demoralizing, but by doing it to the best of your abilities, using the data that is available, and creating what is the closest to the real thing that you can does have the reward of knowing that you did your best.

And sometimes it helps to shove it aside, have a drink or two, relax and pick it up again after a few days.

[N2056]

That is exactly why I took a break. I tend to have a few projects working that I bounce between for that very reason!

[Walter]

I have never fully appriciated all of the work that is put into a FSX plane until now. I have just gotten Gmax, and now I understand (sort of) what the FSX plane makers feel. I am very much confused with all of the different things one can make on Gmax.

Thank you all for your amazing work and thank you for making my personal favorite night fighter, the P-61.

Thank you for your effort and amazing skill!

Walter

[peter12213]

you've just gotta love the P-61, at first i was unsure of the thing, then i started reading about her... she's a wolf in sheeps clothing, looks good and then you find the 'Teeth' and its capabilities... don't know why but i love this image of her in particular perhaps it's all those twin-booms.....

I'm still not sold on this mate, not the model or efforts I mean the aircraft, to me it wasn' anything special, I mean it shot down Betty's and zero's at night, our Mossies and Beaufighters did the same and more and they could tangle with the best, as much as I have researched about this it never really did anything spectacular except being an aircraft and shape that many fans loved and many a pilot hated, apart from that it wasn't special at all! Still can't wait for the finished product though!

[warchild]

::chuckles:: Welll,, her night time escapades were only part of the story. Albeit the most widely known part, but still only part.. See, the P-61 came into the war so late that there really wasnt a whole lot of night time activity to persue, so they started using her in other roles.. We were all kind of surprised when we saw her record for dogfighting fw-190s and turning circles ( litterally ) around any other plane in the air. But the biggest surprise was in her work as an intruder, still flown mostly at night I might add.. With her guns alone she carried a third more destructive power than todays A-10, but she could turn tighter, approach at ungodly slow speeds and then just hit the throttle and was gone. The R/O of Jing Bow Joy Ride reported in his memours of the night he and his pilot went up over china and cut a trains engine in half with her guns. She couldnt climb fast, but with her weight, she could out dive anything and with those big wings and full flaps, she could out turn anything as well.. Two out of three isnt bad in a dog fight, though it still puts her squarely in with the other average fighters. Topping that, she could carry a pretty decent bomb load of either HE or Incendiary bombs. One thing to keep in mind also, was that top turret. It rotated 360 degrees. But this was a fighter. It didnt fly straight and level.. it maneuvered, and a decent gunner could work on taking out the planes to either side or behind them, at the same time the pilot was maneuvering for a kill. Certainly it wouldnt have been easy, but the potential was there.. She was basically just a Jill of all trades and a master of none, but what she did she did like no other aircraft ever could. I'm sorry Pete.. She was put head to head with a Mossy, and she made it look silly. No disrespect to the mossy or her crews. they did an incredible job together, And the mossy did a great many things. She was like the swiss army knife of the british air force. and she did all those jobs very well with the exception of night time operations, and that was all the fault of the radar, and not the plane or the crews.. When put up against a machine whos design is totally dedicated to one job, of course the mossy is gonna be lacking. it wasnt an even competition. The difference is, the Mossy was a bomber, the widow was a fighter.. And for something that was only in the war for one year, the widow did pretty good for herself..
After the war, the P-61 went on to become a few other things. She had already become the nations first all weather fighter, and she would become the worlds first weather plane, flying into thunderstorms on purpose. Later she would become the first american plane to launch what would become todays cruise missiles, and she was invaluable in testing out ejection seats as well..
The biggest thing about her though, was that she could be flown by a trainee. She was so well behaved and docile that anyone could fly her and pretty much be guaranteed a safe return home, and yet, she could go one on one with a butcher bird and survive.
Now, I wont try and sell you on this plane, but frankly, its my opinion that anyone who doesnt try it out is pretty silly if they like aircraft.. I and Paul Frimston will make it fly right, Rob has the modeling down to a science, Jankees is heading up the paint team, razbam is doing weapons effects, and Gunter is doing the special systems to model the throttle properly. We have a great team, and i know we can get the plane extremely accurate..

Pam

[dharris]

With a staff like you have, if this is not payware quality, I will be very surprised! Great crew and a great effort, hope to fly her before I get to old to find the joystick! Thank you for this and all the information, I did not know how much she did, Don

[warchild]

:chuckles:: i hope you get to fly her before I turn too old to read whats on the screen ::lol::... With the release of Roberts Thorp eminent we're ramping up to go full bore back into the widow and move her along.
As to quality, Its done in GMax, and Robert has been pushing that program to the very edges of its limitations ( read, she looks really really good ). The glass is perfect and the care with which he crafts each individual part is simply phenomenal. The flight dynamics are being done by myself and Paul Frimston. Over the years, we've brought you the Vulcam B-2, the Iris F-14, the Iris A-10, the OzX Grumman Goose Redux, and the Razbam A-7s. Compared to the effort we're putting into this plane, those planes are merely stepping stones: lessons along a learning curve. Our very own PRB has volunteered to do the technical writing. Its no small fear as the plane will mimic the data and most of the procedures in the real manual ( which just happens to be copyrighted ). Its a huge job as this is a very complex aircraft. Another SOH member, Jankees, volunteered to head up the paint team. Gunter from RealEngine is working on the systems needed to control water injection and throttle, and Razbam has volunteered to do the coding for the special effects on the canon and machine guns.. Oddly, we still font have a sound set. I gaurantee that it will be the absolute very best aircraft that I have ever been associated with.
Pam

[warchild]

Pete.. As i write this, I am looking at a photo of my uncle Art standing next to the plane he flew when he trained pilots at the beginning of the war. Its a PT-17. A wholely unremarkable plane, but it did a very important job. Likewise, all planes that were in the war did an amazing job. In truth, its not about the planes at all, but rather, the crews who flew them No one plane was really any more remarkable than the next, It was the men inside that were remarkable.. Its true, many pilots hated the P-61. It wasnt small and sexy like a mustang, and being assigned to a P-61 crew pretty much ended any fantasy that you could have about being the lone knight in the sky. You worked as a member of a team. Then too, the Widow was huge. 7000 pounds heavier than a B-25. Unless you were one of the lucky ones to get a "training" flight by Northrops chief pilot, you were most likely to think you got stuck with a real turkey, and flew it that way. There was even one report of a pilot who took off on his patrol mission and while still in radar range, dropped his bombs in the jungle and just flew around till the end of his shift.. For every Chuck Yeager there were a thousand george whatever there names were.. Mjr Bong flew one while visiting the 453rd NFS and loved it. Of course, he himself flew another airplane everyone hated, The P-38. He also became america's top Ace of the war with 48 kills in that P-38. His best friend in another P-38 died at 47 kills. They had a competition going you see and he never really got over that.. But you see, its never the plane. Never ever the plane. it's always down to the person behind the stick and if he knows how to fly it or not. Most pilots looked at this monster and figured she couldnt do squat except get them killed. Self fulfilling prophesies..
Now, I dont mean to imply anything by this, but, I believe the MOD made some type of statement after the war to the effect that if their night missions could get a bomb within five miles of the target, they were having a pretty good night ( or something like that ). The P-61 flew in all types of weather, in the dark, and except for a few idiots like the one i mentioned above, performed pin point attacks on anything it decided was a target. Of course, She had an advanced version of the same radar used in the Mossie. And i think that explains a lot. If the Mossie crews had the same radar, they could have done anything including miracles. In the end though, really, she was just a plane. A piece of metal with skin stretched over it, two engines, a few guns, a bomb mount or three and some place where the crew could park their butts as they handed over their lives to fate. No different than any other aircraft in the war. But because of her, we now have all weather fighters capable of carrying out a mission under any circumstance. Because of her, we have aircraft that can fly into the face of a hurricane, and deliver instrumentation and do research and save lives. Because of her, when little johnny punches out at altitude, he CAN punch out and arrive on the ground safely, and because of her, and another incredible aircraft known as the A-26K we now have dedicated ground attack aircraft like the A-10 and the jaguar. She may not have been all that incredible within her humble little self, but my gods the legacy she left behind.
As for my uncle?? He didnt make it. He and his plane are somewhere off the Irish coast to this day. It was a c-47. Another unremarkable, but incredible plane.
Pam

[rvn817j]

Happy belated birthday Pam.....yesterday?

I saw a P-61 at Dulles Air and Space Museum last week...what an awesome machine.

My donation is ready. Thanks.

[warchild]

Thanks Jay. you know we're gonna do our very best..

Ya know, its funny. We have general sport aircraft, we have aerobatic aircraft, bush flying aircraft, transport and cargo aircraft, all kinds.. Then we have this other kind of aircraft thats harder to define.. we call them warbirds, fighters, bombers, you name it, but that still doesnt really fit. The P-51 was like a knight in shining armour. Its even shaped like a lance. an incredible defender like the Spit, another incredible defender. Then we have tha bad boys on the block; the beaufighter, the P-47, the ground attack aircraft that could rock and roll their way into anything and deliver their payload and be gone. And then we have this other group. The predators. The big cats. There again we have the Beaufighter, and the mossy, and hornet, the B-25 mitchell, The A-26, and of course the P-61 and the Owl.
TWA boight a B-17 after the war and turned it into a VIP transport, so most bombers get lumped into transport aircraft. Most fighters easily transitioned to being sport/aerobatic aircraft; your P-51s, the P-40s, and Jugs. But the predators dont transition so easily. Maybe its because their job wa a dirty one. Take the war too the enemy, and squish it. These were Nasty planes ( and i say that with a great deal of love and admiration ). Like tigers and panthers and lions in the war, they would go out every day and night, and shred anything they ran in too. Imagine how the pilot of a FW or a 109 felt when half way through a turning fight that big black widow simply rotated her turret, raised her guns and drew a bead on him. The 109 or FW can only shoot straight ahead, but heres this plane that can shoot almost at any angle. You roll and dive to get away from those quad fifties, but the P-61 just rolls over and brings that turret back around. Unless providence really loves you, your dead meat. You tangled with a big cat, and your little more than a mouse to it.. These planes dont transition so well to post war aviation. They're big and scary and they remind us of our most darkest selves. The P-61, the Mossy, and the Owl. I think the Brits have the best take on it. They honor their own irregardless of the job. We americans sometimes want to deny how vicious we can be. So we bury the past and couch it in roses and hyacinths making it look and smell pretty. Everyone remembers Enola Gay, but how many remember Bachs Car? The widow, like Bachs Car is part of the darker underbelly of the war. Pure predator, Pure killer, and she does so with a grace that could make a prima ballerina blush. She doesnt translate to general aviation very well. She never will.. Like the mythological king of the skies, shes a dragon, and to ride the dragon, you really have to think like one. Biggles would have liked this plane.

[peter12213]

Thanks Pam, as always your knowledge and stories are extremely interesting, I think it's just my personal lack of knowledge on this particular aircraft and also the lack of reference materials I have also, but as always Reading your comments has set me straight, looking forward to the final release!

[warchild]

Hey, its mutual ya know.. you help keep me straight and level too by bringing in an understanding that sometimes i havent previously had ...
Pam

[hairyspin]

...The P-51 was like a knight in shining armour. Its even shaped like a lance. an incredible defender like the Spit, another incredible defender....

No offence Pam, but although the Spit was an exceptional defensive fighter, the P-51 wasn't - it was an exceptional offensive fighter. Tasked with the defence of the B-17s and B-24s on daylight raids over Europe, they found the best defense to be taking the fight to the enemy so would range far and wide ahead of the bombers, taking out fighters on the ground or just after takeoff from their airfields - with all the advantages of speed, height and position.

Rant over. I'm enjoying watching this project take shape, more power to your elbows!