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Lockheed Vega repaints

WOO-HOO is right! Thanks for the heads-up; will download when I get home from work! :ernae:
The Vega has always been one of my favorite early aircraft. Just imagine -- a civil design that was faster than anything the military had--kind of having a mach-3 learjet nowadays.
...only 7 hours to go...:kilroy:
 
Wow, another big package coming?? :jump:

Hey, Ed, I can see a few more parking spots for those Tri-Motors on the pad in your 3rd pic. :kilroy:
 
Detailed Masters

Hi Good Simmers,

Just a couple of shots to show the detail I have applied to the 2 Vega 5 aircraft - imagination used to create panel lines and markings but hopefully they blend in realistically enough.

These are being used for the foundation of the aircraft repaints displayed by Ed.

Has anyone noticed that some of the screenshots are taken by Ed with the background of a new scenery project that is being developed - it is going to be one of the best scenery packages created for this project. Some unique dedicated object models are being developed for the project by Sidney Schwartz - and the ones done so far are excellent stuff.

Anyway here is some pictures of the detail on these Vega girls.

View attachment 57108 View attachment 57109

Regards and I hope you all had a great Christmas and a good start to the New Year.
 
Oh I'm waiting on bated breath!
If you guys are looking for good Vega references I would recommend Richard Sanders Allen's 'Revolution in the Sky'. It's chock full of stuff on all the early wooden Lockheeds like the Vega, Air Express, Explorer, Sirius, Altair and Orion. Lots of pics too, albeit in black and white.
Also I would recommend changing the fuel section in the aircraft.cfg file to accurately represent the stock Vega's two 50-gallon tanks, one per wing:

Replace or comment out this part:
[fuel]
LeftMain = -6.2, -4.20, 2.7, 96.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)
RightMain = -6.2, 4.20, 2.7, 96.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)
Center1 = -6.2, 0.00, 2.7, 48.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)
Center2 = -7.9, 0.00,-2.0, 280.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)
Center3 = -7.9, 0.00,-2.0, 130.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)

...and replace with this:
[fuel]
LeftMain = -6.2, -4.20, 2.7, 50.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)
RightMain = -6.2, 4.20, 2.7, 50.0, 0.0 //Longitudinal (feet), Lateral (feet), Vertical (feet), Usable(gallons), Unusable (gallons)

A stock or nearly stock Vega carried passengers, mail, maybe hooch but usually didn't have those three huge fuel tanks. Taking out the extra fuel capacity will help the Vega handle much better at the expense of range.
Here's a shot of a repaint I did many moons ago, NC-405L, Ms Leeanna (named after my wife). Has the stock tanks and with a BMW 132 (German built version of a Pratt&Whitney Hornet) up front has a bit more kick than a normal Vega. Granted she doesn't go far on a tank of gas compared to a Wasp powered Vega but I can cruise at 190mph :D
 
I noted the "WWJ" on the vertical stab of the Detroit News Vega. Those were the call letters of the NBC TV affiliate in Detroit, and they used the same letters for their radio station as well. They used to be TV Channel 4 when I was a yout' in that town. AIR they had a controlling interest in the Detroit News, this explains a radio station's call letters on a newspaper's aircraft.
 
WWJ - good spot!

Yep, noted in the research of this aircraft. Good spotting Mate!!! Below is a bit from Wikipedia entry about WWJ 950 am:

"On August 20, 1920, The Detroit News started the station with the call sign 8MK, assigned to it by the United States Department of Commerce Bureau of Navigation, the government bureau responsible for radio regulation at the time.
8MK was initially licensed to Michael DeLisle Lyons, a teenager, and radio pioneer. He assembled the station in the Detroit News Building but the Scripps family asked him to register the station in his name, because they were worried this new technology might only be a fad, so they wanted to keep some distance.
Later that year, Michael and his brother Frank, also assembled the first radio in a police car in Toledo, Ohio (with Ed Clark who started WJR 760 AM in Detroit). They captured a prowler using the radio, and the story captured headlines across the country. RCA got the contract to install radios in police cars across the country.
The Scripps family were also worried radio might replace newspapers if radio caught on, so they financially supported Michael. In fact, most early radio stations were built, for the same reason, by families who owned newspapers . . . out of fear that radio would put them out of business (After all, why buy a paper if you could turn a knob and hear the news?) Michael DeLisle Lyons descended from Francois Bienvenu DeLisle, who served as Cadillac's lieutenant on the founding voyage of Detroit. Francois was also Detroit's first tavernkeeper.
The 8 in the call sign means the station is located in the 8th Radio Inspection District, while the M in the call sign means the station operated under an amateur license.[SUP][4][/SUP] It is not clear why the Detroit News applied for an amateur license instead of an experimental license. As an amateur station, it broadcast at 200 meters (the equivalent of 1500 kHz).
On October 13, 1921 the station was granted a limited commercial license and was assigned the call letters WBL. With the new license, the station began broadcasting at 360 meters (833 kHz), with weather reports and other government reports broadcast at 485 meters (619 kHz).[SUP][5][/SUP]
On March 3, 1922, for reasons that are not known, the call letters, WWJ, were assigned to the station. Some believe the new call letters are an abbreviation for stockholders William and John Scripps, but on page 82 of a book published by the Detroit News in 1922, WWJ-The Detroit News, the station writers write "WWJ is not the initials of any name. It is a symbol. It was issued to the Detroit News by the government in connection with the licensing of this broadcasting plant."[SUP][6][/SUP]
In 1923, the Commerce Department realized that as more and more stations were applying for commercial licenses, it was not practical to have every station broadcast on the same two wavelengths. It was decided to set aside 81 frequencies, in 10 kHz steps, from 550 kHz to 1350 kHz, and each station would be assigned one frequency, no longer having to broadcast weather and government reports on a different frequency than entertainment. As a result, WWJ was moved to 517 meters (580 kHz). It was later re-assigned, during a re-alignment of stations by the new Federal Radio Commission in 1927-28, to fulltime operation on 920 kHz, and allowed to increase its power in stages, reaching 5,000 watts by the late 1930s."

Thanks to Wikipedia for the info.

Ed
 
And thank you for the information! I listened to both of those stations when I lived in Detroit. WJR billed themselves as "The Great Voice of the Great Lakes - from the golden tower of the Fisher Building." WJR was a music and entertainment station when I knew it in the 60s and 70s - they had an excellent program broadcast daily called "Kaleidoscope," whose host was Mike Whorf. Very entertaining listening that called heavily on your imagination. J.P. McCarthy, now deceased, did the music and chat in the afternoons. WJR is now entirely talk radio. WWJ went that route back in the 60s and never turned back.
 
I have a request of the community, related to this thread and don't want to start a new one - technical difficulty: what is Garry Smith's email address? I went to Garry@gjsmith.net and my email refuses to "send." I am using Yahoo.
 
Hi Mate,

We have not forgotten the Vega's - several of them done and in the kitty. However, we have been furiously working on a Scenery Project - the Ford Factory Airport circa 1930's.

The scenery will be released tomorrow so we can then get back to the Vega's and some more Flamingo's as well as bucket of AI Fords still to be done.

Regards
 
So I downloaded the Ford factory and.....

... let me just say WOW (i was going to say HOLY $%&@* ).....This is something you need a fast aircraft to see the big picture, a slow aircraft to really appreciate the detail, and a car to really explore the nooks and crannies. Garry, this is a real work of art. Thank You Gary and Ed!....
:applause::applause:
 
For those who haven't caught them yet...

Garry has released some of the Vegas. The 2 I've played with so far (USAAF and RAAF) are gorgeous! Thanks Garry and Ed! :guinness:

I love it when someone gives a model a great makeover livery.

He's still adding liveries, he added Bush Flying within the last day or 2.

http://www.ford-tri-motor.net/lockheed-vega.htm
 
Good news for all those dark side folks:applause: Garry's new project for the Vega prompted me to see how she would port over to fsX. The result was awesome!! Even the prop is useable as is. The only bit that acts up is when Garry adds extra windows to a few of the models. The result is a highly reflective glass set. Since there is no separate glass bmp, ya have to live with it. Not a bad price to pay for such a cool plane.

I did swap out the default sounds for Nigel's incredible new Avia 56 set and added Milton's massive start-up effect from his "Stoof" series. Talk about air pollution:icon_eek:

Now there is a Vegamite of historical note flying around, adding yet another great touch of realism to the orbX version of the "Land Down Under.":cowboy:
 
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