Martin Marauder Gold for FS9 has been released

[Milton Shupe]

My thanks to Milton, et al., for yet another magnificent contribution to the fs9 community. I know this question has undoubtedly come up before, but I am unsure of the ground steering on the Marauder. Is it done with just the brake pedals? It appears that the nose wheel is fixed, but I recall seeing screenshots with the nose wheel turned, so it got me wondering if there is a switchable lock on the steering. Changing the values in the aircraft config file does not seem to alter the nose gear movement.

On a more general question, there are apparently A-26's and B-26's; and Milton has beautifully modeled both. They look to be completely different aircraft, yet the nomenclature overlaps considerably. The A and B designations indicate "attack" and 'bomber" functionality, but how much overlap is there between these aircraft and why did they not just have have completely separate designations?

Nose gear is set up to be castoring as with the RW models, and steering was but engine differentiation and brakes when required.

If you do not have pedals or a separate throttlle quadrant, you can change the aircraft.cfg contact point.0 as follows:

From this:
point.0= 1, 17.091, 0.000, -8.284, 1800, 0, 1.375, 180.00, 0.393, 2.500, 0.900, 5.000, 6.000, 0, 150.3, 236.4 // castoring
To this:
point.0= 1, 17.091, 0.000, -8.284, 1800, 0, 1.375, 040.00, 0.393, 2.500, 0.900, 5.000, 6.000, 0, 150.3, 236.4 // will allow steering with rudder inputs

As for the model types. I have modeled likenesses of the B/C-5 to the -55 and very loosely, the JM as seen in the attachment.

As to the A-26B/C Invader versus the B-26 Marauder, completely different aircraft. The A-26 was developed later and after the Marauder was discontinued, the A-26 with time and role modifications, used the B26 nomenclature.

 

[vonernsk]

Magnificent marauders

Thank you Milton and all who assisted in this project. Your efforts have been assiduous and the results remarkable. This a/c has always been a favourite of mine. It looks good from almost any angle and it certainly carried its share of the work-load for the US war effort.
Thanks again to all of you great master modellers, painstaking painters, decibel demons and, of course, the flight and instrument programmers who bring it all to amazing life on our screens.

When the load seemed un-bearable, Milton and co just doubled up and started on the FSX version - more than doubling the appreciation of all parts of the Flight Sim world.

Respect!

Mal

 

[downwind]

Got it. All is well now. Thanks.

 

[Mick]

...On a more general question, there are apparently A-26's and B-26's; and Milton has beautifully modeled both. They look to be completely different aircraft, yet the nomenclature overlaps considerably. The A and B designations indicate "attack" and 'bomber" functionality, but how much overlap is there between these aircraft and why did they not just have have completely separate designations?

Well, they DID have completely separate designations - when they were both in service. The Martin B-26 was developed as a medium bomber and retained that role and designation throughout its service life with the Army. (The Navy called it the JM, but that's a different story.)

The Douglas A-26 was developed as an attack aircraft and designated accordingly. (The Navy called it the JD, but again, that's a different story.) It was said that the capability of the A-26 brought attack aviation into the bombardment realm, as it had the performance and warload of a medium bomber (though it retained the single pilot of an attack plane.)

After WW2 the Marauders were all quickly scrapped, as the Army (not yet the Air Force) didn't need three medium (now considered light) bombers. They kept the B-25 as a trainer and utility transport, the A-26 Invader as their light bomber, and the B-26 Marauder went to the smelters.

A few years later, when the Army Air Force morphed into the U.S. Air Force, the service reworked its designation scheme. Among other changes, the A for attack category was discontinued and the A-26 became the B-26. There was no conflict with the Martin plane because all the Marauders were long gone by then.

So the Invader was the A-26 through WW2 and briefly afterwards, but became the B-26 by the time of the Korean conflict, where it served with distinction. A decade or so later the Air Force revived the A for attack category and the B-26 became the A-26 again. I'm not sure exactly when it became the A-26 again, but it served with the Air Force in Vietnam under that designation. It may have still been called the B-26 early in the Vietnam era, but it definitely retired from that conflict as the A-26. (It also served around the world with the CIA through the fifties and sixties under one or the other designation at various times.)

It's only confusing when history is jumbled together in hindsight. At any given time there was never more than one plane called the B-26, and in any time period those concerned always knew what plane was meant by the B-26 designation.

 

[HorusJ]

I'm loving it! Thank yous too all involved! Ferondoe and Wellis,great job on those interiors!

 

[Hurricane91]

The FS9 Beta v1.3 for the B-26 Marauder has been posted.

Thank you Milton for the hard work building and putting this project together. The interior painting by
Ferondoe and Wellis is superb. I especially like how the vc01_L.bmp is designed to allow night lighting
for any gauge layout without having to modify the vc01_L bitmap.

Another nice touch is the pod/nopods model options. These, along with the JM model, allow for a wide
number of Marauder versions, including Mick's excellent early B-26 paints.

Thanks again to the entire crew.

 

[vonernsk]

Stbd prop goes solid disc at night with ll or taxi lts

Hi Milton,

Have been filing my boots flying your B-26 Marauder. Have moved on to night operations and have noticed a small visual glitch.

At dusk or full night, when using Landing or Taxi lights, and when viewed from outside the a/c in the angle extending appx 45 degrees forward and out from the a/c's engines in the horizontal plane and covering an arc to the rear of the a/c from the Starboard to the Port engine (or vice versa), the Starboard prop disc only becomes solid. When the a/c is viewed in the frontal arc inside the 45 degree limits between the engines, all is OK.

Have tested this with spinprop textures from other four bladed prop a/c and get the same result.

It may be that this is just my graphics set up. Has anyone else noticed this minor glitch.

Hate to be a 'rivet counter' - but with such a riveting machine . . .

Mal

 

[Milton Shupe]

Hi Milton,

Have been filing my boots flying your B-26 Marauder. Have moved on to night operations and have noticed a small visual glitch.

At dusk or full night, when using Landing or Taxi lights, and when viewed from outside the a/c in the angle extending appx 45 degrees forward and out from the a/c's engines in the horizontal plane and covering an arc to the rear of the a/c from the Starboard to the Port engine (or vice versa), the Starboard prop disc only becomes solid. When the a/c is viewed in the frontal arc inside the 45 degree limits between the engines, all is OK.

Have tested this with spinprop textures from other four bladed prop a/c and get the same result.

It may be that this is just my graphics set up. Has anyone else noticed this minor glitch.

Hate to be a 'rivet counter' - but with such a riveting machine . . .

Mal

Hello Mal

I have not been able to duplicate your issue with any combination of taxi and/or landing lights at night from any direction in spot view, tower view, or cockpit view. I also moved the aircraft around to see if certain scenery objects would cause the anomaly but could not. I do quite a bit of testing at night to set landing/taxi, nav/recog, interior, and cockpit lighting and have never seen any issues with the prop mesh.

You might try a different location to test your situation. Are you running default scenery at you test location?

Can you post a screen shot please?

 

[vonernsk]

SSD

Milton,

You were right! I was at Glasgow airport in Scotland using 'UK 2000' scenery for that airport done by Garry Summons. When I shifted to Carlisle with standard FS2004 scenery, the issue of the solid Stbd prop disc disappeared.

Would have liked to have sent you a screenie of the issue but have no idea of even where to start.

Anyway, another little quirk resolved.

Thanks for your reply and, as ever, your magnificent models.

Mal

 

[Milton Shupe]

I have not received any trouble reports or issues with the Beta version since release.
If anyone is sitting on issues, ignoring them, whatever, you need to speak now or forever hold your peace.

I have made some updates, fixed a few things since beta release, added the fuel tank gauge, etc.

I will likely go "Gold" with the FS9 version next week sometime.

 

[HorusJ]

If anyone is sitting on issues, ignoring them, whatever, you need to speak now or forever hold your peace.

I'm no expert but I haven't found any problems.Enjoying it very much!
Of all your fine works Milton this one is my favorite! Its a beast and I love it!

Joel

 

[adiazcay]

JM model

I will likely go "Gold" with the FS9 version next week sometime.

Hello, Milton and team

Will you release also a JM version in which the yoke can be hidden, as in the last models of B/C?

Regards

 

[adiazcay]

Of all your fine works Milton this one is my favorite! Its a beast and I love it!

Joel

+1

 

[Milton Shupe]

Hello, Milton and team

Will you release also a JM version in which the yoke can be hidden, as in the last models of B/C?

Regards

Yes, of course. That change has already been made.

 

[adiazcay]

Problem with interiors?

Hello, Milton

One thing i've noticed: the walls of the cockpit show at a lower resolution that other elements (for example, the radio-navigator place or the first aid box). Is nothing showstopper, but I can not understand this difference, having in account that the texture file has no mipmaps...

Here is a screenshot. Regards.

 

[Milton Shupe]

Hello, Milton

One thing i've noticed: the walls of the cockpit show at a lower resolution that other elements (for example, the radio-navigator place or the first aid box). Is nothing showstopper, but I can not understand this difference, having in account that the texture file has no mipmaps...

Here is a screenshot. Regards.

Thanks for the comment.

The interior cockpit, fuseinnermid and fuseinnerrear bmps are all the same resolution. Looking back to the mid section appears better because you are viewing from a distance.

I mapped all the interior on the same scale. Unfortunately in FS9, we are limited to 1024X1024 bmps.
In FSX, they look a lot better as we are using much larger textures.

We do not use mipmaps for the interior textures as you are never far enough away for them to kick in. Even so, at 1024 as your largest, there would be no improvement that I know of.

With that said, I have never tried using a 4096 or 2048 with mips in FS9 although I know without mips, they will crash the sim.

 

[Desert Rat]

With that said, I have never tried using a 4096 or 2048 with mips in FS9 although I know without mips, they will crash the sim.

IIRC, they will load the mip from a 2048 or larger bmp at 1024 anyway, so the larger file size and larger mips are superfluous.

 

[Milton Shupe]

Someone way back in the thread here or FSX asked for variants with no gun pods and one gun pod.

Interestingly, there have been no paints for these variants.

EDIT: I found teh request in teh FSX original thread.

But, if anyone has paint schemes for the No pods, or 1 pod versions, and would like to share a couple for the Gold release, that would be nice.

 

[Mick]

Someone way back in the thread here or FSX asked for variants with no gun pods and one gun pod.
Interestingly, there have been no paints for these variants.
...But, if anyone has paint schemes for the No pods, or 1 pod versions, and would like to share a couple for the Gold release, that would be nice.

Well, my skins for the early planes are appropriate for no gun pods. I'm thinking of the pre-war and early 1942 skins. You're more than welcome to include any of them, but alas, they are completely appropriate for the model, which depicts a later version of the plane with all those differences, some rather noticeable to sharp-eyed Marauder aficionados.

For my own copy, I used the no pods model for all the early skins and the podded models for the later ones. In some cases I was able to determine from reference photo whether to use one or two pods, but in many cases it was difficult or impossible to tell, since the nacelles tend to obscure the pods in side views, which are often the only views of a particular plane. It's especially hard to tell if there's one pod or two.

It's tempting to make a general rule, something like B-26, B-26A no pods; B-26C one pod; B-26F and G two pods, or something like that, but I don't think it was that systematic. I suspect that planes built without pods got them later as field mods, and perhaps some planes built with them may have lost them, since the Marauder was seldom used for the kind of low level work where they would've been most useful. Lots of uncertainty there!

My later skins depict Marauder versions more appropriate for the model, but my assignment of the pods to those skins is largely guesswork.

Except for the very earliest ones, what I have on my Marauder variants is largely guesswork. But I sure like 'em anyway!

 

[HorusJ]

I have been flying around in the "no pods" bird with your(Mick's)skins.This is my favorite one.
Milton?Could you please consider including it in the final release?No problem if you don't,I'll just add it later.

Joel