New Gotha bombers series thread

[Captain Kurt]

Just so you know, you can have 21 hard points to attach weapons, guns and figures. If you make the bomb racks a single bgl it would only take one hard point. I guess you would have to count up the number of other items you are attaching to tell if you had that one dp hard point left.

 

[Ravenna]

Hi Aleatorylamp,
A good idea to add bomb grapples into the model. The only problem that I can see is that bomb racks/ grapples under the nose would require bombs with a slightly "nose up" attitude, and John Fortin's WW1 bombs are in a horizontal plane. The other option for a Gotha IV is to put bomb racks under the wings just out from the fuselage. For the Gotha G.II I have no information regarding different bomb configurations, but the bomb load was much less than the G.IV so the existing DP would do with fewer or smaller bombs.
The existing DP has places for 3 crew members, 2 Parabellum MGs, 6 bomb racks and 6 bombs. With extra places for one outer double rack under each wing and the 4 bombs to hang from them that bumps the total up to 23, so it would be possible. I seem to remember that the upper limit for DP hardpoints is 27, but I could be wrong on that score.
BTW, your G.II looks very good. I still have to look at the format for the BMPs you sent me. For some reason the sim is recognising the AF files but not the BMPs, even though I ran the mdl file throughTEX512.
Cheers,
Ravenna

 

[Ravenna]

Erk! Just saw your last post Captain Kurt. I'll have to revise my plans. with only 21 hardpoints the idea of racks in the model looks even better.

 

[aleatorylamp]

Hello Ravenna, Hello Folks,
I have an idea for the grapples, which I´m going to try out later today. To save on parts, frames are built with 4 slanted oblongs so that they don´t need a horizontal AND a vertical part for each side, but only one per side.

The grapples could be merged into the front and rear oblongs without increasing parts count, so that the shape includes a half-moon to hold the bomb. That way I could have enough free parts for the wing-root racks. First, for a pair of bombs on each side = 10bombs in total as perhaps 3 per side (12 bombs in total) would exceed DP capacity...

I´ll post a WIP model as soon as they are on.

I haven´t seen external bombs on any of the Gotha G.II photos, so they must only have used the internal bomb-bay.
Moreover, I think I remember reading somewhere that this bay held 12 small bombs (12 x 55 lb = 660 lb) or 6 larger ones (6 x 110 lb = 660 lb). So I would leave the G.II without racks.

As for the moment the bombs are all horizontal, for the moment I´ll leave the front frames where they are.
I have to checkout the link Capt. Kurt sent, to see if I can handle building weapons with my existing setup meanwhile.
If it doesn´t work, I´ll make myself some bomb template shapes to get the rack spacing and size right.

The textures: I believe there could be a limitation here, at least for the moment. Perhaps the best idea is to go on the safe side, and only use .xaf textures which are applied via AF99. Any .bmp textures only seem to cause confusion, I´m afraid.

So, lead on, Mac Duff!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[Ravenna]

Aleatorylamp,
I have BMP textures for two of your Gotha G.IV models. I tried the conversion for your recent G.II model but even after TEX512 and reformatting the BMPs they failed to show up in the sim. Perhaps it is a problem of size. I'll look at this tomorrow, right after my PC gets serviced (my keyboard went west and my monitor is giving me strange colours.)
BTW, CFS2 can handle up to 26 hardpoints.

 

[Roxane-21]

The maximum amount of available hardpoints is 24 (not 21), numbered from "mount.0" to "mount.23".

 

[Captain Kurt]

The maximum amount of available hardpoints is 24 (not 21), numbered from "mount.0" to "mount.23".

You are right Roxane. I mis-typed. 24 is correct.

 

[aleatorylamp]

Hello Roxanne21,

Well, with that number of hard points there whould be no problem with populating the Gotha G.IV in a decent way.
Thanks again for your comments on the Caudron´s gunmount. The build went rather well.
I just uploaded the machine last night, and it´s doing very nicely!

Hello Ravenna,

I managed, quite surprisingly, to put in 3 pairs of bomb racks on the fuselage bottom, plus 1 more pair under each
inner-wing. That should make it possible to carry 10 bombs, plus a few smaller ones in the inner bomb-bay.

Attached, are some new upgrade test files for the G.II and G.IV:

Gotha G.II:
The front windows no longer suffer from bleeds across their curved edges, and the gunner ring has the proper light
grey colouring instead of tan, as can be seen on the 4th screenshot

Gotha G.IV:
This is the first test version, to experiment with 10 bomb racks: 6 under-fuselage ones, and 4 under-wing ones.
Surprisingly AF99 still compiles - maybe we can even get 3 under each inner-wing!! But for the moment, let´s see
if these are what you were wanting or expecting.
The first two screenshots show the bomb racks. The 3rd one gives a more general aspect.

Please note that the textures are simple ones - for the moment I am concentrating on texture-srpead and model-build,
not yet on texture quality.

As before, apart from the .Xaf textures that AF99 normally uses, I have included textures in 256-colour .bmp format,
naming them the same, but just adding an extra .bmp suffix.
So: GothaIV.7af is the normal texture, and GothaIV.7af.bmp is the bitmap version.

Do let me know of any other glitches or suggestions.
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[Ravenna]

Hi Stephan,
Your renaming for the BMPs should read this way: GothaIV7.bmp, rather than GothaIV.7AF.bmp. I haven't been able to get your BMPs to show and my efforts were frustrated by a glitch with my PC yesterday, which should be solved today when my service guy arrives.
The bomb racks look very good, but we probably need to try fitting John Fortin's smaller German bombs to the nose racks. The tails of larger bombs will disappear into the fuselage.
I haven't tested this, but the Caleb Flerk site says that the upper limit for hardpoints is 26.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[Captain Kurt]

Hi Ravenna

It really is 24 hard points. We tested higher numbers during the Team Daedalus FW190F-8 fighter bomber development. Nothing will show up after 24 attachments.

 

[aleatorylamp]

Hello Ravenna,
OK, Thanks! I didn´t know how the naming of bitmap textures worked.
The way I named them was only to make sure one could identify the correct bitmap belonging to the corresponding .xaf Texture.

The Rack Frames of course must still be adjusted, depending on the way the bombs are going to fit under them.
From what you comment, for a start, it seems that the supports on the ends of each frame have to go down further,
but I don´t know by how much - maybe twice? We´ll see once your computer is serviced...
Good luck with it! Hopefully it´s not something too serious.

Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[Ravenna]

Up and running again. A bit red faced when the technician restarted the PC (which I had previously tried) and the damn thing worked perfectly. At least now I have sound through all speakers.
Thanks Kurt. Good to know that this has been tried.
Aleatorylamp,
Would you like a copy of the texture set UncleTgt renamed and resized for me?

 

[aleatorylamp]

Hello Ravenna,
Computers seem not to be an exact science after all. Whether this is intentional or not, is debatable...
They are more of an aleatory lamp, a bit like Pixar´s one, but perhaps not as vicious as HAL.

Did you know the letters IBM + 1 letter = HAL? I only found out about 10 years ago.
I believe Arthur C. Clarke was a bit disappointed when he found out.

By all means do send the textures so that I can have a look at them,
although I doubt I´ll be able to do anything with them for the moment.

The textures you sent me by e-mail 3 days ago are all 1024 x 512 x 16.7 million,
and have a different naming-scheme as far as I can see, but I can´t use them yet.

For the moment, I am completely out of my depth regarding this texture format, as well as the
use of TEX512,

and will have to wait until I have CFS2 so that I can see how they work.

Presuably TEX512 converts textures and modifies the .mdl file to acept them. What I don´t understand
is why it worked for two of the Gothas some time ago and not for the present ones. Strange...

Anyway, we´ll get it in the end!

Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[Ravenna]

Aleatorylamp,

TEX512 converts the mdl file to accept BMP textures, then the AF textures have to be run through a program to generate BMP files (I used one by Martin Wright...I think it was/ is Convr8). I'll send you the conversion programs with the BMP reworked by UncleTgt.
As you say, we will get there in the end.

Cheers,
M

 

[aleatorylamp]

Under-nose, slanted up.

Good early morning again...
I saw that the program linked to by Capt. Kurt in Post #19, "mdlc_190_weap.zip" is a CLI-run program
for making weapons, whose Readme seems to indicate that these weapons are in .bgl format.

As a result, I have a cunning plan, hopefully with more success than Baldrick´s cunning plans, which
were commented upon by his master, Count Blackadder, as "O-Legs Mac No-Legs chances of winning the
London-Harbour Marathon... Baldrick, why don´t you run into my fist?"

So, my cunning plan: Were I to make bombs with the correct sizes and shapes with AF99 as .mdl files,
I could convert these to .bgl format easily with MDLtoBGL4, to be used with DP for CFS2.

This way I could make one type of bomb at a slightly upward-sloping angle for the under-nose racks.
Another way to automatically generate a .bgl file is to run the .mdl file through SCASM.

The plastic model on the left would be carrying the bombs of the first type on the left type shown in
the photo, I suppose - i.e. the 110 lb. Then, if we want to be really bellicose, the internal ones could be
maybe twelve 22 pound ones like the soldier is holding.

I could try making a slanted 110 lb .mdl to convert to .bgl.
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

P.S. A Technical question:
Would 44 panels be OK for a bomb, or is this parts count too high, especially if we are going to have 10 bombs?
This would be an Octagon cross-section, with 4 bulkheads to make the rounded teardrop body-shape, plus 4 fins.
Maybe a coarsely made hexagon cross-section with fewer bulkheads (3) is necessary to get parts count down to 28?
AL

 

[Ravenna]

I've never noticed the windmill tails on the larger German bombs before.
I like your cunning plan Aleatorylamp. Much more promise than Baldrick's "Rat au van".
The extended pylon (or is that a bomb sight?) beneath the nose of that model would make it possible to still use the existing bombs if that makes it any easier, but a new slanted bomb would be useful. Certainly Gothas photographed at Nieuwmunster had boms slanted beneath the nose on close fitting racks.

Cheers,
M

 

[aleatorylamp]

Bomb

Hello Ravenna,
It´s the Goertz bomb sight, and the racks seem to reach below.
Alternatively, bombs could be more close-fitting and beside the sight, as I´ve seen on photos too - and it looks better.

I never noticed the windmill tails either. It´s amazing how much unexpected stuff one doesn´t see until one is told.
Now you mention it, the bigger ones have them, but the 50 Kg ones which we want, have straight fins, though.

With the bomb size I´m getting now, proportioned to the photos, I can adjust the rack size to get a close fit for them.

I don´t have anything with which to see Fortin´s bomb .bgl´s, but perhaps the file size will give me an idea about
the polygon number used.

Updated Update!:
I made a bomb .mdl, tried using MDLtoBGL4, and made it produce an API to see it in Airport for Windows,
and it is indeed working now. There is a bomb on the tarmac infront of the plane!

AND: I got SCASM to make the .BGL ! However, I can´t check if it works for CFS2, but it should.
BUT: The bomb is still too big. (See blueprint screenshot), so I´ll send the corrected size in a short while.

The bomb is still only horizontal, and untextured, coloured in dark grey and blue fins, but before doing anything else,
I´d need know if it works. Most probably too, it´s built the wrong position - under the Gotha´s nose, instead of
at Coordinates 0,0,0. That just dawned on me. Stupid things happen to beginners, I´m afraid.

The rat au van is hilarious!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[aleatorylamp]

Horizontal and slanted bomb .bgl´s

Hello Ravenna,
Here´s the better stuff now:
One horizontal 110 lb bomb .bgl, and one slanted 110 lb bomb bgl, (nose-up by 7 degrees),
both built in position 0,0,0. Colours are dark grey body and grey fins.

Hopefully they will be recognized and accepted by DP for CFS2.
If they are correctly placed, I will modify the bomb racks on the Gotha G.IV to fit.

If you would like them texturesd, or otherwise modified, do let me know and I will gladly try.

Cheers,
Aleatorylamp

 

[No Dice]

These may help ??

Payloads **	Building custom payloads for CFS2 by Martin Wright and Simon Porter ***
Loadouts **	Building custom loadouts for CFS2 by Martin Wright and Daisuke Iga ***
**FILES	MdldisAS and MDLpatchw files required for payloads and loadouts above

http://thefreeflightsite.com/Tutorials.htm

 

[aleatorylamp]

Hello NoDice,
OK, got them - Thanks. I´ll see what I can do!
Cheers,
Aleatorylamp