Yo Rami! A small preview of the Italian sceneries

[CrisGer]

sounds like great work, i have worked on the same routes in the train sim you are discussing. what fun. glad you didnt mind my posting those pictures...i love the Italian routes and the amazing work that went into building them and what targets they must have been

here is a typical view of a 1940s Italian RR line with typical pre 1935 change to the brown livery...

another view of a marshaling yard:

this was how they got the trains over some of the high passes, with helper engines pushing from the rear..

and one more pictures of the amazing viaducts...imagine working to build them and one air strike could take them down in seconds...

 

[CrisGer]

here are bombing photos of Ferrara from WWII

http://miles.forumcommunity.net/?t=54810749

scroll down to a post by
mufasa2
Posted on 25/7/2013, 12:41


This very interesting site has photos of Itlailan RR Bomb attacks and modern views of Ferrara and other target cities may help you

http://www.reddog1944.com/Konigsberg_David.htm

 

[CrisGer]

and for reference a similar RR viaduct destroyed across the Adriatic in Yugoslavia:

http://www.warwingsart.com/12thAirForce/borovnica.html

 

[kelticheart]

...One question...should I remove the old GSL scenery for the Po River Valley that included the Reggiane factory?

No, I did not change Reggio Emilia. It still has the Reggiane Factory, which is not only a target, but a distinctive part of the airport area. When arriving by train at the Reggio Emilia station, the Reggiane Factory dominates the landscape on the other side of the marshalling yard. The airport could be seen from the train station in the 1940's and 1950's, now it's hidden by all of the houses that were built in between afterwards.

I included it for those who still haven't got it.

Cheers!
Stef

 

[Blood_Hawk23]

FSrail isn't very nice to me. I had about 10miles or so layed out. went and saved it. Went back the next day and it loaded up blank. so I did it all again this time tried to compile it into a bgl and the bgl is blank. it reads 0kb. not sure whats going on with it but its not liking me. I think I might try the APIs in FSSC and see it it works.

 

[Rami]

Reply...

Stefano,

Thank you, I will test them this evening. I just didn't want to wipe out what you have already done.

 

[kelticheart]

and for reference a similar RR viaduct destroyed across the Adriatic in Yugoslavia:

http://www.warwingsart.com/12thAirForce/borovnica.html

Hi CrisGer!

I am always amazed at how most of you are able to find WWII obscure info and photos!

I do my share of searching by typing all kinds of words in Google search engine, but I'll be darned if I ever stumbled on something as great as the above! Is it a matter of sheer luck or should I take a course about Internet search engines?

I opened any link that came out when I typed in "WWII" and "Ferrara", but I never got what you posted. I'd sure like to learn how to manage that!

Still, I cannot see any oil refinery in those WWII Ferrara pictures....

A comment about what you wrote on those old RR viaducts. All of those magnificent operas were literally built by hand.
If we consider when they were built, from the end of the 19th century all the way up the beginning of WWI, all of the construction machinery we take for granted nowadays hadn't even been imagined yet. Pickaxes, shovels, trowels and wheelbarrows driven by entire armies of people were the only high-tech known back then. Stones, shaped by chisels and hammers, and clay bricks, bound together with hand-made concrete, were the only building materials known at the time.

What's really amazing is that most of them that escaped WWII are still standing and crossed by trains nowadays.

Cheers!
Stef

 

[CrisGer]

Hi and please just call me Cris thanks and i am so glad you found my humble research for you useful. I love digging, and Rami can tell you I enjoy the hunt. I was actually trained in research long ago, as i planned a career either in history or archaeology and still love it. Human endevour and the amazing things people build, achieve and do still amaze me yes ...re those viaducts, i was thinking of that , those huge high ones were built by hand, using scaffolds that were as amazing as the bridges and viaducts that they created with them. I am glad to hear they are still there and were repaired. Please let me know if and when you need info and I will be happy to lend a hand, if you follow those links there is a ton more info connected thru them for bombing missions, it appears many of the US and also the German pilots kept their mission orders and those are an amazing source of actual real time data and detail.

i didnt see a steel mill either. I cant find any reference for one, not even a rolling mill. I think the main target in Ferrara was the large RR station and marshaling yard. Ironic that I have designed activities for it from the early 1900s. You are doing great work! let me know if i can help out any time .. Rami has my Skype address too.

 

[kelticheart]

...re those viaducts, i was thinking of that , those huge high ones were built by hand, using scaffolds that were as amazing as the bridges and viaducts that they created with them.....

Thank you, Cris, for offering your help!

I could have sworn Ferrara had an oil refinery plant during WWII, but evidently I was wrong. The main reason why I got stubborn in trying to build it, is due to one of CFS2 mysterious bugs.

I prefer to have dedicated GSL files for each scenery. They are easier to handle, move around and delete from the cumulative cfs2.gsl if needs be, but there's a glitch to this method.

When we install a Global Scenery Layer (GSL) file adding objects to a given scenery, we add one or more GOBS (this is CFS2 terminology) to the main cfs2.gsl file. As far as I understood it, a gob is related to the location where one puts a scenery object and its area is limited. When MB, or one of the great gsl scenery tools released by Martin Wright, saves a layout into a gsl file, it saves it assigning a sort of "gob address" to it. Such address is that series of numbers written in the gsl filename, if we allow the default save and do not change it into something more comprehensive by human beings as I do.

When exploring a cumulative gsl file with Wright's "GSLEdit" utility, we see a whole bunch of those gob numbers listed if there are objects placed far enough from any given airport saved in our CFS2 airbase.dat file. If they lay near the airport listed location, they are easily spotted because the airport name is displayed instead. The airport represents a "gob", often times more than just one if the airbase is big.

When we add a gsl file, made up of one ore more "gobs", if there is another gob nearby with scenery objects in, the objects are deleted from the cumulative gsl file as if the new gob/s overwrote the old ones.

In order to avoid this annoying bug, one must plan in advance the whole scenery layout and add every single object in it. This is what happened with my work in Ferrara when I went to add the refinery buildings, which nowadays are located North of Ferrara, sandwiched between the city and the Po river. The airport lays just out of the city limits, South of Ferrara. When I first added the refinery scenery dedicated gob, the entire airport objects disappeared from CFS2. When I added the airport layout back, it ate the refinery......

This wasn't the first time it happened since I started playing with gsl sceneries, I knew the cure. But this is why I held back Ferrara since last summer when I started working on this project. If indeed an oil plant existed here during WWII, its scenery objects must be saved in the same file holding all of the airport objects, as this is the only way to avoid the gobs deleting each other when installed separately.

Once we determine if that darn' refinery was there or not during WWII, I can release Ferrara for our beta testers.

Let me add you touched a sad note, when you wrote about the amazing scaffoldings that were built to raise RR viaducts. Many masons, carpenters and bricklayers lost their lives falling from them and it wasn't just because it was over a century ago. Big construction sites are extremely dangerous places to be in even today. I'd rather fly an airplane.....

TO EVERYBODY:

Please, find attached a new beta file which includes everything I did, so far, to replace what was lost a while ago. Besides, a separate file containing wood board textures for Mask Rider's bamboo covered objects that I use in ETO sceneries.

Discard the one I previously attached (I am unable to delete it myself, for some reason), since I changed some of the Po bridge objects in this new one.

Cheers!
Stef

 

[Blood_Hawk23]

Kelti...

The GOB issue is one of the main reasons my WWI scenery is still sitting on the shelf. How do I fix it. you can send it by PM or email if it will take alot of time to explain. but I have to know how to fix the GOBs.

 

[Rami]

Reply...

The GOB issue is one of the main reasons my WWI scenery is still sitting on the shelf. How do I fix it. you can send it by PM or email if it will take alot of time to explain. but I have to know how to fix the GOBs.

Blood_Hawk23,

If you meet me on Skype tonight, I will give you the keys to the GSL kingdom.

 

[Blood_Hawk23]

I'd love too...

But...

I'm working some OT tonite. I'll be going in for 8pm. Which means I'm leaving at 7pm. I HATE being late. So I will have to catch you this weekend. I'll be doing OT the next 3 nights.

Don't lose the thought. I still want to know. I have all of the tools (MW's full set) I just need the knowledge to go with it. And as of right now the brain to help LOL. Time for bed.

Till Later,
John

 

[Blood_Hawk23]

to make things simple

and for future Ref.

Blood_Hawk23 is my gaming name. I've used it and Polar_Lion for 18+ years.

But to make things easy, You guys can call me Blood, or Hawk, or BloodHawk. 23 is just the day I was born and I needed a number for a game name so no worries on that.

Or just call me John.

Don't use BH because its a ref for a womans bra in some of the euro languages. I forget which ones.
I don't answer to JP or Johnny. In fact either will get you shot.

and don't use John Paul because that means I'm in trouble and I'll run and hide. especially if its in French. Yes I heard it alot growing up LOL

So thats that.

Till later,
John or what ever my name is...

 

[kelticheart]

Oh, my!

.....Don't use BH because its a ref for a womans bra in some of the euro languages. I forget which ones....

WHAT?...

So very sorry! I didn't know that, in my language it spells "reggiseno". Come to think of it, the literal translation in English would be "Breast Holder", hence BH.

I duly apologise, Blood_Hawk23, I am only becoming lazy with my typing, I reckon it's not a good thing. It'll never happen again, at least from me.

Cheers!
Stef

P.S.: Send me your e-mail address, mine is listed in each readme I uploaded. I'll mail out to you whatever info/tutorials I have in my archives about building gsl sceneries.

 

[Blood_Hawk23]

WHAT?...

So very sorry! I didn't know that, in my language it spells "reggiseno". Come to think of it, the literal translation in English would be "Breast Holder", hence BH.

I duly apologise, Blood_Hawk23, I am only becoming lazy with my typing, I reckon it's not a good thing. It'll never happen again, at least from me.

Cheers!
Stef

P.S.: Send me your e-mail address, mine is listed in each readme I uploaded. I'll mail out to you whatever info/tutorials I have in my archives about building gsl sceneries.

To tell you the truth its not that big of a deal. I didn't know until about5 years ago when a freind of mine from another game told me about it. He was Dutch. It was kind of funny to find that out.

 

[kelticheart]

To tell you the truth its not that big of a deal. I didn't know until about5 years ago when a freind of mine from another game told me about it. He was Dutch. It was kind of funny to find that out.

Thanks, John!

TO EVERYBODY:

Please, find attached my interpretation of Achim's Italy scenery, Ferrara airport. Loosely based on today's Google sat pictures of the area, keeping in mind how lesser built it must have been during WWII.

Cheers!
KH

 

[Rami]

Reply...

Kelticheart,

I tested all of the scenery, including the airbases...and your work is outstanding. It really adds a touch of realism.

 

[kelticheart]

Glad you like it!

Kelticheart,

I tested all of the scenery, including the airbases...and your work is outstanding. It really adds a touch of realism.

Thank you!

Rami, I misled you about Reggio Emilia. I did change something I thought important, I did not remember it when you asked.

Achim's instructions indicate that any spot in the airport with oil tanks is the refuelling area. He usually places Mask Rider/LW's small oil tanks in it, but I thought they are not very realistic, considering wartime need to keep flammables well separated from aircrafts and other vital structures during possible air attacks. I replaced all of those tanks with Dave Mangum's Luftwaffe oil drums and/or Wolfi's oil drums only. I updated Reggio Emilia as well.

They might be more difficult to locate, but they sure look more realistic than before, besides of being less dangerous in case of a proximity, or even direct, bomb hit. I used Mask Rider/LW's oil tanks in other parts of the scenery, together with Canion's generic large oil tank, simulating a fuel and lubricant depot. I placed them well away of the runways, hangars, revetments and other buildings, as it surely must have been during WWII. In Piacenza case, just because I am lucky enough to have visited the site numerous times since I was a kid, I created a fuel/ammo dump as close as possible to where it still stands nowadays.

Sorry about Reggio E., you might want to extract it from the pack I posted above and take a peek at it.

Come to think of it, in my install Achim's additions of Ghedi and Verona, plus his reworks of Ferrara and Treviso (which I am currently working on) fill up my aircraft tanks 100% anywhere in the scenery and not only in the dedicated refuelling spot, as before. Is it the same case with yours? I don't like it very much, because I have no control over my fuel load anymore. As soon as the aircraft is spawn in Free Flight in any of the above sceneries, I get an instant fill up!

Cheers!
KH

 

[Rami]

Reply...

Stefano,

Not to worry, I removed any old versions first out of habit to avoid any conflicts, so there were no issues as a result. And thanks for the additional info!

 

[kelticheart]

More Northern Italian airfields

This time I am attaching for preview and testing my gsl rework of Achim's Treviso, Trento and Milano-Linate.

Milano-Linate should really be moved to its real location, as Skylane found out here:

http://www.sim-outhouse.com/sohforu...9-Well-I-ll-be&p=874324&viewfull=1#post874324

Milano-Linate layout is so dependent on the shape of the Idroscalo that it almost doesn't make any sense having it where it is now.

Is there any chance that Achim will consider moving Linate to its real location?

Cheers!
KH