B-47 Stratojet
Posted: 10 Feb 2017, 17:12
I let the B-47 out of the bag in Martin's most wanted AI thread a few days ago, so I can now say a little more about what I'm doing. Although the aircraft are done (FS9 and FSX native), I am in the process of building some retro scenery of Macdill AFB to give them a home to operate from.
There are 30 B-47E examples of the 306th BW (blue, red and yellow striped tails). Here's a few examples:
I've built two models, one with tanks and one without. Both have an opening crew door and retractable ladder. I'm also going to attempt a third with JATO bottles. The best way to achieve that I think is to create the smoke and flame with an effect file and trigger it as a light entry in the aircraft.cfg file, much as we do for an afterburner. I haven't really dabbled in effect file design before and a look at one JATO pay-ware example that Martin showed me, suggests the 4 used are quite complex. I'll see what I can do though.
I did quite a bit of research into B-47E serial numbers. The ones used are generally in the range, but there's not much information about specific squadrons that operated them. One document I found was particularly revealing, not so much in allocations, but the sheer number of aircraft that crashed, often with fatal consequences. It was a very difficult aircraft to fly apparently.
I decided on Macdill AFB (Florida) as a home for the B-47s. Although there are a couple of examples of scenery available already, they were not really suitable for retro B-47s in FS9 and are too frame rate heavy in FSX.
I have all the ground polygons and 5 tree blocks laid down. Each block is one single object, with 4 welded texture vertices in total and 1 draw call per block, so the trees are very frame rate friendly. The 30 B-47s are also operating happily, although I have still to make some waypoints to give some alternative destinations to flying circuits:
I'm currently building some custom objects to place in the scenery, but I already have a lot I built for other scenery that I can utilise:
I really only decided to make the B-47 because I finally cracked the B-36 that unblocked my "B-" production line:
Now I can add the B-47 and then go the second step of a building a B-58 Hustler. That is destined to operate from a slightly updated alternative AFCAD in Brent's Carswell scenery. Once I have Macdill finished that is.
John
There are 30 B-47E examples of the 306th BW (blue, red and yellow striped tails). Here's a few examples:
I've built two models, one with tanks and one without. Both have an opening crew door and retractable ladder. I'm also going to attempt a third with JATO bottles. The best way to achieve that I think is to create the smoke and flame with an effect file and trigger it as a light entry in the aircraft.cfg file, much as we do for an afterburner. I haven't really dabbled in effect file design before and a look at one JATO pay-ware example that Martin showed me, suggests the 4 used are quite complex. I'll see what I can do though.
I did quite a bit of research into B-47E serial numbers. The ones used are generally in the range, but there's not much information about specific squadrons that operated them. One document I found was particularly revealing, not so much in allocations, but the sheer number of aircraft that crashed, often with fatal consequences. It was a very difficult aircraft to fly apparently.
I decided on Macdill AFB (Florida) as a home for the B-47s. Although there are a couple of examples of scenery available already, they were not really suitable for retro B-47s in FS9 and are too frame rate heavy in FSX.
I have all the ground polygons and 5 tree blocks laid down. Each block is one single object, with 4 welded texture vertices in total and 1 draw call per block, so the trees are very frame rate friendly. The 30 B-47s are also operating happily, although I have still to make some waypoints to give some alternative destinations to flying circuits:
I'm currently building some custom objects to place in the scenery, but I already have a lot I built for other scenery that I can utilise:
I really only decided to make the B-47 because I finally cracked the B-36 that unblocked my "B-" production line:
Now I can add the B-47 and then go the second step of a building a B-58 Hustler. That is destined to operate from a slightly updated alternative AFCAD in Brent's Carswell scenery. Once I have Macdill finished that is.
John
