@GylbarD
I could have, yes.
It is an entirely experimental design and covering it up would make it harder for people to see how it works.
I was not even sure it would fly at all when I started.
The panels making up the wings have been made a little wider, but are no longer than what they are when you take them out of the box.
The difference in angle between one panel and the next is exactly 18 degrees.
If the panels were a different length or the angle was different, even by a little bit, it doesn't work.
Edit: what I mean by "doesn't work" is that you would end up having to use an odd sized/angled panel in order to make the ring complete.
The "Got your bathers handy?" comment is because of how much water there is on SimplePlanes planet. The odds are if you crash, it's going to be in the water. :P
I'm finding it interesting that more people seem to be downloading this version instead of the 'fixed' one.
Seems people like a bit of 'adventure' in their planes.
@Vidal99977 He is on iOS. I don't think you can XML mod on iOS.
The aircraft exploding thing is probably due to using normal wings, which definitely have a speed limit.
One you get above a certain speed the wings start to wiggle/shake and eventually they 'break' and the rest is just 'boooom'.
Edit:Downloaded and looked at the wings. It is as I thought.
Download this --> https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/g3uDIy/structural-wing-with-control-surface-modded
Save it as an assembly and use it for making wings.
With this item, wings getting the wiggles/shakes will be a thing of the past AND you will be able to make them as big as you want without them sagging. ;)
@Bob1
@JED That is because it takes the underscores between the words out.
Apparently this forum uses them as special characters to alter how the words look.
I'll figure out something after I get back from work.
@JED Yes, I was quite impressed myself.
The last one from Freelancer was easy to make fly, but hard to make it fly even as well as it did and that was not very well.
Some of the upcoming craft have very interesting designs which may be difficult to make fly on a normal scale.
So far I have made them similar in size to a 'standard' fighter aircraft or standard for me.
That means 3 full length fuselage parts and move on from there.
@Falkenwut Cool. It flies pretty well, much better than my last travesty. lol
Made the mistake of targeting one of my missile carrying things and got blown out of the sky for my trouble. heh
@Falkenwut
Darn it, beaten to the punch. lol
On the other hand this might be useful for a thing I'm working on.
Credit if I decide to use it instead of making something that matches close of course.
I'll d/l anyway because it looks like fun.
I could have made a 'sandwich' plane out of this, another 'plate' on the top and bottom and made it look like a playing card.
I would have to think of another name though. heh
About how I test my 'fighters'.
I first have it go head to head with the Spitfire Mk1a.
This is because, while it is old, it is still an outstanding fighter.
If it can go toe to toe and win half the time -or- get into a situation where neither aircraft can score a hit, then I move on to stage two.
Stage two is a F-15c jet fighter, with guns only.
Same deal as with the Spitfire Mk1a.
After that, I load up missiles, usually 4 Interceptors and Guardians, stick on some decoy gear (have to move decoy stuff a few times during testing) and move on to Stage Three.
Stage 3 is F-15c fighter, but loaded for bear this time.
By this stage, if my plane can survive the first pass, I know it is a good fighter aircraft. If it can win more often than not or comes back down to guns only, I know I've done something right.
If I'm feeling really confident, I pull out the Su-27, with it's 'Russian' missiles, which seem to be able to turn 90' corners AND reacquire a target after being decoyed.
My aircraft rarely survive going up against those.
@Airforce51 Got curious and downloaded it.
Didn't 'waddle' when I spawned it at Wright Airport, but that is a LOT of firepower outgoing there.
Put a wing across the top and add a machine gun above every gatling and it will be very interesting, might even make your PC crash. lol
Water takeoff is not doable, it DOES float, but it's nose heavy on water. lol
Most of the concepts in this come from another earlier build called "Fly Ball".
It just looks like a red and white ball, so it didn't attract much attention.
@DoctorCorvus
Heh, I have one or two books that would make a conspiracy theorist very happy, one of them being "Above Top Secret" by Timothy Good and another being "Cosmic Crashes" by Nicholas Redfern.
Lots of really interesting stuff in both books, especially Above Top Secret.
Of course I fully realize that a UFO would have weapons on it, even if they were for use vs spacejunk, but I've been putting weapons of various types on a lot my planes recently and figured it was time to give that a break.
No need for details here, beyond a few lights and things.
Every (classic) UFO I've ever seen in a movie is super smooth with either no or very very few joins visible, not even door lines until the door actually opens.
It seems I have developed a problem.
I get to a point during a build where my brain says 'this looks ok, stop adding detail' even though the build really needs it, then my brain refuses to co-operate.
I have another build, possibly a 'Not the' or more like a variation on a theme, that is flyable and looks.....OK, but I need to add more detail, it looks pretty ordinary right now.
@Texasfam04 I totally agree. People put a lot of work into some of these builds and get nothing and others go and put up something they threw together in a few hours up and they get lots of upvotes.
Had an idea.
I plan on stripping out all of the internal stuff, which is pretty much standard non-xml'd parts and putting in XML'd parts in their place, so where the 'skeleton' now has several hundred parts, I might be able to reduce that number quite a bit, possibly allowing me to add more detail.
This will be a 'good thing' if I can manage it.
Also, the 'official' name for this ship is now the ISD II Hammer.
@jetnyan The aircraft in question is very maneuverable indeed.
I was in the position to see them fly quite often over a number of years, as I did access control work at an airforce training base.
Unfortunatley I can't say more than that because of 'rules and laws'.
The only real issue this aircraft has is that it rolls when you try to loop it.
I have had several of my propellor driven aircraft do this and I can't find any reason why they should.
Also, as far the Wintermob Air Co. goes, I only use that if the plane is good enough and I won't use an actual 'insert real company name here' for a fictional aircraft.
It just feels wrong.
@Treadmill103 You got me there.
I'm a bit of Star Wars fan and have been a member of an on-line club for 15+ years.
It is primarily based around all of the Star Wars games, even the single player only versions.
There is a slight chance I may be awarded a medal for my work on the ISD II I made (no, I'm not going to link it! :P ) and there is currently a discussion on what it should be called. heh.
Both Hammer and Warrior are looking good right now, but I'm waiting on possible feedback from the Command Group. ;)
@Treadmill103 Well, working off of the overall wingspan, an ISD (or ISD II) would be 4.7 times the size.
An ISD is 1600 meters long (1.6 km), so 4.7 x 1600 = 7520 meters or 7.52 km long.
Roughly half the size of a Super Star Destroyer (15km long!).
Also, this is more like a T/I, TIE Interceptors have 4 lasers, not two like a TIE Fighter. ;)
@gunsou03
I have a fixed version, but I cheated a bit.
Replaced all of the flaps with structual wings and gave them control surfaces, except for the center group on each wing, no control surfaces.
Reduced power to all engines to as little as possible and added a couple of the small jets as the main source of thrust. Used XML on those engines to boost power (x25)
Jets will be hidden later.
Added weight (a lot) to rear of aircraft to move CoM back.
Added landing gear, looks crazy but it works well enough to make a takeoff and can always be removed.
I did attempt to look at the wing structure, but after doing so, got scared and left it alone. True!
It now flies pretty well, controls a little slow though and best speed I've seen so far is around 250 mph.
No idea how to upload so that only one person (gunsou03) can get at it unfortunately.
I d/l'd the aircraft and I see what you mean.
The thing I find odd is that all of the flight control surfaces are structual panels, not flight surfaces. The actual wings are ok though.
Using them makes it fly quite oddly, while it is in the air that is.
Moving the CoM back may help.
This will give me something to work on while I think about my next project.
Not as much detail as I would have liked to add, but when your PC starts 'stuttering' in the editor and actual flight zone on low resolution, I think it's time to stop, clean up what you have and upload it as a 'final' version.
Which is what happened.
I may revisit this one day when I get enough $$ to upgrade the PC.
My PC is starting to struggle a bit, what with the physical size and ever growing complexity of the build.
Down to the adding detail bit mostly and making sure of two things as I go;
a) nothing falls off it.
b) it is properly flyable, for a Star Ship that is.
Currently at just over 1000 parts and climbing upwards as I add detail.
I've added a system to help it pull out of a dive, more on that when I eventually post it. It's simple and it works.
@jetnyan It might be because of low physics settings, but here is what is going on.
Tail heavy. When it spawns in, it sits nose up in the air with tail on the ground.
This fixes itself as soon as power is applied.
Also likes to fly up in a big loop.
Landing gear is supposed to go up right? I'm sure they do. What key makes them go up?
Otherwise it's a nice plane and flies well.
You did ask.
Most of my planes are less than perfect.
@Stingray Interesting.
I have only ever had it or previous versions blow up on me once or twice.
I felt stupid once I figured it out; the nose went up too high and the tail hit the ground causing it to go 'BOOM'. Placed a wheel on the rear and the problem was mostly fixed.
Since then, I haven't had it explode on me, except when random spawned aircraft collided with me on takeoff.
Check your centers, as in CoM, CoL and CoT. Press the SPACE bar or whatever serves that purpose on your machine to bring them up.
I'm guessing that it goes nose up and starts flipping nose over tail.
There are at least two things wrong.
The CoL (the blue line) is in front of the CoM (the red line).
Try making the main wing smaller, this will make the CoL move toward the back of the plane.
The CoT (yellow line) is too low on the fuselage.
This will force the nose of the aircraft upwards under power.
Try using less power on take off, just enough to get off the ground usually works.
When you are airborne you will need to trim for level flight at full power.
As usual, my advice may be WRONG, but that is all it is, advice. Use at your own risk.
If it is wrong I'm sure someone will say so. :P
@randomusername Heh, this isn't the one that has the problem.
I have another one, same size, but twice as tall in the rear
Imagine this one with the same sort of structure on top as it has on the bottom.
This one is actually the base for an ISD as in Star Wars, but it's not quite right.
I made it twice as tall where it needed it and reskinned the whole lot, I just need to sort the wings out and it'll be good.
Then I can get to work on that C&C tower area the darn things have and that's going to throw everything out of whack again. lol
@randomusername https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/CSj8UX/Emperors-Hammer-Project-in-progress
That.
I have had to rework it a fair bit, it needed to be twice as high in the rear as this one.
I'm much further along and I don't know why I'm bothering with getting it to fly right now as I still have the whole superstructure on top to add yet, but it's looking good.
@randomusername Very very interesting. I have a 'plane' that is being troublesome and that could help.
Is the plane still fully controllable otherwise, as in can you make it pitch downward via controls?
If it works, you get a cookie and a mention in the description ;)
Mind, if it's bogus and you are messing with us, you will get a mention too :P
Le Sigh.
Having to rebuild it a bit.
It's not tall enough in the rear, it needs to be twice as tall.
I guess you could this the 'Interceptor' ISD.
Now there is an idea......
Ye gods, I may have just made something that will do that.
That box will fit in the load area of the Trooper quite easily and a drop door or something could be fitted with a bit of work.
Anyone know how to make engines turn off again after being activated, aside from turning off all engines after deactivating them?
Also, just in case people were wondering, I do stuff like this when I hit a stumbling block on my big projects, it sometimes gives me ideas on how to get past them.
@GylbarD
I could have, yes.
It is an entirely experimental design and covering it up would make it harder for people to see how it works.
I was not even sure it would fly at all when I started.
The panels making up the wings have been made a little wider, but are no longer than what they are when you take them out of the box.
The difference in angle between one panel and the next is exactly 18 degrees.
If the panels were a different length or the angle was different, even by a little bit, it doesn't work.
Edit: what I mean by "doesn't work" is that you would end up having to use an odd sized/angled panel in order to make the ring complete.
+1The "Got your bathers handy?" comment is because of how much water there is on SimplePlanes planet. The odds are if you crash, it's going to be in the water. :P
Ah.
I see how this is done. Clever.
I'm finding it interesting that more people seem to be downloading this version instead of the 'fixed' one.
Seems people like a bit of 'adventure' in their planes.
@atgxtg Yes, I also found that it doesn't blow up.
I usually fly on low/mid myself, unless I am taking screen shots, so it could be that.
*goes back to work on the Valkyrie Heavy Fighter.
@Vidal99977 He is on iOS. I don't think you can XML mod on iOS.
The aircraft exploding thing is probably due to using normal wings, which definitely have a speed limit.
One you get above a certain speed the wings start to wiggle/shake and eventually they 'break' and the rest is just 'boooom'.
Edit:Downloaded and looked at the wings. It is as I thought.
Download this --> https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/g3uDIy/structural-wing-with-control-surface-modded
Save it as an assembly and use it for making wings.
With this item, wings getting the wiggles/shakes will be a thing of the past AND you will be able to make them as big as you want without them sagging. ;)
@Bob1
@JED That is because it takes the underscores between the words out.
Apparently this forum uses them as special characters to alter how the words look.
I'll figure out something after I get back from work.
@JED Thanks.
It seems the way the web page is named is the problem.
<a href="https://discoverygc.com/wiki/CTE-6000%22Eagle%22CivilianVeryHeavy_Fighter">CTE-6000 Eagle</a>
It should read: https://discoverygc.com/wiki/CTE-6000%22Eagle%22Civilian(underscore)Very(underscore)Heavy_Fighter
@JED Yes, I was quite impressed myself.
The last one from Freelancer was easy to make fly, but hard to make it fly even as well as it did and that was not very well.
Some of the upcoming craft have very interesting designs which may be difficult to make fly on a normal scale.
So far I have made them similar in size to a 'standard' fighter aircraft or standard for me.
That means 3 full length fuselage parts and move on from there.
Arg. Can someone tell me how to put a proper URL in on the description?
Thanks in advance.
So, I posted this on the Discovery Freelancer and then asked what I should make next.
I now have a list of 5 popular fighter craft of varying complexity and shapes.
Eagle
Sabre
Valkyrie
Nyx
Lynx
This is going to be interesting, for me at least.
@Falkenwut Cool. It flies pretty well, much better than my last travesty. lol
+1Made the mistake of targeting one of my missile carrying things and got blown out of the sky for my trouble. heh
@Falkenwut
+1Darn it, beaten to the punch. lol
On the other hand this might be useful for a thing I'm working on.
Credit if I decide to use it instead of making something that matches close of course.
I'll d/l anyway because it looks like fun.
I could have made a 'sandwich' plane out of this, another 'plate' on the top and bottom and made it look like a playing card.
I would have to think of another name though. heh
About how I test my 'fighters'.
I first have it go head to head with the Spitfire Mk1a.
This is because, while it is old, it is still an outstanding fighter.
If it can go toe to toe and win half the time -or- get into a situation where neither aircraft can score a hit, then I move on to stage two.
Stage two is a F-15c jet fighter, with guns only.
Same deal as with the Spitfire Mk1a.
After that, I load up missiles, usually 4 Interceptors and Guardians, stick on some decoy gear (have to move decoy stuff a few times during testing) and move on to Stage Three.
Stage 3 is F-15c fighter, but loaded for bear this time.
By this stage, if my plane can survive the first pass, I know it is a good fighter aircraft. If it can win more often than not or comes back down to guns only, I know I've done something right.
If I'm feeling really confident, I pull out the Su-27, with it's 'Russian' missiles, which seem to be able to turn 90' corners AND reacquire a target after being decoyed.
My aircraft rarely survive going up against those.
@Airforce51 Got curious and downloaded it.
Didn't 'waddle' when I spawned it at Wright Airport, but that is a LOT of firepower outgoing there.
Put a wing across the top and add a machine gun above every gatling and it will be very interesting, might even make your PC crash. lol
@DoctorCorvus
Thank you. :)
Water takeoff is not doable, it DOES float, but it's nose heavy on water. lol
Most of the concepts in this come from another earlier build called "Fly Ball".
It just looks like a red and white ball, so it didn't attract much attention.
@DoctorCorvus
Heh, I have one or two books that would make a conspiracy theorist very happy, one of them being "Above Top Secret" by Timothy Good and another being "Cosmic Crashes" by Nicholas Redfern.
Lots of really interesting stuff in both books, especially Above Top Secret.
Of course I fully realize that a UFO would have weapons on it, even if they were for use vs spacejunk, but I've been putting weapons of various types on a lot my planes recently and figured it was time to give that a break.
+1No need for details here, beyond a few lights and things.
Every (classic) UFO I've ever seen in a movie is super smooth with either no or very very few joins visible, not even door lines until the door actually opens.
It seems I have developed a problem.
I get to a point during a build where my brain says 'this looks ok, stop adding detail' even though the build really needs it, then my brain refuses to co-operate.
I have another build, possibly a 'Not the' or more like a variation on a theme, that is flyable and looks.....OK, but I need to add more detail, it looks pretty ordinary right now.
Just noticed the wingspan. It got that big.
For once I did not really pay any attention to sizes and just 'built it' as it were.
Was going to go far just a plain wing, but it was not stable and wanted to flip badly. Added the tails and it was fixed. Things you learn.
Also, all of those engines sound really nice.
@Airforce51 Try putting wheels on it, just the short ones that don't retract should do it.
Ok...
What I am seeing here is a huge bunch of guns on a structure, but no engines, wings or anything else.
It 'waddles' when you fire those guns or just when it is sitting still?
+1@Texasfam04 I totally agree. People put a lot of work into some of these builds and get nothing and others go and put up something they threw together in a few hours up and they get lots of upvotes.
+1Had an idea.
I plan on stripping out all of the internal stuff, which is pretty much standard non-xml'd parts and putting in XML'd parts in their place, so where the 'skeleton' now has several hundred parts, I might be able to reduce that number quite a bit, possibly allowing me to add more detail.
This will be a 'good thing' if I can manage it.
Also, the 'official' name for this ship is now the ISD II Hammer.
@jetnyan The aircraft in question is very maneuverable indeed.
I was in the position to see them fly quite often over a number of years, as I did access control work at an airforce training base.
Unfortunatley I can't say more than that because of 'rules and laws'.
The only real issue this aircraft has is that it rolls when you try to loop it.
I have had several of my propellor driven aircraft do this and I can't find any reason why they should.
Also, as far the Wintermob Air Co. goes, I only use that if the plane is good enough and I won't use an actual 'insert real company name here' for a fictional aircraft.
It just feels wrong.
@Treadmill103 You got me there.
I'm a bit of Star Wars fan and have been a member of an on-line club for 15+ years.
It is primarily based around all of the Star Wars games, even the single player only versions.
There is a slight chance I may be awarded a medal for my work on the ISD II I made (no, I'm not going to link it! :P ) and there is currently a discussion on what it should be called. heh.
Both Hammer and Warrior are looking good right now, but I'm waiting on possible feedback from the Command Group. ;)
@Treadmill103 Well, working off of the overall wingspan, an ISD (or ISD II) would be 4.7 times the size.
An ISD is 1600 meters long (1.6 km), so 4.7 x 1600 = 7520 meters or 7.52 km long.
Roughly half the size of a Super Star Destroyer (15km long!).
Also, this is more like a T/I, TIE Interceptors have 4 lasers, not two like a TIE Fighter. ;)
+2@gunsou03
I have a fixed version, but I cheated a bit.
Replaced all of the flaps with structual wings and gave them control surfaces, except for the center group on each wing, no control surfaces.
Reduced power to all engines to as little as possible and added a couple of the small jets as the main source of thrust. Used XML on those engines to boost power (x25)
Jets will be hidden later.
Added weight (a lot) to rear of aircraft to move CoM back.
Added landing gear, looks crazy but it works well enough to make a takeoff and can always be removed.
I did attempt to look at the wing structure, but after doing so, got scared and left it alone. True!
It now flies pretty well, controls a little slow though and best speed I've seen so far is around 250 mph.
No idea how to upload so that only one person (gunsou03) can get at it unfortunately.
Not going to upload without permission!!
I d/l'd the aircraft and I see what you mean.
The thing I find odd is that all of the flight control surfaces are structual panels, not flight surfaces. The actual wings are ok though.
Using them makes it fly quite oddly, while it is in the air that is.
Moving the CoM back may help.
This will give me something to work on while I think about my next project.
Not as much detail as I would have liked to add, but when your PC starts 'stuttering' in the editor and actual flight zone on low resolution, I think it's time to stop, clean up what you have and upload it as a 'final' version.
Which is what happened.
I may revisit this one day when I get enough $$ to upgrade the PC.
looks like it might actually fly. lol
The XML Mod is handy, but you can still do a lot of stuff without it.
Also, you can re-download it, just need to find it is all.
Yep, that's bored all right. I'm not even going to d/l this, the physical size will make the game crash on me. lol
Another update coming soonish, say a week or so.
My PC is starting to struggle a bit, what with the physical size and ever growing complexity of the build.
Down to the adding detail bit mostly and making sure of two things as I go;
a) nothing falls off it.
b) it is properly flyable, for a Star Ship that is.
Currently at just over 1000 parts and climbing upwards as I add detail.
I've added a system to help it pull out of a dive, more on that when I eventually post it. It's simple and it works.
@jetnyan It might be because of low physics settings, but here is what is going on.
Tail heavy. When it spawns in, it sits nose up in the air with tail on the ground.
This fixes itself as soon as power is applied.
Also likes to fly up in a big loop.
Landing gear is supposed to go up right? I'm sure they do. What key makes them go up?
Otherwise it's a nice plane and flies well.
You did ask.
Most of my planes are less than perfect.
Yup, this looks good. I used to see them every other day because of where I worked.
*downloads
Edit: well, it flies more or less. Not quite what I was expecting though, it has a few issues.
@Stingray Yep, I went and had a look. Looks pretty nice.
@Stingray Interesting.
I have only ever had it or previous versions blow up on me once or twice.
I felt stupid once I figured it out; the nose went up too high and the tail hit the ground causing it to go 'BOOM'. Placed a wheel on the rear and the problem was mostly fixed.
Since then, I haven't had it explode on me, except when random spawned aircraft collided with me on takeoff.
Has anyone else had this problem?
Check your centers, as in CoM, CoL and CoT. Press the SPACE bar or whatever serves that purpose on your machine to bring them up.
I'm guessing that it goes nose up and starts flipping nose over tail.
There are at least two things wrong.
The CoL (the blue line) is in front of the CoM (the red line).
Try making the main wing smaller, this will make the CoL move toward the back of the plane.
The CoT (yellow line) is too low on the fuselage.
This will force the nose of the aircraft upwards under power.
Try using less power on take off, just enough to get off the ground usually works.
When you are airborne you will need to trim for level flight at full power.
As usual, my advice may be WRONG, but that is all it is, advice. Use at your own risk.
+8If it is wrong I'm sure someone will say so. :P
For a laugh put two of them vs in dogfight.
@CCXRCC Nice work. :)
@randomusername Heh, this isn't the one that has the problem.
I have another one, same size, but twice as tall in the rear
Imagine this one with the same sort of structure on top as it has on the bottom.
This one is actually the base for an ISD as in Star Wars, but it's not quite right.
I made it twice as tall where it needed it and reskinned the whole lot, I just need to sort the wings out and it'll be good.
Then I can get to work on that C&C tower area the darn things have and that's going to throw everything out of whack again. lol
@randomusername https://www.simpleplanes.com/a/CSj8UX/Emperors-Hammer-Project-in-progress
That.
I have had to rework it a fair bit, it needed to be twice as high in the rear as this one.
I'm much further along and I don't know why I'm bothering with getting it to fly right now as I still have the whole superstructure on top to add yet, but it's looking good.
@randomusername Very very interesting. I have a 'plane' that is being troublesome and that could help.
Is the plane still fully controllable otherwise, as in can you make it pitch downward via controls?
If it works, you get a cookie and a mention in the description ;)
Mind, if it's bogus and you are messing with us, you will get a mention too :P
Le Sigh.
Having to rebuild it a bit.
It's not tall enough in the rear, it needs to be twice as tall.
I guess you could this the 'Interceptor' ISD.
Now there is an idea......
@AlexHomKa Thankyou. I try. heh.
Ye gods, I may have just made something that will do that.
That box will fit in the load area of the Trooper quite easily and a drop door or something could be fitted with a bit of work.
Anyone know how to make engines turn off again after being activated, aside from turning off all engines after deactivating them?
Also, just in case people were wondering, I do stuff like this when I hit a stumbling block on my big projects, it sometimes gives me ideas on how to get past them.
@tuadi12123 The TIE Fighter flies about as well as expected it to in SP, that is all.
As for the rest, well, Gooogle knows all. ;)