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[agracier]

Could I also ask a moderator to change my "Status" to modder, so I can start posting betas etc?

I don't think anyone has to wait for modder status to be able to post betas ... I think if members just start posting their work the modder status follows out of appreciation and recognition of the work done and shared. I know I just started posting changes to maps and then new maps and skins and one day just happened to notice a change in status ...

And from what we've seen so far of screenshots, you'll be up there in no time ... looks very nice ....

[mikoyan99]

Cheers!

More progress today; crude retracting undercarriage sorted:


Don't worry about the "holes" in the undercarriage - the default skin file is mapping transparancies to them; hopefully that can be sorted with new base textures. The current texture was a very quick paint job so I could see the fuselage more clearly.
I'm also working with blender to see if I can improve the fairing on the crew compartment. No success so far, but I think i'm getting the hang of it.
I've also been able to access the classfiles in Netbean for the first time - not a clue what i'm looking at, but at least i'm in with a chance now. What I want to do for now is change the gun armament to 20 and 30mm cannon, change the engine two type over to jet, and change the directory for the cockpit so I can transplant an ME210 cockpit:

(You can see why)
As ever, advice is always appreciated on the above.
-Matt

[ton414]

Seems you are viewing from cockpit meshes belonging to the plane, plane and cockpit have different meshes and different hier.him files, you can work with the hier.him from cockpit, in the same way you work with hier.him from plane, in this case you could move forward the cockpit.

[mikoyan99]

The current position of the cockpit is the due to the centre of gravity; any further forwards, and aircraft falls over on the ground. Once I have a new cockpit, i'll do some fine tuning to sort that out.
The main issue with the cockpit is the base aircraft. The plane, based on the P-38, automatically uses the stock P-38 cockpit. Rather than unnecessarily duplicating the cockpit in the mod folder, the P-38 trident authors, as far as i'm aware, programmed the classfiles to reference the stock P-38 cockpit buried in the SFS files in the main game directory. This means that unlike the Autogyro, I can't just copy and past another cockpit into the aircraft, and I have to edit the classfiles first to change the reference location. It's that i'm struggling with.
-Matt

[asheshouse]

Interesting project.
Good luck with achieving it.

[max_thehitman]

Its looking great 
I have a question.
Are you using a number fo diferent skins to piece together this aircraft, or are you using
one skin for the entire plane?
Looking at the screens you posted, it will be a little dificult to paint this one...but
not impossible.
 Anything is possible, I have had my share of near impossible skins to paint in the past. i will be looking
forward to paint this airplane one day too.
At the moment it is impossible for me, I already have too many airplanes to paint new skin-templates.

[mikoyan99]

Currently, it's one skin for the entire aircraft. I'm using the Me210 skin as a default so the transparancies are clear at least.
I'm still working on some aspects of the 3D modelling, so don't worry about skinning it for now - it'll take me a fair amount of time to sort that out and damage models etc, but I look forward to you skinning it in the future.
I think you're right about it being difficult - there are stretched components, and different bits of different aircraft cobbled together in all sorts of odd places.

[HotelAlpha]

Looks like Dr.Frankenplane experimented with Me-210, 410 and came up with this clone that people call the Blohm und Voss Bvp-194

[mikoyan99]

And Fw-190, Sea Fury/Tempest, Ju88......... 

I'm off home for a week; I won't have access to my main computer or files, so here's an alpha to play with for now:
https://www.mediafire.com/?zya10sxbyvsn02k
Very very rough, but quite flyable, and surreal the first time. Make sure you apply port rudder on take-off. I've been working all day on new damage models and a new 3D model for the cockpit, but no luck so far (can't get the .3ds back to mesh properly yet), so it's basically as it was above. Strange things will happen if you get hit. I probably won't be able to do much work for a few weeks after I get back as well, as I have exams.
-Matt

[mikoyan99]

Right, i'm back from Kent, but I have to admit i'm very stuck on how to proceed. The rough list of jobs is:
Cockpit
Weapons (Cannon and warload)
Turbine sounds/effects
Fairing of the cockpit and landing gear wells
Skins
Damage Model
-----------------------
I've dowloaded seemingly all required software, and read through most of the tutorials on here, but I haven't made any progress in days. The skinning and damage models i'm happy to leave until later, but i'm having trouble getting the new cockpit to load, changing weaponry and the turbine effects. The 3d modelling too is proving troublesome.
Currently, i've exported the CF_D0 .msh into 3ds and edited in blender. I can't get it back into the game though. See:
https://www.sas1946.com/main/index.php/topic,31164.0.html
With the cockpit, there is no "cockpit" folder in the P-38T directory; this means I can't copy and paste another cockpit in and start editing it. Do I need to edit the classfiles, or will game use an appropriately labelled folder as an overide of correctly placed?

Likewise, with the weaponry and effects, I know how to move around the bombs and cannon using the hooks in the .msh files, but not how to add or change the weapons themselves. Again, is this to do with the classfiles, or weapons.ru?

I have the tools to edit the classfiles, but not the skill as of yet - the jave code is quite impenetrable.
Any assistance would be greatly appreciated, I want to complete this as a decent mod rather than just an interesting franken.
Has anyone flown this yet? Thoughts?
-Matt

[agracier]

I've flown the plane several times after you first posted the beta. As designs go it's really something different. It will be great fun using it, especially as an ai to go after as enemy.

Flying the beta, I found it to be a bit heavy and not very maneuverable. Which was surprising since someone remarked that these odd, end of the war designs were often just very maneuverable. Maybe it is at the moment still a bit underpowered? I don't know how such things are done in Il-2, in the FM I suspect, so maybe some tinkering with that would be in order.

As for mods themselves, I haven't any experience with those. Only with maps and skins.

[RooMan296]

I think this is a great first effort and I thank you for sharing it with us! I had some fun with it this afternoon and I think the finished mod is gonna be a killer. Unless I'm forgetting something, this is the first plane Ive flown in IL2 with both a prop and seperate jet engine! Very cool indeed!

You might also consider loadin' er up with some massive 30mm cannons to be more of a bomber killer since that seemed to be the primary objective of the last ditch Luftwaffe designs... just a thought.

Great work!!!