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[Shessi]

Hi Pete,
Lovely pipework there fella..lol.

No really, that previous expanding coolant pipe is excellent (shows how Covid lock-down gets us to appreciate the small things in life...must get out more often..ha ha)

Do you know where the new pipe on the side of the radiator goes?  I wouldn't have thought it does a sharp U-bend and connects to the pipe coming off the impellor pump that's on the end of the shaft that drives the generator?

The detail on this side of the engine is really coming together, but that tex mapping!  , are you any good at jigsaw puzzles?

Sorry, no news on any more info.

Cheers

Shessi

[Mission_bug]

Hello Shessi, hope I find you well this rainy Saturday and that all is good with you and yours.

Glad you like it so far, we have grown old during this build, hopefully not much longer to go for this particular vehicle. 

Details of exactly where some of the pipes go sadly eludes me, I do have photographs of the underside but what I need to see is just out of the picture
and so for the time being I will just have to leave things where they are and hope something comes along later to allow me to up-date some of the meshes.

I like jigsaws, this project is my own version, finding spaces is part of the challenge and fun, did I say fun?

Because of the space limitations some areas have now had to be changed, it is full and I like if possible to keep meshes just using one texture so I little
re-jig of the sump parts underneath was necessary to fit the last items along the passenger side I had intended to do.

Here are those parts I am trying to fit on the texture, one looks like some kind of liquid level indicator and
then there is a tank up close to the cab bulkhead:




The parts behind what I think are the sump need to be done again to try and represent these round
parts that attach gearbox and engine together, what the shape is going backward along the vehicle
is difficult to see so again artistic licence will prevail, consider this more in line with a painting than
a set of engineering drawings, that will help you cope with some of my choices in that I can only
use previous experience and guesswork, anything else I make up as I go along :


You can see here I am trying to capture the flat where the bolts go with the curvature of the connection:





The shape will improve because I will eventually join certain bits of geometry together at their vertices
to make the whole but first I need to get a rough shape:





I am trying to imagine the shapes as they connect and go back or forward to the engine block:





This is what has now replaced the previous long box shape and because of the shape and size has
necessitated a new texture for this and further add on parts still to do:




Here we see the new tank and the rod near it have been painted up using the space created on the existing texture
with a start being made for the gearbox, steering parts and what attaches the tank to the side of the engine
on the new texture:





Here are the new parts in position in game, the gap might get a few small pipes and a plaque later but for
now I will concentrate on the bolts for the gearbox join and some new stuff for the steering column:





So, there we are, I will paint the new parts on the new texture tomorrow before the footie, sadly I have
a medical appointment on Monday so I will have to avoid the party crowds and watch the final on my own
with tea and bikkies as I have the whole tournament so far.


Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[Mission_bug]

Hello again guys, a little of what I managed to do this week.


Just as I thought I was done on the passenger side of the engine I found a little more
I thought I should add:




I am not entirely sure but I think this is the pipe that you see coming off the pump and disappearing
down and behind everything else so that is how I tried to make it.  Not sure if it was one complete
length of pipe or not but that is how I portrayed it and made a fixture to hold it in place part way down
and also added the two information plates while I was at it:





That finishes this side of the engine finally apart from a few wires on the bulkhead and the angle pieces that
hold the engine cover.

Here the new parts added to the game:



So, what is left on the other side? 

Well, it seems there is a little bit more than I thought.

Taking a look at the steering wheel I decided it was due a little more detailing:



Making a start on the assembly on the side:



I decided I would try and model this in a way that illustrates how it comes apart instead of just using
a solid part and paint:




Things coming together after a little chopping and welding with spares just in case I messed up:




Here I am developing the other items you see in the photograph, once mapped and painted some of those
parts will be orientated where necessary to fit the box at the bottom of the steering column to replicate
the end pieces:



Castellated nut, how the hell do I make one of those I asked myself, in little pieces was the result, I started
with one of the Blue shapes developing it from a box and eventually joined all six parts together leaving the
slit before using a Boolean method to cut a round hole, these were each mapped individually and a nut shape
made to bring up the rear that also had a hole cut in:





I used all the swear words I knew making that, what a pain, guess I am a glutton for punishment but I got
it looking near enough I think, you decide:



Maybe I should get out more.

Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[Shessi]

Hi Pete,
Thanks for the update and effort, and...there's always more to do....

The pipework looks like a engine oil sump level dipstick holder, and as that other pipe comes from the pump to the dipstick holder, I would imagine is an oil drain pipe to return a small amount of oil back to the sump system.  Great steering box extra detail, along with a very nice castelled nut! (bet nobody's said that to you in a while?!  )

....and yes you really should get out more...lol

Cheers

Shessi

[Mission_bug]

Hello Shessi, thank you very much for the information, really appreciated.

Thankfully I have you and others to try and fill my knowledge void on trucks, my days were mainly the manufacturing side of things, making parts for projects
although I did have a chance briefly to work on a company train refit in kent a long time ago now so while I have some fitting experience that revolved around
rail industry stuff such as traction motors, gear cases and the control equipment used then, my time in trucks was primarily in material handling
so while I got to know most truck parts I did not actually fit things so my knowledge is minimal as to what did what.

As you know we have not yet quite joined all the dots but as I do each section I sometimes see things in the photographs that I was unaware of
when doing other parts of the build, like the oil pipe, I could see roughly where it went but only now do I get idea of where it actually ends.

That pipe from the shroud is still elusive, these are all I have for the underneath and as you can see it does not tell me anything, the only pipe is
that coming down from the pump:








As for nuts, best if we don't go there.


Today was so hot and sunny I did nothing much, after a walk in the park I was fit for nothing, needed a shower and a very long power nap.


This week will be painting mainly of what you already saw, some parts I need to colour and then clone to
make up the complete units, I have made a start:









Not much left to build once these are painted up, just the angle pieces for the engine covers and there is
a rack I want to do for the roof of the desert version and that should complete the build of this truck/crane
combination and I will upload it then, the damage model and the lods will come later.


Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[Mission_bug]

Hello again guys, just another little update.

Here you can see the detail at the bottom of the steering column starting to come together, parts were
made for the front of the block and mapped before they were cloned and reversed for the rear, bolts were
as usual borrowed from previous areas:





The castle nut with a newly made split pin:





Mapping of the casting that holds the bearing race:





The finished parts all painted up:





There are quite a few rods and such that I think are from the drivers pedals in the lower area just back from the detail
just finished but I will not be doing them because I had decided to keep the detail just up to the point where the cab
bulkhead is and had deliberately not cut out the lower part of it to avoid trying to guess how it all came together under
the cab.

So, what is left then?

I now turned my attention to some of the remaining detail that is actually fixed to the cab bulkhead and made a start today.


Here we see the start of those items, first of all trying to replicate the shape of the box in the image using shapes formed
with the line tool:




The line tool has been essential throughout the build for forming awkward shapes, you have seen it done
before for other shapes but here again just as a reminder of the modifiers used:









As you can see from the photograph of the actual vehicle there are also some cables that run across
the top of the bulkhead as well as the various angle iron pieces used to hold the bonnet, once they
are done I think it will be time to finally bring to a close the detailing of this truck.


There are other things to make such as the roof rack for the desert and a few slings but essentially
the Thorneycroft itself will to all intents and purposes be done at last as far as the actual build.


Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[rogeroger]

Nice detailed work on that castle nut. I need to find a nice 3d modeling project.

[Mission_bug]

Nice detailed work on that castle nut. I need to find a nice 3d modeling project.

Glad you like it rogeroger, my piece de resistance possibly.

Everyone should find a special 3d project to do, just for themselves, something special to stimulate the mind, go for it. 

I find the project very soothing to do, with damaged nerves and tendons I can only spend short times at this but that
is the beauty of it as I can just plod along at my own pace if I can, when I can, it fulfills that creative urge.  I have
always felt the need to build things, Lego, Mechano, plastic models, engineering projects and now 3d.

At least I don't have to dust game objects like the scale models I have dotted on shelves around home and you can
do stuff with them for missions in game, keeps me out of mischief, map making is good also, especially when you can
actually make the objects, you can lose yourself in the project, keeps the world at bay and gives you some me time.

The big problem is deciding what you want to make, and how involved it will be, I think I got carried away with this.

Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[rogeroger]

In creating a 3d building object placement mod I'm discovering a lack of variety in the buildings available. In a large area like Portsmouth there are only a certain number of times you can use the same building before it becomes obvious. More western 1940s office blocks and factories are needed. In matching areas to the old photographs there is only so much that you can do.

 3d building projects aren't as challenging as exotic aircraft and nobody is going to say "what a cool office block, can't wait to fly over it", probably the reason why this has been neglected.
The more variety in buildings the more immersive the map.

As an old musician I've had my share of nerve and tendon injuries due to over practicing. I found that yoga and stretching exercises every morning helps. If you are sitting at the computer for long periods, occasionally shake the tension out of your hands and arms. I don't know how serious your injuries are so it's probably best to consult your doctor before doing these.

During covid I found it important to leave the computer periodically and run up and down my 10 meter passage to get the circulation flowing.

[Mission_bug]

Hello rogeroger, thankfully you have the objects available from Cannon that he made for his map but other than that most of what we have is primarily of building types from the east, unfortunately we have a very diverse range of buildings here so a bit of D.I.Y will be essential.  
  Making housing estates is not much of a problem as throughout the U.K. many share very similar building designs as they were erected by councils as workers housing mainly, however, for major public structures in towns and cities that are in many instances quite unique then having the ability to build is imperative as things that were essentially targets are usually big and very noticeable structures that German aircrew would look for as visual clues to find there way if possible, anyway, you are doing a marvelous job so far with what is available so I guess the landscape and layout of the areas you are working on is probably more important than the exact style of buildings.

Most of what I had to use on the Vietnam map were European in design, not entirely out of place because many civic structures would be created as per the home country, Asia though is really in need of some unique structures but there are so many types necessary to populate the maps we have that any one of us could not hope to actually build enough, I have made three specific to a particular map myself but unfortunately there are not enough of us or hours in the day to do full justice to what would be actually needed to furnish our available maps.

As far as the health issues go I have a set of very light physiotherapy stuff I try and do three to four times a day, about eight various types of exercise for various things in a session.  I have cervical spine issues as well as nerve entrapment and a long arm bicep problem, I find it difficult to do repetative movements with the arms as it causes quite harsh pains up the arms, along the neck and into the head, typing is especially difficult because the pain steadily moves up both arms at the same time, the pain killers only do so much and they tell me surgery could actually make things worse, they operated once on the ulner nerve but that left other issues unresolved and even the ulner nerve is still problematical.  Returning to work after that operation only made the other issues worse so all in all I am stuck with it and so doing things a little at a time is the only way to keep the pain manageable.

Anyway, it is what it is.

Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.

[rogeroger]

I didn't know you were a mapmaker. 

I have just checked out your South Vietnam map and have downloaded it. I just need to source the extra objects.

[Mission_bug]

I didn't know you were a mapmaker. 

Hardly a map maker per se, more a tinkerer, I found it too time consuming because like most projects you think it necessary to try and add everything and fix up what was needed, I still might one day return to the 67 map and try to do justice to the airfield and city of Saigon at that time and maybe lengthen all the main runways for some of the big aircraft available to us now that I can make objects.


The only map I made complete was 'Manom' from the 'KevinP' tutorial, Kirby put out the basic outline Vietnam map and I developed it from there.

Also, I put in the roads and rail on the 'ag_cztx_PS_Viet_Minh' and added some airfields that were relevant to the Japanese invasion that were used by French forces.

The 'ag_PS_DP_Baleares', was fixed up to make the harbours on the smaller islands useable by aircraft and boats, the buildings were also added around the altered shore line.

A version of my Vietnam map was developed by another member to replicate the U.S. involvement in the Sixties, certain parts of it I altered to allow better access to some of the airfields that A.I. found difficult.

Other than that I have a version of Ferte Alais adapted for offline and one of the 32nd map with a modern Duxford using the mission from Ferte Alais for their online play added to the map, they were never put out.

You will find some religious buildings here somewhere I made for Uzin (Ivan) for the Zakavkazye maps, those are the only objects I did specifically for a map, it is something I would like to return to eventually but I have a long way still to go on this project and as I said earlier it is deciding what to make that is the problem with so much needed.

Take care and be safe.

Wishing you all the very best, Pete.