Good to know, maybe I’ll pick it up, make some bombing missions as that is the closest any bi-plane atm gets to being able to carry proper bombs that might be able to actually do some damage.
Absolutely love how different the scenery looks!
2 Likes
Yeah, I really like the scenery of the IL-2 GB series. Especially in Flying Circus. Airfields stick out like a sore thumb in some sims, but on the Arras map you really need to know where to look…
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JFC! Lovely!
Nice one. 
Wheels
From this night.
Testing Bodenplate with Otto. Nice from them that you can fly Kuban aircrafts on that map. Me in Cobra and Otto in Jug
Wanted to do some pic of you guys before mission end… but that damn tree! 
It was FUN !
6 Likes
Looks like it was a blast. Wish I could have made it.
Wheels
From the session last night on the 352nd server.
More often than not I would have been apt to collide with or shoot down my teammate and not the enemy aircraft chasing him.
Wheels
5 Likes
Fired up IL2, since I was thinking of Jane’s WWII Fighters and loaded up as close to Bastogne as possible. Things have sure changed a lot in 20 years! The quick battle was near Liege or Aachen, not sure which. No pictures of P-47D (she was a real pain, I got both 109s but one of them clipped my port wing in a head-on) and the Spitfire ground looped on me when I landed. Just need random deer running around for a complete experience!
9 Likes
I haven’t done a real familiarization mission with IL2BoX, despite being invested in it since this past spring; coupled with the winter weather in my real life reminding me of playing Jane’s WWII Fighters in winter '99 as well as being 75 years since the Battle of the Bulge began, I fired up a P-38 in BoBP from a cold start for a little sight seeing.
Start time: 0800, moderate to clear conditions, winter.
It took quite a while to get the engines warmed up in these conditions! So used to dealing with modern turbines that I forget how persnickety these old engines were.
Once warmed up though, the P-38 has power for days. I suspect if the P-38J had been the first of the type to arrive in Europe, it might’ve been a different story. Alas, the P-38E and F models were the first and we know how that story went.
This morning’s destination: Bastogne. Even though I’m carrying extra ammo and full internal fuel, it doesn’t take long to get up to speed and make a decent climb rate.
Getting up there! I think this was at 23,000ft. I got to about 25,000ft over Bastogne.
Bastogne from altitude. It’s a bit tricky when it’s this cold to lose speed and altitude without freezing the engines.
Low altitude pass, looking over the small but important town.
I’m this far south, what else can I look at? A quick check of the map and I can fly east to Malmedy. Further south is St. Vith which for some reason sticks in my mind from Jane’s WWII Fighters.
I turn northwest from here to head back to Liege and attack a train on the ground, which I didn’t get pictures of (kinda busy making those low-level strafing runs).
Finally, buzz the tower! Did I mention it seems really hard to lose speed and altitude? I looped around for quite a bit before I was able to make landing speed.
I’m paranoid about bursting tires and wearing brakes out, so I end up using practically the whole runway length before veering off to the parking area and shutting down.
Sight seeing complete!
I remember trying to do something like this back with Jane’s WWII Fighters – just a simple sight seeing mission, no action – and running the P-38 out of gas, despite drop tanks. Anyone know if the P-38 is slated to get them? Seems odd not to have drop tanks available, but nothing in the weapons list at all.
17 Likes
Beautiful Screens!!
2 Likes
Do any opf the planes have drop tanks? I don’t remeber the P-47 or P-51 having them either?
Wheels
No its a technical limitation in the engine, should have em at some point with the Normandy expansion.
To be honest you don’t really need them other than for screenshots. I broke open the Actual manual for the p-38/47/51 that we have in game, and they list out how much gas each of those planes have and their fuel burn rates at various power settings, all of which are matched in game.
In the p-38 if you took 100% fuel and could run your engine at 100% WEP forever you’d get two hours at that burn rate before your tanks ran dry. In more normal operations with full tanks you have like 4-6 hours of gas available at 100% fuel.
p-51/47 are similar, think you get 40 ish minutes fuel wise on the p-47 at 100% boosted, and somewhere around an hour on the p-51.
Long story short, if you take off with full tanks, you have more than enough gas to do anything you want on the maps provided.
@klarsnow is right, I read that they’re planned along with an improved fuel management system, but it hasn’t been introduced yet. It’s a larger problem for the German planes though I do admit it’s not like it’s an absolute requirement.
1 Like
Thanks for the info on the drop tanks. 
I agree that on the maps we are getting they are unnecessary. I only use 50% fuel in the P-51, P-38, and P-47 and so far I have not had any problems with fuel unless I took a flak hit.
Wheels
I do recall using them a lot in IL2’46, but mostly on the Pacific maps. A friend and I used the multiplayer campaign generator with the F4U and it frequently tasked us with long range missions that demanded drop tanks.
1 Like
Yep. There were several mission types that required them in IL-2 on the Pacific maps which were always fun for me. Unfortunately most online Players only wanted to get in and shoot something in the first two minutes, get shot down, get a new aircraft. Rinse and repeat.
For me the fuel management and navigation challenges, with icons off, were more fun than the actual engagement. If you got damaged far from home, never the goal though, and actually got the plane back and landed it was even more satisfying.
Wheels
1 Like
I remember such missions from Target Rabaul ( do anyone remember TargetWare? ).
Iirc each Saturday have been organized online coop PvP historical event featuring such long flights. I remember one particular mission on which I got totally damaged but made it home. Surely satisfying.
4 Likes