Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-24 Thread Jon Stockill
On Sat, 24 Apr 2004, Al West wrote:

> Did you get a contact at IBM? I'm sure they'd be happy to lend/donate a
> Workstation for development purposes.  I can see it will be very likely that

I didn't unfortunately - it was just a quick question from a girl in their
high performance division, who was going to come back for a proper chat
later, but unfortunately she missed me.

-- 
Jon Stockill
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Al West
On Friday 23 April 2004 10:59, Jon Stockill wrote:
> They were
> particularly impressed with the seahawk and hunter models, so if Vivian
> wants to do a Seafire version of his spitfire model I'm sure they'd be
> happy to supply some information.
>

Also they said they would be happy to help with anyone who wanted to take 
photos or measurements from their aircraft. However, I guess they meant for 
the person to be there rather than rely on them to provide the information.

> IBM wanted to know if it'd
> run on their powerseries kit (I don't think anyone's done it so far, but
> they seemed rather hopeful when I explain the architectures it already
> runs on), 

Did you get a contact at IBM? I'm sure they'd be happy to lend/donate a 
Workstation for development purposes.  I can see it will be very likely that 
IBM may choose to use the Wasp once at other shows in the UK or even Europe 
to draw crowds and play on the link to DB2 'Stinger'.  I am considering at 
the moment if I can spare the time to prepare a 3D model and cockpit for the 
Westland Wasp.  

Cheers for now,
Al

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


RE: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Jon Stockill
On Fri, 23 Apr 2004, Richard Bytheway wrote:

> > You can find my pictures at http://photos.stockill.org.uk/ludex2004
> >
>
> I have to ask, what is img_0006.jpg (Captioned "It's evil but it
> might just work.")?

Heh :-)

That's the kit that interfaced the cyclic...

-- 
Jon Stockill
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


RE: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Vivian Meazza


 Jonathan Richards wrote
 
> On Friday 23 Apr 2004 5:24 pm, Vivian Meazza wrote:
> > Jonathan Richards
> 
> >>  I'm prepared to write to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight
> >> [1] and ask them for information.  
> 
> > I think that would be a very good idea. I think I have evolved a 
> > pretty good idea of what it did from various documents on 
> the web and 
> > elsewhere (good enough for our simulation anyway), but I would be 
> > absolutely fascinated to learn how it actually worked.  Quite a bit 
> > seems to get left out. I assume that it was common knowledge at the 
> > time, and they didn't expect guys like us to be worrying at it over 
> > half a century later.
> 
> I'm baffled, now.  I have just been poking around the website 
> I referenced 
> earlier, and there are two pictures of the MkIIa, clearly 
> taken some time 
> apart, because the squadron markings and paint scheme are 
> different.  That's 
> OK, but in this one:
> [127 kB] http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/gallery/p7350side1024.jpg
> the propeller has three blades, while P7350 is in the middle 
> of this one: [174 kB] 
> http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/gallery/bbmf3ship1024.jpg
> and there are four blades.  Were the propellers 
> interchangeable on the same 
> model?
> I'll get on to RAF Coningsby on Monday, and see what we can 
> get. Jonathan
> 

I think that's a hybrid. 4 bladed propellers were introduced on the Mk VI,
but weren't produced in any numbers until the MkIX. You can also see that
the wrong exhausts are fitted - they should be the 6 into 3 ejector
exhausts, but these are 6 per side stub exhausts. My guess would be a Mk II
airframe fitted with a Merlin 60, since these are probably the most common
engines.

Well spotted!

Regards

Vivian  



___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Jonathan Richards
On Friday 23 Apr 2004 5:24 pm, Vivian Meazza wrote:
> Jonathan Richards

>>  I'm prepared to write to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight 
>> [1] and ask them for information.  

> I think that would be a very good idea. I think I have evolved a pretty
> good idea of what it did from various documents on the web and elsewhere
> (good enough for our simulation anyway), but I would be absolutely
> fascinated to learn how it actually worked.  Quite a bit seems to get left
> out. I assume that it was common knowledge at the time, and they didn't
> expect guys like us to be worrying at it over half a century later.

I'm baffled, now.  I have just been poking around the website I referenced 
earlier, and there are two pictures of the MkIIa, clearly taken some time 
apart, because the squadron markings and paint scheme are different.  That's 
OK, but in this one:
[127 kB] http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/gallery/p7350side1024.jpg
the propeller has three blades, while P7350 is in the middle of this one:
[174 kB] http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/gallery/bbmf3ship1024.jpg
and there are four blades.  Were the propellers interchangeable on the same 
model?
I'll get on to RAF Coningsby on Monday, and see what we can get.
Jonathan


___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


RE: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Vivian Meazza

Jonathan Richards
 
> On Friday 23 Apr 2004 4:11 pm, Vivian Meazza wrote:
> > Jon Stockill wrote
> 
> > > They were particularly impressed
> > > with the Seahawk and hunter models, so if Vivian wants to do a 
> > > Seafire version of his spitfire model I'm sure they'd be happy to 
> > > supply some information.
> >
> > The thought had crossed my mind :-) and the transformation into a 
> > Seafire MkIB or MkIIC would be trivial. Got to get the Spitfire IIa 
> > working properly first, though.
> Vivian
> I work for the MoD, and if you think we could get anything 
> useful I'm prepared 
> to write to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight [1] and ask 
> them for 
> information.  P7350 is a MkIIa: "the oldest airworthy 
> Spitfire in the world 
> and the only survivor of the Battle of Britain still flying" 
> [2]. When I was reading the thread about the boost control 
> valve, I couldn't help 
> thinking that we could contact an engineer who would have a 
> definitive 
> answer.  Any good?

I think that would be a very good idea. I think I have evolved a pretty good
idea of what it did from various documents on the web and elsewhere (good
enough for our simulation anyway), but I would be absolutely fascinated to
learn how it actually worked.  Quite a bit seems to get left out. I assume
that it was common knowledge at the time, and they didn't expect guys like
us to be worrying at it over half a century later.

Regards

Vivian



___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Jonathan Richards
On Friday 23 Apr 2004 4:11 pm, Vivian Meazza wrote:
> Jon Stockill wrote

> > They were particularly impressed
> > with the Seahawk and hunter models, so if Vivian wants to do
> > a Seafire version of his spitfire model I'm sure they'd be
> > happy to supply some information.
>
> The thought had crossed my mind :-) and the transformation into a Seafire
> MkIB or MkIIC would be trivial. Got to get the Spitfire IIa working
> properly first, though.
Vivian
I work for the MoD, and if you think we could get anything useful I'm prepared 
to write to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight [1] and ask them for 
information.  P7350 is a MkIIa: "the oldest airworthy Spitfire in the world 
and the only survivor of the Battle of Britain still flying" [2].
When I was reading the thread about the boost control valve, I couldn't help 
thinking that we could contact an engineer who would have a definitive 
answer.  Any good?
Regards
Jonathan

[1] http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/bbmfhome.html
[2] http://www.raf.mod.uk/bbmf/fighters.html

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Jonathan Richards
On Friday 23 Apr 2004 1:22 pm, Richard Bytheway wrote:
> > You can find my pictures at http://photos.stockill.org.uk/ludex2004
>
> I have to ask, what is img_0006.jpg (Captioned "It's evil but it might
> just work.")?
>
Richard
It's the arrangement of two potentiometers at right angles that we then 
fastened at one end  to the helicopter deck (bottom pot, using about half a 
metre of duct tape) and at the other to a rod leading from the rotor shaft 
(twisted wire at the location marked with green and white tape around the 
aluminium L-section).
The idea was to be able to get resistances/voltages/joystick values for the X 
and Y motions of the real helicopter cyclic control.  Unfortunately, there 
was a problem with the USB on the PCs that we were lent, and although the 
construction was somewhat evil, it did not, in the end, work.
Regards
Jonathan

PS  I am of the opinion that this was, in retrospect, not a Bad Thing (R).  
The real cyclic control was very heavy, because the rotor had the blades 
mounted, but of course no servos.  Many of our users would have struggled 
badly.   Disappointing for Jon, though, who had put heroic efforts into the 
interface electronics.
J.

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


RE: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Vivian Meazza


Jon Stockill wrote
 


 
> > The Fleet Air Arm Museum are very interested in having their own 
> > simulator but this would depend on them being able to find 
> a sponsor - 
> > so it's still dubious as to if anything will happen in that respect.
> 
> They have a Vampire cockpit which they're using as an open 
> display cockpit at the moment, and it's possible that this is 
> what they'll use as their simulator, although various other 
> ideas were discussed too. 

Flew one of those once ... Many years ago. 

> They were particularly impressed 
> with the Seahawk and hunter models, so if Vivian wants to do 
> a Seafire version of his spitfire model I'm sure they'd be 
> happy to supply some information.
> 

The thought had crossed my mind :-) and the transformation into a Seafire
MkIB or MkIIC would be trivial. Got to get the Spitfire IIa working properly
first, though.

I wish now that I had made some time to join you down there. I was busy, but
I don't live too far away, and time can always be found ... I'm kicking
myself.

Well done 

Regards 

Vivian



___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


RE: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Richard Bytheway
> You can find my pictures at http://photos.stockill.org.uk/ludex2004
> 

I have to ask, what is img_0006.jpg (Captioned "It's evil but it might just 
work.")?

Richard

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Jon Stockill
On Thu, 22 Apr 2004, Al West wrote:

> It was highly enjoyable to be able to talk to people about something one
> is very interested in and I am disappointed that both days passed by so
> quickly.  My congratulations go out to the two Jons who did a fantastic
> job in instructing during the show.  It was great to be able to put some
> faces to email addresses.

Yes, it was great to meet you all. I'd just like to say a big thankyou to
those who were there, particularly Jonathan, who helped me set up on
Monday, and joined in the hair tearing, and utterly inspired engineering
(we'll be patenting some innovative uses of duck tape, and the cable tie
plastic rivet). I certainly couldn't have managed the 3 days on my own.

> I took some photos on the second day (I'm not even a photgrapher by any
> means ;-) which are available at:
>   http://uk2004expo.fotopic.net/
> The images are between 300KB and 700KB (1280x1024) - sorry if you are on
> dialup but I've not had time to crop and compress the images.

Fotopic does that for you - They're scaled to fit your screen size.

You can find my pictures at http://photos.stockill.org.uk/ludex2004

> The Fleet Air Arm Museum are very interested in having their own
> simulator but this would depend on them being able to find a sponsor -
> so it's still dubious as to if anything will happen in that respect.

They have a Vampire cockpit which they're using as an open display cockpit
at the moment, and it's possible that this is what they'll use as their
simulator, although various other ideas were discussed too. They were
particularly impressed with the seahawk and hunter models, so if Vivian
wants to do a Seafire version of his spitfire model I'm sure they'd be
happy to supply some information.

> However I was talking to one of the members of staff of the Aeronautical
> Department at Imperial College (London) and they are in the process of
> looking for an open-source flightsim for Linux and she was very excited
> to learn about FlightGear.  Also we came across another group who want
> to use FlightGear for displaying and showing UAV data and position.

In addition to this there was some interest from a company doing safety
simulations for north sea oilrig helicopters, IBM wanted to know if it'd
run on their powerseries kit (I don't think anyone's done it so far, but
they seemed rather hopeful when I explain the architectures it already
runs on), and I spoke to a guy who was interested in using it for remote
flight instruction (apparently this is something that MSFS is already
being used for - I'm a bit dubious, but I suppose it could be useful for a
certain subset of flight training).

We also spoke to a BA 777 pilot (whose son managed a much better landing
than his dad), who will hopefully be signing up to the mailing list so we
can quiz him about cockpit instrumentation etc.

> Well I'm not a journalist either - but if anyone has any questions about the
> show then feel free to ask.

We did speak to a few journalists though, who may well be writing articles
on FlightGear - when I find out where and when they'll be published I'll
let you know.

Overall I'd say the show was EXTREMELY successful. We've learned a few
important lessons, which Jonathan is planning to write up later - just so
we don't make the same mistakes next time.

-- 
Jon Stockill
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-23 Thread Matthew Law
Lee Elliott wrote:

It sounds as though things went really well - round of applause to all 
concerned.  I wish I could have got up there, if only to visit but sadly, 
there wasn't any way I could make it.

Ditto.  I'll definitely try and be there next year.

Well done guys!

All the best,

Matt.

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel


Re: [Flightgear-devel] 2004 Linux User & Developer Expo

2004-04-22 Thread Lee Elliott
On Thursday 22 April 2004 20:29, Al West wrote:
> Greetings All,
>
> I think it was very successful show.  I estimate we got about 80 or so
> people a day flying with FlightGear, around 10% managed to land.  It was a
> shame that we were not able to use the controls within the helicopter, due
> to a 'feature' in HP/Compaq Machine USB controller.  However the helicopter
> was certainly the main attraction and IBM were running a competition to win
> a camera of which part of the entry was to have visited the FlightGear
> Stand.
>
> It was highly enjoyable to be able to talk to people about something one is
> very interested in and I am disappointed that both days passed by so
> quickly. My congratulations go out to the two Jons who did a fantastic job
> in instructing during the show.  It was great to be able to put some faces
> to email addresses.
>
> I took some photos on the second day (I'm not even a photgrapher by any
> means ;-) which are available at:
>   http://uk2004expo.fotopic.net/
> The images are between 300KB and 700KB (1280x1024) - sorry if you are on
> dialup but I've not had time to crop and compress the images.
>
> The Fleet Air Arm Museum are very interested in having their own simulator
> but this would depend on them being able to find a sponsor - so it's still
> dubious as to if anything will happen in that respect.  However I was
> talking to one of the members of staff of the Aeronautical Department at
> Imperial College (London) and they are in the process of looking for an
> open-source flightsim for Linux and she was very excited to learn about
> FlightGear.  Also we came across another group who want to use FlightGear
> for displaying and showing UAV data and position.
>
> Well I'm not a journalist either - but if anyone has any questions about
> the show then feel free to ask.
>
> Cheers for now,
> Al

It sounds as though things went really well - round of applause to all 
concerned.  I wish I could have got up there, if only to visit but sadly, 
there wasn't any way I could make it.

LeeE

___
Flightgear-devel mailing list
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel