Guille's PzCorps Support Base - Multipurpose Icons and more.

[nikivdd]

Thank you for the very nice units. Awesome work from the Guille's unit factory .

[guille1434]

Thanks Nikivdd... It is just a way to compensate for all the fun I am getting with this game AND its mods... You are a big part of it, as we all know!!
I am very glad you find this graphic works nice...

[guille1434]

Almost forgot... (because I did not save the file in the "normal" output folder). Here is a Fokker D.XXI fighter in Low Countries colors (by the way, whats the correct country name for that historic period: Low Countries, Holland, Netherlands... anyone can teach me?). This is a totally original icon (no cut & paste work). I made it from an image downloaded from internet. I think it looks good enough to be added to our arsenal...

PS: As a result of our conversation with Razz1, I uploaded an improved version of the Fokker D.XXI, also another icon with Finnish Air Force Markings. The color of this unit, albeit it's not "historical", is a pretty good match with the one which have other icon units from a small Finnish unit pack I downloaded from this forum. I am slowly expanding this unit icon group, in case someone wants (hint, hint, modders out there!) to make a Winter War Campaign mod (besides the good one made by people from DMP, which is for v1.05 of the game). I took some icons from this mod also and used them as a base for derived units also, and made skins for the DCS software in order to add more icons with a Finnish "uniform PzCorps look".
If someone is interested, I can upload a small "Finland Unit Pack"

2013-03-22: Re-uploaded the Finnish Fokker D.XXI as improved by McGuba (made more to scale, insignia corrected)

[ThvN]

Hi guille, nice work, you've been busy lately! I saw your Sovjet tanks in bebro's thread, are you making the 'KV-220' as well? This was some mashup of an unfinished prototype of a heavier KV model, and it was intended to be mounted with a 85mm or even a 107mm gun.

It was never finished but the chassis was completed when Leningrad was under attack, and they mounted a standard KV turret on this very heavy chassis and used it in combat. They had two or three different prototype chassis at the factory (one of them for a KV-3), of which one or two were used in combat. So it is a unique model, just like the SMK you made, but most people don't know about it.

http://english.battlefield.ru/kv-3-kv-4 ... v-220.html

http://www.armorama.com/modules.php?op= ... _id=177648

http://pkka.narod.ru/kv-vers.htm

And to answer your question about the Netherlands:

The 'Low Countries' is a general phrase and usually means Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands together (Benelux), and sometimes just the coastal regions of Belgium and the Netherlands, but that depends on the era. For the present day, The Netherlands or Holland are both correct, but the Netherlands is more official. The overseas colony which is Indonesia nowadays was called the Dutch East Indies (which the Japanese conquered in WW2).

[Razz1]

I have been using this artwork.

[guille1434]

ThvN: Thanks for the research on the Object 220! You saved me the first step of the project! As always, very thorough... I will try to make the icon for it, I think the results will be good. Thanks also for the explanation about Netherlands!

Razz1: I think the icon I posted is a little more accurate in its outline (specially the wings), but, seeing your icon, I think I can improve mine a little, making the insignia a little more visible and detailing smoe more the cockpit glazing. By the way, I think both icons were made using the same origin image!


PS: Made the improvements to this little fighter, I think it improved the icon somewhat. Go see the post, I changed the uploaded icon!
Thanks for the feedback!

[Razz1]

Ha ha! there were two Fokkers used in the war for the Dutch.

Fokker DXXI-1 and DXXI-5. I can now use mine for Fokker DXXII-1, yours as -5 since it's improved.

Other version were sold to Finland so, a Nazi Swastika and we are good to go for the Finnish war against the Bear.

[guille1434]

Ok, as ThvN suggested, it was a good idea to make another Soviet "special" or, may be "What If" unit. Here is the KV-220, which one prototipe (with a KV-1 turret) was used in the defense of Leningrad city (see the copious references in the post above).

So, all of you can grab:
- KV-220-76 (with a KV-1 turret mounted)
- KV-220-85 (with its specially designed turret, mounting a 85 mm long barreled gun)
- And also, as this one would be a "very" special unit, there is a KV-220-85 variant with a "SE Unit" camo scheme.

Cheers!

[guille1434]

Another addition for the railroad units... This is a transformation of the standard game icon. Made it more like a train, with two cars, one with an artillery gun, the other with an AA turret.

[guille1434]

Razz1: Did not know there were two versions of Fokker D.XXI that were used by the Dutch. I uploaded the "improved" D.XXI, and also an icon with this plane in Finnish Air Force (ahistorical, see my original post) markings. As I made the mask for this icon to use un the DCS program I cam make some other color schemes for it, so ask me if you want a differen version of the Dutch unit to use as the D.XXI-1. By the way, do you know (or someone here) what were the differences between both sub-models?

Thanks!!

[Razz1]

D.XXI-5 had more powerful engines. Longer range (66), movement (13)

So DXXI-1 has shorter range, (51) and movement (12)

[Helmut]

Wo werden Spielergebnisse aus Multiplayerpartien gesammelt?
Vielen Dank
helmut

[guille1434]

Razz1: Thanks for the info!
Helmut: If you are asking something to me, sorry to say I could not understand German language (except from some isolated words). If someone could translate...

[Razz1]

Wo werden Spielergebnisse aus Multiplayerpartien gesammelt?
Vielen Dank
helmut

PM sent.

[ThvN]

Razz1: Did not know there were two versions of Fokker D.XXI that were used by the Dutch. I uploaded the "improved" D.XXI, and also an icon with this plane in Finnish Air Force (ahistorical, see my original post) markings. As I made the mask for this icon to use un the DCS program I cam make some other color schemes for it, so ask me if you want a differen version of the Dutch unit to use as the D.XXI-1. By the way, do you know (or someone here) what were the differences between both sub-models?

Thanks!!

Well, guess who's back ... Nice icons, by the way, but you asked about the Fokker D.XXI (or D.21 for short), so prepare for incoming!

I do not recall the Dutch using more than one version, and I took a look at the English wikipedia page and it does not make a lot of sense... Razz1, I think you've been fooled by wikipedia, but luckily the Finnish (Suomi) wiki page seems quite good, so you can translate that for the best wiki-info. It seems the English wiki uses a lot of obsolete info (Kamphuis from 1966, Green from the 70s), and some of the specs are incorrect, I'll get to that later.

Another thing, the 'variants' with sub-nrs (D.XXI-5) do not exist for the Dutch models: there was only a prototype, a trial machine and after some improvements a bunch were made for the Dutch airforce. These Dutch service machines had the best performance of all D.21's (still not very good, though), the Finnish made a licensed version which did not incorporate all the improvements Fokker made for the Dutch. The Finnish added some features of their own (capacity to mount snow landing gear, and later better gunsights and a better view from the cockpit). These first Finnish airplanes were comparable to the Dutch model but had a slightly lower top speed. These were the ones used with good results in the famous 'Winter War' against the Sovjet Union.

The Finns used the variant numbers, they were called 'series', and they were not necessarily different in equipment or performance, in fact there were only two major Finnish versions with regards to performance. I don't have all my books handy, but I made a google translation from the Finnish wiki, and together with my memory this should suffice for now.

The first Finnish series (Series I) were simply seven aircraft built by Fokker in the Netherlands and delivered to the Finns (in crates) without weapons; in the meanwhile the Finns were busy setting up their production line to build their licensed machines. They had bought a license for a couple of dozen more, I believe.

Series II were the first batch of machines the Finns built themselves; they were 14 machines (Finnish wiki).

Series III were the second batch of licensed machines. I don't know if there were any differences, but I know they had to make changes to the licensed machines' construction, they used a different kind of wood, could mount snow ski's, etc. It could well be that both series II and III had some or all of these changes. Also, they managed to make it cheaper to produce. The Finnish also acquired a new license to produce as many as they liked. The problem however, was that the Finns also built the engines (Bristol Mercury) locally, but that production was slow and they also needed the engines for other aircraft. And the Fokker was not that good, but it would be a shame to waste the production potential, because the Fokker was cheap, easy to build and relatively easy to fix. Which brings us to the next series:

Series IV ('D.XXI-4') wiki entry had me laugh when I read it for the first time, which was painful because I have a minor throat infection at the moment . The series IV was a downgrade by the Finns, since they couldn't produce enough Bristol Mercury engines to mount on the Fokkers. So they mounted some P&W Wasp engines instead, but this made the performance at medium and higher altitudes worse; at low altitude performance was slightly better. These 'Wasp'-machines were not really used as fighters much, but more for training and reconnaissance, apparently. They had better protection (a bit of armor, better fuel system protection) and better visibility from the cockpit.

Series V: Then, a while after the Winter War, Germany invaded the Sovjet Union, the Finns baited the Soviet Union in attacking them and thus started the 'Continuation War'. The Finnish government ordered more aircraft from their factory to replace losses, first a small series of 5 machines (quickly built from spare parts according to the wiki) which was delivered in the summer of 1944, and after that they started work on another order, but that was cancelled because the war was already over. Series V were the same as Series IV it seems.

Where the English wiki-information for the Bristol Pegasus engine for Series V came from I have no idea, but I haven't seen any evidence that it was ever mounted and it is likely the result of a mix-up by Kamphuis (1966). You see, around that time of the Series V the Finns also ordered their factory to make 5 Fokker C.X planes, and these biplanes had the Pegasus engine. So I guess this could be the origin of the mistake.

The specs: the top speed of 460 km/h is too high; this was the speed of the Dutch trial model without any combat gear, combat-ready models could do 446 km/h, the Finnish versions were a bit slower, the Finnish wiki has more accurate numbers for their versions.

Armament notes: Frequently mentioned are models fitted with cannons, but there were only two test machines with these, one was Finnish, it had two 20mm Oerlikon FF, and they didn't like it.
The other was Danish, they trialled a machine with two 20mm Madsen cannon, and later removed this armament. I don't know if the Spanish version had any noticable differences (The Spanish Republican faction had just started production before the end of the Civil War).

[guille1434]

Thanks ThvN, another invaluable "pearl" of specific info about a unit! Fortunately we have our in-forum resident researcher.

[guille1434]

Ok, back to basics...
The 17cm K 18 gun, improved the original game icon (made barrel longer, basically) and made the direct fire variant, in the following "flavors":

- Standard German Heer grey scheme
- SE and SS camouflaged versions (compatible with Elite Units Mod)
- Desert plain color
- SE Desert camo scheme
The five icons, as said, in Arty and direct fire versions, also I attach the masks and base icon graphics to include in the DCS software... Hope you like them!

PS: Improved a little the Finnish Fokker D.XXI, re-uploaded icon, see previous post!

[McGuba]

Nice work with the Fokkers.

I have made two little changes with the Finnish one, though, if you do not mind. First I made it a bit smaller to better match the size of the fighters made by bebro. Now it is slightly smaller than a Bf-109 (its lenght is 8.2m as opposed to 8.95m). Also changed the insigna as the Finnish swastika should not be mirrored, it should always be the same regardless of the direction of the plane.



By the way it matches the aircraft replacements made by bebro seamlessly, I think:





I also like the modified armoured train and probably I will use it, but I might revert to the double artillery gun armament, as there is no animation for the gun + AA gun combo at the moment.

[Razz1]

I knew there was something that was off. It just didn't look right but couldn't describe it.

Good catch on the insignia's as now it looks normal. By the way, I all for making a few of the icons smaller as we have allot of over large units that are not stock.

So does your picture indicate the Russians are running away from the Finns?

[McGuba]

So does your picture indicate the Russians are running away from the Finns?

Actually, yes. The Finns achieved quite an impressive kill to loss ratio during the Winter War, despite they were mostly using old-fashioned planes and they were massively outnumbered:

Finnish fighter pilots often dove into Soviet formations that outnumbered them ten or even twenty times. Finnish fighters shot down 240 confirmed Soviet aircraft, against the Finnish loss of 26.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerial_war ... Winter_War

So the Soviet planes should run away to the opposite direction when seeing the Fokkers.