A Bit O' Lace
Boeing Flying Fortress
B-17G-80
AvHistory - Version-4.00.100
Gregory Pierson's Version 4.0 first released in August 2006 represents a complete update of the AvHistory 1% Assembly Line Process (1%ALP). Compared to our previous efforts, 4.0 is an order of magnitude improvement and a closer step towards our goal of producing aircraft that perform within 1% of the real aircraft. For additional info on Version-4 flight packages see the included AvHistory - Version-4 1%ALP text file.
AIRCRAFT BACKGROUND:
HerbieG created this outstanding B-17G visual as the successor to his famous CFS2 MOLLY. John BRAVO/4 Whelan of the Ground Crew painted Herbie's plane as "A BIT O' LACE"
Rattlesden was the home base of the "A Bit O Lace" B-17 of USAF's 447th Bomb Group, situated between Felsham and Rattlesden, Suffolk ( 9 miles SE of Bury St Edmunds.) Rattlesden was allocated to the Eighth Air Force as a bomber base on 4 June 1942.
Tail number 42-97976 was a boy before it was a girl
The first crew acquired #42-97976 as a new ship. The plane was named "Louie The Creep" after a fictional character of the author Damon Runyon. The plane, after a number of bombing missions was flown with an 11-man crew. An extra radio was installed and manned by a German expatriate as an early form of electronic surveillance.
With a new crew the plane was re-named by pilot Lt. Warren F. Bates "A Bit O' Lace" and flew a total of 83 missions before the war ended. On only 35 of these missions did it carry the Bates crew, which "Bit O Lace" became famous for.
On these 35 missions, the crew suffered no injuries.
With the war in Europe finished "Miss Lace", as she was known to the crew was flown back to the States on July 4th 1945, where she was scrapped at Kingman, AZ.
This was taken from her combat diary: "Right over Kiel, and seconds before the bomb release, I heard the co-pilot say that "This airplane feels funny." Seconds later the tail gunner, who had regained his power of speech, blurted out something to the effect that part of "The tail was gone." A flak shell had gone right through the left horizontal tail, leaving only a partial surface, and completely removing the left elevator.
Note: the AvHistory Lace has the just repaired tail in fresh OD paint.
We dropped out of the formation, and tried to drop the bombs, but the electrical system failed. We flew north a minute or so, the plane now in the hands of the pilot. The pilot did not want to drop over Denmark, so we turned out over sea, and dropped via screwdriver.
We flew on, at a reduced speed, far out to sea on a west-south-west course with occasional ETA's to the pilot. Several fighters joined us, and finally we got back to the base, and the runway was cleared for us. A decision had to be made by the pilot: To jump or ride her in.. Tom decided that he could land the plane, so we all congregated to the radio room, and that was that."
The B-17G was introduced onto the production line in July of 1943, and was destined to be produced in larger numbers than any other Fortress variant. The most readily-noticeable innovation introduced by the B-17G was the power-operated Bendix turret mounted in a chin-type installation underneath the nose. This turret was equipped with two 0.50-inch machine guns.
Another feature introduced by the G was having the waist guns being permanently enclosed behind windows instead of being mounted behind removeable hatches. This made the rear fuselage somewhat less drafty.
The cheek nose guns introduced on the late B-17F were retained, but were staggered so that the left gun was in the forward side window and the right gun was in the middle side window, which reversed the positions used on the late Fs. The cheek gun mounts bulged somewhat outward into the airstream, which helped to improve the forward view from the cheek gun positions.
B-17Gs were built by all three members of the "BVD" production pool, with the Boeing lots ranging from production blocks G-1 to G-110, the Douglas blocks ranging from 5 to 95, and the Lockheed-Vega blocks ranging from 1 to 110.
The B-17G entered service with the Eighth and Fifteenth Air Forces in late 1943.
The so-called "Cheyenne" tail gun mounting modifications were incorporated in the B-17G-80-BO, -45-DL, -35-VE and subsequent batches. These tail gun mountings also had a reflector gunsight instead of the previous ring and bead. With this installation, these B-17Gs were five inches shorter than the earlier versions.
On later production versions, it was found necessary to stagger the waist gun positions so that the two gunners would not get in each other's way.
On the last production batches (B-17G-105 and -110-BO, B-17G-75 to -85-DL, and B-17G-85 to -110-VE), the radio compartment gun was not installed. The ammunition capacity of the waist guns was increased to 600 rpg.
When production finally terminated in 1945, a total of 4035 B-17Gs had been built by Boeing, 2395 by Douglas, and 2250 by Lockheed-Vega. The last Boeing-built B-17G was delivered on April 13, 1945. J.Baugher.
NOTE: The HG_Shared.zip, Charlie's Bomber Base.Zip & the AvHistory Guns - Weapons.zip should be installed with this aircraft. Links to the zip files are provided in the installation readme.
A B-17G will break ground at about 4,500ft @ 65,000lbs but since its climb rate is very low any hills, trees or both at the end of the runway will cause you problems. The Bomber Base Extension Package created by Charles "CHARLIE" Simpson for this project gives you an extra safety margin at these airbases.
At high gross weights the aircraft may lift off the runway but may not be able to climb out of ground effect until sufficient flying speed is reached. Also, if you get shot up and lose 1 or more engines the aircraft may not be able to maintain altitude.
Should you be over the ocean/channel you may descend until you enter ground effect where you may be able to limp home skimming across the water. For reference, ground effect extends for about 2 wingspans above the ground. Each aircraft is different and each aircraft has it's own unique ground effect pattern.
You will also be needing it for a number of the other 4 engine bombers that will be released.
As is usual please report any problems or issues to AvHistory 1% Squawks at
http://www.avhistory.org/scripts/Meg....asp?forumid=3for the fastest responce. We will also be checking in on the major CFS3 boards but our responce may be a bit slower.
BEAR - AvHistory Team
http://www.avhistory.org
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