Topic: „On the Trail of Richard Bach” – in the flight simulator cockpit

This topic has 8 voices, contains 40 replies, and was last updated by jennifer from Belgium 5 days ago.

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February 12, 2012 at 7:11 am #4643
medwyn	I would like to announce a project for computer flight simulator users. Since Richard’s books are filled with unforgettable moments spent in the air, if we use them as a kind of ’flight logbook’ there is a good chance to figure out the routes he was flying really or virtually. And then recreate these flights as accurately as possible using a computer flight simulator software. First of all this project is requiring some research through Richard’s books for datas related to the flights described or mentioned. There are several kind of landmarks (named cities, towns, airports, other unique visual elements) to reek together – some of them are real, others fictional – and the airplanes mentioned in the books are also identical. From the gathered information we can set up different routes and create the flight plans for them. And here comes the cherry on the cake – fly these routes in the simulator and have an extraordinary immersion in Richard’s world…  Special tanks to Richard who is really kind and helps us to follow the authentic checklists, starts the props on the most accurate way we could do it. On the other hand I would like to ask everybody here interested in this simulated flight recreation to help in the preparations and join the flight sim events if possible when they are ready! Time to time I’ll update the information here in this topic to tell how the project is going. Thank you, Happy flying! Peter
February 12, 2012 at 11:15 am #4655
Simon	What kind of help do you need…. tell me something more about a project. How it will work and so on.
February 13, 2012 at 7:37 am #4734
Coleen	Hi medwyn! I would love to be a part of this! Please include me to help anyway I can and to be a part of this anyway I can! What a neat idea! Love it! Looking forward to hearing all about this! Have a great day/evening guys!
February 13, 2012 at 9:21 am #4759
medwyn	Thank you Simon and Coleen, welcome on board One of my hobby is “digital flying” on my computer – there are nice flight simulator softwares anyone can use at home with accurate flight control hardware devices on the side. I prefer MS Flight SImulator X but there are others as well (MS FS 2004, an earlier piece of X, and X-Plane but I have never touched that). The idea is coming from here and from the mental boost of reading the book “Illusions” again which has lots of flight datas – mostly fictional ones as Richard referred to them. At the moment I am reading through “Hypnotizing Maria” to collect all the possible information and landmarks (for ex.: used plane: Beech T-34, Route: Washington to Florida, first leg: Seattle (WA) to Twin Falls (Idaho), and so on) and when it is ready I could set up a “Richard Bach Flight in Hypnotizing Maria”-route. Then creating a flight plan in the sim, get the proper plane if possible and fly the tour with screenshots and some video taken what I could post here. It would be outstanding if anyone could join these flights through the multiplayer possibilities of the flight sim softwares but I understand that these are not as common as a browser software on everyday computers. Anyway you may fall in love with flying if you can have a sim at home On the other hand I don’t have all Richard’s books with me and some of them is really difficult to buy as well, so if any of you is reading any of them, please write notes if you find any flight related information: locations, planes, etc. According to Richard the book “Nothing by chance” is full of real flight locations and datas Richard has really made with his biplane. That’s the book hard to get here in the UK but maybe in Hungary there is a solution (some of Richard’s books are reprinted in the past years there). So the more routes we can set up based in Richard’s books the more joy will be heard from the spinning props This is not a quick project, the more time we spend on fine-tuning the details the more accurate result is coming out. Richard is also really kind to keep everything in bay with the set up and that’s the most authentic help we can have. Thank you again, Peter
February 13, 2012 at 10:06 am #4777
medwyn	I quickly made a tiny teaser:
February 13, 2012 at 10:16 am #4779
Simon	I dont have a lot of skills in MFS … I dont know if my hardware is good enought to play but i will try. I can help you with planes … tell me how can I conntact you. Simon
February 13, 2012 at 10:31 am #4789
jennifer from Belgium	‘Boy oh boy’ (english expression meaning ‘oh my goodness)’ Richard is going to have a ‘field day’ (english expression for wild time) when he returns to the forum….all these new little suprises…
February 14, 2012 at 2:12 pm #4919
Coleen	This is gonna be so cool!!!!! Thank you very much again for starting this!
February 15, 2012 at 3:40 am #4960
medwyn	Simon may have somebody to create the models of the aircrafts we are missing at the moment. We have a specific Travel Air 4000 (remember Illusions ) in the simulator (referring to FSX later on in this forum) where just a few painting modifications are needed but there is no Parks P-2A and Fleet II. available neither freeware nor payware versions. Thank you Simon and good luck! For the Travel Air painting correction I have asked a guy to do – he’ll check the model during this weekend the earliest and then we’ll see…
February 15, 2012 at 3:45 am #4964
jennifer from Belgium	Medwyn how do you pronounce your name…is it med-vin? or Med-vine or med-ween.., med-veen.or something else? I’d like to know cause when I see your name I’d like to have the ‘proper’ sound of it…thanks (remembering the story Rumpelstilkskin at moment
February 16, 2012 at 1:43 pm #5030
medwyn	Jennifer, you can pronounce it like “Peter” Away from joke: I think if you don’t put stress on the “w” (you can almost leave it out from the pronounciation) you will get a simple ‘stress-on-the-first-vocal’ word. Not 100% sure but it works like that in ‘Welwyn’. This is just a nick I use on the net. On the other hand Simon may have someone who can build and/or paint FSX aircraft models. No better news in this topic at the moment – we could have the Parks P-2A and the Fleet II. properly for tours! Fingers crossed. I think this weekend I can put some time on the “Hypnotizing Maria” route plannig and finish it. If that happens I’ll post it here and ask everyone to check it and correct in case of any misunderstanding.
February 17, 2012 at 10:54 am #5079
medwyn	…I didn’t have any specific reason to repeat this “Simon may have somebody to create the some aircraft”-part but I yet did it. Forgive me please! (It seems the lack of oxigen up there and the open cockpit together made me weird. Time to land… ) This reply was modified 89 days ago by medwyn.
February 20, 2012 at 2:27 pm #5242
medwyn	So here is the “Hypnotizing Maria”-route plan in a very rough model: Aircraft used: Beech T-34 Leg 1.: Seattle (Washington) to Twin Falls (Idaho) Leg 2.: Twin Falls (Idaho) to North Platte; Lee Bird airport(Nebraska) - touching Ogden and Rock Springs - we can do a “missed approach” over Cheyenne Airport Leg 3.: North Platte (Nebraska) – Ponca City (Oklahoma) - Altitude: 7500 feet, course: 1-4-0 degrees toward Arkansas - after an hour and 10 mins change course towards Ponca City Leg 4.: Ponca City (Oklahoma) to Pine Bluff (Arkansas) - just above the ground with 160 kts airspeed and up to 1000 feet later Leg 5.: Pine Bluff (Arkansas) to Magee (Mississippi) Leg 6.: Magee (Mississippi) to Marianna (Florida) Leg 7.: Marianna (Florida) to Cross City (Florida) - landing on Rwy 21 Leg 8.: Cross City (Florida) to home… Some questions: - on Leg 6 there are some datas in the book I would like you to check please. In the Hungarian translated version I have I suspect some anomalies in translation. The books tells some altitude datas when Forbes is trying to avoid the storm: 25000 feet and 26000 feet! For a Beech T-34 these are less likely possible but seem to be a mistranslate. I can imagine 12000 feet (maybe the twelve and tewnty was mixed in the translator’s mind? It can happen to beginners learning English…) so it can be either 12500 or 12600 feet but 25000 and 26000 is killing. Would anyone confirm these datas from the original English version of Hypnotizing Maria please? - The final leg says that Jamie Forbes is arriving “home”. This is the point I would call for Richard: what does this mean in terms of airports? Which is that airport south of Cross City in Florida we could consider as the finish? Thank you!
February 20, 2012 at 2:48 pm #5244
Simon	Hi Peter , I think that it is possible.. 25000 is very high altitude, but I think that this plane can reach 9 km I think that it is about 30 000… I am not sure. I think …Richard help us ..
February 20, 2012 at 9:33 pm #5261
Richard	You’re right, Jamie’s T-34B could make it to 20,000, but not a whole lot higher. I cruised the airplane comfortably at 16,000 feet, flying cross-country, with an oxygen tank aboard. On the leg to Marianna, it’s the cloud tops that are at 25,000 ft, not the ’34. Jamie landed at Marianna for reasons not altogether told in the book. That’s where I first flew the T-34A, as an Air Force cadet, when it was Marianna Air Base, a contract primary training field. That’s where I met the original Jamie V. Forbes, my flight instructor there, in September, 1956 and flew with him through March of 1957. Marianna’s a sleepy country airport now (Google map Marianna Municipal Airport, FL), but you can see the cracked unused runways still…the narrow current runways were for the T-34′s, the wide old ones were for the heavier faster North American T-28A’s. Most of the streets are named after air bases or Air Force Bases. The flight shack where Jamie and I briefed for our training flights was on the ramp at the end of Williams Drive (I later went to gunnery school at Williams AFB). When I land there today, it all comes back; it feels to me like the opening scene of _Twelve O’Clock High._ The empty parking ramps were lined with row after row of both types of airplanes, engines starting in clouds of blue smoke, a green flag hanging from the control tower balcony…good flying weather today. “Home” in _Hypnotizing Maria_ is Gilbert Field, Winter Haven, Florida. It’s right in the middle of the state, between Orlando and Tampa, surrounded by lakes. I lived there, in a house over a hangar on Lake Jessie, in the early to mid-70′s. Just heard last week the house has been torn down to make way for a new home. It was right next door to Brown’s Seaplane Base, still run today by Jon Brown, so there’s a swarm of bright yellow Piper Cubs on floats flying from the water every good day. The Google satellite map will probably still show the old house at the northeast corner of the lake. This reply was modified 86 days ago by Richard. This reply was modified 86 days ago by Richard.