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Old 02-27-2010, 05:12 AM
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zapatista zapatista is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Romanator21 View Post
Not true. You would not even notice that you were losing oxygen until it became far too late.
complete bollocks !

your saying there that there is only 2 states possible for a ww2 pilot in relation to oxygen supply
a) perfectly normal and healthy
b) "far to late" (presumably instant near death state, or death itself)

which is obviously total nonsense

even holding your breath for 60 sec is possible (ie instant no further new oxygen), so even if the oxygen tube is shot out or the system has a major leak (while breathing normally), it would take btw 30 and 90 sec or (even longer) for the pilot to be completely disabled, it is NOT instant. and in a gradual reduction of oxygen in a non pressurized aircraft climbing this would take place over a number of minutes, the pilot gradually getting a bit disoriented, trouble concentrating on his tasks, be more clumsy with controls and switches (fine motor control), getting a headache etc. blurring of vision and then blacking out is really the final phase.

my point is this:
1) in both those situations in real life you would get some physical indications from your surrounding, and the physical senses of your body. a trained and experienced pilot would also recognize those earlier then joe average from the street.
2) sitting behind a monitor in your living room is a very dulled experience compared to being in the cockpit and experiencing it, are you really going to argue that point ?

so to SIMULATE the experience of the pilot it would be helpfull to get some additional clues, and this can take many forms and is really what the discussion should be about
1) simple "oxygen status" msg flash on screen ?
2) having the oxygen dial "light up brighter" so that with an initial glance at your instruments you get increased awareness of the important one
3) etc ... etc... many ways to do it

take another example, wasnt the fuel tank right in front of the pilot in some of those aircraft ? damage to the tank could leak fuel into the cockpit, the pilot feels it on his face, sees the liquid maybe, it stings his eyes, he smells the fuel etc... and no not all those events meant that the pilot was instantly on fire either, so it is not about modeling the flames as an on/off status.
- so how do you "model" the pilot smelling the fuel in the cockpit ? if there was lots of fuel splashing about in the cockpit onto the pilot, a strong smell of fuel, and the pilot was in a dodgy dogfight situation, he might well decide to bail out rather then wait for the next spark to set him on fire. even if he stayed in the pit and flew on, he would make sure his goggles were on and he was ready to quickly bail out

again, some kind of visual msg or other feedback is needed to get that sensory information and SIMULATE the information the real pilot would have at that time, sitting behind your monitor just doesnt provide it.

Last edited by zapatista; 02-27-2010 at 05:14 AM.
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