Unifinished model?

cujoe_da_man_c9406f7fe9

So, I recently just installed http://www.daz3d.com/sky-lords-allies after having bought it a long time ago and thought it would look neat with a P-51 I picked up as well, however when I went to start making a scene, I noticed something odd (the image kinda explains the whole thing).

Now I'm curious, is this a complete model or am I missing some addon pack for it? This seriously can't be a finished piece, how exactly does it land/sit like that? I've gone through the entire hierarchy and there are no other wheels and there are no other props/figures to go along with it. The only other things that move are the props and the canopy. It just looks ridiculous.

Khory

No morph or anything that lowers the back wheel? It says the landing gear lowers and raises.

FSMCDesigns

Looks like since it is a fictional/fantasy aircraft that there is no logical landing gear, should have a nose or tail wheel. Just rotate it till it is level and you will be good.

cujoe_da_man_c9406f7fe9

Khory said:

No morph or anything that lowers the back wheel? It says the landing gear lowers and raises.

Yeah, just those front two, but I even made the fuselage transparent and there isn't anything else hidden inside

maclean

I don't know this model, but is it possible it uses switching geometry somewhere?

You could try going through the body parts and look in parameters for alternate geometry.

mac

Richard Haseltine

The store images clearly show it with wheels under the engine pods only, so yes it is meant to be like that.

sriesch

I could have sworn there were some aircraft that lacked wheels on the tail and just had a reinforced skid on the tail, but I don't know of any specific examples. I went looking for a few minutes, didn't turn up what I was looking for, but did discover that some gliders apparently have no landing gear at all, just a skid, and some historical aircraft like the Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messerschmitt_Me_163 ) appeared to have some sort of dolly they use to take off that is left behind to increase performance, and they just slide in for a landing, and needed a special tractor to go retrieve them. Very interesting.

In any case, you could probably add a tailwheel without too much trouble. If you wanted a low-budget one, probably a torus primitive for the rubber and a flattened sphere or cylinder or two for the rest of the wheel and the hub, then another vertical cylinder or two for a strut and shock would probably work except for extreme closeups, and would be very easy to do if you have a few minutes. Search the free sites for wheels and you might find something more detailed you can use, whether an aircraft wheel or even a car wheel.

A strategically placed piece of support equipment, ammo box, figure, etc. could also be used to quickly and easily block where the wheel would have been so you can't see it's not actually there if your aircraft is parked or on the runway. (Other much harder ways you probably don't want but could still use would be one of the supplied wheels or another model, hiding everything but the wheel (although that might be labor-intensive and inefficient, or if you have a modeler you might be able to cut a wheel off a copy and import just the wheel into the scene as a third tail wheel, with the cut edge hidden up inside the fuselage.)

alexhcowley

The skid landing gear on the Me163 killed several of its pilots. The rocket engine used a couple of really nasty chemicals and occasionally didn't burn off all of its fuel. The jolt of landing caused the remaining fuel to explode with consequences that the pilot didn't live to regret.

Cheers,

Alex.