also, if anyone will have more detailed pictures/information on WW2 mines, send it my way, as I'm currently gathering info on that so we can make new mines in gr2

Wow, this might be a major breakthrough mate. Please keep on your brilliant work :yeah:

Hi Max, have you had a look into the Grenades, mines and bobytraps website already? I am sure that you will find there all the information that you need for :salute:

With your experience this shouldn't be necessary but of course I'll recommend you next time I see Donitz.

@gap & Trevally,

I have decided Type 17 (Mark XVII) mine will be the best choice for our new sea mine. So far from everything I was able to find, this was the most used sea mine by British during WW2. If you have other suggestions or information that contradicts mine, please let me know!

Good choice Max, I can't wait to see your model :up:

decided since it is being made for the OH, I'll post the screenies here:

Here is what I've got so far:

http://imageshack.us/a/img819/1551/u6tw.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img855/3603/cohb.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img690/3276/u4mn.jpg

Looks awesome Targor, love the details :yeah:

At this moment I have just a couple of suggestions: the two poles should be identical (two perfect hemispheres) and, for the record, from real photographs I get only 32 bolts fixing the top cover. :salute:

@ Trevally on barrage balloon usage:

http://www.nevingtonwarmuseum.com/un...n-command.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_A...iary_Air_Force

The above links have most of the information you need for placing the balloons in campaign. :yep:

You might also find the following general information useful:

Types of balloon
Disregarding the Admiralty Type Mk. VI spherical balloons employed as offensive means during the so called Operations Albino and Outward [1], [2], [3], [4], [5] (on a side note, similar balloons were also used for carrying propaganda leaflets beyond the enemy lines [6]), and the American D-7 and D-8 low pressure ballonet type balloons [7], [8], which afaik never crossed the Atlantic, three main types of defence balloons served in the British forces:

• the Low Zone Mk. VII and Mk. X ballonet type Kite Balloons, used mostly or exclusively at home for land or coastal defence, and represented in game by our model;
• the Low Zone Mk. IV Kite Balloons, routinely used for the defence of British installations outside UK, in "hot climates" around the Mediterranean and as far as the British Raj [9], [10].
• the Ultra Low Altitude Mk. XIII Balloons, similar in shape to Mk. IV balloons but probably smaller; they were employed aboard British and American landing crafts (both nations apparently used the same design) and by troops disembarked from them during Italy, North Africa and Normandy landings [7]; this model might also be the one most commonly used aboard merchant convoy vessels.

Unless noted otherwise, the information reported below is relative to the Low Zone Mk. VII ballonet type balloon.

Balloon usage
Air defense ballloon could be:

• anchored to the soil for defending cities and military/civil strategic installations. The main purpose of these balloon fields was not to pose a direct threat to attacking aircraft, but interdicting them from flying at low altitude, thus reducing their bomb-dropping accuracy and making them better targets for the air defence batteries which were often associated with balloon barrage fields [12] [13], [14].
• tethered aboard drifters, barges, tugboats, and (occasionally) sailboats. These vessels were often docked in harbours and estuaries and were meant both for defending coastal installations and shipping against air raids, and for interdicting the laying of minefields by low-flying aircraft [13], [14], [15], [16]. Small merchant ships and motor boats could also be manned as supply vessels, used for the servicing and delivery of pre-inflateed balloons to convoy shipping passing through particular chokepoints or leaving from major ports [17], [18].
• towed by sea-going vessels, especially tugs, patrol boats, minesweepers and small merchants, for their own defense and the defense of escorted convoys [15], [19], [20]. The balloons employed for this purpose might have been of the LZ ballonet type [21], or (arguably more often) of the more handy ULA Mk. XIII type [16], [22].
• towed by LST/LSM landing craft (only ULA type, see above).

Balloon barrage flying orders
The general rule prescribed to Balloon Squadrons in Libya, Egypt and the Middle East was as follows [23].

• Land-based balloons:
  • bedded down or hauled at an altitude of 100 ft during day time;
  • flown at a ruling operation height of 2,000 ft at night;
  • flown at a maximum operation height of 2,500 or 4,500 ft in case of air raids.
• Ship-borne balloons: flown at an altitude from 1,000 to 2,000 ft (2,000 ft being the standard height for Mk. XIII balloons flown aboard merchant vessels [15]).

The above provisions had several exceptions, especially concerning the usage of balloons around strategic targets, which was allowed also during day time [23].
Though not being relative to home defence, it is possible that a similar set of rules was also applied to barrage balloon fields in England. It must be nonetheless noted that, at least over London, barrage balloons were flown during the day as well as at night. Historical photographs and footage clearly in same moment of the day different balloons might have been flow at different altitudes, as shown in many photographs and in historical footage [24].

List of sources:
[1] Military History Now - Death From Above: The Bomber Balloons Of WW2
[2] What Lies Beneath Rattlechain Lagoon? - Operation Outward
[3] Wikipedia - Operation Outward
[4] Raoul E. Drapeau on IEEE power&energy Magazine - Operation Outward: Britain's World War II offensive balloons
[5] The Balloon Barrage Reunion Club Website - Free Balloon Operations in World War Two
[6] Lee Richards - The “M” Balloon Unit: British Balloon Distribution of Aerial Propaganda During WWII
[7] skylighter.org - Barrage Balloons in World War II: from Camp Tyson to Omaha Beach
[8] The Army Air Forces in World War II, Vol. VI: Men and Planes, Chapter 3: Air defense of the United States
[9] BBRC - Sqdn/L Robert Wallis Beresford 978 Squadron India
[10] BBRC - Various pictures of Sqdn Ldr Beresford and his Crew
[10] Maj Franklin J. Hillson on Airpower Journal - Summer 1989 - Barrage Ballons for Low-Level Air Defense
[11] Air Minister Sees Barrage Balloons ("Pathé Gazette" newsreel, 1938)
[12] Air Attack On Dover Harbour ("Pathé Gazette" newsreel, 1940)
[13] Beaten Back ("Pathé Gazette" newsreel, 1940)
[14] BBRC - Barrage Balloon Vessels: an Introduction
[15] BBRC - Balloon Barrage Vessel A Y Alessie: a short pictorial history
[16] Leonard C. Bacon - Hull's Own Airforce Station (17 Balloon Centre - RAF Sutton on Hull), Chapter 2: Things Ballonatic
[17] WW2Talk forum - Gasmasks, barrage balloons, sandbags and wardens’ rattles 1938, post#7
[18] RN Department Office of Naval Intelligence, Nov 1918 - Kite Balloons in Escorts
[19] uboat.net - Allied warships - HMS Nubian (F 36)
[20] Barrage Balloons for Convoys ("Pathé Gazette" newsreel, 1940)
[22] War44 forums - Kite Balloons that Beat the Dive Bombers
[23] BBRC - Battle Orders - Balloon Barrages and Squadrons in Egypt, Libya and Levant
[24] Balloon Barrage ("Pathé Gazette" newsreel, 1941)
http://www.britishpathe.com/video/ba...itle-heres-how
worldwar-two.net - Barrage Balloons
Traces of World War 2 - RAF - 902 Balloon
John Penny - A short history of No.11 Balloon Centre at Pucklechurch, 1939 to 1945, and RAF Station Pucklechurch, 1945 to 1959
War44 forums - Barrage Balloons
Ottawa Citizen, 12 Dec 1939 - Balloon Barrage Placed Over The Firth Of Forth
The Glasgow Herald, 18 Apr 1942 - Firth of Forth's Protection from the Air
Matrix Games Forums - Barrage balloons
US War Department - Barrage Balloon: Operation of Matériel and Employment of Personnel (FM 4-117, June 1 1942)
US War Department - Barrage Balloon Site Installations (FM 4-184, April 13 1943)
BBRC - Balloon Command: Development of Balloon Command in the first and second world wars

Looking good Targor:up:

thanks Gap - I will read through this tonight:yeah:

Make sure to watch the dramatic footage of the German raid on Dover of August 1940. It records the destruction of a barrage balloon, and the downing of several planes by the British coastal artillery. :-?

I hope we can recreate a similar scenery in game :sunny:

Yep. Started over yesterday in order to make sure to stay as close as possible to correct numbers.

:up:

Personally I would go for the following figures:

- diameter: 40"
- central belt height: 8", or whatever fits better the pictures and drawings we have available.
- total height (only mine body without the two caps): 20" + belt height + 20"
- horns: 11 horns of 6" (2 on the top cap, 5 on the top hemisphere, 4 on the lower hemishpere)
- color and markings: as visible from this picture: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_1NdL_8bK4S...0/DSC00267.JPG

That is pretty much the route I have decided to take :)

Given you have problems with mines already?
I'd slim the model down by doing graphics work for all the bolts and nuts!
Those things will produce a massive amount of verts to render!
:o
Even haveing the LOD version once you get to close?
I'd expect problems.
Here's what I did for bolts on the 12 pounder.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUn-Pa0DPSg

The mod's coming a long way :)