Alpha Simulations Fairey Swordfish

By Nigel C. Martin (25 May 2004)

Before I whack it on the computer, a quick peek into its heritage. It is an amazing fact that the Swordfish entered service with the Royal Navy in 1935 and served on 25 front line squadrons during the Second World War, despite its obsolescence. An amazing number of aircraft were built totalling some 2399, and in spite of its obvious vintage served in some battles that have been recorded as instrumental in major sea offensives. Indeed many of these have been well documented and it beggars belief as to the blatant cheek putting up some 1930's aircraft up against what were then, state of the art 40's enemy technology which was in most cases very advanced weaponry. I guess this demonstrates, as if we needed it, the heroism and courage the aircrews had across all of the services and allies during that dark part of history.

Perhaps one of the most notable exchanges was in May 1941 - Swordfish from the aircraft carriers HMS Victorious and HMS Ark Royal (in two waves) were engaged in seeking out the German battleship Bismarck and its subsequent demise after her rudder was damaged from the attack. None of the 20 torpedoes launched dealt a fatal blow. However the damage sustained was enough for the Royal Navy task force to later bring to bear their guns and subsequently sink the Bismarck. A great sigh of relief came from allied shipping!

1942 saw the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and the cruiser Prinz Eugen quietly slip out of the French port of Brest and risk a chancy dash through the English Channel to join the Norwegian campaign. A massive force of Swordfish from the hastily reformed 825 Squadron (Fleet Air Arm) took off and flew towards the battle group. These Swordfish were previously based on the Ark Royal before her sinking. This massive fleet numbered SIX.

Because of the slow speed and total vulnerability the aircraft stood little to no chance of success. Undaunted, the effort went ahead under the courageous leadership of Lieutenant Commander E. Esmonde. For his outstanding leadership and coolness under fire he was awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross.

All six Swordfish reached the outer screen of destroyers, which encircled the capital ships, three torpedoes were deployed, the other three aircraft only had a mile to run to reach the dropping point when last seen.

No torpedo reached its target, all six aircraft were shot down, and only five crew survived from the original 18.

There are many well-documented and amazing stories about this superb aircraft and it's well worth seeking them out on the internet, if you're interested. (Thanks to www.shearwateraviationmuseum.ns.ca for some great detail about the Swordfish.)

Back to flight simulation. AlphaSim as I am sure you are aware has a healthy hangar of aircraft located on their website which we may buy on-line, download and fly.

I must confess, I am a recent convert to this form of purchase and am still a little well, uneasy.. Don't ask me why, maybe it's the nice box which off-the-shelf products come in, with their well laid-out instructions and in the main error-free installation and error-free flight. Admittedly not in all cases though.

So from AlphaSim's site the Swordfish stood out like a beacon to me. A beautiful aircraft I adore so after an uncomplicated process of purchase you will be treated to three zipped files (three files must be downloaded, unless you have a broadband (DSL) connection, in which case a single-shot zip file is now available).

Place these files into the FS root directory (which I did not initially do! How about a self-extracting file, it would make life a lot easier) and hey presto, the Swordfish are in the aircraft menu.

I felt somewhat nostalgic, so I selected the RNAS Yeovilton version in daylight and fine conditions. The Swordfish looked fine with lovely exterior detail especially the rigging. This could have looked ridiculous if not created with a modicum of restraint, but no problems here, a fab job.

I felt the look was very authentic from an external aspect, across the Mk1 (810 Sqn RNHF), Mk2 (836 Sqn) and Mk3 (119 Sqn). A worthy note here, the Mk1 has the RN Historical Flight aircraft as an option and when selected the crew stand up, the rear gunner holds the White Ensign and looks cool - fine and dandy, great for any airshow you may pass! (Despite the flag does not have the effect of 'flowing' I think it should have actually moved, this would have looked the business, and accurate.) I have to say the aircrew looks great, some lovely attention to detail. Under the wings of the various types, understandably the ordnance changes. You can if you wish experience the release of the torpedo and bombs by selecting (/), a further press of (/) will see the ordnance return for another sortie.

As with any tail dragger the forward view is hindered during ground operations, so external view is handy if you do not want to make some enemies and a lot of bent metal! Apply some throttle, rudder input to go port or starboard (left or right to you landlubbers!) and in the main it behaves itself. We must remember this aircraft does not taxi at breakneck speed so if you try that, it will do funny things. I must say however, it had a tendency to 'waddle', I guess the secret is to taxi at the appropriate speed.

You may look at the undercarriage and assume there is an error as the wheels have a strange and almost unnatural angle, but this was a reality. This was essentially due to absorbing the punishing landings it had to endure while at sea. A nice little feature here is that there is a painted line across the tyre and wheel. To check movement you have to look hard though! Also when landing with a bump the undercarriage is nicely animated.

Line up, apply gentle throttle inputs and bring the tail off the tarmac; within a very short space of time you are airborne. I felt it was a little too quickly. I fully appreciate one of the endearing factors was the STOL capabilities but I still felt this model was too eager to lift off. The indicated airspeed at rotation was 40/45 knots, without a headwind.

The cockpit has a good period feel. The instruments are of course analogue and well laid out. One or two are a little difficult to read but not an issue. Great attention to detail is shown in the control column and rudder bars; these look very convincing. Oh yes and a lovely wet compass is depicted in front of the pilot. This is not functional in normal 2D view but in virtual cockpit mode it works. The torpedo aiming bars are well detailed - the technology behind these was hyper simple. In 2D panel view there is however a noticeable absence of the customary buttons for the GPS, ATC, etc. but there is a very good reason for this: ensuring the authentic look is maintained, which works well.

With easy selection (shift-2), you can call up the autopilot panel, where all functions are easy to select and use. You can call up the GPS in the same way (shift-3). If you want to move these around the screen you can position the mouse cursor press and position to your desired position. Shift-4 brings up the functional throttle unit.

I felt while using the hat keys to look left and right and down some detail was lacking (there are no other panel views than the normal straight ahead one), but the virtual cockpit mode looked good.

In the air this aircraft looks stunning and if like me you spend most of any flight outside admiring the detail this will delight.

Flying - well the aileron response was positive as was the elevator, (nice effect, the crew move their heads as you input aileron and elevator) but the rudder showed some lovely visual movement. At last I thought, some nice flight dynamics ahead, however despite pushing full left or right, little or marginal reaction. From personal experience I am fully aware that if full input left or right on the rudder while flying straight and level you will very quickly be privileged to some 'nice' manoeuvres you if not corrected. This did not happen.

I selected flaps and heard them travelling and there was a marked reaction to the flight performance. The Swordfish has some small slats on the leading edge of the upper wing, which have the same effect as flaps.

However, once over the threshold with the throttle back, you gently sink and touch down. There's no trace of any friction smoke as the wheels touch. Whilst I am on the issue of smoke, it would have been a nice touch if when applying full throttle from tick-over a puff or two was detected. However when you start the engine you can see the starting handle rotate (this action rotates a massive fly wheel which when engaged rotates the engine and starts). When the engine starts there is a trace of smoke, when in reality, more smoke would be seen.

On landing, I waited for the tail to make contact, apply gentle braking, wait for the forward speed to bleed off then get off the active. Remember the limitation of ground handling before you belt back to the wardroom for that tot of rum!

I did like the type options that are included with the differing color schemes, especially the RAF Mk3 - this looked well, business-like, in black and displaying a radar dome on the under side of the fuselage for the sub-hunting system. Remember, at this stage set up your wing fold and tail hook commands; I set 'W' and 'H' obvious really. Don't forget to do this as the detail is very good.

Within the package purchased comes some interesting scenery detail. Once installed as covered above you can access these via Select a Flight, you will see 6 options to choose from: 1. Approach to MAC ship Amastra flat top to land on! 2. Second option of the same, but bad weather 3. Tour of Taranto. 4. Flight over the Rock. 5. E-Boat Patrol. 6. RNHF Air Show Practice.

My first reaction was great, some nice date specific scenarios to fly. I selected Option 1 and 2 and and while there was some very nice land and sea detail there was no ship! So back to the instructions and yes they ask you to 'activate' the ship, in easy to follow instructions.

Tour of Taranto, well once selected, you are positioned above the sea. OK nice but without any shipping evident which would have added a degree of reality.

Flight over the Rock, I know this airport very well and made many a approach, and was eager to select this one. OK the trees are nice but where is the runway? I was placed smack dab into the trees and took me many an attempt to taxi out, which I hasten to add kept crashing. (I guess I could have switched off the crash detection.) So my Bell 47 was called upon straight up get some height. So there is the runway, a stone throw away in fact. I got back into the Swordfish to continue my flight.

E-Boat patrol, I followed the briefing, climbed to the appropriate height on a northerly course but no E-boat. I guess in time I would have spotted it. A good enough reason try again!

RNHF Air Show Practice, I guess we are well experienced and expert flyers aren't we? And well up for the task of showing off our skills, so without further ado once selected you are positioned on long final with a sea of cars in the car parks, line up, throttle back, get the guys standing with the flag for a salute to the crowd...What crowd...no people! I know it says practice but I would have been nice to have the public in attendance.

To get some scenery with the aircraft is a nice feature but I felt the mission offerings were lacking in detail. However the additional scenery, i.e., more air bases, found in the scenery add-on area of the AlphaSim site are excellent; I thoroughly enjoyed those.

I have to mention a further part of this programme, i.e., two missions to fly in Combat Flight Simulator 2: a working torpedo run on to the Bismarck with the ship on the move and to make life more difficult you will be under heavy fire! If there was ever a reason to buy CFS2 that has to be it! As you will now be aware, I have not flown these so no further comment can be made (shame!)

System Used For Review: Windows XP Professional Athlon 2 GHz CPU 510 DDR Ram Nividia 128MB Graphics Card

The Swordfish was my first offering from AlphaSim and at a cost of £8.85 (about $16.00) well worth the investment.

I am continuing to enjoying flying the aircraft. It makes a pleasant change to move around the skies in such a historically important aircraft at a speed that you can you take in the scenery.

Happy landings, on terra firma or at sea!

Nigel. C. Martin
nigel@dbv-northeast.co.uk

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