Thanks for this clear demonstration. I've heard about this bombsight many times over the years but never really understood what was involved. Its an ingenious mechanism for its time. Flawed but still probably the best solution available despite its complexity and reliability issues under wartime conditions. The bombardiers job was much more complicated than I imagined.
I was surprised at the noise too but WW2 bombers weren't very quiet themselves; no way you would hear that whirring over the sound of 4 Wright Cyclones.
can u imagine teaching a bunch of farmboys,whose knowledge of technology might have been limited to setting the points on a case tractor,how to use this thing in '43,must have been daunting
Frankly back in those days a High School Diploma meant something and your bombardiers where college educated. Even the English Majors were well grounded in math and trig and most of those "kids" fixed their own cars, trucks and tractors.
I had 2 complete Norden sights. I found them in a 2nd hand centre and paid $1.00 each for them. Initially, I couldn't give them away until a young country bloke wanted it and the other I trashed. I had grandiose ideas of building a very large watch out of each, but the task proved way beyond me. A true story.
I've always wondered how this was done, since I had a general idea of the various factors that would affect how a bomb falls and what can affect when a bomb might be released. Quite an amazing piece of equipment. No wonder it was so heavily protected to keep the technology out of enemy hands.
Amazing tech for the day. The finish on that bombsight reminds me of that black 'rubberized' finish that was on my Grand Parents 8mm projector. With the sound that thing was making, and the look of the finish, I would get a distinct 'smell' from their old projectors in my mind... Amazing...
My father repaired them during the war - a top secret job. He mentioned that one day they got a request to transfer one of their men - so they (obviously) chose the worst performing guy. He ended up working on the Enola Gay's bombsight.
@@antientdude1100 No - it did exactly what it was advertised as being able to do - but the rest of the technology of the time and the conditions made the overall improvement in accuracy negligible. Today it's just become another favorite anti-military industrial complex propaganda story.
Cool, thanks! As complicated as it is, it is just a matter of simple geometry! We, that and Sperry gyroscopes, Auto pilot, ad infinitum!! This clears up why this was such a coveted Top Secret issue!!
I've never been involved in something so harrowing, so I can only speculate, but I wonder if it was in a way nice to have something to concentrate on. I'm sure every service member up there was well aware of the attrition rate over Germany. Thanks for the Video Tim.
You: Hunched over with your eye in the sight... FLAK: "KNOCK KNOCK" You: still focused on site but wave them away "just give me a damn minute will ya?"
I read that the bombsight design and manufacture cost (in 1940's dollars) $1.5 billion, or 1/2 of that needed for the Manhattan project. Also that the purported high accuracy was only true for very slow flight altitudes. But yep, a cool piece of engineering at any rate.
I live very close to the calcite mine that produced crystals for the optics of the NBS. The mineral was used for something about "parallax". The mine is in the SoCal desert what is now Anza Borrego SP.
Where did you get a real, functional Nordin site? Please make a video explaining that, how you learned to use it and how you put it all together with your model and treadmill.
Another DeJa Vu I do know 1 Thing THAT IS FACT!....The "Norden Bomb Sight" WAS SUPER CLASSIFIED FOR YEARS!!!.....HELL THIS IS WHY THE TOWNS IN CT. ALL HAD "NIKE NUKE TIPPED MISSILE SITES" ALL OVER THE PLACE Until the Late 1960's!!!!.....I actually live about 15 Miles from the Norden Factory!!.......Its STILL THERE TO THIS DAY!!!.......
Today, the algorithm for such a bombsight would be in computer code, which is relatively quick and easy to develop and revise. Before that, the algorithm would have been in electrical circuitry. Changing that algorithm would have meant changing components out at best, and at worst, redesigning whole circuits. That would likely be a far more involved process. Consider that the Norden was basically a mechanical computer that was designed long before portable computers, or even adequate analog electrical computational machines existed. So developing and refining the Norden's operational algorithm would have meant redesigning and building new mechanical components like gears and linkages, and their mounting structures, if not whole assemblies, which would be even more difficult, expensive, and time consuming. This is one insanely sophisticated, complex mechanism, and the fact that its function is completely mechanical makes it all the more mind boggling.
It worked in theory. In practice, it had no way of predicting wind direction and speed between the airplane and the ground, and both could change radically.
Even modern technology can't "predict" wind speed and direction in real time, only detect it inside of a very limited sphere around the sensors. This is why naval guns fell out of use in favor of missiles, which can carry their sensor package with them. Your criticism is short-sighted and ignorant, ignoring how incredibly bad ass it was that such an effective electro-mechanical device existed in the early 1940s. There also were a lot of blown-the-hell-up buildings in Europe that would attest to it working in more than theory.
@@XH1927 Think what you like, no skin off my nose, but the limitations of optical bombsights, Norden or other, were well known even at the time they were introduced, and for exactly the reason I stated.
Am I correct in understanding that the vertical component of the wind is being ignored here? Do you have any calculations or information on how negligible this effect is? (What I mean is, if the wind blows upward, it could extend the bomb's flight, whereas a downward wind might shorten it.)
Very interesting. Thank you for making this. Is it true, as Malcolm Gladwell contents in his related talk, that the device didn't really work as well as promised in the heat of battle?
Like most of Gladwell's stuff, it is riddled with inaccuracies presented in an authoritative manner which sounds believable. However, it is true that the Norden bombsight did not work as well in combat as it did in pre-war peacetime. Gladwell has certainly never seen a Norden bombsight, and much of his research is sloppy, though some of his assertions are true. First, the inaccuracies: Norden was Dutch, not Swiss. Mark XV was a Navy designation. The AAF designation was M-9. You did not input ground speed, wind speed, or "target coordinates". By synchronizing on the target, the bombsight computed groundspeed. Head or tail wind speed was not a factor in the process. By correcting for drift, the bombsight computed crosswind. And target coordinates is totally bogus. It was not handcuffed to anybody. It most definitely did not contain an explosive device. Herman Lang reconstructed the bombsight structure from memory and gave it to the Germans. The Germans had no high altitude precision bombers and therefore had no use for it. They did have a gyro stabilized bombsight, the Lotfernrorhr 7, which was similar but much simpler. Leuna was a particularly bad case of precision bombing. (20 raids were conducted by the US, not 22; the other 2 were by the RAF). However, there is some truth to the facts stated about skill of the bombardier, function of the equipment, and effects of high altitude and weather. Because of mass production wartime models were less accurate than prewar models. There were, however, many lessons learned during the war which resulted in steadily improved results. General Lemay made two changes: He insisted on a straight run to the target without evasive action, and he chose the best bombardiers to be lead bombardiers, with the others in the group dropping on signal from the lead. The C-1 autopilot was introduced, allowing the bombardier to steer the plane much more accurately on the bomb run. The time over the target was increased. The types of bombs, particularly smaller ones, were changed, resulting in more accuracy. Finally, with air superiority won later in the war, it was possible to use lower bombing altitudes. What all this meant was that the Circular Error Probable (50% of bombs falling in a radius) went from 75 feet in prewar testing to around 1200 feet in 1943, but improved to 900 feet by 1945. When looking at how many bombs fell within 1000 feet of the target, this went from 10-15% in early 1943 to 40-60% in early 1945. Just as Leuna was a bad case, there were many successes. The best reference for this is "America's Pursuit of Precision Bombing" 1910-1945 by McFarland. Also see the United States Strategic Bombing Survey. The best book on Herman Lang and the Duquesne Spy Ring is "Double Agent" by Peter Duffy.
You did a great job man, thanks. I guess the precision on stike was in between few meters. Should link this video to every moron stating this or that site has been bombed by mistake: If it has been bombed, its cause it has been marked as a target before.
The Circular Error Probable (50% of bombs falling in a radius) went from 75 feet in prewar testing to around 1200 feet in 1943, but improved to 900 feet by 1945. When looking at how many bombs fell within 1000 feet of the target, this went from 10-15% in early 1943 to 40-60% in early 1945.
Pilot to bombardier,, you have the ship,, Gimbal gyro for point of reference for calculus computation. Bomb aimer must manually set level of gyro plane using bubble tubes. Hence some aimer earned monicker bubble happy by being too focused on minuscule adjustments. The limited range of gyro motion could be upset by maneuvers or merely turbulence thus requiring square one resetting. In combat conditions hitting with in 500 yards was not bad. A hundred ships might get lucky and hit something vital. The secrets were sold before the war, Carl Zeiss Lofernrorhr 7 was a typical similar type. The US Navy gave up on these for more accuracy in dive bombardment. 72,000 of these were produced by various manufacturers at a cost of over 8,000 dollars each. In 1940 dollars. A pinprick of war spending by pentagon in WW II.
Great video and presentation. Looks so complicated... It always amazes me how much thinking goes into devices like this. What I do not get is, why not mace coloured photo to "bomb" not this black and white? Would be more - true to original.
I've been watching for a benefit in optics for scan3d , Photogrametry GIS.. We found a little optics geometry (thank you) and something that says that war crimes against civilians were normal in wwii days... Your use of the white cloud to simulate.. He made me lose my respect for it. That eliminates all ethics. You can't rule out being killed under the cloud, your friend, a family, a child, or your brother one day. What might make all this "accuracy" that manufacturers might claim, in the field of lying No matter how much the emerging cloud guides you, it makes you kill some of those you think are fighting you and the remaining 96% of beings that don't fight you! You kill her just because you don't know her? There are many mathematical clouds that hide you from what you can't guess! Please learn to look at the aerial maps with sufficient respect, because of the life you carry underneath, which is not your enemy, and they do not have the right to involve them in the absurd war in the first place?! It can be destroyed and impossible to recover. I felt humiliated and desperate when I saw this analogy. Everyone with me felt inhuman, even though everyone with me loved us and respected your way of analogy: Concrete and computer-independent embodiment
I'm interested in knowing YOUR solution to the problem..or, are you just one of those people who feels the need to demonstrate their superiority on the Internet by making drive-by comments?
What a comprehensive and fascinating explanation after all these years. I am delighted.
Thanks for this clear demonstration. I've heard about this bombsight many times over the years but never really understood what was involved. Its an ingenious mechanism for its time. Flawed but still probably the best solution available despite its complexity and reliability issues under wartime conditions. The bombardiers job was much more complicated than I imagined.
"There's nothing on TV tonight... let's take out the treadmill and the Norden bombsight".
Thanks for this. My dad was a Norden Bombsight Technician with the Navy. I still have his Analog Multimeter that was issued to him.
Man, I never knew that thing made that loud a noise. I bet you had to be really smart to operate that little box, as well as the entire aircraft.
I was surprised at the noise too but WW2 bombers weren't very quiet themselves; no way you would hear that whirring over the sound of 4 Wright Cyclones.
can u imagine teaching a bunch of farmboys,whose knowledge of technology might have been limited to setting the points on a case tractor,how to use this thing in '43,must have been daunting
Frankly back in those days a High School Diploma meant something and your bombardiers where college educated. Even the English Majors were well grounded in math and trig and most of those "kids" fixed their own cars, trucks and tractors.
those kids were disciplined and the navigators, bombardiers and pilots were carefully chosen and all officers - these were not hicks ...
Why?? Are you saying the farm boys were dumber than city boys or had no aptitude for math and physics?
Now any 12 year old can watch some videos and figure it out
I've only just started watching this and I'm really excited.
Who in the hell gave this a thumbs down??
Because he's telling the Krauts how the bombsight works.
His little Bomber there is in trouble already. He's lost a prop. Hope he can make it back on three engines.
Hey it's a B17. It can make it on one engine.
Great tutorial Tim - a lot clearer than the video the Army Air Corps did on the same topic!
I had 2 complete Norden sights. I found them in a 2nd hand centre and paid $1.00 each for them. Initially, I couldn't give them away until a young country bloke wanted it and the other I trashed. I had grandiose ideas of building a very large watch out of each, but the task proved way beyond me. A true story.
Amazing tutorial and "hands on" feeling to this class. Thank you for producing this excellent video.
I've always wondered how this was done, since I had a general idea of the various factors that would affect how a bomb falls and what can affect when a bomb might be released. Quite an amazing piece of equipment. No wonder it was so heavily protected to keep the technology out of enemy hands.
Absolutely fascinating and gives one yet more admiration for the efforts of those very brave crews.
Always wanted to know how this worked....Good video Sir. Very complicated piece of equipment.
Thank you so much for this terrifically easy to follow of a complicated precision machine. I have has so many questions that are now answered. TY!
I totally understand this video owing to my expertise in programming my blue ray disk player.
Amazing tech for the day. The finish on that bombsight reminds me of that black 'rubberized' finish that was on my Grand Parents 8mm projector. With the sound that thing was making, and the look of the finish, I would get a distinct 'smell' from their old projectors in my mind... Amazing...
My father repaired them during the war - a top secret job. He mentioned that one day they got a request to transfer one of their men - so they (obviously) chose the worst performing guy. He ended up working on the Enola Gay's bombsight.
The bomb sight turned out to be a lemon anyway..
My father did also. He was with the ninth out of England. He never talked about it.
Is that why the bomb hit the Catholic neighborhood?
"let's put him on the enola gay, can't miss!"
@@antientdude1100 No - it did exactly what it was advertised as being able to do - but the rest of the technology of the time and the conditions made the overall improvement in accuracy negligible. Today it's just become another favorite anti-military industrial complex propaganda story.
Cool, thanks! As complicated as it is, it is just a matter of simple geometry! We, that and Sperry gyroscopes, Auto pilot, ad infinitum!!
This clears up why this was such a coveted Top Secret issue!!
Thanks for the explanation. That must have been a hard job to work that instrument while the flak is exploding around the plane.
I've never been involved in something so harrowing, so I can only speculate, but I wonder if it was in a way nice to have something to concentrate on. I'm sure every service member up there was well aware of the attrition rate over Germany. Thanks for the Video Tim.
You: Hunched over with your eye in the sight... FLAK: "KNOCK KNOCK"
You: still focused on site but wave them away "just give me a damn minute will ya?"
Good lord, that was complicated. I see most USAAF bombardiers needed to take geometry before going into combat.
trig...its all angles
"General, this man is describing a vacuum cleaner!"
D@mn near sounds like one.
I get the "Hogan's Heros" reference!
I know nothing
I read that the bombsight design and manufacture cost (in 1940's dollars) $1.5 billion, or 1/2 of that needed for the Manhattan project. Also that the purported high accuracy was only true for very slow flight altitudes. But yep, a cool piece of engineering at any rate.
I live very close to the calcite mine that produced crystals for the optics of the NBS. The mineral was used for something about "parallax". The mine is in the SoCal desert what is now Anza Borrego SP.
Thanks. Now I know what "PDI Centered" means when they always say it in the old "12-O'clock High" tv show episodes from 1964 through 1967
I'm not sure why I watched all of that but thank you.
Wonderful piece of engineering, I just wish I could find something showing the insides!
Having grown up watching 12 O'clock high on tv made this look easy.
So, you’re basically doing a maths exam, 15,000 ft up, whilst people fire at you!
the sight did all the math...mechanical computer
Outstanding my math teacher in HS tried to teach some of now the Trig. Now it Makes sense....
I think this video is the highlight of my last week in you-tube land
Kidding aside this is some fascinating stuff. That thing seems loud on the bench, but I'd bet no one came close to noticing.
what a fantastic device
Brilliant video!
Wow! This is great! Thank you for posting this!
AWESOME VIDEO AND DISPLAY THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR SHARING
Interesting to watch this after seeing Malcolm Gladwell's TED talk.
Dude, did you really build all this stuff just to make this video? This was in depth!!
Theres a game called 'Simpleplanes' and I'm learning how to use the bomb sight on a B-17. Thanks!
Where did you get a real, functional Nordin site? Please make a video explaining that, how you learned to use it and how you put it all together with your model and treadmill.
Another DeJa Vu I do know 1 Thing THAT IS FACT!....The "Norden Bomb Sight" WAS SUPER CLASSIFIED FOR YEARS!!!.....HELL THIS IS WHY THE TOWNS IN CT. ALL HAD "NIKE NUKE TIPPED MISSILE SITES" ALL OVER THE PLACE Until the Late 1960's!!!!.....I actually live about 15 Miles from the Norden Factory!!.......Its STILL THERE TO THIS DAY!!!.......
Today, the algorithm for such a bombsight would be in computer code, which is relatively quick and easy to develop and revise.
Before that, the algorithm would have been in electrical circuitry. Changing that algorithm would have meant changing components out at best, and at worst, redesigning whole circuits. That would likely be a far more involved process.
Consider that the Norden was basically a mechanical computer that was designed long before portable computers, or even adequate analog electrical computational machines existed. So developing and refining the Norden's operational algorithm would have meant redesigning and building new mechanical components like gears and linkages, and their mounting structures, if not whole assemblies, which would be even more difficult, expensive, and time consuming.
This is one insanely sophisticated, complex mechanism, and the fact that its function is completely mechanical makes it all the more mind boggling.
Only to the modern mind that has been dulled by electronic aids.
@@XH1927 you got electronic aids? Unprotected sex with an infected computer?
And for targeting on ships and such...all of those seem like insane technology to be around those days.
It worked in theory. In practice, it had no way of predicting wind direction and speed between the airplane and the ground, and both could change radically.
Even modern technology can't "predict" wind speed and direction in real time, only detect it inside of a very limited sphere around the sensors. This is why naval guns fell out of use in favor of missiles, which can carry their sensor package with them. Your criticism is short-sighted and ignorant, ignoring how incredibly bad ass it was that such an effective electro-mechanical device existed in the early 1940s.
There also were a lot of blown-the-hell-up buildings in Europe that would attest to it working in more than theory.
@@XH1927 Think what you like, no skin off my nose, but the limitations of optical bombsights, Norden or other, were well known even at the time they were introduced, and for exactly the reason I stated.
Swords work in theory but in practice had no way of reaching targets 100m away so they SUCC
"Bombs Away!"
Well done. Wonder how many bombardiers actually mastered how to use it. And then could use it while being fired upon.
All of them.
@@gkess7106 Great answer. Only one was needed, though. All the other bombers would just follow his lead.
Am I correct in understanding that the vertical component of the wind is being ignored here? Do you have any calculations or information on how negligible this effect is? (What I mean is, if the wind blows upward, it could extend the bomb's flight, whereas a downward wind might shorten it.)
Now imagine doing all this in a freezing cold temperature, loud noises while dodging bullets from ME-109s.
Devilishly devious in intricacies.
I found myself here by way of Taff in Exile, very, very interesting....I wonder what percentage of bombardiers truly mastered this thing.
Everyone, or they didn't fly until they did.
I have that exact same model B-17!
Skipper:"ok lads were just over the French coast" Me [the bombardier] "Bombs away!"
So when Enola Gay released Little Boy it was about 1.5 miles from target?
So who was the "toggle" guy when there wasn't a bombardier on board.
Very interesting! Thank you!
Now,, it all makes much more this is how it's done sense.
Ground speed must have been critical, I didn't know it calculator ground speed and not air speed.
This, is very interesting.
Very interesting. Thank you for making this. Is it true, as Malcolm Gladwell contents in his related talk, that the device didn't really work as well as promised in the heat of battle?
Like most of Gladwell's stuff, it is riddled with inaccuracies presented in an authoritative manner which sounds believable. However, it is true that the Norden bombsight did not work as well in combat as it did in pre-war peacetime. Gladwell has certainly never seen a Norden bombsight, and much of his research is sloppy, though some of his assertions are true.
First, the inaccuracies: Norden was Dutch, not Swiss.
Mark XV was a Navy designation. The AAF designation was M-9.
You did not input ground speed, wind speed, or "target coordinates". By synchronizing on the target, the bombsight computed groundspeed. Head or tail wind speed was not a factor in the process. By correcting for drift, the bombsight computed crosswind. And target coordinates is totally bogus.
It was not handcuffed to anybody.
It most definitely did not contain an explosive device.
Herman Lang reconstructed the bombsight structure from memory and gave it to the Germans. The Germans had no high altitude precision bombers and therefore had no use for it. They did have a gyro stabilized bombsight, the Lotfernrorhr 7, which was similar but much simpler.
Leuna was a particularly bad case of precision bombing. (20 raids were conducted by the US, not 22; the other 2 were by the RAF). However, there is some truth to the facts stated about skill of the bombardier, function of the equipment, and effects of high altitude and weather. Because of mass production wartime models were less accurate than prewar models. There were, however, many lessons learned during the war which resulted in steadily improved results. General Lemay made two changes: He insisted on a straight run to the target without evasive action, and he chose the best bombardiers to be lead bombardiers, with the others in the group dropping on signal from the lead. The C-1 autopilot was introduced, allowing the bombardier to steer the plane much more accurately on the bomb run. The time over the target was increased. The types of bombs, particularly smaller ones, were changed, resulting in more accuracy. Finally, with air superiority won later in the war, it was possible to use lower bombing altitudes. What all this meant was that the Circular Error Probable (50% of bombs falling in a radius) went from 75 feet in prewar testing to around 1200 feet in 1943, but improved to 900 feet by 1945. When looking at how many bombs fell within 1000 feet of the target, this went from 10-15% in early 1943 to 40-60% in early 1945. Just as Leuna was a bad case, there were many successes. The best reference for this is "America's Pursuit of Precision Bombing" 1910-1945 by McFarland. Also see the United States Strategic Bombing Survey. The best book on Herman Lang and the Duquesne Spy Ring is "Double Agent" by Peter Duffy.
Tim Moore thanks for clearing this up! Gladwell and the exploding bombsight, haha.
You did a great job man, thanks.
I guess the precision on stike was in between few meters.
Should link this video to every moron stating this or that site has been bombed by mistake:
If it has been bombed, its cause it has been marked as a target before.
So how accurate were these bombsights? How far off target would a group of bombs typically impact?
The Circular Error Probable (50% of bombs falling in a radius) went from 75 feet in prewar testing to around 1200 feet in 1943, but improved to 900 feet by 1945. When looking at how many bombs fell within 1000 feet of the target, this went from 10-15% in early 1943 to 40-60% in early 1945.
that's so awesome ^_^
It's a mechanical calculator that does only one function.
Thanks Tim Moore. I have a question, if I may? What is the i P? Also, what would it be used for?
The "IP" was the "Initial Point". This is the final navigational checkpoint at which point the bomb run would begin.
Great video, but a shame that it was out of focus a lot towards the end and poorly lit.
Cool
Pilot to bombardier,, you have the ship,,
Gimbal gyro for point of reference for calculus computation. Bomb aimer must manually set level of gyro plane using bubble tubes. Hence some aimer earned monicker bubble happy by being too focused on minuscule adjustments.
The limited range of gyro motion could be upset by maneuvers or merely turbulence thus requiring square one resetting.
In combat conditions hitting with in 500 yards was not bad. A hundred ships might get lucky and hit something vital.
The secrets were sold before the war, Carl Zeiss Lofernrorhr 7 was a typical similar type.
The US Navy gave up on these for more accuracy in dive bombardment.
72,000 of these were produced by various manufacturers at a cost of over 8,000 dollars each. In 1940 dollars. A pinprick of war spending by pentagon in WW II.
Great video and presentation. Looks so complicated... It always amazes me how much thinking goes into devices like this.
What I do not get is, why not mace coloured photo to "bomb" not this black and white? Would be more - true to original.
Интересно✌️👍🇺🇸❤️
Anyone else here because of Malcolm Gladwell
Nice video. Focus would have been better, but still cool.
Pourrions nous avoir le même document en francais svp.
Sorry, but the wobble and the inability to see the defined terms on the table is causing nausea.
Yeah, and they said the Sidewinder missile could hit the general's cigar in the middle of the desert and it couldn't even come close.
Motors sure were noisy back then!
They still are. It's just that we have better sound-suppressing technology now.
Gears.
They still only hit things they meant to hit by accident. The safest place on the ground to be was plumb in the middle of the target!
I've been watching for a benefit in optics for scan3d , Photogrametry GIS..
We found a little optics geometry (thank you) and something that says that war crimes against civilians were normal in wwii days... Your use of the white cloud to simulate.. He made me lose my respect for it.
That eliminates all ethics. You can't rule out being killed under the cloud, your friend, a family, a child, or your brother one day.
What might make all this "accuracy" that manufacturers might claim, in the field of lying No matter how much the emerging cloud guides you, it makes you kill some of those you think are fighting you and the remaining 96% of beings that don't fight you! You kill her just because you don't know her?
There are many mathematical clouds that hide you from what you can't guess!
Please learn to look at the aerial maps with sufficient respect, because of the life you carry underneath, which is not your enemy, and they do not have the right to involve them in the absurd war in the first place?! It can be destroyed and impossible to recover. I felt humiliated and desperate when I saw this analogy. Everyone with me felt inhuman, even though everyone with me loved us and respected your way of analogy: Concrete and computer-independent embodiment
WHAT
Crappy!
war is stupid
Absolute waste of money and lives ultimately for a machine that did not work as advertised. Still, Fascinating machine for its time
I'm interested in knowing YOUR solution to the problem..or, are you just one of those people who feels the need to demonstrate their superiority on the Internet by making drive-by comments?