Oldbaldguy

What a shame. No good deed(s) ever go unpunished these days.

Never apologize or hope true heroism is okay. Ever. No matter where you bring it up.

Note the lack of the tall antenna mast in front of the windscreen. Seems all the rest have them. And the canopy frames look to be bare aluminum. Saw this on early Navy T-34s as well.

You know, Shatner makes a good point in his interview: he was there for the view, not the rush. While all the others were focused inward and preoccupied with a couple of minutes of giddy weightlessness, they missed the obvious like teenagers banging on their phones while walking through the Louvre. He spent his time glued to the window looking at the home planet from a perspective he likely could not have imagined just an hour before. When they landed, all the others hopped out with much the same reactions as people who have just made a tandem skydive on their birthday, but Shatner was, I think, still savoring the moment and was much more contemplative. Maybe it was because he is nearly a century old; maybe he was deeply moved by the experience. I’d like to think it was the latter. If Bezos, Musk, et al are going to do this, they ought to fill their seats with more Shatners and fewer giggling elites bouncing around the cabin if they expect to move humans off the planet and into the void.

Seems to me most likely that the light under the nose is a red anti collision beacon. The requirement for those things was pretty much world wide by then. Good place for it.

Well, an A3J is just an RA-5C without the hump and canoe and with smaller flaps. If you can make it work, you’ll be limited to only three squadron colors: Heavy 1, 3 and 7 unless you go with the clown colors on the operational and weapons test birds. Heavy 1’s tail color was black, Heavy 3 was the RAG so their tail color was international red/orange and Heavy 7’s color was bright blue. There were ten RA-5 squadrons so their paint was a little more sporty. Either way, can’t wait to see what you cook up!

I dunno, that looks like way more than the usual amount of oil on the PBY. I’ve never seen that much pumped over the side and there not be a problem somewhere and sure as hell wouldn’t fly it like that. Also, docents at museums often enjoy an audience more than they do facts and leave a lot to be desired when it comes to operational knowledge. These are great shots, BTW.

Point of information that some might find interesting: Shatner’s flight today released practically zero CO2 into the atmosphere because it uses no carbon based fuel. Most of his Bezos' support vehicles are electric; his boosters come back to roost to be used again rather than fall into the ocean like NASA’s. While I’m not a big fan, it seems to me that he is doing as much as he can to further the green cause and still move us forward. So, I’m not sure what all the hubbub is about. And I’ll bet old, fat and in need of hair plugs describes a significant percentage of the people on this site - me in particular. Besides, every mammal on earth releases carbon dioxide with every breath. Without it, there would be no green plants and then where would we be?

Okay, here’s a Viggie question that has bugged me for a very long time: Does anyone on here know definitively - and I mean without question; no opinions or “I think”s - what color NAA used for the word NAVY on the sides of the earliest batch of RA-5Cs? I know for certain it wasn’t black and any of the various shades of gray you see on decal sheets these days are bogus because gray was not a thing back then. I remember it being a pale green color that reflected light and it was stickers or tape, not paint. I’ve seen it used on helmets and flight deck gear as well. Really screws up a flash photo. Whatever color it was, the jets came from the factory that way although it wasn’t long before it was replaced by regular old black lettering. I have the same Viggie books as everybody else but have yet to see a reference to it in any of them other than the occasional call-out of it being light gray. It’s possible (even probable) that my memory by now is a bit tango uniform on this, but I’ve carried the same vivid image in my head for decades and it ain’t gray.

That’s the cleanest Spad I’ve ever seen. No exhaust stains; no oil anywhere. Gorgeous but somehow weird. Like being in the Twilight Zone.

Lived there once upon a time. There is even more really cool stuff to see and do in the area. List is almost endless. There are some stunning, heart-stopping models on this site, but you ought to see the ship models at the Mariner’s Museum in Newport News, for example.

Yeah, true, but look what you’re comparing the Viggie to - a Hoover and a COD. Not really a fair fight is it?

Ooooo! Seriously, Dan. Oooooo! But that’s the easy part. You still have to come up with that impossible to capture front end.

This would a perfect airplane for old farts like me - its tanks and my bladder have identical times to flameout.

Sorry, was never a big fan of Heavy Nine’s green tails. The airplane is absolute aeroerotica, but that green paint leaves a lot to be desired. Of course, squadron markings varied from skipper to skipper throughout the airplane’s time in service. Always liked Heavy Seven’s schemes and those of Heavy Eleven, although 11’s checker tails looked better on their Whales than on their Viggies. Still and all, a good 1/32 kit that captures the look would certainly cause me to grab my wallet regardless of the decal sheet.