Oldbaldguy

Still using the same Paasche compressor and Badger brush I bought new in early 1986. Still truckin’. Hopefully I didn’t just jinx them.

And what the heck paint scheme is that? Airplane looks new, but is that a three-color scheme with old style national insignia? And why are the wings gray instead of intermediate blue? This is a great photo, but like you said - so many questions. Okay. I’m done; I’ll leave you be. Morning chores are calling.

And I have another question: Airliners spend a lot of time in the air being flown by a lot of different crews but we rarely see cockpit photos that show the same level of wear and tear as military aircraft. I wonder if this is true of all big airplanes or is it an industry thing or just my imagination?

I know it’s a Ford/Chevy thing, but why do so many dump on Airbuses? Everybody and their brother flies ‘em and their tanker actually works, unlike their competition.

Well, it appears my supposition is mostly a suppository.

I’m thinking rockets fired along a rail separated from the airplane more cleanly than those fired from a zero length launcher. Unless I’ve missed something, in the Corsair photo, the firing sequence for the HVARs it carried required the rocket to first drop from the pylon then ignite and go about its merry way. Airflow being a fickle thing, if the rocket did not separate cleanly and wallowed about a bit after release, then it is going to go in whatever direction it was pointed when the motor kicked in. Rockets launched along a rail, however, do not have wonky separation issues because the motor fires first and then the round is forced to slide down the rail and go in the direction the unwavering strip of steel sent it - at least initially. Were I a betting man, I’d bet that the US favored zero length pylons because you could load a bomb, a pod or anything else on one as easily as you could a rocket as long as the lug spacing was the same, making it easier and quicker to respond to changing mission needs. I don’t know that Brit airplanes with rocket rails could do that.

Hahahaha! Brown shoe squids! Ya just gotta love ‘em.

Since Merlins were liquid cooled, they were tightly cowled without many/any openings for outside air. Radials are air cooled and require copious amounts of high speed air coming into the cowling, moving over the cylinders, around the engine case and out the backside of the cowl. Even if both engines leaked the same amounts of oil during flight, the radial would show more on the fuselage and nacelles aft of the engine because droplets of oil atomized picked up by the pressurized air flow were carried out and back along the airframe by the slipstream. Oil being what it is, it tends to stick to a surface and pick up particles of dirt and such making a very visible mess. Glycol has different properties so it may not show as much - I don’t know. Any liquid filled system is supposedly sealed but when the motor is running, the stuff is under pressure and bound to find its way outside. The thing about engine and hydraulic oil is that at the speeds we are talking about, even a little bit quickly looks like a nasty mess. Oh, and airplane bellies are nasty because it is a pain in the keester to clean them and only a rare few will do it voluntarily.

We’re beginning to drift from the question in my original post, but the Beaufighter photo is basically the premise of what I was asking. Look at the smoke trails from the rockets - they all are almost ruler straight all the way to the target. If you look at photos of US rockets fired in a similar situation, they rarely fly straight and tend to go where they please (within reason) causing me to wonder if the Brit launch rails make the difference.

Uh oh. Secants and tangents and velocity vectors and all that math stuff.

Imagine if you can a modeling world in which no one ever said, “No, you can’t do that.” Well, we are there. This one is already singing to me, all sweet like.

A couple of recent threads have made me wonder about something. Back in the WW2 days and maybe a bit beyond, it seems there were a couple of ways to deliver unguided rockets. The Brits seemed to prefer launching their rockets from longish rails under the wings of their airplanes while the US used zero-length launchers. Does anyone know off-hand if one system was inherently more accurate (inasmuch as unguided rockets can be) than the other or were these just different ways of doing business with pretty much the same results?

Ya know, this is the absolute definition of a group build. I’d love to know how many other modelers and/or subject matter experts provided comment/input throughout the duration of this epic build.

Anyone else having problems with MRP colors not playing well with Mr Surfacer gray primer? Just shot a little 1/48 Panther only to have the MRP sea blue flow back from the undercoat in several places. I pulled back and started misting several tack coats and it worked better. Do I need to switch to an MRP primer? Between uncertain results like this and always dribbling half a pricy bottle’s worth on the floor, I’m beginning to not like the stuff anymore.

Well. Are we but modelers? Yea. And lawyers, too!

It’s a matter of principle, something of which we seem to have less and less every day. No one likes to be scammed, duped, gotten over on. If no one calls BS, it will continue and likely get worse.

Four works as well. I think you are probably right since there are four hangy-down things clearly visible in the photo and it appears each round apparently has only one of these things at the front and back of the rocket tube.

Bad things happen when good men remain silent. Who benefits from the auction, BTW?

Looks like only two per wing, assuming a symmetrical load. I see two warheads and two side by side lighter spots back at the fins. The clips you mention: Could it be there are two in the front and two in the back that attach the rocket to the rail but ride on either side of the rail? Otherwise, what’s to keep the rocket from falling off? This obviously is not a zero-length launch rail and the rockets have to ride along it to the end when fired.

Not particularly hard to fix that. Basic modeling stuff. I cut out the blanks and then trimmed a small white plastic throw-away cup until it fit like I wanted it to. Sourced a generic turbine face somewhere and there you go. Hard to see much in there no matter what you do.

Gust locks when parked? Crew holding aft stick while taxiing? Trim set for takeoff - pre taxi checklist item?

Admittedly, I did not bother to check what has come before, but these come to mind…. “That’s not what I meant”: LSPs modeled for missions the planes were not originally designed for, such as firefighting or spray missions, search and rescue, research, air racing, R&D, maybe even a playground diorama. Lots of options. Must be supportable; no what-ifs allowed. “Helos only”: LSP rotary wing models. No other limits. ”Saturday night at the movies”: an LSP model of any flying device as it appeared in a movie except for the Top Gun movies - those airplanes have been done to death already. ”Demonstrators”: LSP model of anything flown by any demonstration team anywhere on the planet. Must be in team colors. ”Warboats”: LSP model of any military flying boat, floatplane, or amphibian from WW1 or WW2 ”Minis”: the smallest LSP model you can find ”No Crewcuts”: any LSP anybody wants to build as long as it has at least one well-dressed crew member and/or support vehicle (in a nod to Kev’s tanker truck) posed in/with it. Just posed together; no diorama needed.

Seriously, Mach Schnell?

Four. There’s a dude texting with his back to you beside the gun. Or maybe he’s taking a nap - hard to tell.