The Olympus PEN-FT is the most advanced member of the PEN half-format family that flourished in the 1960s. The Pen-F is, all appearances to the contrary, an SLR, but its designers avoided the characteristic hump and bulk of other SLRs by using a Porro prism and fixing it sideways. This required some creative engineering of the shutter design, but the camera's designer, the ingenious Y. Maitani, came up with a brilliant solution there.

 

All film Pens use 35 mm film but the image only takes up half a frame and is exposed sideways, so if you hold the camera horizontally, the picture will be taken in the portrait mode.

 

Olympus offered a large line-up of high quality lenses, but in my opinion, the standard 38/f.1.8 Zuiko lens is also far and away the best choice. Almost always, I find that the field of view is exactly what I need. The lens is fast enough too. Come on. Who needs more aperture than f/1.8?

 

The FT offers off-the-prism (and thus, implicitly, through-the-lens) metering, which makes the viewfinder image a bit darker. Focusing still is a breeze, however, thanks to the microprism focusing screen. The light meter is not coupled - it indicates which f-stop to use, albeit using a proprietary numbering scheme.

 

The web abounds with detailed descriptions of the panoply of technology used in this camera, so I won't talk about that,

 

On a personal note - I find this camera a pure joy to use. There are no frills. It does what it's supposed to do, no more. So I'm not distracted and can concentrate on composing your picture, which is what I should be doing instead of fiddling with controls and menus.

 

You feel, hear and see that it's a brilliant piece of technology. A lot of complex engineering went into making it as simple as it is. Unlike modern computerized DSLRs which appear to be following the tenet that "if it was difficult to engineer it should also be difficult to use."

 

People react to it. Not like they'd react to a high-end DSLR or medium format behemoth. This camera doesn't elicit envy, it just pleases people with its looks. The reaction of the technician in the camera shop today was typical: A small gasp, followed by "Wow, that's a stunner. Let me hear the sound of her." That's right. He said "her", not "it". And then I fired her and his eyes lit up with joy and he went "Ahhhhhh ....yes!"

See what I mean? Everyone who sees her walks off with a smile on their face.

 

This is not a silent camera. But her sound is pure music to anyone who loves cameras. Granted, she has drawbacks.

 

Though she's rather heavy (which is good), the manufacturing quality isn't comparable to, say. a Leica. You see that when she twists and flexes slightly in your hands and you feel it most of all when you advance the film. That has a grindy feel to it.

 

But still. This baby was made in 1966, and I'd say she's in a very admirable state, given that she'll turn 50 next year.

BF-4 Flt 508 Mr. Peter Wilson and BF-5 Flt 370 Sqn Ldr Andy Adgell fly from HMS Queen Elizabeth on 27 Sep 2018

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

 

Improvements

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

 

Costs

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

The position of titular organist ("head" or "chief" organist) at Notre-Dame is considered one of the most prestigious organist posts in France, along with the post of titular organist of Saint Sulpice in Paris, Cavaillé-Coll's largest instrument.

 

The organ has 7,374 pipes, with ca 900 classified as historical. It has 110 real stops, five 56-key manuals and a 32-key pedalboard. In December 1992, a two-year restoration of the organ was completed that fully computerized the organ under three LANs (Local Area Networks).

We are your ancient family. We come from the star system The Pleiades. We know ourselves as The Pleiadians and we, eons ago, millions of years ago, were your relatives.

 

When your Earth sphere, Terra, was being formed, there were many who expressed an interest to be pioneers and to go to a new area to learn to experience, to formulate, to create. That was the opportunity and many of our dearly beloved Pleiadians signed on.

 

The Pleiadian culture is ancient. [It] was seeded from another universe, a universe of love, a universe that moved back to All That Is. The Pleiadians seeded the Pleiadian star system within this universe before the Earth’s sphere transfer became available. We formed a tremendous society. We operate with love. We operate with ideas and ideals that you are totally unfamiliar with.

 

Our technology in your terms would be somewhat similar. We are, in your terms, computerized. We like that term because it represents an overall picture of our abilities. The picture actually only represents one per cent of what we are capable of doing. However, from your point of view, think of us as a computerized society. We are collective energy. We are not of your dimension.

 

The star system of the Pleiades has seven stars, six of which we believe, you may see from the naked eye. There are many planets and we are millions upon millions of miles from your system though we have transportation that can bring us here very quickly. We have many modes of transportation.

 

Mostly we come in starships. Often mother ships. The mother ships are gigantic, one of your miles, housing thousands. [They are] elongated, one of our fashions, [and] would take, in your terms, days to transport itself here. We have disc ships which can be here quickly, within portions of your day.

 

We have difficulty at times translating your time system, your hours, your minutes, into what is relative to our system, perhaps less than one quarter of your day. We are an advanced civilization. Our technology is ancient because it is coming from another universe that has evolved back to First Cause.

 

We chose not to evolve back to First Cause but to go on out of love, to assist the growth of this universe. We were allowed to bring that knowing with us because our technological development is totally in line with the First Cause and we would never operate in any fashion that did not support the love and development of humanity of all creatures in all of this universe. So we were allowed to be here. We were welcomed.

 

We are the ambassadors, in this star area, this universe, from another universe. We are working with many, not just with Terra, the Earth. We are working in other solar systems, with other planetary creatures, with other creations.

 

This universe is a vast and new experiment. Different options, we like that word, are being attempted here. Free will reigns in this universe. On Terra you think you have free will but you do not really understand what free will is. Free will encompasses the complete idea that whatever it is that you are wanting you may have. And your sole point in choosing to partake in the planetary system within this universe that has free will was so that you may do whatever it is that you wish.

 

Terra was formed with specific intents in mind. It was formed to be a center for this solar system, a trade center, a launching pad for ideas. Much like, as different portions of your globe have developed, and different port cities, or areas came into fashion and represented trends, cultural advancements, exchanges of ideas at different points in time, and then fell by the wayside.

 

The ideal of Terra’s role would be the jewel within the universe for its beauty physically to the eye, and this physical beauty would be beheld not just in one dimension but in many dimensions. That it would be a center of tremendous beauty, of tremendous exchange, of freedom, of ideas and beauty and love and peoples, humanities, creatures from all of this universe and star system ideally would have come here and exchanged what it is they had, as goods would be exchanged in the marketplace, with others.

 

Now, as you know, that has not taken place. Fortunately that is changing. Unfortunately, eons in your past, events occurred that were not anticipated, for when one deals with free will one never knows. There are no expectations with free will, just intentions and hopes. And even intentions sometimes may be transmuted.

 

Now, that was the original intention. Then eons ago, millions of years ago, there was a disruptive force that became quite pronounced in this area of creation, experimenting as it would be, with another form of being. This experimenting was not evil, it was just another point of view. We speak in very neutral terms so as not to lay blame or prejudice on anyone.

 

This disruptive force effected Terra greatly. It threw the cosmic forces, the hierarchies into vast confusion. And it has been all these eons, these millions of years that this has been attempted to be righted.

 

Now, through the last thousands of years we have been assisting the higher spiritual forces, those from the First Cause. Our assistance we freely gave because original family members came to this experiment of Terra and then when those disruptive energies became prevalent and changed the intent of what Terra would be we lost contact with our family members. It was very sad for us, for we had never anticipated this loss.

 

Being that we as Pleiadians are highly evolved and of great knowing and great connectedness with the First Cause, we knew that this was a temporary loss of family members, though temporary in our terms was millions of years. And though the initial shock was felt literally throughout the universe and universes, we formulated a plan and knew that there would be a time when we would be reunited.

 

We are your family members who lost contact with you eons ago. We have come to retrieve you. We have come to reestablish contact, to assist you, so that you can now reunite with us, liberate yourselves and choose to come back to the Pleiades or to stay here on Terra and raise the vibration and allow Terra to become what it was originally planned to become, the international exchange, intergalactic international trade exchange center for the universe.

 

Now, as you may well know, that upon looking at your planet you can shake your head and say, goodness, we have ventured far from our original goal. And, indeed, that is true, you have. However, at this time events are manifesting on your planet that are about to change all of that.

 

It was known eons ago that there would be a point where the energies would be ripe for contact, for adjustments, for receiving energy for realignment. It was hoped that that juncture would be reached through the opening of the free will bodies, by their own choice, through love.

 

That is not the case. You have reached critical times. It began peaking 30, 40 years ago, and the activities that have been occurring on this sphere have been of grave concern to all within your universe. The lack of love for humanity, for one another on this planet. Separations of self from self. The missing of the message that you are all one, that you are all connected, that what one does affects the other.

 

Know that there are many millions on the planet out of the billions, who are awakened, who are moving toward the enlightenment, moving towards the acknowledgement of the First Creator, in whatever minuscule way they can conceive of this vast entity.

 

What is happening on your planet at this time is that the energy of the First Creator, is being presented to the planet as a whole. When we say “as a whole”, there are no groupings that would be select over others. The opportunities exist for everyone. It is the individual humanity’s choice to acknowledge the opportunity that presents itself.

 

[The awakened ones will be] assigned, so to speak, to awaken someone. First Creator energy is now being made available to the planet, on a vast level, vast. It’s encircling the sphere. Light frequency is bombarding your planet, though only those who know how to use this energy can feel it. It is as if an invisible force is in your lives and if you are not aware of this invisible force, you will not see it.

 

Now, if the awakeners approach the awakenees with love, with intent of service, with intent of changing the planetary potential, the planetary history, and also are willing to bond unconditionally with the awakenee, it will be successful. In most cases, those that need now to be awakened are working about this in their dream state and they are in a state of confusion in their waking world and so they are welcoming something that will give them greater power and direction.

 

The awakenees will need guidance for a short amount of time because of the energy that is available [but] the knowings will happen very quickly, then they, too, [will awaken and empower others]. The more members, the greater members of humanity that are in knowing, the easier the times ahead will be.

 

We are working, sitting at the edges of our seats. When we say “our”, we mean our beings, the star individuals, the star families, the spirit guides, the ascended masters, the callers from the great cause, the First Cause. There are many here. The skies, the atmospheres are full, so to speak, of who we are keeping Terra in force, keeping it alive and vibrant, glowing, and also respecting your free will at the same time.

 

That is why we say the awakenings are so important at this time. They are of prime concern. Individual awakenings. Word of mouth. It is the best way of accomplishing what it is that needs to be accomplished. Word of mouth. Books are fine. Tapings are fine. But one individual loving another individual liberates, frees. And that individual goes off and creates and effects many others. That is how the process will occur, as we see it.

 

We stated earlier that Terra is a free will district along with the entire universe, however, there is a code of honor that exists along with free will. And that code of honor represents the respect for life. All of life. The respect, and the commitment to no violation of life. The honoring of life is paramount, and allowing that life.

 

Now, millions upon millions of years ago when the disruptive forces came in and changed all of that, free will was granted still and we stepped back, and saw and watched, and knew that there would be a time when all of this would come to an apex, as it would be said when the changes could be made.

 

Disruptive forces have come again. This time they will not succeed. However, the energy is of great influence on the planet at this time because of the technological development and the extent of this technological influence throughout the planet.

 

We ask that each person individually speak to another. At this point very powerful individuals are being awakened. Those individuals who effect other people, who influence other people are those that are awakening at this time, and are being awakened by those who made agreements, contracts eons ago to perform this service. We see that there will be changes geographically, great changes. Because the changes represent the most benevolent way of realignment. If there were to be great destructions, and there will be some destructions along the lines of warrings, if that were to be the prevalent case upon the entire sphere, it would effect the cosmos so greatly, that in this case it cannot be allowed.

 

The changes that will happen on the surface of Terra are not definite. They will not be definite until they occur, until energy peaks. The energy will be peaking partially through what’s happening on the globe, also through planetary and cosmic influences. The closer you may move towards the misuse of the technology, then of course, Mother Earth, a living, viable, breathing entity, would shift itself rather than destroy itself.

 

[The] shifts will be of a healing nature, much as the ill person may experience the tremendous fevers and burn and sweat and shake and then heal themselves. If Mother Earth did not shift herself and the misuse of technology would be [a] prevalent paradigm, do you know what would occur? It would be the destruction of the universe.

 

We do not wish to be annihilated and misuse of your technology on your planet could annihilate a universe. Contemplate on what we are speaking for it is profound.

 

Many of you are looking for blacks and whites and the universe exists in gray areas. It is not the way you think it is. There is life teeming everywhere that you cannot see. There are many dimensions, there are many forms of beings. What happens in your dimension would affect us all because the building blocks of the universe, of the cosmos are connected. The atoms, the elements are all one. They are universal. Universal tools, so to speak. And through the misuse of one, in one segmented area, it would effect many others. So that is why we say, we are tuning Mother Earth to this knowing. Mother Earth knows this potential happening and would shift herself when the time and the danger becomes great.

 

Understand that all of these changes are contingent upon the awakenings. If the awakenings happen very quickly and those within the governments, within the arms industries, those within the publishing, communicative areas, television, newspaper, movies, [if] those influential people on the planet are awakened quickly, all could shift. Mother Earth will do whatever is necessary to realign for her own survival.

 

We are saying that if your intention is to step into the times ahead with joy, and experience, and be a partaker, a conscious partaker of the movement that the planet is selecting, then clearly think of what it is that you want, intend it, plan on it, and then trust that the part of the body located in the solar plexus will guide you along with the heart, to be where it is you need to be. If you are clear in your plannings, if you count on it, if you state it matter of factly, step into the knowing, not the thinking, but the knowing beyond all shadow of a doubt that you will be here in joy, in harmony, in happiness, in creativity, and in greater rejoicing of building the world, the civilization that you all desire, then so shall you be.

 

Now, think of that for a few moments and choose what it is you want. Examine your hearts about what it is you are wanting. Throw by the wayside those things that are not important to you and put your energy, your thoughts, your hearts, into what it is that is most important. And do not, under any circumstances, be afraid of making a change, for change is going to occur whether you select it or not. So, by consciously selecting a change, whether it be a move, or what have you, [it] may be your method, your means, of moving into the times ahead.

 

Do not resist change. Flow. It may come in the area of relationships, the breakings up or the coming togethers. It may come in the area of employment or a lack of. It may come in the area of sudden abundance presenting itself to you or lack of. All these events will motivate you towards something. We ask that you go inside, trust the feelings. Trust yourself. One of the most beneficial endeavors that you will be involved with is forming the extended families. With a networking of thirty to fifty people it will be very powerful. We also wish to speak of the availability of outside communication that is waiting to speak with many of you, that is speaking with each and every one of you though you do not acknowledge it. Vast numbers are willing to help.

 

We ask you to examine your hearts, relinquish your fears, move towards what it is that will be most important. We suggest, and we will assist in these endeavors, that through your dream states you dare to dream of possibilities that seem outlandish. Awakened ones and those becoming awakened are being fed information through the dream state from the vast numbers and given so called ideas. Instigated information. Potentialities of abilities that are far beyond what is available now on the planet. And these will be fun things. These will be joyful things. These will be loving things, healing things, successful things. Play with your dream states and when one of these crazy ideas comes to you, grasp onto it like a hot air balloon and ride it for a while over the topography of yourself and see where it will take you.

 

We ask you to approach these times with an open mind, a creative mind, a loving mind, to move into the self. To trust the self. Open the heart. To connect with humanity, to awaken the others. To be gentle with who you are. For your difficulties you will lay down as they are old clothes that you will no longer fit into or wear. Your aches, longings and difficulties can all be laid to rest as you move into this great new garment of being.

 

Many will be petrified of moving into this time for much must be relinquished. Much must be changed and given up. However, we are saying that if the Earth itself did not change in its seasons, it would be pretty dreary indeed. And so fall needs to come and the winter set to rest so that in spring there may be regrowth, revitalization and awakenings. This is what you’ll be experiencing.

 

We have committed to guide you on this time. There are many who are here loving you, assisting you, doing whatever is necessary. Open your hearts. Open your eyes to what is coming. Do not be afraid. Know that you are surrounded by love and energy greater than at this point you can fathom. So great it is beyond your knowing, though a part of you knows that greatness and brings it to yourself.

 

We trust that what we have said empowers you, enlightens you, guides you to who you need to be. Move forward. Move in love. Feel the connectedness of all that is.

 

Look into the eyes of fellow humanity and see yourselves for you are there. Bless each one with the knowing that you have and your awakenings will be greater than you ever imagined.

 

goldenageofgaia.com/disclosure/who-are-the-extraterrestri...

A seamstress is a woman who sews for a living.

Sewing is the craft of fastening or attaching objects using stitches made with a needle and thread. Sewing is one of the oldest of the textile arts, arising in the Paleolithic era. Before the discovery of spinning yarn or weaving fabric, archaeologists believe Stone Age people across Europe and Asia sewed fur and skin clothing using bone, antler or ivory needles and "thread" made of various animal body parts including sinew, catgut, and veins. Although usually associated with clothing and household linens, sewing is used in a variety of crafts and industries, including shoemaking, upholstery, sailmaking, bookbinding and the manufacturing of some kinds of sporting goods. Sewing is the fundamental process underlying a variety of textile arts and crafts, including embroidery, tapestry, quilting, appliqué and patchwork.

For thousands of years, all sewing was done by hand. The invention of the sewing machine in the 19th century and the rise of computerization in the later 20th century led to mass production of sewn objects, but hand sewing is still practiced around the world. Fine hand sewing is a characteristic of high-quality tailoring, haute couture fashion, and custom dressmaking, and is pursued by both textile artists and hobbyists as a means of creative expression.-Wikipedia

Two Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II fighter jets have successfully landed on board HMS Queen Elizabeth for the first time, laying the foundations for the next 50 years of fixed wing aviation in support of the UK’s Carrier Strike Capability.

 

Royal Navy Commander, Nathan Gray, 41, made history by being the first to land on board HMS Queen Elizabeth, carefully maneuvering his stealth jet onto the thermal coated deck. He was followed by Squadron Leader Andy Edgell, RAF, both of whom are test pilots, operating with the Integrated Test Force (ITF) based at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland.

 

Shortly afterwards, once a deck inspection has been conducted and the all-clear given, Cmdr Gray became the first pilot to take off using the ship’s ski-ramp.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

 

Improvements

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

 

Costs

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

 

The purpose of a power supply on a model railroad is to provide power to make the trains run, and if the layout is big enough and complex enough to require more than one power feed, the POLARITY is important. Otherwise, there will be short circuits, and the trains will not run. For the hundredth time, my layout is small enough and simple enough to run off of one DC power pack. Computerized Direct Digital Control would add complexity that I don’t need and expense that I cannot afford. Although my layout is big enough to give the illusion of visually separate scenes, I don’t have enough track space between the staging areas and the passing siding to allow more than one train in motion, so I simply alternate them. Besides, the tempo of operations on the single track Santa Fe line across northern New Mexico in the mid-1950’s was only five passenger trains and one through freight train a day each way plus a local freight that ran a few times a week.

 

I originally chose Kato Unitrack so I could quickly set up on my dinner table and run some trains and test various track arrangements without having to custom cut flex track and custom wire each track arrangement for my future layout. Once I built the layout, I have changed my passing sidings, industrial spurs, and staging yards several times by unsnapping, re-arranging, and popping the tracks back together. The Unitrack wiring system is simple “plug and play” with standard connectors and no soldering necessary.

 

When I first got started with Unitrack, I ordered a starter set that had an S-62F power feed track whose wiring cable ran to my Kato power pack. That worked fine for testing my brand new Super Chief in 2006. On longer track circuits the train ran slower further away from the power feed. I installed a second power feed track S-62F on the other side of the layout, and my train wouldn’t move. WTF? I checked for opens and found none, but the circuit breaker had popped. Both cables from the S-62F tracks connected to a 3 to 1 connector that snapped into the power pack. The connectors can only plug in the right way. Then I unplugged one of the power track feeds, and the train ran. I swapped power feeds, and the train ran but in the opposite direct. POLARITY PROBLEM! But how?

 

Most power feed tracks have big and unrealistic screw terminals for connecting both wires to the power pack. The sleek Kato S-62F track has a two wire cable that can run through a hole in the sub-roadbed or can be routed to an opening on either side of the track for temporary table top set-ups. These cable routing holes are near the end of the track, but the track can be snapped in either direction. When using only one S-62F power feed track, it doesn’t matter which direction the power feed track is placed in the small set-up, but if more than one is used, all the S-62F power feed holes must be oriented the same. I am not talking about whether the cables go left, right, or down but rather the location of the cable holes as you face the feeder track. Kato does not even mention it on the instructions that come with the track or in any of the booklets that come with track sets.

 

Here is how I standardize the polarity on my layout. Model manufactures for HO and N scales (and possibly others) have agreed that a POSITIVE voltage applied to the RIGHT rail and a NEGATIVE voltage to the LEFT will make an engine go FORWARD. Reversing circuits simply switch the polarity around to go backward. On many American layouts including mine, we arbitrarily decide that going RIGHT (as the viewer faces the layout) is EASTBOUND and going LEFT is WESTBOUND because many railfans in the Northern Hemisphere photograph east-west lines from the south side to allow the sun to illuminate the trains. I picked up that orientation when I was active in NTrak back in 1979-95. According to the General Code of Operating Rules followed by most American railroads, eastbound trains are superior to westbound trains of the same class. Therefore, the FORWARD setting on my Kato power pack is EASTBOUND, and the REVERSE setting is WESTBOUND. Given the fixed nature of the Kato Unitrack wiring plugs, in order to make the FORWARD setting propel the trains EASTBOUND, all the S-62F cable holes must be on the right as you face the track. I use two of these on my mainline and a third one on my portable test track. All of my staging tracks are reversing loops and powered by feeder UniJoiners which I’ll discuss later.

 

For clarity I unsnapped the feeder track from the track that holds an engine pointed Eastbound. Notice that the cable is on the RIGHT side as you view the track.

 

taken for Our Daily Challenge - stopped action

 

I wanted to do a wave today but there wasn't enough wind to produce anything more than a gentle swell today so I tried for a fast enough speed to stop the water action of the fountains instead. The photo above and below depicts one of the Maids of the Mist, an icon of St. Joseph. Constance faces West and behind her, facing East is Hope.

 

The one that looks like a nozzle below is in the compass fountain in St. Joseph. Most of the time jets go straight up from the ground in the area of the compass but at selected times during the hour the ground jets stop and instead the nozzles (cannons) surrounding the compass all begin to spray into its center. It was actually too busy today to get good shots because it was so crowded. The best time is when there are just a dozen or so kids playing in it. I'll link a few I took last year so you can get a better idea of it.

 

Facts about the compass fountain:

1. Concrete inner splash pad is 150 ft. in diameter

2. Outer ring of the pad is 200 ft. in diameter

3. There are 28 varying height water jets

4. These water jets supply 785 gallons of water per minute

5. There are 5 computerized light shows available

6. There are 8 water cannons mounted on armillary spheres

7. Cannons are equipped with 1000 watt lights

8. These cannons spray water 35 ft. into the air

9. The cannons supply 2,560 gallons of water per minute

10. The water reservoir holds 10,860 gallons of recycled water

 

Westland Sea King HAR3 XZ594 (cn WA860) Royal Air Force, Sea King Rescue Training Unit (SKTU), on the Thursday before RIAT 2015 at Fairford UK (FFD). (photo 4829-1).

 

The Westland WS-61 Sea King is a British license-built version of the American Sikorsky S-61 helicopter of the same name, built by Westland Helicopters. The aircraft differs considerably from the American version, with Rolls-Royce Gnome engines (derived from the US General Electric T58), British-made anti-submarine warfare systems and a fully computerized flight control system.

 

A dedicated search and rescue (SAR) version, the HAR3, was developed for the RAF Search and Rescue Force. The type entered service in 1978. Westland also manufactured SAR versions of the Sea King for the Royal Norwegian Air Force, the German Navy and the Belgian Air Force. On SAR variants, the cabin was enlarged by a stretch of the fuselage behind the door; another key feature, used for additional flotation in the unusual event of a water landing, inflatable buoyancy bags were housed inside the aircraft's sponsons. Upgrades and changes made to SAR Sea Kings include the addition of radar warning receivers, a cargo hook for the underslung carriage of goods, and the redesigning of the cockpit for compatibility with night vision goggles. As of 2006, up to 12 HAR3/3As were dispersed across the UK, a further two HAR3s were attached to the Falkland Islands, providing 24-hour rescue coverage.

 

Source: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westland_Sea_King

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!

 

Some background:

The Northrop Grumman-IAI F-24 is the latest reincarnation of the USAF "Lightweight Fighter Program" which dates back to the 1950ies and started with the development of Northrop's F-5 "Freedom Fighter".

 

The 1st generation F-5 became very successful in the export market and saw a long line of development, including the much more powerful F-5E "Tiger II" and the F-20 Tigershark (initially called F-5G). Northrop had high hopes for the F-20 in the international market; however, policy changes following Ronald Reagan's election meant the F-20 had to compete for sales against aircraft like the F-16, the USAF's latest fighter design (which was politically favored). The F-20 development program was eventually abandoned in 1986 after three prototypes had been built and a fourth partially completed.

 

But this was not the end for Northrop’s Lightweight Fighter. In the early 1980s, two X-29As experimental aircraft were built by Grumman from two existing Northrop F-5A Freedom Fighter airframes. The Grumman X-29 was a testbed for forward-swept wings, canard control surfaces, and other novel aircraft technologies. The aerodynamic instability of this arrangement increased agility but required the use of computerized fly-by-wire control. Composite materials were used to control the aeroelastic divergent twisting experienced by forward-swept wings, also reducing the weight. The NASA test program continued from 1984 to 1991 and the X-29s flew 242 times, gathering valuable data and breaking ground for new aerodynamic technologies of 4th and 5th generation fighters.

 

Even though no service aircraft directly evolved from the X-29, its innovative FBW system as well as the new material technologies also opened the door for an updated F-20 far beyond the 1990ies. It became clear that ever expensive and complex aircraft could not be the answer to modern, asymmetrical warfare in remote corners of the world, with exploding development costs and just a limited number of aircraft in service that could not generate true economies of scale, esp. when their state-of-the-art design would not permit any export.

Anyway, a global market for simpler fighter aircraft was there, as 1st generation F-16s as well as the worldwide, aging F-5E fleet and types of Soviet/Russian origin like the MiG-29 provided the need for a modern, yet light and economical jet fighter. Contemporary types like the Indian HAL Tejas, the Swedish Saab Gripen, the French Dassault Rafale and the Pakistani/Chinese FC-1/JF-17 ”Thunder” proved this trend among 4th - 4.5th generation fighter aircraft.

 

Northrop Grumman (Northrop bought Grumman in 1994) initiated studies and basic design work on a respective New Lightweight Fighter (NLF) as a private venture in 1995. Work on the NLF started at a slow pace, as the company was busy with re-structuring.

The idea of an updated lightweight fighter was fueled by another source, too: Israel. In 1998 IAI started looking in the USA for a development partner for a new, light fighter that would replace its obsolete Kfir fleet and partly relieve its F-16 and F-15 fleet from interception tasks. The domestic project for that role, the IAI Lavi, had been stillborn, but lots of its avionics and research were still at hand and waited for an airframe for completion.

The new aircraft for the IAF was to be superior to the MiG-29, at least on par with the F-16C/D, but easier to maintain, smaller and overall cheaper. Since the performance profiles appeared to be similar to what Northrop Grumman was developing under the NLF label, the US company eventually teamed up with IAI in 2000 and both started the mutual project "Namer" (=נמר, “Tiger” in Hebrew), which eventually lead to the F-24 I for the IAF which kept its project name for service and to the USAF’s F-24A “Tigershark”.

 

The F-24, as the NLF, was based on the F-20 airframe, but outwardly showed only little family heritage, onle the forward fuselage around the cockpit reminds of the original F-5 design . Many aerodynamic details, e. g. the air intakes and air ducts, were taken over from the X-29, though, as the experimental aircraft and its components had been developed for extreme maneuvers and extra high agility. Nevertheless, the X-29's forward-swept wing was considered to be too exotic and fragile for a true service aircraft, but the F-24 was to feature an Active Aeroelastic Wing (AAW) system.

 

AAW Technology integrates wing aerodynamics, controls, and structure to harness and control wing aeroelastic twist at high speeds and dynamic pressures. By using multiple leading and trailing edge controls like "aerodynamic tabs", subtle amounts of aeroelastic twist can be controlled to provide large amounts of wing control power, while minimizing maneuver air loads at high wing strain conditions or aerodynamic drag at low wing strain conditions. This system was initially tested on the X-29 and later on the X-53 research aircraft, a modified F-18, until 2006.

 

Both USAF and IAF versions feature this state-of-the-art aerodynamic technology, but it is uncertain if other customers will receive it. While details concerning the F-24's system have not been published yet, it is assumed that its AAW is so effective that canard foreplanes could be omitted without sacrificing lift and maneuverability, and that drag is effectively minimized as the wing profile can be adjusted according to the aircraft’s speed, altitude, payload and mission – much like a VG wing, but without its clumsy and heavy swiveling mechanism which has to bear high g forces. As a result, the F-24 is, compared to the F-20, which could carry an external payload of about 3.5 tons, rumored to be able to carry up to 5 tons of ordnance.

 

The delta wing shape proved to be a perfect choice for the required surface and flap actuators inside of the wings, and it would also offer a very good compromise between lift and drag for a wide range of performance. Anyway, there was one price to pay: in order to keep the wing profile thin and simple, the F-24’s landing gear retracts into the lower fuselage, leaving the aircraft with a relatively narrow track.

 

Another major design factor for the outstanding performance of this rather small aircraft was weight reduction and structural integrity – combined with simplicity, ruggedness and a modular construction which would allow later upgrades. Instead of “going big” and expensive, the new F-24 was to create its performance through dedicated loss of weight, which was in some part also a compensation for the AAW system in the wings and its periphery.

 

Weight was saved wherever possible, e .g. a newly developed, lightweight M199A1 gatling gun. This 20mm cannon is a three-barreled, heavily modified version of the already “stripped” M61A2 gun in the USAF’s current F-18E and F-22. One of the novel features is a pneumatic drive instead of the traditional electric mechanism, what not only saves weight but also improves trigger response. The new gun weighs only a mere 65kg (the six-barreled M61A2 weighs 92kg, the original M61A1 112 kg), but still reaches a burst rate of fire of 1.800 RPM (about 800 RPM under cyclic fire, standard practice is to fire the cannon in 30 to 50-round bursts, though) and a muzzle velocity of 1.050 metres per second (3,450 ft/s) with a PGU-28/B round.

 

While the F-16 was and is still made from 80% aluminum alloys and only from 3% composites, the F-24 makes major use of carbon fiber and other lightweight materials, which make up about 40% of the aircraft’s structure, plus an increased share of Titanium and Magnesium alloys. As a consequence and through many other weight-saving measures like keeping stealth capabilities to a minimum (even though RAM was deliberately used and many details designed to have a natural low radar signature, resulting in modest radar cross-section (RCS) reductions), a single, relatively small engine, a fuel-efficient F404-GE-402 turbofan, is enough to make the F-24 a fast and very agile aircraft, coupled with a good range. The F-24’s thrust/weight ratio is considerably higher than 1, and later versions with a vectored thrust nozzle (see below) will take this level of agility even further – with the pilot becoming the limiting factor for the aircraft’s performance.

 

USAF and IAF F-24s are outfitted with Northrop Grumman's AN/APG-80 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar, also used in the F-16 Block 60 aircraft. Other customers might only receive the AN/APG-68, making the F-24 comparable to the F-16C/D.

 

The first prototype, the YF-24, flew on 8th of March 2008, followed by two more aircraft plus a static airframe until summer 2010. In early 2011 the USAF placed an initial order of 101 aircraft (probably also to stir export sales – the earlier lightweight fighters from Northrop suffered from the fact that the manufacturer’s country would not use the aircraft in its own forces). These initial aircraft will replace older F-16 in the interceptor role, or free them for fighter bomber tasks. The USN and USMC also showed interest in the aircraft for their aggressor squadrons, for dissimilar air combat training. A two-seater, called the F-24B, is supposed to follow soon, too, and a later version for 2020 onwards, tentatively designated F-24C, is to feature an even stronger F404 engine and a 3D vectoring nozzle.

 

Israel is going to produce its own version domestically from late 2014 on, which will exclusively be used by the IAF. These aircraft will be outfitted with different avionics, built by Elta in Israel, and cater to national requirements which focus more on multi-purpose service, while the USAF focusses with its F-24A on aerial combat and interception tasks.

 

International interest for the F-24A is already there: in late 2013 Grumman stated that initial talks have been made with various countries, and potential export candidates from 2015 on are Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, Finland, Norway, Australia and Japan.

  

General F-24A characteristics:

Crew: 1 pilot

Length: 47 ft 4 in (14.4 m)

Wingspan: 27 ft 11.9 in / 8.53 m; with wingtip missiles (26 ft 8 in/ 8.13 m; without wingtip missiles)

Height: 13 ft 10 in (4.20 m)

Wing area: 36.55 m² (392 ft²)

Empty weight: 13.150 lb (5.090 kg)

Loaded weight: 15.480 lb (6.830 kg)

Max. take-off weight: 27.530 lb (12.500 kg)

 

Powerplant

1× General Electric F404-GE-402 turbofan with a dry thrust of 11,000 lbf (48.9 kN) and 17,750 lbf (79.2 kN) with afterburner

 

Performance

Maximum speed: Mach 2+

Combat radius: 300 nmi (345 mi, 556 km); for hi-lo-hi mission with 2 × 330 US gal (1,250 L) drop tanks

Ferry range: 1,490 nmi (1715 mi, 2759 km); with 3 × 330 US gal (1,250 L) drop tanks

Service ceiling: 55,000 ft (16,800 m)

Rate of climb: 52,800 ft/min (255 m/s)

Wing loading: 70.0 lb/ft² (342 kg/m²)

Thrust/weight: 1.09 (1.35 with loaded weight & 50% fuel)

 

Armament

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) M199A1 3-barreled Gatling cannon in the lower fuselage with 400 RPG

Eleven external hardpoints (two wingtip tails, six underwing hardpoints, three underfuselage hardpoints) and a total capacity of 11.000 lb (4.994 kg) of missiles (incl. AIM 9 Sidewinder and AIM 120 AMRAAM), bombs, rockets, ECM pods and drop tanks for extended range.

  

The kit and its assembly:

A spontaneous project. This major kitbash was inspired by fellow user nighthunter at whatifmodelers.com, who came up with a profile of a mashed-up US fighter, created “out of boredom”. The original idea was called F-21C, and it was to be a domestic successor to the IAI Kfirs which had been used by the US as aggressor aircraft in USN and USMC service for a few years.

 

As a weird(?) coincidence I had many of the necessary ingredients for this fictional aircraft in store, even though some parts and details were later changed. This model here is an interpretation of the original design. The idea was spun further, and the available parts that finally went into the model also had some influence on design and background.

I thank nighthunter for sharing the early ideas, inviting me to take the design to the hardware stage (sort of…) and adapting my feedback into new design sketches, too, which, in return, inspired the model building process.

 

Well, what went into this thing? To cook up a F-24 à la Dizzyfugu you just need (all in 1:72):

● Fuselage from a Hasegawa X-29, including the cockpit and the landing gear

● Fin and nose cone from an Italeri F-16A

● Inner wings from a (vintage) Hasegawa MiG-21F

● Outer wings from a F-4 (probably a J, Hasegawa or Fujimi)

 

The wing construction deviates from nighthunter’s original idea. The favorite ingredients would have been F-16XL or simple Mirage III wings, but I found the composite wing to be more attractive and “different”. The big F-16XL wings, despite their benefit of a unique shape, might also have created scale/size problems with a F-20 style fuselage? So I built hybrid wings: The MiG-21 landing gear wells were filled with putty and the F-4 outer wings simply glued onto the MiG inner wing sections, which were simply cut down in span. It sounds like an unlikely combo, but these parts fit together almost perfectly! In order to hide the F-4 origins I modified them to carry wingtip launch rails, though, which were also part of nighthunter’s original design.

 

The AAW technology detail mentioned in the background came in handy as it explains the complicated wing shape and the fact that the landing gear retracts into the fuselage, not into the wings, which would have been more plausible… Anyway, there’s still room for a simpler export version, with Mirage III or Kfir C.2/7 wings, and maybe canards?

 

Using the X-29 as basis also made fitting the new wings onto the area-ruled fuselage pretty easy, as I could use the wing root parts from the X-29 to bridge the gap. The original, forward-swept wings were just cut away, and the remains used as consoles for the new hybrid delta wings. Took some SERIOUS putty work, but the result is IMHO fine.

 

The bigger/square X-29 air intakes were taken over, and they change the look of the aircraft, making it look less F-5-ish than a true F-20 fuselage. For the same reason I kept the large fairing at the fin base, combining it with a bigger F-16 tail, though, as a counter-balance to the new, bigger wings. Again, the F-16 fin was/is part of nighthunter’s idea, so the model stays true to the original concept.

 

For the same reason I omitted the original X-29 nose, which is rather pointy, sports vanes and a large sensor boom. The F-16 nose was a plausible choice, as the AN/APG-80 is also carried by late Fighting Falcons, and its shape fits well, too.

 

All around the hull, some small details like radar warning sensors, pitots and air scoops were added. Not really necessary, but such thing add IMHO to the overall impression of such a fictional aircraft beyond the prototype stage.

 

Cockpit and landing gear were taken OOB, I just added a pilot figure and slightly modified the seat.

 

The ordnance was puzzled together from the scrap box, the AIM-9Ls come from the same F-4 kit which donated its outer wings, the AIM-120s come from an Italeri NATO weapons kit. The drop tanks belong to an F-16.

  

Painting and markings:

At first I considered an F-24I in IAF markings, or even a Japanese aircraft, but then reverted to one of nighthunter’s initial, simple ideas: an USAF aircraft in the “Hill II” paint scheme (F-16 style), made up from three shades of gray (FS 36118, 36270 and 36375) with low-viz markings and stencils. Dutch/Turkish NF-5A/Bs in the “Hill II” scheme were used as design benchmarks, too. It’s a simple livery, but on this delta wing aircraft it looks pretty interesting. I used enamels, what I had at hand: Humbrol 127 and 126, and Modelmaster's 1723.

 

A light black ink wash was applied, in order to em,phasize the engraved panel lines, in contrast to that, panels were manually highlighted through dry-brushed, lighter shades of gray (Humbrol 27, 166 and 167).

 

“Hill II” also adds to a generic, realistic touch for this whif. Doing an exotic air force thing is rather easy, but creating a convincing whif for a huge military machinery like the USAF’s takes more subtlety, I think.

 

The cockpit was painted in medium Gray (Dark Gull Grey, FS 36231, Humbrol 140), as well as the radome. The landing gear and the air intakes were painted white. The radome was painted with Revell 47 and dry-brushed with Humbrol 140.

 

Decals were puzzled together from various USAF aircraft, including sheets from an Airfix F-117, an Italeri F-15E and even an Academy OV-10D.

  

Tadah: a hardware tribute to an idea, born from boredom - and the aircraft does not look even bad at all? What I wanted to achieve was to make the F-24 neither look like a F-20, nor a Saab Gripen clone, as the latter comes close in overall shape, size and design.

Character Creation

 

Steel is a superhero appearing in comic books published by DC Comics. He is a genius engineer who builds a mechanized suit of armor that mirrors Superman's powers. Steel initially seeks to replace Superman, who has been killed by Doomsday. After Superman is resurrected, he accepts Steel as an ally. Steel's sledgehammer and real name of John Henry Irons are references to the mythical railroad worker John Henry. He has a niece named Natasha Irons who is also a superhero with similar steel armor.

 

Publication history

 

First appearing in The Adventures of Superman #500 (June 1993), he is the second character known as Steel and was created by Louise Simonson and artist Jon Bogdanove.

 

The character is portrayed by Shaquille O'Neal in the 1997 film adaptation of the same name and Wolé Parks in the television series Superman & Lois. Additionally, Michael Dorn and Zeno Robinson have voiced the character in animation.

 

Modern Age: New Earth: Reign of the Supermen

 

After the death of Superman, Metropolis was without a protector watching over it. After several weeks without a Superman, new heroes appeared and declared themselves to be Superman. One was Eradicator, dubbed "the Last Son of Krypton," who looked the most like Superman but was merciless in his approach to crime-fighting. Also, Superboy tried to take up the mantle by getting the media on his side, but his youth and arrogance prevented him from being a true successor.

 

Also, Cyborg Superman claimed to be the real deal, and got the federal government to back his claims. After realizing the the weapons he used to design for a living were being manufactured and sold to street gangs and inspired by the example Superman set, John created a suit of armor to help him fight crime and stop the sale of his weapons.

 

Due to all of the new Supermen running around, the media focused on all of them, with the press giving John the title the "Man of Steel." Also, a local psychic told the media that he was the real Superman reincarnated in a robotic body. During his adventures, the Man of Steel ran into Superboy, and explained to him how a Superman should act. He also encountered Lex Luthor, who tried to get hire him. However, he turned Lex's offer down. He later ran into Lois Lane, who wanted to know if he really was Superman. He set her straight by telling him that he never claimed to be Superman. Though she realized he was not actually Superman, Lois believed he was most like the original.

 

Eventually, Steel found the location of the one distributing his weapons. When he went to confront them, he discovered that his ex-girlfriend and development partner, Angora Lapin a.k.a. White Rabbit was the distributor. Having pieced together the Man of Steel's identity, she offered him a chance to join her in her pursuits, but he promptly turned her down. To escape, she shot him with a Toastmaster and fled as he recovered.

 

While trying to track White rabbit down, he had a run-in with the Eradicator. After watching him kill a criminal he had apprehended, John told Eradicator that he could not be the real Superman. Upset at the notion, Eradicator attacked John until Lois arrived and stopped the two. However, Eradicator got upset again and flew Steel into orbit. The two landed in California and fought to a standstill. When Steel tells Eradicator that a Superman needs to have compassion, he calms down and leaves.

 

Unable to fly back to Metropolis, Steel hitches a ride on an airplane. When they land, White Rabbit and her men ambush him at the airport. He manages to fight them off, grab Angora, and force her to take him to the plant where she is producing the Toastmasters. However, the plant was rigged with traps that John manages to escape. He manages to get clear of the plant as it explodes, but Angora is still inside and is presumed dead. Despite the death of the supplier, John knows that there will still be Toastmasters may resurface on day.

 

The Return of Superman

 

After Coast City is destroyed, he investigates the destruction personally and runs into Cyborg Superman. He tells John that Eradicator was responsible, but Steel does not fully trust his account. After running into Lois Lane, also suspicious of the story, the notice a disturbance near the harbor, meeting Luthor and Supergirl on the scene. As Steel attacks the suit, Superboy arrives to to warn everyone that Cyborg Superman was truly responsible for the events in Coast City, and that he's coming for Metropolis next. At that moment, the real Superman comes from inside of the warsuit. Despite being powerless, he vows to stop Cyborg Superman's plans.

 

No one present, including John, believes he is the real Superman, but he nonetheless goes to the ruins of Coast City with Superman and Superboy. Once there, the group sees Engine City where Coast City used to be and manage to force their way inside, but Superboy leaves to stop a missile fired at Metropolis. Once inside, Supergirl appears, having been secretly tailing them at Superman's suggestion. While talking, Superman abbreviates his title from Man of Steel to simply Steel. The three encounter Mongul, who had just activated the jets inside the city in a bid to knock the Earth out of orbit.

 

While Superman and Supergirl fend off Mongul, Steel heads off to shut down the reactors powering the jets. Once there, Cyborg Superman uses his connection to the machinery to control and morph the room to stop him. Eventually, he takes over his armor, but before he can kill him, John flies the armor into the gear system, jamming it with his armor and disabling the jets.

 

Though John survives with minimal injuries, his armor is destroyed, leaving him defenseless when Cyborg Superman uses the landscape to try to kill him again. This time, Superboy arrives just in time to save him.After Superman regains his powers and defeats his Cyborg counterpart, everyone returns to Metropolis. With no armor, he continues trying to get toastmasters off the street with little success. After a talk with Superman, Steel decides to leave Metropolis and retire as Steel.

 

Steel: Returning Home

 

After his adventures in Metropolis, Steel decides to return to his hometown: Washington D.C. Having originally stayed away to avoid being pursued by his old bosses at Amertek, he decides to take the chance that they have lost interest in him and move back in with his family. Present to greet him at the bus station is his niece Natasha, who greets him by her childhood nickname "Uncle Hunk." While the two talk, a fight breaks out between the Central Avenue Sharks, who are using Toastmasters, and the East Streeters who rely on the strength enhancing drug Tar.

 

Though John tries to intervene, he is distracted by the sight of his nephew Jehmal in the fray, giving a Tar-Freak an opening to knock him out. When he recovers, he and Natasha head home, where John is greeted by the rest of the family; his grandparents Butter and Bess, his sister-in-law Blondell, her second son Paco, and her foster kids Tyke and Darlene.

 

While the Irons family is having dinner Jehmal arrives home late. John, remembering what happened that afternoon, asks Bess how he has been, but while they talk, and group of armored thugs working for Amertek appear and attack the family. John manages to take them out, but Butter takes a stray shot. Feeling guilty about bringing danger to his family, John uses his old armor and parts he salvaged from the thugs' armor to improve the suit and become Steel once again. Knowing that his mission would require him to operate outside the law, John keeps the "S" shield off his new armor to avoid dishonoring Superman.

 

Steel begins balancing investigating Amertek with stopping the constant gang skirmishes plaguing the neighborhood. During on fight, Steel sees Jehmal fighting, confirming his suspicions that he was in a gang. In response, he forces him to tell the rest of the family about it and quit the gang (he actually did not quit). Steel then finds the location of the place where the Toastmasters are sold by a member named Spiral. Steel interrupts the sale and manages to get a lead on the source of the weapons.

 

However, Spiral, afraid of being considered as a snitch, tricks the gang leader Cowboy into thinking Jehmal sold them out to Steel. The group then captures Jehmal and turns him over to the supplier of the weapons, Amalgam. Before Jehmal is killed, Steel arrives, having tracked Spiral again. As he battles Amalgam, Steel tells Amalgam that Jehmal was innocent. Steel manages to pin Amalgam down, but he assumes Spiral was his informant and kills him. Once the police arrive, Steel leaves, but thanks to something Amalgam said, John gets the idea to use the media to fight Amertek.

 

Later, John confront his former boss, Col. Weston about dealing the Toastmasters, but he feigns innocence, and john trusts him enough to leave. After breaking into Amertek to find incriminating evidence, a fight involving armored guards lead to the building being destroyed, but he manages to escape with a CD-ROM with the evidence he needed to take down Amertek. Weston uses the incident to paint Steel as a criminal in the eyes of the public. To further add to his troubles, he begins orchestrating on John directly and members of his family.

 

In a short period, John is attacked by a Tar-Freak at a funeral, Tyke loses the use of his legs after he and Jehmal are caught in a drive-by shooting, Natasha is hit by a car, and Blondell is mugged. Realizing he can't beat Amertek alone, he enlists Detective Shauna Beryl to use the a hard disk full of evidence he broke into Amertek for to take down Amertek. While she gets the information decrypted, John learns that Jehmal found out his gang was responsible for hurting his family. Seeking revenge, Jehmal steals a more powerful, potentially lethal version of Tar and uses it to confront Cowboy. Steel findd them and pins Jehmal down until the S-Tar wears off.

 

Worlds Collide

 

After getting Jehmal to the hospital, he then goes to Amertek intent on taking down Weston. The armored guards aren't enough to stop Steel from getting to Weston. He considers killing him, but Detective Beryl arrives to arrest him, and talks Steel down. John forces Weston to tell him who has Amertek selling weapons to gangs. Weston tells about a group in Metropolis led by a man named Hazard, before John hands him over to the police. He then heads to Metropolis to track down Black Ops.

 

When he arrives he find the city is still recovering from recent events. While searching for Amertek, he encounters Superboy, Rocket and Hardware, the latter two having been transported from their universe into the DC Universe. Steel put his search for Black Ops on hold to help stop their two universes from merging together.

 

War with Black Ops

 

When John continues investigating Black Ops, Hazards begins sending his team to attack Steel and further his agenda in Washington. Along the way, he deals with a super-powered serial killer and helps Maxima avoid being captured by an alien warlord. At the same time, his armor begins mysteriously teleporting on and off his body seemingly at random. His fight with Black Ops is interrupted again by the return of White Rabbit, who survived her last encounter with Steel and now plans to brainwash several Congressmen to help her monopolize gun sales in the country.

 

She sends one of her super-powered thugs to distract Steel and a visiting Superman while her plan came into fruition. However, Natasha was interning for a Congresswoman who was brainwashed, and tipped Steel off that something was wrong. While investigating, he met and befriended actor/British spy Double, and the two team up to stop Angora. While they shut down her plan and capture her crew, Angora herself escapes.

 

When he returns from fighting White rabbit, he finds out that Tyke has been kidnapped. He begins searching for him to no avail. At the same time, a hi-tech bounty hunter begins targeting Steel, and he finds out that someone is offering a money reward for his armor. He then gets a lead from Detective Beryl that leads him to a child-experimentation operation.

 

When Steel goes to shut the operation, the bounty hunter from before arrives for another round. After John shows him that his employer is exploiting children, he decides to help Steel free them instead of continue fighting, and tells Steel that Hazard was the one who put up the bounty and that he knows where Hazard's base is.

 

The two head out to take down Black Ops. They storm the base and take down most of the team, but Hazard and Split escape. However, he finds Tyke inside, but it turns out Tyke went with Hazard willingly because he had promised Tyke the use of his legs again. Though he is returned home safely, he now harbors a deep hatred for his uncle.

 

Underworld Unleashed

 

A few days after Tyke is returned home, Steel is helping contain a protest that evolved into a riot when a bomb goes off at a nearby mosque. While rescuing people trapped inside the building, he is attacked from behind. He turn around to find Metallo was the culprit. Remembering Metallo's weakness from his time in Metropolis, Steel manages to knock Metallo's head off.

 

However, when Neron was supercharging the powers of supervillians around the world, he gave Metallo the power to survive having his head knocked off and control any nearby metal to create a new body, which he does. Steel tries again, knocking his head into the Potomac. With no metal nearby, Steel is satisfied and returns to helping people in the mosque. However, the junk at the bottom of the river and a nearby patrol cruiser provide enough metal to create a bigger and better body. He then tries to absorb Steel's armor,but he can't.

 

The distraction gives Steel an opening to knock Metallo's head off again, and it conveniently lands at the feet of Lieutenant (formerly detective) Beryl. She then warns Steel about another bomb threat at a local hospital. Steel instructs her to take Metallo's head to S.T.A.R. Labs and races to find the bomb. After capturing the thugs who planted the bomb, they reveal that it is wired to blow if it is tampered with. With less than a minute on the timer, Steel flies as fast as he can to get the bomb to a less populated area.

 

On the way, he is stopped by Metallo, who managed to reform himself before he could be taken to Star. Steel tries to keep moving, but Metallo equipped himself with rockets, allowing him to follow. With no time to move the bomb, John tosses the bomb at Metallo, but he absorbs it instead. However, while the bomb casing was metal, the explosive was actually plastique, which he couldn't absorb. The bomb then goes off, destroying Metallo entirely. Steel survives the blast, but he passes out in midair.

 

The Superman Rescue

 

Before Steel can fall, Alpha Centurion catches him. He tells Steel that Superman has been kidnapped and he is assembling a rescue team to find him before the world realizes he is missing. Steel agrees to help, but wants to get this done as soon as possible before Washington falls apart.

 

Steel joins Supergirl, Superboy and the Eradicator on the Centurion's ship and head out into space. Superboy tells the others he does not trust the Centurion. These fears are realized when the Centurion abandons the rest to battle an alien platoon on an asteroid. Out-manned and stranded, Steel manages create a makeshift transport. Arriving on a nearby planet, the team is confronted by the Cyborg Superman, who takes them all down. He turns them over as prisoner of the Tribunal he is allied with.

 

While in custody, Steel discovers the Alpha Centurion is also a prisoner. Steel manages to teleport his armor to him an escape along with Supergirl and Eradicator. While Steel and Supergirl, both in disguise, go to a local bar to try and find information, Eradicator stays behind to try and rescue Superboy. Unfortunately, Steel and Supergirl are discovered and a bar fight breaks out. It ends quickly when the Cyborg turns up and recaptures them. For escaping, they are both sentenced to death.

 

Fortunately, the group is taken the same place as Superman. Together they manage to escape and rally behind Superman. Thanks to the Cyborg turning on the Tribunal. Superman leads them to confront the Tribunal itself, which ultimately decides to drop the charges against them rather than keep fighting. The group then returns to Earth.

 

On the way back, Superman thanks Steel for going so far for his sake, John believes that they did little to help, while he saved them and an entire planet. Superman disagrees, and asks him to hang out with him when they reach Metropolis home. Though grateful, John declines in order to get home in time for thanksgiving.

 

Ending Black Ops

 

When John returns from space, he parts ways with the squad and return to Washington. However, Tyke, still bitter over having been denied a chance to walk again, was searching for a way for it to be so. Thinking he had found an operation that could restore his legs in a local tabloid, Tyke sought a way to pay for such an operation. When he learned that federal agents were offering a reward for information on Steel's secret identity, Tyke tracked them down and told that Steel was John Henry Irons.

 

However, they only gave him a measly $20 for the information, meaning he sold out his uncle for nothing. Also, the agents were working with Hazard, meaning his enemy now know who he is. In response, Hazard sics a cyborg named Hardwire (who, ironically, was transformed by the same process Tyke thought would cure his paralysis) on Steel. When he gets there, he guns down the Irons family as they sit down for dinner. No one is killed, but a seriously wounded John is captured..

 

Hardwire takes John to the agents, but before they can take him, Hardwire turns on them. He grabs them all and flies them to the Washington Monument and blows the top off. When John recovers, his armor appears around him and the two fight. During the fight, Hardwire attaches explosives on himself, Steel, and the two agents, planning to kill himself and them. As they fight, the two agents are killed before the countdown even finishes. Unable to get Hardwire to disarm the devices, Steel teleports his armor off to save his life, so the bombs only kill Hardwire. When the police and the media arrive, John had no choice but to reveal his secret identity to the public.

 

After his declaration, John is blamed by the police for the destruction of the Monument and is arrested. However, Hazard sends Split to bring John to Hazard's base. Angered at all Hazard has done, he rushes him, but is suspended in the air by his telekinesis. When he asks him why he broke him out of holding, he responds that he is using the "breakout" to distract everyone with a manhunt and masks his agenda. That said, he prepares to kill John.

 

In a desperate gambit, John tries to summon his armor. He succeeds and fights off the Black Ops members. They reach a standstill when Steel takes Shellshock's twin sister Shellgame hostage. He manages to get her to reveal Hazard's plan; he is hacking into the Pentagon's computers to gain control of America's nuclear arsenal. Once he learns the truth, Hazard nearly kills him with his telekinesis, but Steel manages to teleport himself away along with his armor.

 

Steel reappears in the "White Zone" his armor goes to when it teleports. However, both he cannot remain there with his armor on, so he teleports back to Washington. However, he winds up in the air with a military chopper that immediately attacks him. As he recovers, Black Ops teleports in to renew their attack, and Steel retreats with the intent to expose Hazard's plan. Steel fends them off, but realizes he still needs to warn someone about Hazard's plan.

 

He then teleports back to the White Zone to come up with a new plan. When he does, he teleports to his old laboratory to find something he hid there long ago, hoping never to use it but keeping it just in case. The object he finds is the Annihilator, the most powerful weapon he ever designed. Deciding to wait before using it, he begins his plan to stop Hazard.

 

First, he posts the details of Hazard's plan on the internet, knowing the government would have to investigate. Shortly after, part of the Black Ops team arrives to fight at the same time the FBI arrives to arrest Steel. While Black Ops defeats the agents, Steel flies off again, but they quickly catch up again. They quickly overpower him. The tides tun when Natasha, haven ingested a vial of Tar, helps him out.

 

Together they fend Black Ops off, but the military arrives to stop them all. Black Ops teleports away, but the grab Natasha and offer her safety for his surrender. Unable to see a better option, Steel takes the Annihilator from it's hiding place and arms it, ready to take the fight to Hazard. After a quick test, he teleports to Black Ops base, ready to take them all down.

 

He gives the team one chance to free Natasha, but they refuse. He then begins fighting them, but avoids firing the Annihilator. The chaos gives Natasha time to free herself and the two fight Black Ops together. When the are cornered, Steel tries to teleport them both out, but he cannot teleport others with him.

 

Backed into a corner again, Steel begins using the Annihilator to destroy Hazard's computers, stopping him from hacking into the Pentagon. Hazard tries to immobilize him, but Steel keeps firing into the base, so Hazard has Split teleport them back outside. The fight continues, but Hazard pulls his team back after Steel accidentally hit three of his people with the Annihilator. The two go at it, but when the military intervenes, Steel uses the opening to defeat Hazard.

 

Once Hazard is detained, Steel learns of the consequences of his actions. While everyone is still alive Child Protective services reclaim Tyke and Darlene feeling that being around Steel is too dangerous. Later, John meets with the government, who claim that Hazard will be dealt with. However he was secretly allowed to go free and granted custody of Tyke. In order to keep the Annhilator out of the wrong hands, he leaves it in Hazard's base and triggers it's self-destruct.

 

Leaving D.C.

 

Now that Steel's identity is out, his family has no peace. They are harassed by neighbors and mobs of people, who feel he is too dangerous to have near their homes. Later, Natasha is kidnapped by Plasmus, who is trying to blackmail Steel into creating a suit for himself. Steel rescues her by building a suit with a trap for Plasmus inside.

 

Though Natasha is safe, John is still worried that he is endangering his family. Steel moves out (temporarily staying with his friend Dr. Amanda Quick) but the family is still harassed. His family is attacked by both Doctor Polaris and the Parasite, both arriving seeking the Annihilator. John Henry's beloved grandmother Bess is killed in the fight when she tries to attack Parasite. Deciding it is too dangerous for his family, he enlists Double to move them somewhere secret.

 

After teleporting into White Zone, he sees a nightmarish looking version of his armor. He quickly teleports again, ending up at Hazard's old lair. He discovers the three Black Ops member he killed were actually still alive. They corner him, as he teleported without his armor, but the armor has followed him to the lair.

 

John Henry works with the other three to try and fight off the armor. They try to flee, but the armor keeps finding them. Natasha, having run away to avoid being relocated, took some Tar and followed him there and tries to help. John Henry realizes that the armor is his dark side given form. Realizing this, Steel banishes the armor to the White Zone, seemingly for good. Later, John realizes Natasha is handling Bess's death poorly.

 

She spends several nights sleeping at the cemetery and then attacks John in a Tar fueled rage when he confronts here there. A blind gravedigger tells them that Bess's soul is not at rest because someone stole her wedding ring and she wants to be buried with it. Steel manages to track down the thief and the recover wedding ring. To return it, John and Natasha exhume Bess's body is exhumed and rebury her with the ring, letting her soul rest. John Henry and Natasha fix up their old home before leaving it and D.C. behind.

 

The Death of Steel

 

Irons suffered mortal wounds after releasing Doomsday from the JLA Watchtower to battle Imperiex. Superman was unable to turn away the Black Racer, a being that gathers souls and ushers them into the afterlife. This time, however, the Black Racer showed mercy and delivered Irons to Apokolips, where the evil Darkseid healed Iron's body. Darkseid placed Irons in the Entropy Aegis, a burned out Imperiex-probe altered by Apokoliptan science. This new armor was far superior to his old, but the upgrades made it more of a curse than a blessing. Darkseid was able to use the Entropy Aegis to control Steel and make him serve Apokolips.

 

Superman gathered the members of Team Superman and challenged Darkseid on the field of battle for the return of Steel. After his defeat Darkseid removed Steel from the armor only to reveal that he was returning him as he found him in a state of near death. Natasha Irons and a Multiverse displaced Supergirl were able to act quickly and save his life. Upon his return to Earth John allowed his niece, Natasha to take up the mantle of Steel while he recovered.

 

52 Weeks

 

During the year where Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman disappear, Steel was the active hero of Metropolis. Using a new armor he had to deal with his rebellious niece, Natasha, who wants to be a superhero, the mystery of Supernova, and Lex Luthor's Everyman Project. When Natasha tries to join the Teen Titans, he stops her by destroying her armor, and tells her to build her own armor if she wants it badly enough. As part of Luthor's conspiracy, John Henry was unknowingly given new powers: a steel coated skin than he could heat at will.

 

When Natasha found out, she was upset as he forbade her from participating. In response, she joins anyway and earns a spot on Lex's Infinity Inc. team. When Steel comes to get Natasha away from Lex, she attacks him and drives him away. However, when Natasha catches onto Luthor's plans, she tries relaying her findings but is caught. When John comes to help her, he finds Natasha's teammates opposing him. He easily tears through them, but the Teen Titans arrive to back him up.

 

Steel dispatches Everyman at the cost of his armor, but he reaches Luthor. However, that Luthor used the meta-gene therapy to give him powers like those of Superman. Steel fights him anyway but is overpowered. Thanks to Luthor being overwhelmed by his super-senses and Natasha finding a way to disable his powers, Steel comes out on top. Before he knocks him out, Steel reveals that the meta-gene therapy was toxic to the human body, and he would have died in six months if they hadn't intervened.

 

Infinity Inc.

 

Several months after the Everyman Project was shut down, John realized something was wrong with Natasha. Despite going to therapy to help with her state of mind, Natasha did not get better. When Natasha refused to continue therapy, he tried to talk to her about it. When he touched her though, Natasha turned into a cloud of mist that dissipated. Distraught, he asked Superman to search for her to no avail. After checking with other former Everyman project members Gerome and Erik, he is attacked by Kid Empty, another Everyman participant who feeds on the minds of others.

 

Before he can kill him, Natasha regains her solid form and drives him away. John realizes that everyone involved in the project is gaining new powers and deduces that their powers reflect their mental state, with Natasha's power reflecting her fear of abandonment. At the same time, Mercy Graves, trying to avoid being found by Luthor, who is in hiding after the Everyman Project fell apart, asks to run with him to avoid being caught. Skeptical that she has changed, he gives her a chance to prove herself.

 

After Jerome, Erik, and Natasha use their new powers to take down an Kid Empty, John decides to have them and their new friend Lucia reform Infinity Inc. to help them round up the the participants who gain new powers and show the world that the Everyman members are not all dangerous. While the team was in the field, John remained in touch with them from Steelworks to lend support.

 

After a few missions Steel answers a call from Superman who found a gruesome body of an Everyman teen in the Arctic. Eventually he and the team realizes that someone is capturing, experimenting on, and killing Everyman participants. When the teams gets a lead on the killer's location, Natasha opts not to tell Steel. Leaving alone, Natasha sent a voicemail telling John what they were up to. Rushing after them, Steel and Superman arrive to find a crater where the building the killer was hiding in used to be. Supermans asks if Steel is okay, and responds that he vows to find Natasha and the team again.

 

Reign of Doomsday

 

Steel resurfaces for a fight with Doomsday. With no other heroes around, Steel is left to fight Doomsday by himself. Natasha Irons tries to persuade her uncle not to fight Doomsday, but John insist and heads off into battle. John gave the fight all he had. John even managed to hit Doomsday with a direct hit from his hammer. Steel had hurled his hammer from a thousand feet away.

 

During the fight Doomsday evolves growing armor out his body and also possess the ability to fly. John manages to break away a piece of Doomsday's chest armor which allowed John to introduce nanonytes into Doomsday's body. The nanonytes were suppose to paralyze Doomsday for an hour until help arrived, but the effects only lasted a few seconds. John then gets pounded by Doomsday until he is knocked unconscious. We last see John being carried off by a flying Doomsday.

 

New 52

 

John Henry Irons debuted as a scientist working for Gen. Sam Lane for Metal-0 Project, an initiative to develop an armored super-soldier designed to stop the recently debuted Superman. But he quit when he saw how Luthor tortured the captured Superman, under Lane's license.

 

When Brainiac, calling himself the Collecter of Worlds, attacked Metropolis and take control of John Corben, Irons donned a Metal-0 suit prototype and stopped the controlled soldier with a PC virus of his own design.

 

Steel has been seen within the pages of Action Comics, during a back up storyline. In this story, Steel helps Superman to fight crime. Steel was then seen in Action Comics Annual helping Superman fend off the villain called Kryptonite Man. Steel defeats the villain and managed to make his powers defunct. He is later was seen in Australia, helping the poor and searching new ways to use his technologies in less aggressive scenarios.

 

He has joined The Reverse Suicide Squad with Power Girl, Unknown Soldier, and Warrant. The Thinker under the guise of Amanda Waller is leading them.

 

After Forever Evil, Steel joined the forces than were fighting against Doomsday, but he was affected by the toxic emanations from the monster. To stop the damage and prevent more infection, Steel added to his armor a film of liquid metal. He would join to Lana Lang in a search for Doomsday possessed Superman in space to help him but they discovered than in Superman absence, Brainiac attacked the earth again.

 

Currently he is in a relationship with Superwoman aka Lana Lang.

 

DC: Rebirth

 

As things begin to change in the DC Universe, Steel began a new initiative in Metropolis. Having started up Steelworks with Natasha and letting Lana move in with him while she starts a new job in Metropolis while operating as Steel. Using new armors, he fights alongside Natasha and Lana, now operating as Superwoman. When Ultrawoman takes over the city in a bid to steal Superwoman's powers, Steel helps lead and coordinate the efforts take the city back and defend the people from her army of female Bizarro clones.

 

Once Ultrawoman is defeated, John Henry has to help Lana, whose powers have begun killing her. Desperate to save his girlfriend, he enlists Superman's help, and he stays with her while she recovers. When she does, they discover that Lana has lost all of her powers. John tries to support her while she copes, but she pushes him away instead, though they later reconcile.

 

John Henry and Natasha then give Lana a power suit to help her continue as Superwoman. However, they discover that the last time Lana donned it, the suit was able to permanently copy her now lost powers. With Lana's problem resolved, the three return to fighting crime and rounding up the escaped metahuman prisoners.

 

Powers and Abilities

 

John Henry Irons possess no superhuman powers. He is an exceptionally gifted intellect that specializes in various fields of engineering. A genius of the highest order, he built a bullet proof suit of armor whose computerized pneumatic exoskeletal joints gave him superhuman strength.

 

In specific situations Steel had temporarily developed superpowers:

 

Teleportation: When under unexplained circumstances he was able to transport himself to a "white void zone".

 

Organic steel skin: During 52 Steel was injected with the formula of the Everyman Project by Lex Luthor and developed an invulnerable organic steel skin than he could super heat at will and throw as a projectile.

 

Weapons and Equipment - Armors

 

Steel had used different armors since his first appearance:

 

Man of Steel armor: Homemade armor created in homage to Superman.

 

Shieldless armor: Used after the return of Superman and from the time Steel fought against Hazard and AmerTek.

 

JLA armor: From the time he joined the JLA, and used a similar yet different "S" shield.

Faceless armor: Similar to the previous one, but with a faceless helmet instead his steal coated face.

 

Entropy Aegis armor: Forged in Apokolips, was instrumental to bring him back to life. However it was feeding of his soul, so he had to quit using it.

 

52 armor: Using after Infinity Crisis and during the year of absent of Superman, he used again the El house crest as his own symbol.

 

Metal-0 Prototype armor: In the New 52 continuity, this was his first armor. He used it to fight Metallo and the Kyptonite Man.

 

Shield Armor: Using against the Suicide Squad and Doomsday. He would later add a film of liquid steel.

 

Armor Systems

 

Helmet systems include broadband communications array, VDU readouts for environmental controls, and retractable one-way visor.

 

Life-support systems which recycle oxygen supply, remove waste, and convert perspiration to potable water.

 

Independent heating and freon-compressed air-conditioning units regulate internal temperatures.

 

Hydraulic servomotors along his exoskeletal joints increase strength and speed tenfold

 

Air-cooled cannons in his forearms gauntlet fire metal spikes and rubber projectiles. They function as the launching platform for concussive sonic grenades.

 

Segmented breakaway boots that can be jettisoned if necessary.

 

Micro-jet engine compressors controlled by Pressure sensitive toggles in his gloves.

 

Thrusters proved a wide range of airborne manoeuvrability.

 

Armor is composed of breathable fire-retardant nomex fabric.

 

Embedded solar cells help keep his armor fully charged.

 

His suit is made of a composite high-tensile steel alloy treated with micron-thick reflective sealant to shield against microwave and subatomic particle radiation.

 

Trivia : According to JLA 1000000, his Armor is going to last all the way to the 118th Century and be worn by Steel 7 in the 51st Century, Steelman of New Centurions in the 100th Century and Lancelot Grail, the Cosmic Knight in 118th Century

 

Hammer Abilities

 

Remote-controlled

 

Can alter trajectory or stop mid-throw

 

Polarizing inertial dampers within hammer increase inertia relative to distance hurled

 

Magnetically attaches to back of armor.

 

Segmented handle telescopes into locked position.

 

⚡ Happy 🎯 Heroclix 💫 Friday! 👽

_____________________________

 

A year of the shows and performers of the Bijou Planks Theater.

 

Secret Identity: Dr. John Henry Irons II

 

Publisher: DC

 

First appearance: The Adventures of Superman #500 (June 1993)

 

Created by: Louise Simonson (Writer)

Jon Bogdanove (Artist)

 

First appearance cover:

www.flickr.com/photos/paprihaven/51737806513/

 

This is Steel's first appearance, but his namesake, John Henry, appeared in BP 2019 Day 270!

www.flickr.com/photos/paprihaven/48803869831/

醫學跳躍性的進步

EMI CT brain scanner, installed at Atkinson Morley's Hospital, Wimbledon in 1971 (the first used clinically), by EMI, Hayes, Middlesex, 1970-1971.

1978年榮總長庚先後引進腦部電腦斷層，從診斷到治療，利用電腦運算回推影像形成或是算出三度空間每一小立方體所得放射劑量，

這都是在我學校時期聞所未聞，而在當住院醫師時趕上第一代腦斷層攝影。

做出這張來紀念。 (Sereotactic body radiotherapy, SBRT）

Saudi Arabia was interested in acquiring the F-15E for its air force, but the aircraft was deemed too sensitive for export. As an alternative, Saudi Arabia requested the delivery of 24 F-15Fs, which were similar to the F-15E but without the second crew member and without some of the more advanced avionics deemed too sensitive for export. However, in 1993, the Royal Saudi Air Force was given permission to purchase 72 slightly downgraded versions of the F-15E Strike Eagle, initially designated F-15XP but now known as F-15S. The F-15S has an APG-70S radar that is "detuned" from the capabilities of the APG-63 of the F-15C/D and does not have the ability to do computerized ground mapping. It has only 60 percent of the bandwidth of the APG-63 and is limited to only 16 rather than 32 channels. The AWG-27 programmable armament control set was reprogrammed to prevent the carriage of certain weapons systems, and the hands-off automatic terrain following mode was deleted from the ASW-51 autopilot. A ring laser gyro INS was provided, but the military-grade GPS system was eliminated, although the Saudis have added a commercial-grade GPS system.

 

Some sensitive ECM systems are replaced with older equipment or are deleted altogether. The nuclear weapon wiring fitted to USAF F-15Es was deleted. Some initial reports indicated that the F-15S would not be provided with the ability to carry conformal fuel tanks and their associated weapons pylons, but this turned out not to be the case. Saudi Arabia received 48 downgraded versions of the Martin Marietta LANTIRN system known as AAQ-19 Sharpshooter, as well as the AAQ-20 Pathfinder, which is a simplified version of the AAQ-13 Nav-Pod. The AAQ-20 is not compatible with the AGM-65 Maverick air-to-ground missile and has some air-to-air features deleted.

 

In this image, an F-15S (F-15S-59-MC, serial number 93-0913 reserialed to 9225) from the 6 Squadron, Wing 5 stationed at King Khalid AB near Khamis Mushait flies over the western Arabian desert. A total of 72 were placed on order under Peace Sun IX. The first example took off on its maiden flight on 19 June 1995. Production was planned at a rate of one per month, with the 72nd and last F-15S being delivered in 1999. A new variant, the F-15SA (Saudi Advanced), is under development and will have a new fly-by-wire flight control system and the APG-63(v)3 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, digital electronic warfare systems (DEWS), and infrared search and track (IRST) systems. It will also have a redesigned cockpit, once intended for the F-15SE Silent Eagle.

Credit to VoodoKR for the technique behind making the wheels.

 

In 1999, Kongo Firearms Incorporated developed the Third-track Artillery Vehicle, a modular unit capable of carrying a wide variety of weapon loadouts, although it was designed specifically to carry artillery onto the battlefield.

The TAV is moderately armored, although it is mine-proof, and is also kitted out with KFI's Armored Vehicle Protection System, which fires a variety of smoke grenades and infra red screening rounds, as well as anti-personnel grenades.

Any artillery that the TAV happens to be carrying can be connected to the onboard computer, which requires only a single operator. For this reason, the minimum crew is 2; one driver and one artillery operator. However, the TAV can seat up to four, which allows for communications specialists, officers, and mechanics to also be present when and if the need arises.

The model shown here is fitted with the Python Multiple Launching Rocket System, which shoots up to 40 rockets at a time from the multiple barreled pod. Because of the computerized auto-loader, it has a relatively fast rate of fire, up to 2 rounds/second, and has a maximum range of 45 km. There is a wide variety of warheads available that can be mounted on the rockets, including but not limited to: incendiary, high explosive, submunition anti-personnel, biochemical, and vision-obscuring.

Ford Escort (MkIII) RS1600i (1984-90) Engine 1597 cc S4 OC 115PS

 

Registration Number YWX 88- - (last 2 digits unclear)

FORD EUROPE ALBUM

 

www.flickr.com/photos/45676495@N05/sets/72157623665118181...

 

The Mark III Escort was developed under the code name Erika, and launched in 1980, unlike the Mark II the new car was more than a reskin of the previous generation Escort. The Mark III was a departure from the two previous models, the biggest changes being the adoption of front-wheel drive, and the new hatchback body. The car used Ford's contemporary design language of the period with the black louvred radiator grille and straked rear lamp clusters, as well as introducing the aerodynamic bustle-back; bootlid stump. Sales in the United Kingdom increased, and by 1982 it had overtaken the ageing Cortina as the nation's best-selling car, beginning an eight-year run as Britain's best selling car.

 

New were the overhead camshaft CVH engines in 1.3 L and 1.6 L formats, with the older Ford Kent-based Valencia engine from the Fiesta powering the 1.1 L. From launch, the car was available in base (Popular), L, GL, Ghia and XR3 trim.

 

A convertible version, made by coachbuilder Karmann, appeared the same year as the five-door estate (1983). It was the first drop-top car produced by Ford Europe since the Corsair of the 1960s. The Escort Cabriolet was initially available in both XR3i and Ghia specification, but the Ghia variant was later dropped.

 

To compete with Volkswagen's Golf GTI, a hot hatch version of the Mark III was developed – the XR3. Initially this featured a tuned version of the 1.6 L CVH engine of 96bhp

fitted with a twin-choke Weber carburettor, uprated suspension and numerous cosmetic alterations.

 

The car lacked the five speed transmission and fuel injection of its Volkswagen rival a situation addressed in October 1982 for the 1983 model year with the arrival of the XR3i with 105bhp eight months behind the limited edition (8,659 examples), racetrack-influenced RS 1600i. The Cologne-developed RS received a more powerful engine with 115 PS (85 kW), thanks to computerized ignition and a modified head as well as the fuel injection

 

Diolch am 83,664,099 o olygfeydd anhygoel, mae pob un yn 90cael ei werthfawrogi'n fawr.

 

Thanks for 83,664,099 amazing views, every one is greatly appreciated.

 

Shot 25.07.2021 at Beaumanor Hall, Woodhouse, Leic. 148-079

 

This is not a real battle, you can see this on the uniforms yellow-blue instead of the full-colored suits worn by Federation troops...

 

This is a fully digitalized process of sorting out good shooters from bad ones...

 

...digital cheating is often discovered but is often not a problem since when the actually enlist and show up in person it will be revealed quite fast who hasn´t got the real skill...

 

Skeletons are by far the most popular training program opponent to the aspiring troopers, that is because it is really cool to see the simulated skeleton´s bones splinter in all directions when hit...

  

Three Lockheed Martin F-35A-2B "Lightning II" "Joint Strike Fighter's", from the 63rd Fighter Squadron, and a General Dynamics (its aviation unit now part of Lockheed Martin) General Dynamics F-16 "Fighting Falcon", from the 309th Fighter Squadron, fly in formation alongside a Boeing KC-135 "Stratotanker", from the 161st Air Refueling Wing, during a refueling mission near Phoenix Aug. 27, 2019. Six F-35s from the 63rd FS competed in Exercise Panther Beast where the pilots tested their munition dropping accuracy.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

 

Improvements

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

 

Costs

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

Maker:

Born: USA

Active: USA

Medium: color dye transfer print

Size: 6.5" x 10 in

Location: USA

 

Object No. 2016.633

Shelf: A-6

 

Publication:

 

Other Collections: Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division

 

Notes: Kodak was experimenting with the final formulation of its new Kodachrome film in the late 1930’s and decided to give some unknown number of rolls of 35mm Kodachrome film to the photographers of the FSA project to use as a pilot program. The FSA photographic project itself was historic employing some of the photographers who would become some of the most famous photographers of their generation including Walker Evans, Marion Post Wolcott, Arthur Rosenstein, Dorothea Lange, Jack Delano, Russell Lee, John Vachon and others. In an article about the photography produced by the FSA photographers Fortune Ryan and Penelope Dixon said, “The result of Stryker’s project (the FSA photography) was the radical enlargement of Americans’ capacity to to conceive redeeming images of minorities and victims of plight in general, and the elevation, at least temporarily, of photo-journalism to an aesthetic plateau equal to any previously achieved by art photography.”

 

The original transparency was lent to the Light Gallery in the 1980’s by the Library Of Congress in order to make a definitive print record of the image by the dye transfer method because of its archival and longevity characteristics and its ability to accurately reproduce the full range of the transparency. In this case the original was quite dark and had suffered color shifts which were brought to a visually acceptable balance by adjusting the color separation negs. The Light Gallery had proposed to make 250 copies each of about 60 different Kodachromes from the FSA files but the project was abandoned far short of its completion. At the best some images may have had as many as 35 copies made but others may have had as few as 10. The dye transfer printing method was also a Kodak product that was introduced in the mid 30’s to reproduce color transparencies of the Ektacolor and later the Kodachrome type. The method involved the making of enlarged color separation negatives on black and white film through a red, a green, and a blue filter which were in turn used to make relief positives on a gelatin matrix film at the size of the print which were put in colored dye baths of cyan(red filter negative), magenta(green filter negative) and yellow(blue filter negative) and finally transferred in register onto a prepared piece of photographic paper which itself had no chemistry incorporated into it(enhancing its archivality). The dyes were very stable and very bright which enabled the dye transfers to have a larger color gamut than any other color photographic printing method and longevity of up to 150 years with good handling. Kodak discontinued the manufacture of the dye transfer materials in the late 1980’s with the introduction of computerized retouching since the largest audience for the prints had been advertising agencies and publications which used the pictures to retouch and refine photos of products and portraits.

 

To view our archive organized by Collections, visit: OUR COLLECTIONS

 

For information about reproducing this image, visit: THE HISTORY OF PHOTOGRAPHY ARCHIVE

 

At the eastern end of the Garden of Champ de Mars, in front of the Ecole Militare, is the Monument to Peace, constructed in 2000. The word "peace" is written in 32 languages on 32 columns. A computerized keyboard inside the monument allows visitors to leave their personal message of peace

 

PLEASE view on black. Press L or click image.

Three Lockheed Martin F-35A Lighting II "Joint Strike Fighter's", assigned to the 63rd Fighter Squadron at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., fly in formation during a refueling mission Aug. 27, 2019, near Phoenix. A Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker, assigned to the Arizona Air National Guard, 161st Fueling Wing, refueled six F-35s. During a refueling mission, the boom operator extends the boom to make contact with the aircraft and once in contact, fuel is pumped through the boom to the aircraft.

  

LUKE AIR FORCE BASE, Ariz. --

From start to finish, many Airmen contribute to the success of an F-35A Lightning II strike mission.

 

Mission success depends on a smooth transition from every required task from building bombs to maintaining the jets to flying them. For a strike mission, the whole process starts with building the munitions.

 

“There’s a lot of prep work that goes into building a munition,” said Staff Sgt. Noah Dankocsik, 56th Equipment Maintenance Squadron conventional maintenance crew chief. “It requires reading through multiple steps in our technical data to properly putting it together. To build munitions, you have to put on tails and noses, and you have the bomb body itself to prepare.”

 

Once munitions are built they are put on a trailer and the Airmen from the line delivery section pull the trailers of bombs to the flightline to transfer to the weapons load crews. Weapons then take those bombs and load them onto the jets, Dankocsik said.

 

In addition to having the weapons loaded, F-35s are inspected and prepped for flight.

 

“Our crew chiefs perform Before Operation Servicing (BOS) inspections to ensure aircraft are serviced and ready for flight,” said Master Sgt. Micheal Whitehead, 63rd Aircraft Maintenance Unit (AMU) F-35 lead production superintendent. “Crew chiefs, avionics, weapons, Autonomic Logistics Information System expediters will then review aircraft forms and clear any discrepancies. The production superintendent will perform a forms review and a walk around of the aircraft, (prior to) releasing it for flight.”

 

Recently, all the cohesion and cooperation between these units came together Aug. 27 during the ‘Panther Beast’ 63rd Fighter Squadron competition.

Competing pilots flew 50 miles to acquire and destroy 6 to 12 targets over a 45-minute period in hopes of becoming the winners of ‘Panther Beast’, said Lt. Col. Curtis Dougherty, 63rd Fighter Squadron commander.

 

“After landing, the tape review will reveal the truth, and we’ll celebrate the victors at a fighter squadron and aircraft maintenance unit awards ceremony,” said Dougherty.

 

Airmen from multiple units worked together to build the munitions used, maintain the aircraft and fly the jets. Dougherty said it was their cooperation that made the competition possible.

 

“The work started weeks before weapons hit targets,” he said. “Our AMU has been hard at work loading aircraft with external pylons that we’ve never flown with before at Luke. Ammo has spent countless hours building more weapons than we’ve ever dropped in this squadron’s history. The pilots have spent that time planning: determining which targets and attacks will challenge the squadron’s instructors and ensuring everyone has the knowledge requisite to succeed. On the day of the mission, it all comes together.”

 

While the competition is a special event, maintenance, ammo and pilots work together to perform these tasks frequently. Dougherty said, it’s this synergy that allows our Air Force to be an effective fighting force.

 

“To succeed, we rely on the world’s finest maintenance professionals to care about the small details so that all of the critical aircraft systems work at their peak capability and weapons function the way they were intended,” he added. “We ask our pilots to prepare and brief with diligence to be ready to execute at the highest levels. The team environment and esprit de corps that extends across our aircraft maintenance unit and fighter squadron inspires the finest our Airmen have to offer.”

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

Found at the 1940s Air Terminal Museum, Houston, Texas

 

Per Wikipedia:

 

"Pan American World Airways, commonly known as Pan Am, was the principal and largest international air carrier in the United States from 1927 until its collapse on December 4, 1991. Founded in 1927 as a scheduled air mail and passenger service operating between Key West, Florida, and Havana, Cuba, the airline became a major company credited with many innovations that shaped the international airline industry, including the widespread use of jet aircraft, jumbo jets, and computerized reservation systems. It was also a founding member of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), the global airline industry association."

Lightning Integrated Technician team members taxi-in an Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II "Joint Strike Fighter" (sn 14-5095) (MSN AF-96) June 8, 2018, at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz. With the LIT team, multiple components of an aircraft undergoing maintenance can be worked on simultaneously.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

The body language and pose of this man look like he is just about to give this computerized ticket machine a good talking to. I don't understand the things either... I'd rather talk to a real person.

 

Please view in full size for the best effect.

The Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II "Joint Strike Fighter" sits in a hangar loaded with dummy external munitions, Feb. 13, 2019 at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz. After completing the external pylon installation training, the weapons loading standardization crew, a team of three Airmen, became the first team at Luke to be certified on external GBU-12 bomb and AIM-9 missile loading.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, Nev. - Marines with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 211 'Wake Island Avengers,' 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, tow a Lockheed Martin F-35B "Lightning II" into a hangar for maintenance at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., July 10. A total of 10 aircraft and more than 250 Marines with VMFA 211 will participate in Red Flag 17-3, a realistic combat training exercise hosted by the U.S. Air Force to assess the squadron’s ability to deploy and support contingency operations using the F-35B.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 "Lightning II" is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official "Lightning II" name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it "Panther", instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 "Raptor", intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 "Raptor", drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E "Strike Eagle" in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 "Raptor", and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's "Super Hornet".

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

A Royal Australian Air Force Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II "Joint Strike Fighter" taxis at Luke Air Force Base, Ariz., Dec. 3, 2018. Two F-35s were preparing to take off and fly to Hawaii as part of their multi-day journey to Australia.

 

To RAF as A 36-009

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. David Moore, a Lockheed Martin F-35A "Lightning II" pilot from the 34th Fighter Squadron, climbs out of the cockpit after a flight from Hill Air Force Base, Utah, to Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, Oct. 30, 2017. A dozen F-35As and approximately 300 Airmen are on their way to Kadena Air Base, Japan, deployed under U.S. Pacific Command's (PACOM) Theater Security Package program, which has been in operation since 2004. This marks PACOM’s first operational tasking for the F-35A and builds upon the successful debut of the fifth-generation stealth fighter in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region at the Seoul International Aerospace & Defense Exhibition earlier this month.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 "Lightning II" is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official "Lightning II" name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 "Raptor", intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 "Raptor", drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E "Strike Eagle" in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 "Raptor", and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

 

Improvements

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's "Super Hornet".

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

 

Costs

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

Before computerized simulation, there was Viewmaster, which--along with imagination--educated my generation. Here is a scan from a 1964 Viewmaster description booklet detailing what might happen on the Apollo 11 NASA Mission.

 

Released before the historic moonwalk mission, this imagined flight includes artists' renderings of the space walk.

 

I may have had this reel, although this one isn't mine.

 

I found this, and a reel featuring the actual 1969 spacewalk at "Curiosities," a fabulous treasure trove of antiques, folk art and supplies for the assemblage artist in Dallas, TX.

NELLIS AIR FORCE BASE, Nev. - Marines with Marine Fighter Attack Squadron (VMFA) 211 'Wake Island Avengers,' 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, tow a Lockheed Martin F-35B "Lightning II" into a hangar for maintenance at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., July 10. A total of 10 aircraft and more than 250 Marines with VMFA 211 will participate in Red Flag 17-3, a realistic combat training exercise hosted by the U.S. Air Force to assess the squadron’s ability to deploy and support contingency operations using the F-35B.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 "Lightning II" is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official "Lightning II" name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it "Panther", instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the "Joint Strike Fighter" (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 "Raptor", intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 "Raptor", drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E "Strike Eagle" in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 "Raptor", and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

  

Improvements

 

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms.

 

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes.

 

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's "Super Hornet".

 

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

 

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system.

 

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft.

 

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency.

 

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

  

Costs

 

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Boeing B-29 Superfortress "Enola Gay":

 

Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.

 

On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions.

 

Transferred from the United States Air Force.

 

Manufacturer:

Boeing Aircraft Co.

Martin Co., Omaha, Nebr.

 

Date:

1945

 

Country of Origin:

United States of America

 

Dimensions:

Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)

 

Materials:

Polished overall aluminum finish

 

Physical Description:

Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.

Quoting Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum | Dornier Do 335 A-0 Pfeil (Arrow):

 

The Do-335 was one of a small group of aircraft marking the pinnacle of international piston-engined development. It was the fastest production piston-engined fighter ever built, attaining 846 kilometers per hour (474 mph) in level flight at a time when the official world speed record was 755 kph (469 mph). Powered by two 1800-hp engines in a unique low-drag configuration and weighing 9600 kg (21,000 lb) loaded, it was an exceptional heavy fighter. This very innovative design also featured an ejection seat, for pilot safety, and a jettisoning fin.

 

The unconventional layout of the Do-335 -- one engine "pulling" in the nose and another "pushing" in the tail - was patented by Claudius Dornier in 1937. The configuration provided the power of two engines, but with reduced drag and better maneuverability. The German Aviation Ministry (RLM) was interested in the design, but initially wanted Dornier only to produce bombers. By 1942, Dornier was still continuing design work and the war situation was worsening. The Luftwaffe now needed a multi-purpose fighter, and the prototype Do-335V-1 ("V" indicating "versuchs" or "experimental") flew in fighter form in September, 1943 - six years after its conception. Orders were immediately placed for 14 prototypes, 10 A-0 preproduction aircraft, 11 production A-1 single-seaters, and 3 A-10 and A-12 two-seat trainers.

 

The aircraft was quite large for a single-seat fighter, with a cruciform tail and a tricycle landing gear. The two massive liquid-cooled Daimler-Benz DB-603 engines were used in four different versions, each displacing 44.5 liters (2670 cu in) and weighing 910 kg (2006 lb). The engine produced 1750 hp from 12 cylinders in an inverted V layout using fuel injection and an 8.3:1 compression ratio. The rear three-bladed propeller and dorsal fin were jettisoned by explosive bolts in an emergency, to allow the pilot to bail out safely using a pneumatic ejection seat. The seat, inclined 13 degrees to the rear, was ejected with a force of 20 times gravity. The ventral fin could be jettisoned for a belly landing.

 

Unlike a normal twin-engined aircraft, with wing-mounted engines, loss of an engine on the Do-335 did not cause a handling problem. Even with one engine out, speed was a respectable 621 kph (348 mph). Because of its appearance, pilots dubbed it the "Ant eater" ("Ameisenbar"), although they described its performance as exceptional, particularly in acceleration and turning radius. The Do-335 was very docile in flight and had no dangerous spin characteristics. Many Do-335 prototypes were built, as the Reich strained desperately to provide day and night fighters and fast reconnaissance aircraft to the failing war effort. One of the many RLM production plans, issued in December 1943, called for the production of 310 Do-335s by late 1945. Initial production was at the Dornier Manuel plant, but this factory was bombed heavily in March-April, 1944, and the Do-335 tooling was destroyed.

 

Ten Do-335A-0 preproduction aircraft were then produced at Dornier's Oberpfaffenhofen plant in July-October 1944, by which time the Allied bombing campaign was delaying arrivals of engines, propellers, radios, and structural subcomponents. This had a serious effect, because the Do-335 was not a simple aircraft: installation of the electronics alone took 60 hours of assembly, and the electrical parts list was 112 pages long. Production of Daimler-Benz engines, for example, was switched to factories set up in underground salt mines and gypsum mines, but high humidity caused corrosion problems and production dropped 40 percent. Although several preproduction aircraft were issued to combat conversion units some 10 months before the war ended, no Do-335s actually entered combat. Deliveries began to the 1st Experimental Squadron of the Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe ( I/Versuchsverband Ob.d.L.) in late July 1944 for operational trials.

 

The first of the Do-335A-1 production version left the Dornier line at Friedrichshafen early in 1945, one of only four produced in 1945. It was armed with one 30 mm MK-103 cannon (70 rounds were carried) firing through the propeller hub and two 15 mm MG-151/15 cannon (200 rounds per gun) firing from the top of the forward engine. Even with the fighter situation as desperate as it was, these aircraft were still equipped to carry 500 kg (1100 lb) of bombs internally. Further operational testing, including use of air-to-ground guided missiles, began in Spring 1945 with Trials Unit (Erprobungskommando) 335.

 

The Do-335A-6 was to be a two-seat night fighter version with the advanced FFO FuG-217J Neptun radar having triple "trident"-like antennas (hence the name "Neptun") on the fuselage and wings, but only a prototype was completed. A total of 37 prototypes, 10 A-0s, 11 A-1s and 2 A-12 trainers were built, although nearly 85 additional aircraft were in assembly when U.S. troops overran the Friedrichshafen factory in late April, 1945. The Vienna-Swechat plant of the Ernst Heinkel AG was also scheduled to build the Do-335 beginning in February, 1945, but production never started.

 

The NASM aircraft is the second Do-335A-0, designated A-02, with construction number (werke nummer) 240102 and factory registration VG+PH. It was built at Dornier's Rechlin-Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany, plant on April 16, 1945. It was captured by Allied forces at the plant on April 22, 1945. After checkout, it was flown from a grass runway at Oberweisenfeld, near Munich, to Cherbourg, France. During this flight, the Do-335 easily outclimbed and outdistanced two escorting P-51s, beating them to Cherbourg by 45 minutes. Under the U.S. Army Air Force's "Project Sea Horse," two Do-335s were shipped to the United States aboard the Royal Navy ship HMS "Reaper" together with other captured German aircraft, for detailed evaluation. This aircraft was assigned to the U.S. Navy, which tested it at the Test and Evaluation Center, Patuxent River Naval Air Station, Maryland. The other aircraft, with registration FE-1012 (later T2-1012), went to the USAAF at Freeman Field, Indiana, where it was tested in early 1946. Its subsequent fate is unknown, and this is the only Do-335 known to exist.

 

Following Navy flight tests in 1945-48, the aircraft was donated to the Smithsonian's National Air Museum in 1961 but was stored at NAS Norfolk until 1974. It was then returned to Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany, where the Dornier company restored it to original condition in 1975. The return trip to Germany required an exemption under U.S. laws concerning the export of munitions. The Dornier craftsmen doing the restoration - many of whom had worked on the original aircraft -- were astonished to find that the explosive charges fitted to blow off the tail fin and rear propeller in an emergency were still in the aircraft and active, 30 years after their original installation! The Do-335 was put on static display at the May 1-9, 1976, Hannover Airshow, and then loaned to the Deutsches Museum in Munich, where it was on prominent display until returned to Silver Hill, MD, for storage in 1986.

 

Country of Origin:

Germany

 

Physical Description:

Twin engine, pusher / puller, fighter / bomber; grey/green, green; late World War II development.

A wrecking yard (Australian, New Zealand, and Canadian English), scrapyard (Irish and British English) or junkyard (American English) is the location of a business in dismantling where wrecked or decommissioned vehicles are brought, their usable parts are sold for use in operating vehicles, while the unusable metal parts, known as scrap metal parts, are sold to metal-recycling companies.

 

Other terms include wreck yard, wrecker's yard, salvage yard, breakers yard, dismantler and scrapheap. In the United Kingdom, car salvage yards are known as car breakers, while motorcycle salvage yards are known as bike breakers. In Australia, they are often referred to as 'Wreckers'.

 

The most common type of wreck yards are automobile wreck yards, but junkyards for motorcycles, bicycles, small airplanes and boats exist too.

 

Many salvage yards operate on a local level—when an automobile is severely damaged, has malfunctioned beyond repair, or not worth the repair, the owner may sell it to a junkyard; in some cases—as when the car has become disabled in a place where derelict cars are not allowed to be left—the car owner will pay the wrecker to haul the car away.

 

Salvage yards also buy most of the wrecked, derelict and abandoned vehicles that are sold at auction from police impound storage lots,and often buy vehicles from insurance tow yards as well.

 

The salvage yard will usually tow the vehicle from the location of its purchase to the yard, but occasionally vehicles are driven in. At the salvage yard the automobiles are typically arranged in rows, often stacked on top of one another.

 

Some yards keep inventories in their offices, as to the usable parts in each car, as well as the car's location in the yard. Many yards have computerized inventory systems. About 75% of any given vehicle can be recycled and used for other goods.

 

In recent years it is becoming increasingly common to use satellite part finder services to contact multiple salvage yards from a single source.

 

In the 20th century these were call centres that charged a premium rate for calls and compiled a facsimile that was sent to various salvage yards so they could respond directly if the part was in stock. Many of these are now Web-based with requests for parts being e-mailed instantly.

Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.

 

On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions.

   

Transferred from the United States Air Force.

     

Manufacturer:

 

Boeing Aircraft Co.

Martin Co., Omaha, Nebr.

    

Date: 1945

   

Country of Origin: United States of America

   

Dimensions:

Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)

   

Materials:

Polished overall aluminum finish

   

Physical Description:

Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.

  

Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated, propeller-driven, bomber to fly during World War II, and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Boeing installed very advanced armament, propulsion, and avionics systems into the Superfortress. During the war in the Pacific Theater, the B-29 delivered the first nuclear weapons used in combat. On August 6, 1945, Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., in command of the Superfortress Enola Gay, dropped a highly enriched uranium, explosion-type, "gun-fired," atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Major Charles W. Sweeney piloted the B-29 Bockscar and dropped a highly enriched plutonium, implosion-type atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. On August 14, 1945, the Japanese accepted Allied terms for unconditional surrender.

 

In the late 1930s, U. S. Army Air Corps leaders recognized the need for very long-range bombers that exceeded the performance of the B-17 Flying Fortress. Several years of preliminary studies paralleled a continuous fight against those who saw limited utility in developing such an expensive and unproven aircraft but the Air Corps issued a requirement for the new bomber in February 1940. It described an airplane that could carry a maximum bomb load of 909 kg (2,000 lb) at a speed of 644 kph (400 mph) a distance of at least 8,050 km (5,000 miles). Boeing, Consolidated, Douglas, and Lockheed responded with design proposals. The Army was impressed with the Boeing design and issued a contract for two flyable prototypes in September 1940. In April 1941, the Army issued another contract for 250 aircraft plus spare parts equivalent to another 25 bombers, eight months before Pearl Harbor and nearly a year-and-a-half before the first Superfortress would fly.

 

Among the design's innovations was a long, narrow, high-aspect ratio wing equipped with large Fowler-type flaps. This wing design allowed the B-29 to fly very fast at high altitudes but maintained comfortable handling characteristics during takeoff and landing. More revolutionary was the size and sophistication of the pressurized sections of the fuselage: the flight deck forward of the wing, the gunner's compartment aft of the wing, and the tail gunner's station. For the crew, flying at extreme altitudes became much more comfortable as pressure and temperature could be regulated. To protect the Superfortress, Boeing designed a remote-controlled, defensive weapons system. Engineers placed five gun turrets on the fuselage: a turret above and behind the cockpit that housed two .50 caliber machine guns (four guns in later versions), and another turret aft near the vertical tail equipped with two machine guns; plus two more turrets beneath the fuselage, each equipped with two .50 caliber guns. One of these turrets fired from behind the nose gear and the other hung further back near the tail. Another two .50 caliber machine guns and a 20-mm cannon (in early versions of the B-29) were fitted in the tail beneath the rudder. Gunners operated these turrets by remote control--a true innovation. They aimed the guns using computerized sights, and each gunner could take control of two or more turrets to concentrate firepower on a single target.

 

Boeing also equipped the B-29 with advanced radar equipment and avionics. Depending on the type of mission, a B-29 carried the AN/APQ-13 or AN/APQ-7 Eagle radar system to aid bombing and navigation. These systems were accurate enough to permit bombing through cloud layers that completely obscured the target. The B-29B was equipped with the AN/APG-15B airborne radar gun sighting system mounted in the tail, insuring accurate defense against enemy fighters attacking at night. B-29s also routinely carried as many as twenty different types of radios and navigation devices.

 

The first XB-29 took off at Boeing Field in Seattle on September 21, 1942. By the end of the year the second aircraft was ready for flight. Fourteen service-test YB-29s followed as production began to accelerate. Building this advanced bomber required massive logistics. Boeing built new B-29 plants at Renton, Washington, and Wichita, Kansas, while Bell built a new plant at Marietta, Georgia, and Martin built one in Omaha, Nebraska. Both Curtiss-Wright and the Dodge automobile company vastly expanded their manufacturing capacity to build the bomber's powerful and complex Curtiss-Wright R-3350 turbo supercharged engines. The program required thousands of sub-contractors but with extraordinary effort, it all came together, despite major teething problems. By April 1944, the first operational B-29s of the newly formed 20th Air Force began to touch down on dusty airfields in India. By May, 130 B-29s were operational. In June, 1944, less than two years after the initial flight of the XB-29, the U. S. Army Air Forces (AAF) flew its first B-29 combat mission against targets in Bangkok, Thailand. This mission (longest of the war to date) called for 100 B-29s but only 80 reached the target area. The AAF lost no aircraft to enemy action but bombing results were mediocre. The first bombing mission against the Japanese main islands since Lt. Col. "Jimmy" Doolittle's raid against Tokyo in April 1942, occurred on June 15, again with poor results. This was also the first mission launched from airbases in China.

 

With the fall of Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands chain in August 1944, the AAF acquired airbases that lay several hundred miles closer to mainland Japan. Late in 1944, the AAF moved the XXI Bomber Command, flying B-29s, to the Marianas and the unit began bombing Japan in December. However, they employed high-altitude, precision, bombing tactics that yielded poor results. The high altitude winds were so strong that bombing computers could not compensate and the weather was so poor that rarely was visual target acquisition possible at high altitudes. In March 1945, Major General Curtis E. LeMay ordered the group to abandon these tactics and strike instead at night, from low altitude, using incendiary bombs. These firebombing raids, carried out by hundreds of B-29s, devastated much of Japan's industrial and economic infrastructure. Yet Japan fought on. Late in 1944, AAF leaders selected the Martin assembly line to produce a squadron of B-29s codenamed SILVERPLATE. Martin modified these Superfortresses by removing all gun turrets except for the tail position, removing armor plate, installing Curtiss electric propellers, and modifying the bomb bay to accommodate either the "Fat Man" or "Little Boy" versions of the atomic bomb. The AAF assigned 15 Silverplate ships to the 509th Composite Group commanded by Colonel Paul Tibbets. As the Group Commander, Tibbets had no specific aircraft assigned to him as did the mission pilots. He was entitled to fly any aircraft at any time. He named the B-29 that he flew on 6 August Enola Gay after his mother. In the early morning hours, just prior to the August 6th mission, Tibbets had a young Army Air Forces maintenance man, Private Nelson Miller, paint the name just under the pilot's window.

 

Enola Gay is a model B-29-45-MO, serial number 44-86292. The AAF accepted this aircraft on June 14, 1945, from the Martin plant at Omaha (Located at what is today Offut AFB near Bellevue), Nebraska. After the war, Army Air Forces crews flew the airplane during the Operation Crossroads atomic test program in the Pacific, although it dropped no nuclear devices during these tests, and then delivered it to Davis-Monthan Army Airfield, Arizona, for storage. Later, the U. S. Air Force flew the bomber to Park Ridge, Illinois, then transferred it to the Smithsonian Institution on July 4, 1949. Although in Smithsonian custody, the aircraft remained stored at Pyote Air Force Base, Texas, between January 1952 and December 1953. The airplane's last flight ended on December 2 when the Enola Gay touched down at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. The bomber remained at Andrews in outdoor storage until August 1960. By then, concerned about the bomber deteriorating outdoors, the Smithsonian sent collections staff to disassemble the Superfortress and move it indoors to the Paul E. Garber Facility in Suitland, Maryland.

 

The staff at Garber began working to preserve and restore Enola Gay in December 1984. This was the largest restoration project ever undertaken at the National Air and Space Museum and the specialists anticipated the work would require from seven to nine years to complete. The project actually lasted nearly two decades and, when completed, had taken approximately 300,000 work-hours to complete. The B-29 is now displayed at the National Air and Space Museum, Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.

 

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The Waffenträger (Weapon Carrier) VTS3 “Diana” was a prototype for a wheeled tank destroyer. It was developed by Thyssen-Henschel (later Rheinmetall) in Kassel, Germany, in the late Seventies, in response to a German Army requirement for a highly mobile tank destroyer with the firepower of the Leopard 1 main battle tank then in service and about to be replaced with the more capable Leopard 2 MBT, but less complex and costly. The main mission of the Diana was light to medium territorial defense, protection of infantry units and other, lighter, elements of the cavalry as well as tactical reconnaissance. Instead of heavy armor it would rather use its good power-to-weight ratio, excellent range and cross-country ability (despite the wheeled design) for defense and a computerized fire control system to accomplish this mission.

 

In order to save development cost and time, the vehicle was heavily based on the Spähpanzer Luchs (Lynx), a new German 8x8 amphibious reconnaissance armored fighting vehicle that had just entered Bundeswehr service in 1975. The all-wheel drive Luchs made was well armored against light weapons, had a full NBC protection system and was characterized by its extremely low-noise running. The eight large low-pressure tires had run-flat properties, and, at speeds up to about 50 km/h, all four axles could be steered, giving the relatively large vehicle a surprising agility and very good off-road performance. As a special feature, the vehicle was equipped with a rear-facing driver with his own driving position (normally the radio operator), so that the vehicle could be driven at full speed into both directions – a heritage from German WWII designs, and a tactical advantage when the vehicle had to quickly retreat from tactical position after having been detected. The original Luchs weighed less than 20 tons, was fully amphibious and could surmount water obstacles quickly and independently using propellers at the rear and the fold back trim vane at the front. Its armament was relatively light, though, a 20 mm Rheinmetall MK 20 Rh 202 gun in the turret that was effective against both ground and air targets.

 

The Waffenträger “Diana” used the Luchs’ hull and dynamic components as basis, and Thyssen-Henschel solved the challenge to mount a large and heavy 105 mm L7 gun with its mount on the light chassis through a minimalistic, unmanned mount and an autoloader. Avoiding a traditional manned and heavy, armored turret, a lot of weight and internal volume that had to be protected could be saved, and crew safety was indirectly improved, too. This concept had concurrently been tested in the form of the VTS1 (“Versuchsträger Scheitellafette #1) experimental tank in 1976 for the Kampfpanzer 3 development, which eventually led to the Leopard 2 MBT (which retained a traditional turret, though).

 

For the “Diana” test vehicle, Thyssen-Henschel developed a new low-profile turret with a very small frontal area. Two crew members, the commander (on the right side) and the gunner (to the left), were seated in/under the gun mount, completely inside of the vehicle’s hull. The turret was a very innovative construction for its time, fully stabilized and mounted the proven 105mm L7 rifled cannon with a smoke discharger. Its autoloader contained 8 rounds in a carousel magazine. 16 more rounds could be carried in the hull, but they had to be manually re-loaded into the magazine, which was only externally accessible. A light, co-axial 7,62mm machine gun against soft targets was available, too, as well as eight defensive smoke grenade mortars.

 

The automated L7 had a rate of fire of ten rounds per minute and could fire four types of ammunition: a kinetic energy penetrator to destroy armored vehicles; a high explosive anti-tank round to destroy thin-skinned vehicles and provide anti-personnel fragmentation; a high explosive plastic round to destroy bunkers, machine gun and sniper positions, and create openings in walls for infantry to access; and a canister shot for use against dismounted infantry in the open or for smoke charges. The rounds to be fired could be pre-selected, so that the gun was able to automatically fire a certain ammunition sequence, but manual round selection was possible at any time, too.

 

In order to take the new turret, the Luchs hull had to be modified. Early calculations had revealed that a simple replacement of the Luchs’ turret with the new L7 mount would have unfavorably shifted the vehicle’s center of gravity up- and forward, making it very nose-heavy and hard to handle in rough terrain or at high speed, and the long barrel would have markedly overhung the front end, impairing handling further. It was also clear that the additional weight and the rise of the CoG made amphibious operations impossible - a fate that met the upgraded Luchs recce tanks in the Eighties, too, after several accidents with overturned vehicles during wading and drowned crews. With this insight the decision was made to omit the vehicle’s amphibious capability, save weight and complexity, and to modify the vehicle’s layout considerably to optimize the weight distribution.

 

Taking advantage of the fact that the Luchs already had two complete driver stations at both ends, a pair of late-production hulls were set aside in 1977 and their internal layout reversed. The engine bay was now in the vehicle’s front, the secured ammunition storage was placed next to it, behind the separate driver compartment, and the combat section with the turret mechanism was located behind it. Since the VTS3s were only prototypes, only minimal adaptations were made. This meant that the driver was now located on the right side of the vehicle, while and the now-rear-facing secondary driver/radio operator station ended up on the left side – much like a RHD vehicle – but this was easily accepted in the light of cost and time savings. As a result, the gun and its long, heavy barrel were now located above the vehicle’s hull, so that the overall weight distribution was almost neutral and overall dimensions remained compact.

 

Both test vehicles were completed in early 1978 and field trials immediately started. While the overall mobility was on par with the Luchs and the Diana’s high speed and low noise profile was highly appreciated, the armament was and remained a source of constant concern. Shooting in motion from the Diana turned out to be very problematic, and even firing from a standstill was troublesome. The gun mount and the vehicle’s complex suspension were able to "hold" the recoil of the full-fledged 105-mm tank gun, which had always been famous for its rather large muzzle energy. But when fired, even in the longitudinal plane, the vehicle body fell heavily towards the stern, so that the target was frequently lost and aiming had to be resumed – effectively negating the benefit from the autoloader’s high rate of fire and exposing the vehicle to potential target retaliation. Firing to the side was even worse. Several attempts were made to mend this flaw, but neither the addition of a muzzle brake, stronger shock absorbers and even hydro-pneumatic suspension elements did not solve the problem. In addition, the high muzzle flames and the resulting significant shockwave required the infantry to stay away from the vehicle intended to support them. The Bundeswehr also criticized the too small ammunition load, as well as the fact that the autoloader magazine could not be re-filled under armor protection, so that the vehicle had to retreat to safe areas to re-arm and/or to adapt to a new mission profile. This inherent flaw not only put the crew under the hazards of enemy fire, it also negated the vehicle’s NBC protection – a serious issue and likely Cold War scenario. Another weak point was the Diana’s weight: even though the net gain of weight compared with the Luchs was less than 3 tons after the conversion, this became another serious problem that led to the Diana’s demise: during trials the Bundeswehr considered the possibility to airlift the Diana, but its weight (even that of the Luchs, BTW) was too much for the Luftwaffe’s biggest own transport aircraft, the C-160 Transall. Even aircraft from other NATO members, e.g. the common C-130 Hercules, could hardly carry the vehicle. In theory, equipment had to be removed, including the cannon and parts of its mount.

 

Since the tactical value of the vehicle was doubtful and other light anti-tank weapons in the form of the HOT anti-tank missile had reached operational status, so that very light vehicles and even small infantry groups could now effectively fight against full-fledged enemy battle tanks from a safe distance, the Diana’s development was stopped in 1988. Both VTS3 prototypes were mothballed, stored at the Bundeswehr Munster Training Area camp and are still waiting to be revamped as historic exhibits alongside other prototypes like the Kampfpanzer 70 in the German Tank Museum located there, too.

  

Specifications:

Crew: 4 (commander, driver, gunner, radio operator/second driver)

Weight: 22.6 t

Length: 7.74 m (25 ft 4 ¼ in)

Width: 2.98 m ( 9 ft 9 in)

Height: XXX

Ground clearance: 440 mm (1 ft 4 in)

Suspension: hydraulic all-wheel drive and steering

 

Armor:

Unknown, but sufficient to withstand 14.5 mm AP rounds

 

Performance:

Speed: 90 km/h (56 mph) on roads

Operational range: 720 km (445 mi)

Power/weight: 13,3 hp/ton with petrol, 17,3 hp/ton with diesel

 

Engine:

1× Daimler Benz OM 403A turbocharged 10-cylinder 4-stroke multi-fuel engine,

delivering 300 hp with petrol, 390 hp with diesel

 

Armament:

1× 105 mm L7 rifled gun with autoloader (8 rounds ready, plus 16 in reserve)

1× co-axial 7.92 mm M3 machine gun with 2.000 rounds

Two groups of four Wegmann 76 mm smoke mortars

  

The kit and its assembly:

I have been a big Luchs fan since I witnessed one in action during a public Bundeswehr demo day when I was around 10 years old: a huge, boxy and futuristic vehicle with strange proportions, gigantic wheels, water propellers, a mind-boggling mobility and all of this utterly silent. Today you’d assume that this vehicle had an electric engine – spooky! So I always had a soft spot for it, and now it was time and a neat occasion to build a what-if model around it.

 

This fictional wheeled tank prototype model was spawned by a leftover Revell 1:72 Luchs kit, which I had bought some time ago primarily for the turret, used in a fictional post-WWII SdKfz. 234 “Puma” conversion. With just the chassis left I wondered what other use or equipment it might take, and, after several weeks with the idea in the back of my mind, I stumbled at Silesian Models over an M1128 resin conversion set for the Trumpeter M1126 “Stryker” 8x8 APC model. From this set as potential donor for a conversion the prototype idea with an unmanned turret was born.

 

Originally I just planned to mount the new turret onto the OOB hull, but when playing with the parts I found the look with an overhanging gun barrel and the bigger turret placed well forward on the hull goofy and unbalanced. I was about to shelf the idea again, until I recognized that the Luchs’ hull is almost symmetrical – the upper hull half could be easily reversed on the chassis tub (at least on the kit…), and this would allow much better proportions. From this conceptual change the build went straightforward, reversing the upper hull only took some minor PSR. The resin turret was taken mostly OOB, it only needed a scratched adapter to fit into the respective hull opening. I just added a co-axial machine gun fairing, antenna bases (from the Luchs kit, since they could, due to the long gun barrel, not be attached to the hull anymore) and smoke grenade mortars (also taken from the Luchs).

 

An unnerving challenge became the Luchs kit’s suspension and drive train – it took two days to assemble the vehicle’s underside alone! While this area is very accurate and delicate, the fact that almost EVERY lever and stabilizer is a separate piece on four(!) axles made the assembly a very slow process. Just for reference: the kit comes with three and a half sprues. A full one for the wheels (each consists of three parts, and more than another one for suspension and drivetrain!

Furthermore, the many hull surface details like tools or handles – these are more than a dozen bits and pieces – are separate, very fragile and small (tiny!), too. Cutting all these wee parts out and cleaning them was a tedious affair, too, plus painting them separately.

Otherwise the model went together well, but it’s certainly not good for quick builders and those with big fingers and/or poor sight.

  

Painting and markings:

The paint scheme was a conservative choice; it is a faithful adaptation of the Bundeswehr’s NATO standard camouflage for the European theatre of operations that was introduced in the Eighties. It was adopted by many armies to confuse potential aggressors from the East, so that observers could not easily identify a vehicle and its nationality. It consists of a green base with red-brown and black blotches, in Germany it was executed with RAL tones, namely 6031 (Bronze Green), 8027 (Leather Brown) and 9021 (Tar Black). The pattern was standardized for each vehicle type and I stuck to the official Luchs pattern, trying to adapt it to the new/bigger turret. I used Revell acrylic paints, since the authentic RAL tones are readily available in this product range (namely the tones 06, 65 and 84). The big tires were painted with Revell 09 (Anthracite).

 

Next the model was treated with a highly thinned washing with black and red-brown acrylic paint, before decals were applied, taken from the OOB sheet and without unit markings, since the Diana would represent a test vehicle. After sealing them with a thin coat of clear varnish the model was furthermore treated with lightly dry-brushed Revell 45 and 75 to emphasize edges and surface details, and the separately painted hull equipment was mounted. The following step was a cloudy treatment with watercolors (from a typical school paintbox, it’s great stuff for weathering!), simulating dust residue all over the hull. After a final protective coat with matt acrylic varnish I finally added some mineral artist pigments to the lower hull areas and created mud crusts on the wheels through light wet varnish traces into which pigments were “dusted”.

  

Basically a simple project, but the complex Luchs kit with its zillion of wee bits and pieces took time and cost some nerves. However, the result looks pretty good, and the Stryker turret blends well into the overall package. Not certain how realistic the swap of the Luchs’ internal layout would have been, but I think that the turret moved to the rear makes more sense than the original forward position? After all, the model is supposed to be a prototype, so there’s certainly room for creative freedom. And in classic Bundeswehr colors, the whole thing even looks pretty convincing.

 

The Museum of Flight, Seattle.

 

Walking through the Concorde fuselage, I was struck by the tiny windows and somewhat cramped seats. Well, with a New York to London flight time of just under 3.5 hours, Concorde didn't need to provide its passengers with the creature comforts required to endure long-haul flights on conventional airliners.

========================================================

Here's a first-hand account of a trip on Concorde by By Jeffrey Levine in The Washington Post of December 17, 1989:

 

The Concorde -- transporter of the rich and famous, supersonic sled to sophisticated shores, chariot of the demigods -- has been around now for nearly a decade and a half.

 

Air France first went supersonic in January of 1976,featuring a flight from Paris to Rio de Janiero, and by the end of this month, the Air France Concorde will have carried about 850,000 passengers. I can now say I was one of the fleet few.

 

Not long ago, I found myself sitting in an opulent Air France lounge at New York's Kennedy Airport, swigging free champagne and waiting for the boarding announcement for the Paris-bound Concorde.

 

I tried to keep from gaping at my exquisitely outfitted and supremely blase fellow travelers, but when Sean Penn slouched over to a nearby phone, I debated whipping out my trusty auto-focus. On second thought, however, I decided I'd rather take my flight inside the plane.

 

When the lounge hostess made the boarding announcement, I drained my flute of champagne and headed for destiny at warp speed. As two nattily uniformed crew members checked my ticket and showed me to my seat, I had the sudden feeling that something was terribly wrong. In a flash I realized what was amiss: The crew members were smiling and politely helping me to stow my baggage, in startling contrast to the aloof soft-drink dispensers I've encountered on regular flights lately.

 

But as I bashed my head on a luggage rack, I realized that, in terms of passenger space, the Concorde doesn't differ much from smaller aircraft. This plane was built for speed, not comfort.

 

There are two gray-leather seats on each side of the aisle, and the cabin looks like a normal passenger jet that has shrunk to three-quarter size. The central aisle makes for frequent intimate encounters with other passengers, and even the serving carts are down-sized.

 

I settled into my seat and tried to look out the window -- a task not easily done through a window that is three panes thick and smaller than a paperback book.

 

But soon we were taxiing to the runway and lining up for takeoff. (No waiting behind scores of domestic flights for this bird!) The pilot, in elegant French-accented tones, warned us that we would be turning left immediately upon takeoff, and with that, he fired up the beast.

 

The engine note slowly grew to a sharp, overpowering, yet somehow muted whine. The plane, helping itself to plenty of runway, gradually built to a thrilling speed and nosed into the air. I was expecting to have my eyeballs pressed into my head, but there was none of the brain-compressing sensation of lift that normally comes with takeoff.

 

Instead, there was a sensation of terrific forward momentum, accompanied by a light juddering as the Concorde skimmed low over the water. This plane was in no hurry to gain altitude. True to his word, the pilot carved a sweeping left turn, the craft now beginning to shudder like a rocket sled on bumpy ice.

 

Then it leveled and began to climb -- not in a steady rise but in stages -- a shaking, racketing struggle for altitude. When I finally gathered my wits about me, I took a look at the Machmeter -- a small screen on the bulkhead registering our speed in cool green liquid crystal numbers -- to see that we were already traveling at over Mach 1, the speed of sound, or about 740 miles per hour.

 

We would soon reach a cruising altitude of 57,000 feet (as opposed to about 35,000 feet for most commercial aircraft) and a speed of Mach 2.2, or about 1,600 mph.

 

Once we reached cruising altitude and I could take stock of things, three qualities of supersonic travel became apparent.

 

First, turbulence is minimal way up there. We were not buffeted even once by wind.

 

Second, Mach 2.2 is noisy; conversation required leaning and screaming.

 

Third, at supersonic speed the Concorde produces a constant vibration, as much heard as felt, rather like driving rapidly over a smoothly packed gravel road.

 

It was as if we were flying through light sandpaper. Flying at that speed also produces heat, and when I held my face to the window I could feel warmth.

 

I decided to see what the brains of this machine looked like. I got permission to go forward and peer into the cockpit, half expecting to see only a large blinking computer up there, perhaps wearing a beret.

 

But no, there were three officers in what was a remarkably unremarkable cockpit. Absent were the video-game-like screens and computerized paraphernalia present on more modern aircraft. Instead there was the bewildering profusion of dials, gauges and switches found on the aircraft of my youth.

 

Nodding and mumbling under the captain's haughty gaze, I turned and headed for my seat. By now a line had built for the bathrooms, probably because, due to space considerations, the plane had only two bathrooms for its hundred passengers.

 

As I inched my way to the end of this squirming line, I realized that even though a person may amass tremendous wealth and travel in the most sophisticated form of transportation on earth, nothing can dispel the loss of dignity that comes of waiting in line to go to the bathroom.

 

When my turn came, I discovered that the bathrooms had been designed for a retromingent.

 

The rest of the flight? Rather uneventful. The other passengers provided little entertainment -- although one gentleman did spend the entire time wearing his raincoat, with a newspaper draped over his head and face -- and there was no movie.

 

The food was good, but almost everything was pureed and formed into a soft mold, which made for easy chewing but a disturbing feeling of infantility; the wine, however, was excellent (this was, after all, Air France).

 

Sean Penn slept the whole way. The landing was more conventional than the takeoff, although as the plane slowed to near landing speed it again turned into a shaking ox-cart.

 

Best of all, and to my mind the real element that made me a Concorde convert (besides the gift-wrapped leather folders that were handed out as gifts as we approached Paris), was the fact that we debarked in Paris after 3 1/2 hours, feeling refreshed, relaxed and ready to hit the Champs Elysees instead of a hotel pillow.

 

Air France has daily Concorde flights between New York and Paris; the current round-trip fare is $5,308.

 

From January through March, Air France will offer a special fare between New York and Paris, in conjunction with American Express; if you charge a first-class ticket ($4,422) on your American Express credit card, your ticket can be upgraded to a Concorde flight.

 

British Airways also flies the Concorde between New York and Paris; in addition, it has three Concorde flights a week from Washington to Paris, with a round-trip fare of $6,398.

 

Jeffrey Levine is a freelance writer in Chicago who usually takes the bus.

 

www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/travel/1989/12/1...

  

Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated propeller-driven bomber of World War II and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Although designed to fight in the European theater, the B-29 found its niche on the other side of the globe. In the Pacific, B-29s delivered a variety of aerial weapons: conventional bombs, incendiary bombs, mines, and two nuclear weapons.

 

On August 6, 1945, this Martin-built B-29-45-MO dropped the first atomic weapon used in combat on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Bockscar (on display at the U.S. Air Force Museum near Dayton, Ohio) dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. A third B-29, The Great Artiste, flew as an observation aircraft on both missions

 

Transferred from the United States Air Force.

   

Manufacturer: Boeing Aircraft Co.

Martin Co., Omaha, Nebr.

   

Date: 1945

   

Country of Origin: United States of America

   

Dimensions:

Overall: 900 x 3020cm, 32580kg, 4300cm (29ft 6 5/16in. x 99ft 1in., 71825.9lb., 141ft 15/16in.)

   

Materials:

Polished overall aluminum finish

   

Physical Description:

Four-engine heavy bomber with semi-monoqoque fuselage and high-aspect ratio wings. Polished aluminum finish overall, standard late-World War II Army Air Forces insignia on wings and aft fuselage and serial number on vertical fin; 509th Composite Group markings painted in black; "Enola Gay" in black, block letters on lower left nose.

    

Boeing's B-29 Superfortress was the most sophisticated, propeller-driven, bomber to fly during World War II, and the first bomber to house its crew in pressurized compartments. Boeing installed very advanced armament, propulsion, and avionics systems into the Superfortress. During the war in the Pacific Theater, the B-29 delivered the first nuclear weapons used in combat. On August 6, 1945, Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., in command of the Superfortress Enola Gay, dropped a highly enriched uranium, explosion-type, "gun-fired," atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Three days later, Major Charles W. Sweeney piloted the B-29 Bockscar and dropped a highly enriched plutonium, implosion-type atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. Enola Gay flew as the advance weather reconnaissance aircraft that day. On August 14, 1945, the Japanese accepted Allied terms for unconditional surrender.

 

In the late 1930s, U. S. Army Air Corps leaders recognized the need for very long-range bombers that exceeded the performance of the B-17 Flying Fortress. Several years of preliminary studies paralleled a continuous fight against those who saw limited utility in developing such an expensive and unproven aircraft but the Air Corps issued a requirement for the new bomber in February 1940. It described an airplane that could carry a maximum bomb load of 909 kg (2,000 lb) at a speed of 644 kph (400 mph) a distance of at least 8,050 km (5,000 miles). Boeing, Consolidated, Douglas, and Lockheed responded with design proposals. The Army was impressed with the Boeing design and issued a contract for two flyable prototypes in September 1940. In April 1941, the Army issued another contract for 250 aircraft plus spare parts equivalent to another 25 bombers, eight months before Pearl Harbor and nearly a year-and-a-half before the first Superfortress would fly.

 

Among the design's innovations was a long, narrow, high-aspect ratio wing equipped with large Fowler-type flaps. This wing design allowed the B-29 to fly very fast at high altitudes but maintained comfortable handling characteristics during takeoff and landing. More revolutionary was the size and sophistication of the pressurized sections of the fuselage: the flight deck forward of the wing, the gunner's compartment aft of the wing, and the tail gunner's station. For the crew, flying at extreme altitudes became much more comfortable as pressure and temperature could be regulated. To protect the Superfortress, Boeing designed a remote-controlled, defensive weapons system. Engineers placed five gun turrets on the fuselage: a turret above and behind the cockpit that housed two .50 caliber machine guns (four guns in later versions), and another turret aft near the vertical tail equipped with two machine guns; plus two more turrets beneath the fuselage, each equipped with two .50 caliber guns. One of these turrets fired from behind the nose gear and the other hung further back near the tail. Another two .50 caliber machine guns and a 20-mm cannon (in early versions of the B-29) were fitted in the tail beneath the rudder. Gunners operated these turrets by remote control--a true innovation. They aimed the guns using computerized sights, and each gunner could take control of two or more turrets to concentrate firepower on a single target.

 

Boeing also equipped the B-29 with advanced radar equipment and avionics. Depending on the type of mission, a B-29 carried the AN/APQ-13 or AN/APQ-7 Eagle radar system to aid bombing and navigation. These systems were accurate enough to permit bombing through cloud layers that completely obscured the target. The B-29B was equipped with the AN/APG-15B airborne radar gun sighting system mounted in the tail, insuring accurate defense against enemy fighters attacking at night. B-29s also routinely carried as many as twenty different types of radios and navigation devices.

 

The first XB-29 took off at Boeing Field in Seattle on September 21, 1942. By the end of the year the second aircraft was ready for flight. Fourteen service-test YB-29s followed as production began to accelerate. Building this advanced bomber required massive logistics. Boeing built new B-29 plants at Renton, Washington, and Wichita, Kansas, while Bell built a new plant at Marietta, Georgia, and Martin built one in Omaha, Nebraska. Both Curtiss-Wright and the Dodge automobile company vastly expanded their manufacturing capacity to build the bomber's powerful and complex Curtiss-Wright R-3350 turbo supercharged engines. The program required thousands of sub-contractors but with extraordinary effort, it all came together, despite major teething problems. By April 1944, the first operational B-29s of the newly formed 20th Air Force began to touch down on dusty airfields in India. By May, 130 B-29s were operational. In June, 1944, less than two years after the initial flight of the XB-29, the U. S. Army Air Forces (AAF) flew its first B-29 combat mission against targets in Bangkok, Thailand. This mission (longest of the war to date) called for 100 B-29s but only 80 reached the target area. The AAF lost no aircraft to enemy action but bombing results were mediocre. The first bombing mission against the Japanese main islands since Lt. Col. "Jimmy" Doolittle's raid against Tokyo in April 1942, occurred on June 15, again with poor results. This was also the first mission launched from airbases in China.

 

With the fall of Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands chain in August 1944, the AAF acquired airbases that lay several hundred miles closer to mainland Japan. Late in 1944, the AAF moved the XXI Bomber Command, flying B-29s, to the Marianas and the unit began bombing Japan in December. However, they employed high-altitude, precision, bombing tactics that yielded poor results. The high altitude winds were so strong that bombing computers could not compensate and the weather was so poor that rarely was visual target acquisition possible at high altitudes. In March 1945, Major General Curtis E. LeMay ordered the group to abandon these tactics and strike instead at night, from low altitude, using incendiary bombs. These firebombing raids, carried out by hundreds of B-29s, devastated much of Japan's industrial and economic infrastructure. Yet Japan fought on. Late in 1944, AAF leaders selected the Martin assembly line to produce a squadron of B-29s codenamed SILVERPLATE. Martin modified these Superfortresses by removing all gun turrets except for the tail position, removing armor plate, installing Curtiss electric propellers, and modifying the bomb bay to accommodate either the "Fat Man" or "Little Boy" versions of the atomic bomb. The AAF assigned 15 Silverplate ships to the 509th Composite Group commanded by Colonel Paul Tibbets. As the Group Commander, Tibbets had no specific aircraft assigned to him as did the mission pilots. He was entitled to fly any aircraft at any time. He named the B-29 that he flew on 6 August Enola Gay after his mother. In the early morning hours, just prior to the August 6th mission, Tibbets had a young Army Air Forces maintenance man, Private Nelson Miller, paint the name just under the pilot's window.

 

Enola Gay is a model B-29-45-MO, serial number 44-86292. The AAF accepted this aircraft on June 14, 1945, from the Martin plant at Omaha (Located at what is today Offut AFB near Bellevue), Nebraska. After the war, Army Air Forces crews flew the airplane during the Operation Crossroads atomic test program in the Pacific, although it dropped no nuclear devices during these tests, and then delivered it to Davis-Monthan Army Airfield, Arizona, for storage. Later, the U. S. Air Force flew the bomber to Park Ridge, Illinois, then transferred it to the Smithsonian Institution on July 4, 1949. Although in Smithsonian custody, the aircraft remained stored at Pyote Air Force Base, Texas, between January 1952 and December 1953. The airplane's last flight ended on December 2 when the Enola Gay touched down at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland. The bomber remained at Andrews in outdoor storage until August 1960. By then, concerned about the bomber deteriorating outdoors, the Smithsonian sent collections staff to disassemble the Superfortress and move it indoors to the Paul E. Garber Facility in Suitland, Maryland.

 

The staff at Garber began working to preserve and restore Enola Gay in December 1984. This was the largest restoration project ever undertaken at the National Air and Space Museum and the specialists anticipated the work would require from seven to nine years to complete. The project actually lasted nearly two decades and, when completed, had taken approximately 300,000 work-hours to complete. The B-29 is now displayed at the National Air and Space Museum, Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.

     

Inventory number: A19500100000

   

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!

 

Some background:

The Northrop Grumman-IAI F-24 is the latest reincarnation of the USAF "Lightweight Fighter Program" which dates back to the 1950ies and started with the development of Northrop's F-5 "Freedom Fighter".

 

The 1st generation F-5 became very successful in the export market and saw a long line of development, including the much more powerful F-5E "Tiger II" and the F-20 Tigershark (initially called F-5G). Northrop had high hopes for the F-20 in the international market; however, policy changes following Ronald Reagan's election meant the F-20 had to compete for sales against aircraft like the F-16, the USAF's latest fighter design (which was politically favored). The F-20 development program was eventually abandoned in 1986 after three prototypes had been built and a fourth partially completed.

 

But this was not the end for Northrop’s Lightweight Fighter. In the early 1980s, two X-29As experimental aircraft were built by Grumman from two existing Northrop F-5A Freedom Fighter airframes. The Grumman X-29 was a testbed for forward-swept wings, canard control surfaces, and other novel aircraft technologies. The aerodynamic instability of this arrangement increased agility but required the use of computerized fly-by-wire control. Composite materials were used to control the aeroelastic divergent twisting experienced by forward-swept wings, also reducing the weight. The NASA test program continued from 1984 to 1991 and the X-29s flew 242 times, gathering valuable data and breaking ground for new aerodynamic technologies of 4th and 5th generation fighters.

 

Even though no service aircraft directly evolved from the X-29, its innovative FBW system as well as the new material technologies also opened the door for an updated F-20 far beyond the 1990ies. It became clear that ever expensive and complex aircraft could not be the answer to modern, asymmetrical warfare in remote corners of the world, with exploding development costs and just a limited number of aircraft in service that could not generate true economies of scale, esp. when their state-of-the-art design would not permit any export.

Anyway, a global market for simpler fighter aircraft was there, as 1st generation F-16s as well as the worldwide, aging F-5E fleet and types of Soviet/Russian origin like the MiG-29 provided the need for a modern, yet light and economical jet fighter. Contemporary types like the Indian HAL Tejas, the Swedish Saab Gripen, the French Dassault Rafale and the Pakistani/Chinese FC-1/JF-17 ”Thunder” proved this trend among 4th - 4.5th generation fighter aircraft.

 

Northrop Grumman (Northrop bought Grumman in 1994) initiated studies and basic design work on a respective New Lightweight Fighter (NLF) as a private venture in 1995. Work on the NLF started at a slow pace, as the company was busy with re-structuring.

The idea of an updated lightweight fighter was fueled by another source, too: Israel. In 1998 IAI started looking in the USA for a development partner for a new, light fighter that would replace its obsolete Kfir fleet and partly relieve its F-16 and F-15 fleet from interception tasks. The domestic project for that role, the IAI Lavi, had been stillborn, but lots of its avionics and research were still at hand and waited for an airframe for completion.

The new aircraft for the IAF was to be superior to the MiG-29, at least on par with the F-16C/D, but easier to maintain, smaller and overall cheaper. Since the performance profiles appeared to be similar to what Northrop Grumman was developing under the NLF label, the US company eventually teamed up with IAI in 2000 and both started the mutual project "Namer" (=נמר, “Tiger” in Hebrew), which eventually lead to the F-24 I for the IAF which kept its project name for service and to the USAF’s F-24A “Tigershark”.

 

The F-24, as the NLF, was based on the F-20 airframe, but outwardly showed only little family heritage, onle the forward fuselage around the cockpit reminds of the original F-5 design . Many aerodynamic details, e. g. the air intakes and air ducts, were taken over from the X-29, though, as the experimental aircraft and its components had been developed for extreme maneuvers and extra high agility. Nevertheless, the X-29's forward-swept wing was considered to be too exotic and fragile for a true service aircraft, but the F-24 was to feature an Active Aeroelastic Wing (AAW) system.

 

AAW Technology integrates wing aerodynamics, controls, and structure to harness and control wing aeroelastic twist at high speeds and dynamic pressures. By using multiple leading and trailing edge controls like "aerodynamic tabs", subtle amounts of aeroelastic twist can be controlled to provide large amounts of wing control power, while minimizing maneuver air loads at high wing strain conditions or aerodynamic drag at low wing strain conditions. This system was initially tested on the X-29 and later on the X-53 research aircraft, a modified F-18, until 2006.

 

Both USAF and IAF versions feature this state-of-the-art aerodynamic technology, but it is uncertain if other customers will receive it. While details concerning the F-24's system have not been published yet, it is assumed that its AAW is so effective that canard foreplanes could be omitted without sacrificing lift and maneuverability, and that drag is effectively minimized as the wing profile can be adjusted according to the aircraft’s speed, altitude, payload and mission – much like a VG wing, but without its clumsy and heavy swiveling mechanism which has to bear high g forces. As a result, the F-24 is, compared to the F-20, which could carry an external payload of about 3.5 tons, rumored to be able to carry up to 5 tons of ordnance.

 

The delta wing shape proved to be a perfect choice for the required surface and flap actuators inside of the wings, and it would also offer a very good compromise between lift and drag for a wide range of performance. Anyway, there was one price to pay: in order to keep the wing profile thin and simple, the F-24’s landing gear retracts into the lower fuselage, leaving the aircraft with a relatively narrow track.

 

Another major design factor for the outstanding performance of this rather small aircraft was weight reduction and structural integrity – combined with simplicity, ruggedness and a modular construction which would allow later upgrades. Instead of “going big” and expensive, the new F-24 was to create its performance through dedicated loss of weight, which was in some part also a compensation for the AAW system in the wings and its periphery.

 

Weight was saved wherever possible, e .g. a newly developed, lightweight M199A1 gatling gun. This 20mm cannon is a three-barreled, heavily modified version of the already “stripped” M61A2 gun in the USAF’s current F-18E and F-22. One of the novel features is a pneumatic drive instead of the traditional electric mechanism, what not only saves weight but also improves trigger response. The new gun weighs only a mere 65kg (the six-barreled M61A2 weighs 92kg, the original M61A1 112 kg), but still reaches a burst rate of fire of 1.800 RPM (about 800 RPM under cyclic fire, standard practice is to fire the cannon in 30 to 50-round bursts, though) and a muzzle velocity of 1.050 metres per second (3,450 ft/s) with a PGU-28/B round.

 

While the F-16 was and is still made from 80% aluminum alloys and only from 3% composites, the F-24 makes major use of carbon fiber and other lightweight materials, which make up about 40% of the aircraft’s structure, plus an increased share of Titanium and Magnesium alloys. As a consequence and through many other weight-saving measures like keeping stealth capabilities to a minimum (even though RAM was deliberately used and many details designed to have a natural low radar signature, resulting in modest radar cross-section (RCS) reductions), a single, relatively small engine, a fuel-efficient F404-GE-402 turbofan, is enough to make the F-24 a fast and very agile aircraft, coupled with a good range. The F-24’s thrust/weight ratio is considerably higher than 1, and later versions with a vectored thrust nozzle (see below) will take this level of agility even further – with the pilot becoming the limiting factor for the aircraft’s performance.

 

USAF and IAF F-24s are outfitted with Northrop Grumman's AN/APG-80 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar, also used in the F-16 Block 60 aircraft. Other customers might only receive the AN/APG-68, making the F-24 comparable to the F-16C/D.

 

The first prototype, the YF-24, flew on 8th of March 2008, followed by two more aircraft plus a static airframe until summer 2010. In early 2011 the USAF placed an initial order of 101 aircraft (probably also to stir export sales – the earlier lightweight fighters from Northrop suffered from the fact that the manufacturer’s country would not use the aircraft in its own forces). These initial aircraft will replace older F-16 in the interceptor role, or free them for fighter bomber tasks. The USN and USMC also showed interest in the aircraft for their aggressor squadrons, for dissimilar air combat training. A two-seater, called the F-24B, is supposed to follow soon, too, and a later version for 2020 onwards, tentatively designated F-24C, is to feature an even stronger F404 engine and a 3D vectoring nozzle.

 

Israel is going to produce its own version domestically from late 2014 on, which will exclusively be used by the IAF. These aircraft will be outfitted with different avionics, built by Elta in Israel, and cater to national requirements which focus more on multi-purpose service, while the USAF focusses with its F-24A on aerial combat and interception tasks.

 

International interest for the F-24A is already there: in late 2013 Grumman stated that initial talks have been made with various countries, and potential export candidates from 2015 on are Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand, Finland, Norway, Australia and Japan.

  

General F-24A characteristics:

Crew: 1 pilot

Length: 47 ft 4 in (14.4 m)

Wingspan: 27 ft 11.9 in / 8.53 m; with wingtip missiles (26 ft 8 in/ 8.13 m; without wingtip missiles)

Height: 13 ft 10 in (4.20 m)

Wing area: 36.55 m² (392 ft²)

Empty weight: 13.150 lb (5.090 kg)

Loaded weight: 15.480 lb (6.830 kg)

Max. take-off weight: 27.530 lb (12.500 kg)

 

Powerplant

1× General Electric F404-GE-402 turbofan with a dry thrust of 11,000 lbf (48.9 kN) and 17,750 lbf (79.2 kN) with afterburner

 

Performance

Maximum speed: Mach 2+

Combat radius: 300 nmi (345 mi, 556 km); for hi-lo-hi mission with 2 × 330 US gal (1,250 L) drop tanks

Ferry range: 1,490 nmi (1715 mi, 2759 km); with 3 × 330 US gal (1,250 L) drop tanks

Service ceiling: 55,000 ft (16,800 m)

Rate of climb: 52,800 ft/min (255 m/s)

Wing loading: 70.0 lb/ft² (342 kg/m²)

Thrust/weight: 1.09 (1.35 with loaded weight & 50% fuel)

 

Armament

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) M199A1 3-barreled Gatling cannon in the lower fuselage with 400 RPG

Eleven external hardpoints (two wingtip tails, six underwing hardpoints, three underfuselage hardpoints) and a total capacity of 11.000 lb (4.994 kg) of missiles (incl. AIM 9 Sidewinder and AIM 120 AMRAAM), bombs, rockets, ECM pods and drop tanks for extended range.

  

The kit and its assembly:

A spontaneous project. This major kitbash was inspired by fellow user nighthunter at whatifmodelers.com, who came up with a profile of a mashed-up US fighter, created “out of boredom”. The original idea was called F-21C, and it was to be a domestic successor to the IAI Kfirs which had been used by the US as aggressor aircraft in USN and USMC service for a few years.

 

As a weird(?) coincidence I had many of the necessary ingredients for this fictional aircraft in store, even though some parts and details were later changed. This model here is an interpretation of the original design. The idea was spun further, and the available parts that finally went into the model also had some influence on design and background.

I thank nighthunter for sharing the early ideas, inviting me to take the design to the hardware stage (sort of…) and adapting my feedback into new design sketches, too, which, in return, inspired the model building process.

 

Well, what went into this thing? To cook up a F-24 à la Dizzyfugu you just need (all in 1:72):

● Fuselage from a Hasegawa X-29, including the cockpit and the landing gear

● Fin and nose cone from an Italeri F-16A

● Inner wings from a (vintage) Hasegawa MiG-21F

● Outer wings from a F-4 (probably a J, Hasegawa or Fujimi)

 

The wing construction deviates from nighthunter’s original idea. The favorite ingredients would have been F-16XL or simple Mirage III wings, but I found the composite wing to be more attractive and “different”. The big F-16XL wings, despite their benefit of a unique shape, might also have created scale/size problems with a F-20 style fuselage? So I built hybrid wings: The MiG-21 landing gear wells were filled with putty and the F-4 outer wings simply glued onto the MiG inner wing sections, which were simply cut down in span. It sounds like an unlikely combo, but these parts fit together almost perfectly! In order to hide the F-4 origins I modified them to carry wingtip launch rails, though, which were also part of nighthunter’s original design.

 

The AAW technology detail mentioned in the background came in handy as it explains the complicated wing shape and the fact that the landing gear retracts into the fuselage, not into the wings, which would have been more plausible… Anyway, there’s still room for a simpler export version, with Mirage III or Kfir C.2/7 wings, and maybe canards?

 

Using the X-29 as basis also made fitting the new wings onto the area-ruled fuselage pretty easy, as I could use the wing root parts from the X-29 to bridge the gap. The original, forward-swept wings were just cut away, and the remains used as consoles for the new hybrid delta wings. Took some SERIOUS putty work, but the result is IMHO fine.

 

The bigger/square X-29 air intakes were taken over, and they change the look of the aircraft, making it look less F-5-ish than a true F-20 fuselage. For the same reason I kept the large fairing at the fin base, combining it with a bigger F-16 tail, though, as a counter-balance to the new, bigger wings. Again, the F-16 fin was/is part of nighthunter’s idea, so the model stays true to the original concept.

 

For the same reason I omitted the original X-29 nose, which is rather pointy, sports vanes and a large sensor boom. The F-16 nose was a plausible choice, as the AN/APG-80 is also carried by late Fighting Falcons, and its shape fits well, too.

 

All around the hull, some small details like radar warning sensors, pitots and air scoops were added. Not really necessary, but such thing add IMHO to the overall impression of such a fictional aircraft beyond the prototype stage.

 

Cockpit and landing gear were taken OOB, I just added a pilot figure and slightly modified the seat.

 

The ordnance was puzzled together from the scrap box, the AIM-9Ls come from the same F-4 kit which donated its outer wings, the AIM-120s come from an Italeri NATO weapons kit. The drop tanks belong to an F-16.

  

Painting and markings:

At first I considered an F-24I in IAF markings, or even a Japanese aircraft, but then reverted to one of nighthunter’s initial, simple ideas: an USAF aircraft in the “Hill II” paint scheme (F-16 style), made up from three shades of gray (FS 36118, 36270 and 36375) with low-viz markings and stencils. Dutch/Turkish NF-5A/Bs in the “Hill II” scheme were used as design benchmarks, too. It’s a simple livery, but on this delta wing aircraft it looks pretty interesting. I used enamels, what I had at hand: Humbrol 127 and 126, and Modelmaster's 1723.

 

A light black ink wash was applied, in order to em,phasize the engraved panel lines, in contrast to that, panels were manually highlighted through dry-brushed, lighter shades of gray (Humbrol 27, 166 and 167).

 

“Hill II” also adds to a generic, realistic touch for this whif. Doing an exotic air force thing is rather easy, but creating a convincing whif for a huge military machinery like the USAF’s takes more subtlety, I think.

 

The cockpit was painted in medium Gray (Dark Gull Grey, FS 36231, Humbrol 140), as well as the radome. The landing gear and the air intakes were painted white. The radome was painted with Revell 47 and dry-brushed with Humbrol 140.

 

Decals were puzzled together from various USAF aircraft, including sheets from an Airfix F-117, an Italeri F-15E and even an Academy OV-10D.

  

Tadah: a hardware tribute to an idea, born from boredom - and the aircraft does not look even bad at all? What I wanted to achieve was to make the F-24 neither look like a F-20, nor a Saab Gripen clone, as the latter comes close in overall shape, size and design.

Thanks for your visit, hope you enjoyed, kindly leave your comment that will be very rewarding

 

Sagrada Família, Barcelona , Spain

 

The Basílica de la Sagrada Família (Catalan: [bəˈzilikə ðə lə səˈɣɾaðə fəˈmiljə]; Spanish: Basílica de la Sagrada Familia; ('Basilica of the Holy Family')), also known as the Sagrada Família, is a large unfinished Roman Catholic minor basilica in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Designed by Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí (1852–1926), his work on the building is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. On 7 November 2010, Pope Benedict XVI consecrated the church and proclaimed it a minor basilica.

 

On 19 March 1882, construction of the Sagrada Família began under architect Francisco de Paula del Villar. In 1883, when Villar resigned, Gaudí took over as chief architect, transforming the project with his architectural and engineering style, combining Gothic and curvilinear Art Nouveau forms. Gaudí devoted the remainder of his life to the project, and he is buried in the crypt. At the time of his death in 1926, less than a quarter of the project was complete.

 

Relying solely on private donations, the Sagrada Família's construction progressed slowly and was interrupted by the Spanish Civil War. In July 1936, revolutionaries set fire to the crypt and broke their way into the workshop, partially destroying Gaudí's original plans, drawings and plaster models, which led to 16 years work to piece together the fragments of the master model. Construction resumed to intermittent progress in the 1950s. Advancements in technologies such as computer aided design and computerized numerical control (CNC) have since enabled faster progress and construction passed the midpoint in 2010. However, some of the project's greatest challenges remain, including the construction of ten more spires, each symbolizing an important Biblical figure in the New Testament. It is anticipated that the building can be completed by 2026, the centenary of Gaudí's death.

     

Enjoy the moment !!!!

 

Notre-Dame de Paris ( French for "Our Lady of Paris"), also known as Notre-Dame Cathedral or simply Notre-Dame, is a historic Catholic cathedral on the eastern half of the Île de la Cité in the fourth arrondissement of Paris, France. The cathedral is widely considered to be one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture, and it is among the largest and most well-known church buildings in the world. The naturalism of its sculptures and stained glass are in contrast with earlier Romanesque architecture.

 

As the cathedral of the Archdiocese of Paris, Notre-Dame is the parish that contains the cathedra, or official chair, of the archbishop of Paris, currently Cardinal André Vingt-Trois. The cathedral treasury is notable for its reliquary which houses some of Catholicism's most important first-class relics including the purported Crown of Thorns, a fragment of the True Cross, and one of the Holy Nails.

 

In the 1790s, Notre-Dame suffered desecration during the radical phase of the French Revolution when much of its religious imagery was damaged or destroyed. An extensive restoration supervised by Eugène Viollet-le-Duc began in 1845. A project of further restoration and maintenance began in 1991.

 

Architecture

Notre-Dame de Paris was among the first buildings in the world to use the flying buttress (arched exterior supports). The building was not originally designed to include the flying buttresses around the choir and nave but after the construction began, the thinner walls (popularized in the Gothic style) grew ever higher and stress fractures began to occur as the walls pushed outward. In response, the cathedral's architects built supports around the outside walls, and later additions continued the pattern.

 

Many small individually crafted statues were placed around the outside to serve as column supports and water spouts. Among these are the famous gargoyles, designed for water run-off, and chimeras. The statues were originally colored as was most of the exterior. The paint has worn off, but the gray stone was once covered with vivid colors. The cathedral was essentially complete by 1345. The cathedral has a narrow climb of 387 steps at the top of several spiral staircases; along the climb it is possible to view its most famous bell and its gargoyles in close quarters, as well as having a spectacular view across Paris when reaching the top. The design of St. Peter's Anglican Cathedral in Adelaide, Australia was inspired by Notre-Dame de Paris.

 

Construction history

 

In 1160, because the church in Paris had become the "Parisian church of the kings of Europe", Bishop Maurice de Sully deemed the previous Paris cathedral, Saint-Étienne (St Stephen's), which had been founded in the 4th century, unworthy of its lofty role, and had it demolished shortly after he assumed the title of Bishop of Paris. As with most foundation myths, this account needs to be taken with a grain of salt; archeological excavations in the 20th century suggested that the Merovingian Cathedral replaced by Sully was itself a massive structure, with a five-aisled nave and a facade some 36m across. It seems likely therefore that the faults with the previous structure were exaggerated by the Bishop to help justify the rebuilding in a newer style. According to legend, Sully had a vision of a glorious new cathedral for Paris, and sketched it on the ground outside the original church.

 

To begin the construction, the bishop had several houses demolished and had a new road built in order to transport materials for the rest of the cathedral. Construction began in 1163 during the reign of Louis VII, and opinion differs as to whether Sully or Pope Alexander III laid the foundation stone of the cathedral. However, both were at the ceremony in question. Bishop de Sully went on to devote most of his life and wealth to the cathedral's construction. Construction of the choir took from 1163 until around 1177 and the new High Altar was consecrated in 1182 (it was normal practice for the eastern end of a new church to be completed first, so that a temporary wall could be erected at the west of the choir, allowing the chapter to use it without interruption while the rest of the building slowly took shape). After Bishop Maurice de Sully's death in 1196, his successor, Eudes de Sully (no relation) oversaw the completion of the transepts and pressed ahead with the nave, which was nearing completion at the time of his own death in 1208. By this stage, the western facade had also been laid out, though it was not completed until around the mid-1240s. Over the construction period, numerous architects worked on the site, as is evidenced by the differing styles at different heights of the west front and towers. Between 1210 and 1220, the fourth architect oversaw the construction of the level with the rose window and the great halls beneath the towers.

 

The most significant change in design came in the mid 13th century, when the transepts were remodeled in the latest Rayonnant style; in the late 1240s Jean de Chelles added a gabled portal to the north transept topped off by a spectacular rose window. Shortly afterwards (from 1258) Pierre de Montreuil executed a similar scheme on the southern transept. Both these transept portals were richly embellished with sculpture; the south portal features scenes from the lives of St Stephen and of various local saints, while the north portal featured the infancy of Christ and the story of Theophilus in the tympanum, with a highly influential statue of the Virgin and Child in the trumeau.

 

Crypt

The Archaeological Crypt of the Paris Notre-Dame was created in 1965 to protect a range of historical ruins, discovered during construction work and spanning from the earliest settlement in Paris to the modern day. The crypts are managed by the Musée Carnavalet and contain a large exhibit, combining detailed models of the architecture of different time periods, and how they can be viewed within the ruins. The main feature still visible is the under-floor heating installed during the Roman occupation.

 

Organ and organists

Though several organs were installed in the cathedral over time, the earliest ones were inadequate for the building.[citation needed] The first more noted organ[citation needed] was finished in the 18th century by the noted builder François-Henri Clicquot. Some of Clicquot's original pipework in the pedal division continues to sound from the organ today. The organ was almost completely rebuilt and expanded in the 19th century by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll.

 

The position of titular organist ("head" or "chief" organist) at Notre-Dame is considered one of the most prestigious organist posts in France, along with the post of titular organist of Saint Sulpice in Paris, Cavaillé-Coll's largest instrument.

 

The organ has 7,374 pipes, with ca 900 classified as historical. It has 110 real stops, five 56-key manuals and a 32-key pedalboard. In December 1992, a two-year restoration of the organ was completed that fully computerized the organ under three LANs (Local Area Networks). The restoration also included a number of additions, notably two further horizontal reed stops en chamade in the Cavaille-Coll style. The Notre-Dame organ is therefore unique in France in having five fully independent reed stops en chamade.

 

Among the best-known organists at Notre-Dame de Paris was Louis Vierne, who held this position from 1900 to 1937. Under his tenure, the Cavaillé-Coll organ was modified in its tonal character, notably in 1902 and 1932. Léonce de Saint-Martin held the post between 1932 and 1954. Pierre Cochereau initiated further alterations (many of which were already planned by Louis Vierne), including the electrification of the action between 1959 and 1963. The original Cavaillé-Coll console, (which is now located near the organ loft), was replaced by a new console in Anglo-American style and the addition of further stops between 1965 and 1972, notably in the pedal division, the recomposition of the mixture stops, a 32' plenum in the Neo-Baroque style on the Solo manual, and finally the adding of three horizontal reed stops "en chamade" in the Iberian style.

 

After Cochereau's sudden death in 1984, four new titular organists were appointed at Notre-Dame in 1985: Jean-Pierre Leguay Olivier Latry, Yves Devernay (who died in 1990), and Philippe Lefebvre This was reminiscent of the 18th-century practice of the cathedral having four titular organists, each one playing for three months of the year.

 

Bells

The cathedral has 10 bells. The largest, Emmanuel, original to 1681, is located in the south tower and weighs just over 13 tons and is tolled to mark the hours of the day and for various occasions and services. This bell is always rung first, at least 5 seconds before the rest. Until recently, there were four additional 19th-century bells on wheels in the north tower, which were swing chimed. These bells were meant to replace nine which were removed from the cathedral during the Revolution and were rung for various services and festivals. The bells were once rung by hand before electric motors allowed them to be rung without manual labor. When it was discovered that the size of the bells could cause the entire building to vibrate, threatening its structural integrity, they were taken out of use. The bells also had external hammers for tune playing from a small clavier.

 

On the night of 24 August 1944 as the Île de la Cité was taken by an advance column of French and Allied armoured troops and elements of the Resistance, it was the tolling of the Emmanuel that announced to the city that its liberation was under way.

 

In early 2012, as part of a €2 million project, the four old bells in the north tower were deemed unsatisfactory and removed. The plan originally was to melt them down and recast new bells from the material. However, a legal challenge resulted in the bells being saved in extremis at the foundry.[11] As of early 2013, they are still merely set aside until their fate is decided. A set of 8 new bells was cast by the same foundry in Normandy that had cast the four in 1856. At the same time, a much larger bell called Marie was cast in the Netherlands—it now hangs with Emmanuel in the south tower. The 9 new bells, which were delivered to the cathedral at the same time (31 January 2013),[12] are designed to replicate.

 

Parked trailer full of crushed cars ready for their final journey to the recycling plant.

A wrecking yard (Australian, New Zealand, and Canadian English), scrapyard (Irish and British English) or junkyard (American English) is the location of a business in dismantling where wrecked or decommissioned vehicles are brought, their usable parts are sold for use in operating vehicles, while the unusable metal parts, known as scrap metal parts, are sold to metal-recycling companies.

 

Other terms include wreck yard, wrecker's yard, salvage yard, breakers yard, dismantler and scrapheap. In the United Kingdom, car salvage yards are known as car breakers, while motorcycle salvage yards are known as bike breakers. In Australia, they are often referred to as 'Wreckers'.

 

The most common type of wreck yards are automobile wreck yards, but junkyards for motorcycles, bicycles, small airplanes and boats exist too.

 

Many salvage yards operate on a local level—when an automobile is severely damaged, has malfunctioned beyond repair, or not worth the repair, the owner may sell it to a junkyard; in some cases—as when the car has become disabled in a place where derelict cars are not allowed to be left—the car owner will pay the wrecker to haul the car away.

 

Salvage yards also buy most of the wrecked, derelict and abandoned vehicles that are sold at auction from police impound storage lots,and often buy vehicles from insurance tow yards as well.

 

The salvage yard will usually tow the vehicle from the location of its purchase to the yard, but occasionally vehicles are driven in. At the salvage yard the automobiles are typically arranged in rows, often stacked on top of one another.

 

Some yards keep inventories in their offices, as to the usable parts in each car, as well as the car's location in the yard. Many yards have computerized inventory systems. About 75% of any given vehicle can be recycled and used for other goods.

 

In recent years it is becoming increasingly common to use satellite part finder services to contact multiple salvage yards from a single source.

 

In the 20th century these were call centres that charged a premium rate for calls and compiled a facsimile that was sent to various salvage yards so they could respond directly if the part was in stock. Many of these are now Web-based with requests for parts being e-mailed instantly.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The Waffenträger (Weapon Carrier) VTS3 “Diana” was a prototype for a wheeled tank destroyer. It was developed by Thyssen-Henschel (later Rheinmetall) in Kassel, Germany, in the late Seventies, in response to a German Army requirement for a highly mobile tank destroyer with the firepower of the Leopard 1 main battle tank then in service and about to be replaced with the more capable Leopard 2 MBT, but less complex and costly. The main mission of the Diana was light to medium territorial defense, protection of infantry units and other, lighter, elements of the cavalry as well as tactical reconnaissance. Instead of heavy armor it would rather use its good power-to-weight ratio, excellent range and cross-country ability (despite the wheeled design) for defense and a computerized fire control system to accomplish this mission.

 

In order to save development cost and time, the vehicle was heavily based on the Spähpanzer Luchs (Lynx), a new German 8x8 amphibious reconnaissance armored fighting vehicle that had just entered Bundeswehr service in 1975. The all-wheel drive Luchs made was well armored against light weapons, had a full NBC protection system and was characterized by its extremely low-noise running. The eight large low-pressure tires had run-flat properties, and, at speeds up to about 50 km/h, all four axles could be steered, giving the relatively large vehicle a surprising agility and very good off-road performance. As a special feature, the vehicle was equipped with a rear-facing driver with his own driving position (normally the radio operator), so that the vehicle could be driven at full speed into both directions – a heritage from German WWII designs, and a tactical advantage when the vehicle had to quickly retreat from tactical position after having been detected. The original Luchs weighed less than 20 tons, was fully amphibious and could surmount water obstacles quickly and independently using propellers at the rear and the fold back trim vane at the front. Its armament was relatively light, though, a 20 mm Rheinmetall MK 20 Rh 202 gun in the turret that was effective against both ground and air targets.

 

The Waffenträger “Diana” used the Luchs’ hull and dynamic components as basis, and Thyssen-Henschel solved the challenge to mount a large and heavy 105 mm L7 gun with its mount on the light chassis through a minimalistic, unmanned mount and an autoloader. Avoiding a traditional manned and heavy, armored turret, a lot of weight and internal volume that had to be protected could be saved, and crew safety was indirectly improved, too. This concept had concurrently been tested in the form of the VTS1 (“Versuchsträger Scheitellafette #1) experimental tank in 1976 for the Kampfpanzer 3 development, which eventually led to the Leopard 2 MBT (which retained a traditional turret, though).

 

For the “Diana” test vehicle, Thyssen-Henschel developed a new low-profile turret with a very small frontal area. Two crew members, the commander (on the right side) and the gunner (to the left), were seated in/under the gun mount, completely inside of the vehicle’s hull. The turret was a very innovative construction for its time, fully stabilized and mounted the proven 105mm L7 rifled cannon with a smoke discharger. Its autoloader contained 8 rounds in a carousel magazine. 16 more rounds could be carried in the hull, but they had to be manually re-loaded into the magazine, which was only externally accessible. A light, co-axial 7,62mm machine gun against soft targets was available, too, as well as eight defensive smoke grenade mortars.

 

The automated L7 had a rate of fire of ten rounds per minute and could fire four types of ammunition: a kinetic energy penetrator to destroy armored vehicles; a high explosive anti-tank round to destroy thin-skinned vehicles and provide anti-personnel fragmentation; a high explosive plastic round to destroy bunkers, machine gun and sniper positions, and create openings in walls for infantry to access; and a canister shot for use against dismounted infantry in the open or for smoke charges. The rounds to be fired could be pre-selected, so that the gun was able to automatically fire a certain ammunition sequence, but manual round selection was possible at any time, too.

 

In order to take the new turret, the Luchs hull had to be modified. Early calculations had revealed that a simple replacement of the Luchs’ turret with the new L7 mount would have unfavorably shifted the vehicle’s center of gravity up- and forward, making it very nose-heavy and hard to handle in rough terrain or at high speed, and the long barrel would have markedly overhung the front end, impairing handling further. It was also clear that the additional weight and the rise of the CoG made amphibious operations impossible - a fate that met the upgraded Luchs recce tanks in the Eighties, too, after several accidents with overturned vehicles during wading and drowned crews. With this insight the decision was made to omit the vehicle’s amphibious capability, save weight and complexity, and to modify the vehicle’s layout considerably to optimize the weight distribution.

 

Taking advantage of the fact that the Luchs already had two complete driver stations at both ends, a pair of late-production hulls were set aside in 1977 and their internal layout reversed. The engine bay was now in the vehicle’s front, the secured ammunition storage was placed next to it, behind the separate driver compartment, and the combat section with the turret mechanism was located behind it. Since the VTS3s were only prototypes, only minimal adaptations were made. This meant that the driver was now located on the right side of the vehicle, while and the now-rear-facing secondary driver/radio operator station ended up on the left side – much like a RHD vehicle – but this was easily accepted in the light of cost and time savings. As a result, the gun and its long, heavy barrel were now located above the vehicle’s hull, so that the overall weight distribution was almost neutral and overall dimensions remained compact.

 

Both test vehicles were completed in early 1978 and field trials immediately started. While the overall mobility was on par with the Luchs and the Diana’s high speed and low noise profile was highly appreciated, the armament was and remained a source of constant concern. Shooting in motion from the Diana turned out to be very problematic, and even firing from a standstill was troublesome. The gun mount and the vehicle’s complex suspension were able to "hold" the recoil of the full-fledged 105-mm tank gun, which had always been famous for its rather large muzzle energy. But when fired, even in the longitudinal plane, the vehicle body fell heavily towards the stern, so that the target was frequently lost and aiming had to be resumed – effectively negating the benefit from the autoloader’s high rate of fire and exposing the vehicle to potential target retaliation. Firing to the side was even worse. Several attempts were made to mend this flaw, but neither the addition of a muzzle brake, stronger shock absorbers and even hydro-pneumatic suspension elements did not solve the problem. In addition, the high muzzle flames and the resulting significant shockwave required the infantry to stay away from the vehicle intended to support them. The Bundeswehr also criticized the too small ammunition load, as well as the fact that the autoloader magazine could not be re-filled under armor protection, so that the vehicle had to retreat to safe areas to re-arm and/or to adapt to a new mission profile. This inherent flaw not only put the crew under the hazards of enemy fire, it also negated the vehicle’s NBC protection – a serious issue and likely Cold War scenario. Another weak point was the Diana’s weight: even though the net gain of weight compared with the Luchs was less than 3 tons after the conversion, this became another serious problem that led to the Diana’s demise: during trials the Bundeswehr considered the possibility to airlift the Diana, but its weight (even that of the Luchs, BTW) was too much for the Luftwaffe’s biggest own transport aircraft, the C-160 Transall. Even aircraft from other NATO members, e.g. the common C-130 Hercules, could hardly carry the vehicle. In theory, equipment had to be removed, including the cannon and parts of its mount.

 

Since the tactical value of the vehicle was doubtful and other light anti-tank weapons in the form of the HOT anti-tank missile had reached operational status, so that very light vehicles and even small infantry groups could now effectively fight against full-fledged enemy battle tanks from a safe distance, the Diana’s development was stopped in 1988. Both VTS3 prototypes were mothballed, stored at the Bundeswehr Munster Training Area camp and are still waiting to be revamped as historic exhibits alongside other prototypes like the Kampfpanzer 70 in the German Tank Museum located there, too.

  

Specifications:

Crew: 4 (commander, driver, gunner, radio operator/second driver)

Weight: 22.6 t

Length: 7.74 m (25 ft 4 ¼ in)

Width: 2.98 m ( 9 ft 9 in)

Height: XXX

Ground clearance: 440 mm (1 ft 4 in)

Suspension: hydraulic all-wheel drive and steering

 

Armor:

Unknown, but sufficient to withstand 14.5 mm AP rounds

 

Performance:

Speed: 90 km/h (56 mph) on roads

Operational range: 720 km (445 mi)

Power/weight: 13,3 hp/ton with petrol, 17,3 hp/ton with diesel

 

Engine:

1× Daimler Benz OM 403A turbocharged 10-cylinder 4-stroke multi-fuel engine,

delivering 300 hp with petrol, 390 hp with diesel

 

Armament:

1× 105 mm L7 rifled gun with autoloader (8 rounds ready, plus 16 in reserve)

1× co-axial 7.92 mm M3 machine gun with 2.000 rounds

Two groups of four Wegmann 76 mm smoke mortars

  

The kit and its assembly:

I have been a big Luchs fan since I witnessed one in action during a public Bundeswehr demo day when I was around 10 years old: a huge, boxy and futuristic vehicle with strange proportions, gigantic wheels, water propellers, a mind-boggling mobility and all of this utterly silent. Today you’d assume that this vehicle had an electric engine – spooky! So I always had a soft spot for it, and now it was time and a neat occasion to build a what-if model around it.

 

This fictional wheeled tank prototype model was spawned by a leftover Revell 1:72 Luchs kit, which I had bought some time ago primarily for the turret, used in a fictional post-WWII SdKfz. 234 “Puma” conversion. With just the chassis left I wondered what other use or equipment it might take, and, after several weeks with the idea in the back of my mind, I stumbled at Silesian Models over an M1128 resin conversion set for the Trumpeter M1126 “Stryker” 8x8 APC model. From this set as potential donor for a conversion the prototype idea with an unmanned turret was born.

 

Originally I just planned to mount the new turret onto the OOB hull, but when playing with the parts I found the look with an overhanging gun barrel and the bigger turret placed well forward on the hull goofy and unbalanced. I was about to shelf the idea again, until I recognized that the Luchs’ hull is almost symmetrical – the upper hull half could be easily reversed on the chassis tub (at least on the kit…), and this would allow much better proportions. From this conceptual change the build went straightforward, reversing the upper hull only took some minor PSR. The resin turret was taken mostly OOB, it only needed a scratched adapter to fit into the respective hull opening. I just added a co-axial machine gun fairing, antenna bases (from the Luchs kit, since they could, due to the long gun barrel, not be attached to the hull anymore) and smoke grenade mortars (also taken from the Luchs).

 

An unnerving challenge became the Luchs kit’s suspension and drive train – it took two days to assemble the vehicle’s underside alone! While this area is very accurate and delicate, the fact that almost EVERY lever and stabilizer is a separate piece on four(!) axles made the assembly a very slow process. Just for reference: the kit comes with three and a half sprues. A full one for the wheels (each consists of three parts, and more than another one for suspension and drivetrain!

Furthermore, the many hull surface details like tools or handles – these are more than a dozen bits and pieces – are separate, very fragile and small (tiny!), too. Cutting all these wee parts out and cleaning them was a tedious affair, too, plus painting them separately.

Otherwise the model went together well, but it’s certainly not good for quick builders and those with big fingers and/or poor sight.

  

Painting and markings:

The paint scheme was a conservative choice; it is a faithful adaptation of the Bundeswehr’s NATO standard camouflage for the European theatre of operations that was introduced in the Eighties. It was adopted by many armies to confuse potential aggressors from the East, so that observers could not easily identify a vehicle and its nationality. It consists of a green base with red-brown and black blotches, in Germany it was executed with RAL tones, namely 6031 (Bronze Green), 8027 (Leather Brown) and 9021 (Tar Black). The pattern was standardized for each vehicle type and I stuck to the official Luchs pattern, trying to adapt it to the new/bigger turret. I used Revell acrylic paints, since the authentic RAL tones are readily available in this product range (namely the tones 06, 65 and 84). The big tires were painted with Revell 09 (Anthracite).

 

Next the model was treated with a highly thinned washing with black and red-brown acrylic paint, before decals were applied, taken from the OOB sheet and without unit markings, since the Diana would represent a test vehicle. After sealing them with a thin coat of clear varnish the model was furthermore treated with lightly dry-brushed Revell 45 and 75 to emphasize edges and surface details, and the separately painted hull equipment was mounted. The following step was a cloudy treatment with watercolors (from a typical school paintbox, it’s great stuff for weathering!), simulating dust residue all over the hull. After a final protective coat with matt acrylic varnish I finally added some mineral artist pigments to the lower hull areas and created mud crusts on the wheels through light wet varnish traces into which pigments were “dusted”.

  

Basically a simple project, but the complex Luchs kit with its zillion of wee bits and pieces took time and cost some nerves. However, the result looks pretty good, and the Stryker turret blends well into the overall package. Not certain how realistic the swap of the Luchs’ internal layout would have been, but I think that the turret moved to the rear makes more sense than the original forward position? After all, the model is supposed to be a prototype, so there’s certainly room for creative freedom. And in classic Bundeswehr colors, the whole thing even looks pretty convincing.

 

Western section of the San Francisco- Oakland Bay bridge. Connecting to Yerba Buena Island on the left.

Public light show installation (2013)

On March 5, 2013, a public art installation called "The Bay Lights" was activated on the western span's vertical cables. The installation was designed by artist Leo Villareal and consists of 25,000 LED lights. It will be on display nightly until 2015.[36] In order to reduce driver distractions, the privately funded display is not visible to users of the bridge, only to distant observers. This lighting effort is intended to form part of a larger project to "light the bay"[37] Villareal used various algorithms to generate patterns such as rainfall, reflections on water, bird flight, expanding rings, and others. Villareal's patterns and transitions will be sequenced and their duration determined by computerized random number generator to make each viewing experience unique.[38] Owing to the efficiency of the LED system the estimated operating cost is only US $15.00 per night.

 

All rights reserved - Copyright 2014© Henri Louis Hirschfeld

All images are exclusive property and may not be copied, downloaded, reproduced, transmitted, manipulated or used in any way without expressed, written permission of the photographer.

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the model, the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some background:

The T-54 and T-55 tanks were a series of Soviet main battle tanks introduced in the years following the Second World War. The first T-54 prototype was completed at Nizhny Tagil by the end of 1945. Initial production ramp up settled for 1947 at Nizhny Tagil, and 1948 for Kharkiv were halted and curtailed as many problems were uncovered; the T-34-85 still accounted for 88 percent of production through the 1950s.The T-54 eventually became the main tank for armored units of the Soviet Army, armies of the Warsaw Pact countries, and many others. T-54s and T-55s have been involved in many of the world's armed conflicts since the later part of the 20th century.

 

The T-54/55 series eventually became the most-produced tank in history. Estimated production numbers for the series range from 86,000 to 100,000. They were replaced by the T-62, T-64, T-72, T-80 and T-90 tanks in the Soviet and Russian armies but remain in use by up to 50 other armies worldwide, some having received sophisticated retrofitting.

The T-54/55 tanks were mechanically simple and robust, very simple to operate compared to Western tanks, and did not require a high level of training or education in their crew members. The T-54/55 was a relatively small main battle tank, presenting a smaller target for its opponents to hit. The tanks had good mobility thanks to their relatively light weight (which permitted easy transport by rail or flatbed truck and allowed crossing of lighter bridges), wide tracks (which gave lower ground pressure and hence good mobility on soft ground), a good cold-weather start-up system and a snorkel that allowed river crossings.

 

By the standards of the 1950s, the T-54 was an excellent tank combining lethal firepower, excellent armor protection and good reliability while remaining a significantly smaller and lighter tank than its NATO contemporaries—the US M48 Patton tank and the British Centurion tank. The 100 mm D-10T tank gun of the T-54 and the T-55 was also more powerful than its Western counterparts at that time (the M48 Patton initially carried a 90 mm tank gun and the Centurion Mk. 3 carried the 20-pounder (84 mm) tank gun). This advantage lasted until the T-54 began to be countered by newer Western developments like the M60 main battle tank and upgraded Centurions and M48 Pattons using the 105 mm rifled Royal Ordnance L7 or M68 gun. Due to the lack of a sub-caliber round for the 100 mm gun, and the tank's simple fire-control system, the T-54/55 was forced to rely on HEAT shaped-charge ammunition to engage tanks at long range well into the 1960s, despite the relative inaccuracy of this ammunition at long ranges. The Soviets considered this acceptable for a potential European conflict, until the development of composite armor began reducing the effectiveness of HEAT warheads and sabot rounds were developed for the D-10T gun.

 

T-54/55 tanks also had their drawbacks. Small size was achieved at the expense of interior space and ergonomics, which caused practical difficulties, as it constrained the physical movements of the crew and slowed operation of controls and equipment. This was a common trait of most Soviet tanks and hence height limits were set for certain tank crew positions in the Soviet Army.

The low turret profile of the tanks prevented them from depressing their main guns by more than 5° since the breech would strike the ceiling when fired, which limited the ability to cover terrain by fire from a hull-down position on a reverse slope – a tactical flaw that became apparent (and costly) during the Arab-Israeli the Six-Day War. As in most tanks of that generation, the internal ammunition supply was not shielded, increasing the risk that any enemy penetration of the fighting compartment could cause a catastrophic secondary explosion. The original T-54 lacked NBC protection, a revolving turret floor (which complicated the crew's operations), and early models lacked gun stabilization. All of these problems were corrected in the otherwise largely identical T-55 tank.

Together, the T-54/55 tanks have been manufactured in the tens of thousands, and many still remain in reserve, or even in front-line use among lower-technology fighting forces. Abundance and age together make these tanks cheap and easy to purchase. While the T-54/55 is not a match for a modern main battle tank, armor and ammunition upgrades could dramatically improve the old vehicle's performance to the point that it cannot be dismissed on the battlefield.

 

During the Cold War, Soviet tanks never directly faced their NATO adversaries in combat in Europe, but it became involved in many other local conflicts. For instance, the Israeli army fought against it during the Six-Day War in 1967, and many Egyptian and Syrian T-54/55s were captured. Their numbers were so great that they were repaired, modernized and even put into IDF service or exported - around 200 T-54s, T-55s and PT-76s fell into Israeli hands at that time. T-54s and T-55s were modernized to Tiran 4 or 5 standard prior to the Yom Kippur War, some outfitted with a NATO-compatible Sharir (Royal Ordnance L7) 105 mm gun and other Western equipment and weapons.

 

During the Yom Kippur War in 1973, Israel captured additional T-54s and T-55s, and these new vehicles led to the Ti-51 MBT (also known as “Tiran 51”)and some minor variants. This time the modifications were more thorough and included fitting an American Detroit Diesel engine, new semi-automatic hydromechanical transmission equipped with a torque converter and new air cleaners. Blazer explosive reactive armor was added to the hull and turret, a Cadillac-Gage-Textron gun stabilization system was integrated as well as an EL-OP Matador computerized fire control system. Further changes included a new low-profile commander's cupola, IR detectors, Image-intensifier night vision equipment for the commander, gunner and driver, Spectronix fire detection and suppression system, new turret basket, extensive external stowage, modernized driver's station including replacement of tillers by a steering wheel, new final drives, new all-internal fuel system and improved suspension. Basically, the T-54/55 hull was filled with new equipment, creating an almost new and different MBT! Some of these tanks were also outfitted with a detachable dozer blade and designated Ti-51Sh.

 

A small series of the captured Yom Kippur War tanks was furthermore re-built as so-called Ti-52s during 1974 and 1975. This program was focused on recycling T-54 and T-55 hulls that had damaged turrets or main weapons. The upgrade centered around an American 90 mm M41 cannon with a T-shaped blast deflector as new main armament, a weapon that was available in abundance after the IDF’s gun uprating of its M48 Patton tanks to the bigger L7 gun. For the Ti-52 a new, welded turret was devised, tailored to the M41 gun and its M87 mount. It was longer but narrower than the original T-54/55 turtle shell turret, but kept its low profile, and it featured prominent storage boxes at the sides and at the back that made it look outwardly bigger than it actually was. The turret had a 360° manual and electric-hydraulic traverse, (24°/sec) and the gun could be depressed to -9° and elevated to +19°. 60 rounds were carried (Fifteen in the turret, the rest in the hull). Beyond standard HE and AP ammunition types, a special HVAP round with a muzzle velocity of 3,750 ft/s (1,140 m/s) was available, too, with a maximum penetration of 15 in (380 mm) of vertical armor at 30 ft and still 9½ in (241 mm) at 2.000 yards. This was complemented by a coaxial heavy Browning .50 cal (12.7 mm) machine gun with 500 rounds (plus 500 more in reserve), a weapon that has proven to be useful and effective in asymmetric warfare. An additional .30 AA machine gun on a swivel mount and with 5.000 rounds in store was placed on the turret roof, next to the commander cupola.

The main automotive upgrade was the replacement of the original V12-W-55 engine with 560 hp with the proven American Detroit Diesel 8V-71T developing 609 hp that had already been used for other Tiran conversions. With a slightly better power/weaight ration than the original T-55 (the lighter turret and engine saved around 2 tons), performanca and handling of the Ti-52 were improved.

Other modifications included a laser rangefinder placed over the barrel, thermal/night sights for the gunner and commander, a computerized FCS, new radio equipment, complete NBC protection lining and anti-RPG rubber side skirts that also suppressed dust clouds while on the move as well as German-made smoke dischargers.

 

These upgraded vehicles entered service in 1975. With the conversion and different systems came a new role: The Ti-52s went from being an MBT to a tank destroyer and scout/reconnaissance vehicle. The Ti-52 was an ‘ambush predator’ and would use its small size, low profile and good maneuverability to outflank the enemy, engage, and then withdraw along pre-arranged lanes of engagement. The Ti-52 was unofficially nicknamed “עקרב/Ak'rav” (Scorpion) and became a successful conversion, but by the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s, the tank (just like the other Israeli Tiran versions as well as the original T-54/55 family) had become obsolete. Its gun simply did not have the penetrative power to combat modern armored fighting vehicles. Nevertheless, the tank served the Israeli Army well for 15 years, and it was used in combat during the 1982 Lebanon War, where it proved to be highly effective if its tactical strengths of speed and low profile could be exploited. In direct open-field confrontation it turned out to be vulnerable, esp. to dedicated anti-tank weapons of the time (AT-3 Sagger and RPG-7).

 

All Tirans of various versions were withdrawn from active IDF service at the end of the 1980s. Some were sold and some were converted into Achzarit APCs. However, some Tirans are still in possession of the Israeli Army, possibly in reserve or in storage. The Israeli Army had 488 Tirans in 1990, 300 in 1995, 200 in 2000, 2001 and 2002 and still 261 in 2006 and 2008.

  

Specifications:

Crew: Four (commander, gunner, loader, driver)

Weight: 34 tonnes (37.5 ST)

Length: 8,42 m (27 ft 7 in) with gun forward

6,37 m (20ft 10 1/2 in) hull only

Width: 3.53 m (11 ft 6 3/4 in) with side skirts

3.37 m (11 ft 1 in) hull only

Height: 2.73 m (9 ft)

Ground clearance: 0.425 m (16.73 in)

Suspension: Torsion bar

Fuel capacity: 580 l internal, plus 320 l external and 400 l in two jettisonable rear drums

 

Armor:

16 – 120 mm (0.63 – 4.72 in)

 

Performance:

Maximum road speed: 54 km/h (33.5 mph)

Off-road speed: 38 km/h (24 mph)

Operational range: 500 km on road

Up to 715 km with two 200-liter auxiliary fuel tanks

Power/weight: 17.9 hp (12.9 kW)/tonne

 

Engine:

1× American Detroit Diesel 8V-71T with 609 hp (438 kW)

 

Transmission:

Mechanical [synchromesh], 5 forward, 1 reverse gears

 

Armament:

1× 90mm M41/T139 gun with 60 rounds

1x coaxial .50 cal (12.7 mm) machine gun with a total of 1.000 rounds

1x .30 AA machine gun on a swivel mount with a total of 5.000 rounds

2x4 smoke grenade launchers

 

The kit and its assembly:

This is actually the second submissiion to the "Captured!" group build at whatifmodellers.com in November 2020, but since my first project stalled (waiting for parts that I ordered while building) I started this second tank and it made very quick progress.

 

Thsi what-if model has a concrete background: Israel captured during the Six Day War and the Yom Kippur conflict a lot of various Arabian tanks, including T-54/55s, PT-76s and T-62. Their numbers were so huge that many were converted on a serial basis and adopted into Israeli service or exported. So, this one became one of those modified T-55s with a new turret/gun, ERA and anti-RPG rubber side skirts. Inspiration was a little the Austrian "Kürassier" tank hunter, and the idea that many surplus 90 mm guns from upgraded M48 Patton tanks must have been available. So, why not combine everything into a dedicated IDF tank hunter?

 

The basis is a Trumpeter kit which went together well, just some PSR was necessary around the rear. I omitted the extra fuel drums (Israel is a rather small country...) and added some ERA plates to the front glacis plate. The biggest change is a different turret and mudguards, which come from an upgraded, late Danish M41 Walker Bulldog conversion set from S&S Models. It consists of a resin turret and many white metal parts, including the gun and the mantlet, the side skirts and some other stuff. The set is actually intended for a diecast M41 (Amercom/Altaya, Hobbymaster or Warmaster) as basis, but the parts were easy to integrate into the T-55 hull. The turret ring is a little smaller, so that a few spacers hold the new turret in place. The turret itself was taken OOB (including the smoke grenade dischargers), I just added the light machine gun and the swivel mount on the roof. IIRC, they are leftover pieces from an Italeri Merkava (very suitable!). The white metal mantlet and the resin turret were "bridged" with a woven dust cover, made from tissue paper dipped in white glue.

 

Themudguards are white metal pieces and needed some tailoring to fit at the front. They are actually a little too short for the T-55 hull, but taken "as is" they offered a nice opening for the drive sprocket wheels at the rear, and I settled for this simple solution.

  

Painting and markings:

Painting was done with paints from the rattle can - I chose a "Sinai Grey" livery for operations in the Southern regions (in the North, IDF tanks tend to be painted olive drab). After the base coat in two very similar shades of dark sand /RAL 7008 and 8000) the model received a black ink washing and dry-brushing with khaki drill (Humbrol 72) and later some light grey (Revell 75); the camouflage nets in the storage baskets were painted in olive drab (Humbrol 155) for some contrast.

The markings/decals come from a generic IDF markings set from Peddinghaus Decals. The Israeli marking system entered service after 1960 and it is still used today by the IDF, even if the meanings of some symbols are still unknown or unclear.

The white stripes on the cannon barrel identify which battalion the tank belongs to. If the tank belongs to the 1st Battalion, it only has one stripe on the barrel, if it is the 2nd Battalion, it has two stripes, and so on.

The company the tank belongs to is determined by a white Chevron, a white ‘V’ shaped symbol painted on the sides of the vehicle sometimes with a black outline. If the M-50 belonged to the 1st Company, the Chevron was pointing downwards, if the tank belonged to the 2nd Company, the ‘V’ was pointing forward. If the Chevron was pointed upwards, the vehicle belonged to the 3rd Company, and, if it pointed backward it belonged to the 4th Company.

The company identification markings have different sizes according to the space a tank has on its sides. The M48 Patton had these symbols painted on the turret and were quite big, while the Centurion had them painted on the side skirts. The Shermans had little space on the sides, and therefore, the company identification markings were painted on the side boxes, or in some cases, on the sides of the gun mantlet.

The platoon identification markings are written on the turrets and are divided in two: a number from 1 to 4 and one of the first four letters of the Hebrew alphabet: א (Aleph), ב (bet), ג (gimel) and ד (dalet ). The Arabic number, from 1 to 4, indicates the platoon to which a tank belongs to and the letter, the tank number inside each platoon. Tank number 1 of the 1st Platoon would have painted on the turret the symbol ‘1א’, tank number 2 of 3rd Platoon would have painted on the turret the symbol ‘3ב’, and so on. The platoon’s command tank only has the number without the letter, or in rare cases, the platoon commander has א, i.e. the first tank of the platoon.

 

Once painting and decals were done, the kit received an overall coat with matt acrylic varnish and final assembly started - namely the attempt to mount the wheels and tracks inside/thorugh the mudguards. Fiddly affair, but it worked better than expected, and as a final step I dusted the model with sand-grey mineral artist pigments.

Landmark Accomplishments:

Longest highway tunnel in North America (13,300' or 2.5 miles).

Longest combined rail and highway use tunnel in North America.

First U.S. tunnel with jet turbine and portal fan ventilation.

First computerized regulation of both rail and highway traffic.

First tunnel designed for -40° F. and 150 mph winds.

Portal buildings designed to withstand avalanches

This was taken at the southwest corner of Broadway & 91st Street...

 

Note: this photo was published in a Jan 1, 2010 blog titled "Quad Band Dual SIM Cellphone – Slim Touchscreen Mobile (Black)." It was also published in a Jun 7, 2010 Technologeek blog, with the same title that I used as the caption on this Flickr page. And it was published in an Aug 16, 2010 Exotic Pet Information blog, with the same title that I used as the caption on this Flickr page. It was also published in a Dec 9, 2010 blog titled "What are the top ten best cellphones in the United States, besides the iPhone?"

 

Moving into 2011, the photo was published in an Apr 9, 2011 blog titled "Oktoberfest takes Cambridge’s portable stage."

 

***********************************

 

Looking back on some old photos from 40-50 years ago, I was struck by how visible the differences were between the culture of then, versus the culture of now. In some cases, it was evident from the things people wore, or carried, or did, back then which they no longer do today. But sometimes it was the opposite: things that didn't exist back in the 1960s and 1970s have become a pervasive part of today's culture.

 

A good example is the cellphone: 20 years ago, it simply didn't exist. Even ten years ago, it was a relatively uncommon sight, and usually only on major streets of big cities. Today, of course, cell phones are everywhere, and everyone is using them in a variety of culture contexts.

 

However, I don't think this is a permanent phenomenon; after all, if you think back to the early 1980s, you probably would have seen a lot of people carrying Sony Walkmans, or "boom-box" portable radios -- all of which have disappeared...

 

If Moore's Law (which basically says that computers double in power every 18 months) holds up for another decade, then we'll have computerized gadgets approximately 100 times smaller, faster, cheaper, and better -- which means far better integration of music, camera, messaging, and phone, but also the possibility of the devices being so tiny that they're embedded into our eyeglasses, our earrings, or a tattoo on our forehead.

 

So the point of this album is to provide a frame of reference -- so that we can (hopefully) look back 10-20 years from now, and say, "Wasn't it really weird that we behaved in such bizarre ways while we interacted with those primitive devices?"

The Ghost of Cassiopeia

 

This is IC 63 to the right (the Ghost Nebula) along with its companion IC 59 to the left. These lie 550 light years from earth in the constellation Cassiopeia. You may have noticed this constellation near the Milky Way in the northeast sky, it forms a "W" that is often used as a pointer to find the Andromeda Galaxy. The very bright star is Gamma Cassiopeiae, it is 19 times more massive than our sun and is 65,000 times brighter. It is a variable star that rotates at incredible speed that creates eruptions of mass into a surrounding disc. The mass loss is related to the brightness variations.

 

A most challenging object to process once the imaging data is obtained due to the bright star. It is a 2 component nebula both emission (light it emits) and reflection light from the star. It is non typical in photography capture as I used my red, green and blue broadband filters along with the hydrogen alpha narrowband. It's about 7 hours of time on the rgb filters split evenly and maybe 4 of ha narrowband. The rgb data was on 3 minute exposures and the ha on 5 minutes.

 

I learned to do a computerized meridian flip on the telescope so now my imaging plans are fully automated which means I can set it up, get it going and sleep while it takes photos.

Two Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II fighter jets have successfully landed on board HMS Queen Elizabeth for the first time, laying the foundations for the next 50 years of fixed wing aviation in support of the UK’s Carrier Strike Capability.

 

Royal Navy Commander, Nathan Gray, 41, made history by being the first to land on board HMS Queen Elizabeth, carefully maneuvering his stealth jet onto the thermal coated deck. He was followed by Squadron Leader Andy Edgell, RAF, both of whom are test pilots, operating with the Integrated Test Force (ITF) based at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland.

 

Shortly afterwards, once a deck inspection has been conducted and the all-clear given, Cmdr Gray became the first pilot to take off using the ship’s ski-ramp.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II is a family of single-seat, single-engine, all-weather, stealth, fifth-generation, multirole combat aircraft, designed for ground-attack and air-superiority missions. It is built by Lockheed Martin and many subcontractors, including Northrop Grumman, Pratt & Whitney, and BAE Systems.

 

The F-35 has three main models: the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A (CTOL), the short take-off and vertical-landing F-35B (STOVL), and the catapult-assisted take-off but arrested recovery, carrier-based F-35C (CATOBAR). The F-35 descends from the Lockheed Martin X-35, the design that was awarded the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program over the competing Boeing X-32. The official Lightning II name has proven deeply unpopular and USAF pilots have nicknamed it Panther, instead.

 

The United States principally funds F-35 development, with additional funding from other NATO members and close U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom, Italy, Australia, Canada, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, and formerly Turkey. These funders generally receive subcontracts to manufacture components for the aircraft; for example, Turkey was the sole supplier of several F-35 parts until its removal from the program in July 2019. Several other countries have ordered, or are considering ordering, the aircraft.

 

As the largest and most expensive military program ever, the F-35 became the subject of much scrutiny and criticism in the U.S. and in other countries. In 2013 and 2014, critics argued that the plane was "plagued with design flaws", with many blaming the procurement process in which Lockheed was allowed "to design, test, and produce the F-35 all at the same time," instead of identifying and fixing "defects before firing up its production line". By 2014, the program was "$163 billion over budget [and] seven years behind schedule". Critics also contend that the program's high sunk costs and political momentum make it "too big to kill".

 

The F-35 first flew on 15 December 2006. In July 2015, the United States Marines declared its first squadron of F-35B fighters ready for deployment. However, the DOD-based durability testing indicated the service life of early-production F-35B aircraft is well under the expected 8,000 flight hours, and may be as low as 2,100 flight hours. Lot 9 and later aircraft include design changes but service life testing has yet to occur. The U.S. Air Force declared its first squadron of F-35As ready for deployment in August 2016. The U.S. Navy declared its first F-35Cs ready in February 2019. In 2018, the F-35 made its combat debut with the Israeli Air Force.

 

The U.S. stated plan is to buy 2,663 F-35s, which will provide the bulk of the crewed tactical airpower of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps in coming decades. Deliveries of the F-35 for the U.S. military are scheduled until 2037 with a projected service life up to 2070.

 

Development

 

F-35 development started in 1992 with the origins of the Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and was to culminate in full production by 2018. The X-35 first flew on 24 October 2000 and the F-35A on 15 December 2006.

 

The F-35 was developed to replace most US fighter jets with the variants of a single design that would be common to all branches of the military. It was developed in co-operation with a number of foreign partners, and, unlike the F-22 Raptor, intended to be available for export. Three variants were designed: the F-35A (CTOL), the F-35B (STOVL), and the F-35C (CATOBAR). Despite being intended to share most of their parts to reduce costs and improve maintenance logistics, by 2017, the effective commonality was only 20%. The program received considerable criticism for cost overruns during development and for the total projected cost of the program over the lifetime of the jets.

 

By 2017, the program was expected to cost $406.5 billion over its lifetime (i.e. until 2070) for acquisition of the jets, and an additional $1.1 trillion for operations and maintenance. A number of design deficiencies were alleged, such as: carrying a small internal payload; performance inferior to the aircraft being replaced, particularly the F-16; lack of safety in relying on a single engine; and flaws such as the vulnerability of the fuel tank to fire and the propensity for transonic roll-off (wing drop). The possible obsolescence of stealth technology was also criticized.

  

Design

 

Overview

 

Although several experimental designs have been developed since the 1960s, such as the unsuccessful Rockwell XFV-12, the F-35B is to be the first operational supersonic STOVL stealth fighter. The single-engine F-35 resembles the larger twin-engined Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, drawing design elements from it. The exhaust duct design was inspired by the General Dynamics Model 200, proposed for a 1972 supersonic VTOL fighter requirement for the Sea Control Ship.

 

Lockheed Martin has suggested that the F-35 could replace the USAF's F-15C/D fighters in the air-superiority role and the F-15E Strike Eagle in the ground-attack role. It has also stated the F-35 is intended to have close- and long-range air-to-air capability second only to that of the F-22 Raptor, and that the F-35 has an advantage over the F-22 in basing flexibility and possesses "advanced sensors and information fusion".

 

Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on 25 March 2009, acquisition deputy to the assistant secretary of the Air Force, Lt. Gen. Mark D. "Shack" Shackelford, stated that the F-35 is designed to be America's "premier surface-to-air missile killer, and is uniquely equipped for this mission with cutting-edge processing power, synthetic aperture radar integration techniques, and advanced target recognition".

 

Improvements

Ostensible improvements over past-generation fighter aircraft include:

 

Durable, low-maintenance stealth technology, using structural fiber mat instead of the high-maintenance coatings of legacy stealth platforms

Integrated avionics and sensor fusion that combine information from off- and on-board sensors to increase the pilot's situational awareness and improve target identification and weapon delivery, and to relay information quickly to other command and control (C2) nodes

High-speed data networking including IEEE 1394b and Fibre Channel (Fibre Channel is also used on Boeing's Super Hornet.

The Autonomic Logistics Global Sustainment, Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS), and Computerized maintenance management system to help ensure the aircraft can remain operational with minimal maintenance manpower The Pentagon has moved to open up the competitive bidding by other companies. This was after Lockheed Martin stated that instead of costing 20% less than the F-16 per flight hour, the F-35 would actually cost 12% more. Though the ALGS is intended to reduce maintenance costs, the company disagrees with including the cost of this system in the aircraft ownership calculations. The USMC has implemented a workaround for a cyber vulnerability in the system. The ALIS system currently requires a shipping-container load of servers to run, but Lockheed is working on a more portable version to support the Marines' expeditionary operations.

Electro-hydrostatic actuators run by a power-by-wire flight-control system

A modern and updated flight simulator, which may be used for a greater fraction of pilot training to reduce the costly flight hours of the actual aircraft

Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries to provide power to run the control surfaces in an emergency

Structural composites in the F-35 are 35% of the airframe weight (up from 25% in the F-22). The majority of these are bismaleimide and composite epoxy materials. The F-35 will be the first mass-produced aircraft to include structural nanocomposites, namely carbon nanotube-reinforced epoxy. Experience of the F-22's problems with corrosion led to the F-35 using a gap filler that causes less galvanic corrosion to the airframe's skin, designed with fewer gaps requiring filler and implementing better drainage. The relatively short 35-foot wingspan of the A and B variants is set by the F-35B's requirement to fit inside the Navy's current amphibious assault ship parking area and elevators; the F-35C's longer wing is considered to be more fuel efficient.

 

Costs

A U.S. Navy study found that the F-35 will cost 30 to 40% more to maintain than current jet fighters, not accounting for inflation over the F-35's operational lifetime. A Pentagon study concluded a $1 trillion maintenance cost for the entire fleet over its lifespan, not accounting for inflation. The F-35 program office found that as of January 2014, costs for the F-35 fleet over a 53-year lifecycle was $857 billion. Costs for the fighter have been dropping and accounted for the 22 percent life cycle drop since 2010. Lockheed stated that by 2019, pricing for the fifth-generation aircraft will be less than fourth-generation fighters. An F-35A in 2019 is expected to cost $85 million per unit complete with engines and full mission systems, inflation adjusted from $75 million in December 2013.

 

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!

  

Some Background:

The Lockheed F-94 Starfire was a first-generation jet aircraft of the United States Air Force. It was developed from the twin-seat Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star in the late 1940s as an all-weather, day/night interceptor, replacing the propeller-driven North American F-82 Twin Mustang in this role. The system was designed to overtake the F-80 in terms of performance, but more so to intercept the new high-level Soviet bombers capable of nuclear attacks on America and her Allies - in particular, the new Tupelov Tu-4. The F-94 was furthermore the first operational USAF fighter equipped with an afterburner and was the first jet-powered all-weather fighter to enter combat during the Korean War in January 1953.

 

The initial production model, the F-94A, entered operational service in May 1950. Its armament consisted of four 0.50 in (12.7 mm) M3 Browning machine guns mounted in the fuselage with the muzzles exiting under the radome for the APG-33 radar, a derivative from the AN/APG-3, which directed the Convair B-36's tail guns and had a range of up to 20 miles (32 km). Two 165 US Gallon (1,204 litre) drop tanks, as carried by the F-80 and T-33, were carried on the wingtips. Alternatively, these could be replaced by a pair of 1,000 lb (454 kg) bombs under the wings, giving the aircraft a secondary fighter bomber capability. 109 were produced.

 

The subsequent F-94B, which entered service in January 1951, was outwardly virtually identical to the F-94A. Its Allison J33 turbojet had a number of modifications made, though, which made it a very reliable engine. The pilot was provided with a roomier cockpit and the canopy received a bow frame in the center between the two crew members. A new Instrument Landing System (ILS) was fitted, too, which made operations at night and/or in bad weather much safer. However, this new variant’s punch with just four machine guns remained weak, and, to improve the load of fire, wing-mounted pods with two additional pairs of 0.5” machine guns were introduced – but these hardly improved the interceptor’s effectiveness. 356 of the F-94B were nevertheless built.

 

The following F-94C was extensively modified and initially designated F-97, but it was ultimately decided just to treat it as a new version of the F-94. USAF interest was lukewarm since aircraft technology had already developed at a fast pace – supersonic performance had already become standard. Lockheed funded development themselves, converting two F-94B airframes to YF-94C prototypes for evaluation with a completely new, much thinner wing, a swept tail surface and a more powerful Pratt & Whitney J48. This was a license-built version of the afterburning Rolls-Royce Tay, which produced a dry thrust of 6,350 pounds-force (28.2 kN) and approximately 8,750 pounds-force (38.9 kN) with afterburning. Instead of machine guns, the proposed new variant was exclusively armed with unguided air-to-air missiles.

Tests were positive and eventually the F-94C was adopted for USAF service, since it was the best interim solution for an all-weather fighter at that time. It still had to rely on Ground Control Interception Radar (GCI) sites to vector the interceptor to intruding aircraft, though.

 

The F-94C's introduction and the availability of the more effective Northrop F-89C/D Scorpion and the North American F-86D Sabre interceptors led to a quick relegation of the earlier F-94 variants from mid-1954 onwards to second line units and to Air National Guards. By 1955 most of them had already been phased out of USAF service, and some of these relatively young surplus machines were subsequently exported or handed over to friendly nations, too. When sent to the ANG, the F-94As were modified by Lockheed to F-94B standards and then returned to the ANG as B models. They primarily replaced outdated F-80C Shooting Stars and F-51D/H Mustangs.

 

At that time the USAF was looking for a tactical reconnaissance aircraft, a more effective successor for the RF-80A which had shown its worth and weaknesses during the Korea War. For instance, the plane could not fly at low altitude long enough to perform suitable visual reconnaissance, and its camera equipment was still based on WWII standards. Lockheed saw the opportunity to fill this operational gap with conversions of existing F-94A/B airframes, which had, in most cases, only had clocked few flying hours, primarily at high altitudes where Soviet bombers were expected to lurk, and still a lot of airframe life to offer. This led to another private venture, the RF-94B, auspiciously christened “Stargazer”.

 

The RF-94B was based on the F-94B interceptor with its J33 engine and the original unswept tail. The F-94B’s wings were retained but received a different leading-edge profile to better cope with operations at low altitude. The interceptor’s nose with the radome and the machine guns underneath was replaced by a new all-metal nose cone, which was more than 3 feet longer than the former radar nose, with windows for several sets of cameras; the wedge-shaped nose cone quickly earned the aircraft the unofficial nickname “Crocodile”.

One camera was looking ahead into flight direction and could be mounted at different angled downward (but not moved during flight), followed by two oblique cameras, looking to the left and the right, and a vertical camera as well as a long-range camera focussed on the horizon, which was behind a round window at port side. An additional, spacious compartment in front of the landing gear well held an innovative Tri-Metrogen horizon-to-horizon view system that consisted of three synchronized cameras. Coupled with a computerized control system based on light, speed, and altitude, it adjusted camera settings to produce pictures with greater delineation.

All cameras could be triggered individually by pilot or a dedicated observer/camera systems operator in the 2nd seat. Talking into a wire recorder, the crew could describe ground movements that might not have appeared in still pictures. A vertical view finder with a periscopic presentation on the cockpit panel was added for the pilot to enhance visual reconnaissance and target identification directly under the aircraft. Using magnesium flares carried under its wings in flash-ejector cartridges, the RF-94B was furthermore able to fly night missions.

The RF-94B was supposed to operate unarmed, but it could still carry a pair of 1.000 lb bombs under its wings or, thanks to added plumbings, an extra pair of drop tanks for ferry flights. The F-94A/B’s machine gun pods as well as the F-94C’s unguided missile launchers could be mounted to the wings, too, making it a viable attack aircraft in a secondary role.

 

The USAF was highly interested in this update proposal for the outdated interceptors (almost 500 F-94A/Bs had been built) and ordered 100 RF-94B conversions with an option for 100 more – just when a severe (and superior) competitor entered the stage after a lot of development troubles: Republic’s RF-84F Thunderflash reconnaissance version. The first YRF-84F had already been completed in February 1952 and it had an overall slightly better performance than the RF-94B. However, it offered more internal space for reconnaissance systems and was able to carry up to fifteen cameras with the support of many automatized systems, so that it was a single seater. Being largely identical to the F-84F and sharing its technical and logistical infrastructures, the USAF decided on short notice to change its procurement decision and rather adopt the more modern and promising Thunderflash as its standard tactical reconnaissance aircraft. The RF-94B conversion order was reduced to the initial 100 aircraft, and to avoid operational complexity these aircraft were exclusively delivered to Air National Guardss that had experience with the F-94A/B to replace their obsolete RF-80As.

 

Gradual replacement lasted until 1958, and while the RF-94B’s performance was overall better than the RF-80A’s, it was still disappointing and not the expected tactical intelligence gathering leap forward. The airframe did not cope well with constant low-level operations, and the aircraft’s marginal speed and handling did not ensure its survivability. However, unlike the RF-84F, which suffered from frequent engine problems, the Stargazers’ J33 made them highly reliable platforms – even though the complex Tri-Metrogen device turned out to be capricious, so that it was soon replaced with up to three standard cameras.

 

For better handling and less drag esp. at low altitude, the F-94B’s large Fletcher type wingtip tanks were frequently replaced with smaller ones with about half capacity. It also became common practice to operate the RF-94Bs with only a crew of one, and from 1960 on the RF-94B was, thanks to its second seat, more and more used as a trainer before pilots mounted more potent reconnaissance aircraft like the RF-101 Voodoo, which eventually replaced the RF-94B in ANG service. The last RF-94B was phased out in 1968, and, unlike the RF-84F, it was not operated by any foreign air force.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 2 (but frequently operated by a single pilot)

Length: 43 ft 4 3/4 in (13.25 m)

Wingspan (with tip tanks): 40 ft 9 1/2 in (12.45 m)

Height: 12 ft. 2 (3.73 m)

Wing area: 234' 8" sq ft (29.11 m²)

Empty weight: 10,064 lb (4,570 kg)

Loaded weight: 15,330 lb (6,960 kg)

Max. takeoff weight: 24,184 lb (10,970 kg)

 

Powerplant:

1× Allison J33-A-33 turbojet, rated at 4,600 lbf (20.4 kN) continuous thrust,

5,400 lbf (24 kN) with water injection and 6,000 lbf (26.6 kN) thrust with afterburner

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 630 mph (1,014 km/h) at height and in level flight

Range: 930 mi (813 nmi, 1,500 km) in combat configuration with two drop tanks

Ferry range: 1,457 mi (1,275 nmi, 2,345 km)

Service ceiling: 42,750 ft (14,000 m)

Rate of climb: 6,858 ft/min (34.9 m/s)

Wing loading: 57.4 lb/ft² (384 kg/m²)

Thrust/weight: 0.48

 

Armament:

No internal guns; 2x 165 US Gallon (1,204 liter) drop tanks on the wing tips and…

2x underwing hardpoints for two additional 165 US Gallon (1,204 liter) ferry tanks

or bombs of up to 1.000 lb (454 kg) caliber each, plus…

2x optional (rarely fitted) pods on the wings’ leading edges with either a pair of 0.5" (12.7 mm)

machine guns or twelve 2.75” (70 mm) Mk 4/Mk 40 Folding-Fin Aerial Rockets each

  

The kit and its assembly:

This project was originally earmarked as a submission for the 2021 “Reconnaissance & Surveillance” group build at whatifmodellers.com, in the form of a Heller F-94B with a new nose section. The inspiration behind this build was the real-world EF-94C (s/n 50-963): a solitary conversion with a bulbous camera nose. However, the EF-94C was not a reconnaissance aircraft but rather a chase plane/camera ship for the Air Research and Development Command, hence its unusual designation with the suffix “E”, standing for “Exempt” instead of the more appropriate “R” for a dedicated recce aircraft. There also was another EF-94C, but this was a totally different kind of aircraft: an ejection seat testbed.

 

I had a surplus Heller F-94B kit in The Stash™ and it was built almost completely OOB and did – except for some sinkholes and standard PSR work – not pose any problem. In fact, the old Heller Starfire model is IMHO a pretty good representation of the aircraft. O.K., its age might show, but almost anything you could ask for at 1:72 scale is there, including a decent, detailed cockpit.

 

The biggest change was the new camera nose, and it was scratched from an unlikely donor part: it consists of a Matchbox B-17G tail gunner station, slimmed down by the gunner station glazing's width at the seam in the middle, and this "sandwich" was furthermore turned upside down. Getting the transitional sections right took lots of PSR, though, and I added some styrene profiles to integrate the new nose into the rest of the hull. It was unintentional, but the new nose profile reminds a lot of a RF-101 recce Voodoo, and there's, with the straight wings, a very F-89ish look to the aircraft now? There's also something F2H-2ish about the outlines?

 

The large original wing tip tanks were cut off and replaced with smaller alternatives from a Hasegawa A-37. Because it was easy to realize on this kit I lowered the flaps, together with open ventral air brakes. The cockpit was taken OOB, I just modified the work station on the rear seat and replaced the rubber sight protector for the WSO with two screens for a camera operator. Finally, the one-piece cockpit glazing was cut into two parts to present the model with an open canopy.

  

Painting and markings:

This was a tough decision: either an NMF finish (the natural first choice), an overall light grey anti-corrosive coat of paint, both with relatively colorful unit markings, or camouflage. The USAF’s earlier RF-80As carried a unique scheme in olive drab/neutral grey with a medium waterline, but that would look rather vintage on the F-94. I decided that some tactical camouflage would make most sense on this kind of aircraft and eventually settled for the USAF’s SEA scheme with reduced tactical markings, which – after some field tests and improvisations in Vietnam – became standardized and was officially introduced to USAF aircraft around 1965 as well as to ANG units.

 

Even though I had already built a camouflaged F-94 some time ago (a Hellenic aircraft in worn SEA colors), I settled for this route. The basic colors (FS 30219, 34227, 34279 and 36622) all came from Humbrol (118, 117, 116 and 28, respectively), and for the pattern I adapted the paint scheme of the USAF’s probably only T-33 in SEA colors: a trainer based on Iceland during the Seventies and available as a markings option in one of the Special Hobby 1:32 T-33 kits. The low waterline received a wavy shape, inspired by an early ANG RF-101 in SEA camouflage I came across in a book. The new SEA scheme was apparently applied with a lot of enthusiasm and properness when it was brand new, but this quickly vaned. As an extra, the wing tip tanks received black anti-glare sections on their inner faces and a black anti-glare panel was added in front of the windscreen - a decal from a T-33 aftermarket sheet. Beyond a black ink wash the model received some subtle panel post-shading, but rather to emphasize surface details than for serious weathering.

 

The cockpit became very dark grey (Revell 06) while the landing gear wells were kept in zinc chromate green primer (Humbrol 80, Grass Green), with bright red (Humbrol 60, Matt Red) cover interiors and struts and wheels in aluminum (Humbrol 56). The interior of the flaps and the ventral air brakes became red, too.

 

The decals/markings came from a Special Hobby 1:72 F-86H; there’s a dedicated ANG boxing of the kit that comes with an optional camouflaged aircraft of the NY ANG, the least unit to operate the “Sabre Hog” during the Seventies. Since this 138th TFS formerly operated the F-94A/B, it was a perfect option for the RF-94B! I just used a different Bu. No. code on the fin, taken from a PrintScale A/T-37 set, and most stencils were perocured from the scrap box.

After a final light treatment with graphite around the afterburner for a more metallic shine of the iron metallic (Revell 97) underneath, the kit was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A camouflaged F-94 is an unusual sight, but it works very well. The new/longer nose considerably changes the aircraft's profile, and even though the change is massive, the "Crocodile" looks surprisingly plausible, if not believable! And, despite the long nose, the aircraft looks pretty sleek, especially in the air.