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This is the short-range planetary sensor dome. Above the bridge is the stellar array, while long-range sensors are arranged around the navigational deflector, pointing only in the direction of travel.
My latest acquisition. Very nice compact camera. Large, bright viewfinder.
The Agfa Optima sensor electronic was identical to the Agfa Optima 535 Sensor electronic and — like the Agfa Optima sensor Flash - produced in Portugal.
Manufactured in 1982.
Lens: Agfa Solitar 40mm / 1:2.8
Shutter: 1/30 sec. to 1/500
Aperture range: 2.8 to 22
Dimensions: 104 × 70 × 56 mm
Weight: 265 g
Batteries: 3 x alkaline / silver oxide 625G
Information retrieved from this website (in German), which also features beautiful photos of all the 1970s Agfa Optima line.
Another good read (in English) is the Agfa Optima 1535 page on Alfred's Camera Page.
I recently added a 1-wire thermometer network, using the 1-wire USB adapter (DS9490R), temperature sensors (DS18S20), speaker wire, and audio plugs, jacks, and splitters.
A smaller version of this graph is shown on my Insteon thermostat web control page.
The temperature sensors seem to be very accurate (well, precise, at least). They're digital, so no calibration required (they are factory calibrated, I assume). And with 1-wire technology, you can string lots of them on one common data line (and ground, so it's actually a 2-wire system, but who's counting).
The sensor for the blue graph is run up inside one of the A/C vents, so I can get a direct indication of the A/C output. As you can see, it does about 1-2 cycles per hour. (I bumped the thermostat up from 78 to 80 around 10am.)
The outside sensor is hanging out the window by my computer, in the shade of the bushes and the big tree out front, so I don't think direct sunlight is affecting it much in the afternoons.
Oh, and this image is from a custom-made graphing page from the temperature logs using PHP and GD. Temperature logging is done by digitemp every 15 seconds.
Seen on Flickr EXPLORE - # 376 - September 22, 2017, click here
Green trees on a suburban street in the morning sunlight. This picture is straight out from the camera, no processing except darken a the brightness a bit. What I call the magic of the CCD Sensor, no longer used in digital cameras.
Made with the Pentax Optio Z-10 point and shoot.
Sensors get dirty, it is impossible to change lens and keep them clean...
Mine has to be cleaned two times a year or more.
When you choose smaller apertures, the dirt spots show shamelessly. In one of my last photos, www.flickr.com/photos/henrique_silva/6600173785/, the aperture was f/36 and so every little tiny bit of dirt was showing, I spent a little time in Lightroom cleaning them, but there are still some in the picture... It was urgent to clean the 40D's sensor
Again I went trough this delicate process, I use Sensor Scope from Delkin Devices, it works well, it uses a combination of vacuum cleaner and moistened sensor wands to get the job done. Here is a before / after mosaic, it is not completly clean, but in fact there is a compromise between having the sensor damaged or have one or two dust spots...
If you want to know more about the process, I will be happy to answer!
Check your sensor for dust!
a - Create a new image in Photoshop or any other application and fill it with white
b - Set your camera to Aperture Priority, ISO100, and aperture to it's minimum f/22 - f/45
c - Set lens focus to Manual, and focus to closest possible
d - Shoot in raw or if in jpeg, turn off special image processing functions
e - Zoom in until the photoshop image fills your camera focusing screen
f - Shoot camera facing the white image on your monitor, and during this exposure, move your camera back and fourth being careful to not to point the lens outside of your white image. You can also zoom in in the image...
g - Process your image, adjust contrast, brightness, clarity, whatever, so that you get a clear view of the dirt spots!
h - Now you can go through the cleaning process - remember that what shows on the bottom of the image will be towards the top of the camera sensor...
i - Repeat the process from a to g and if you are happy with the result, then you are done; otherwise, repeat again... this time I had to make three swab cleanings. It is preferable to clean gently several times than applying to much force.
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Technical Info:
Camera: Canon EOS 40D
Lens: EF-S15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM
Focal Length: 40 mm
Sensitivity: ISO 100
Exposure: 0,3 sec at f/22
Exposure bias: 0 EV
Exposure Program: Aperture priority
Metering Mode: Pattern
Flash: no flash
GPS
Coordinates:
Altitude:
©Henrique Silva, all rights reserved - no reproduction without prior permission
Hatte ich folgendes nicht schon an anderer Stelle geschrieben?
1. Beim Filmtransport verschwindet der belichtete Film hinter einer Klappe, so ist er bei versehentlichem Öffnen geschützt.
2. Man spult den Film mit dem Schnellschalthebel zurück, nachdem man vorher einen Umschaltknopf betätigt hat!
3. Die Auslösung über den roten Sensor-Punkt ist wirklich sehr sanft und erschütterungsfrei.
Richtig! Diese drei exklusiven Merkmale der Selectronic Sensor findet man später wieder in den genial designten Optima-sensor-electronic-Modellen.
Der äußerliche Unterschied fällt natürlich sofort ins Auge. Die Selectronic sensor hatte die recht konventionelle, für die damalige Zeit aber moderne sachliche Form der Optima 500 fortgesetzt. Ein großer Erfolg war die die Selectronic nicht, aber das Innenleben hatte sich so bewährt, dass es mit kleinen Abwandlungen für die Optima Sensor electronic übernommen wurde.
Während aber die neuen Optimas einen voll programmierten Paratronic-Verschluss besaßen (man hatte keinen Einfluss auf Belichtungszeit und Blende), war die Selectronic sensor ein Zeitautomat: Die Blende wird vorgewählt, die Zeit dazu wird von der Kamera errechnet und eingestellt. Beide Werte sieht man im Sucher. Dieses System gefällt mir viel besser.
Es gab noch die Selectronic "S", die mit dem Vierlinser Solinar statt mit dem Dreilinser Apotar ausgerüstet war und außerdem einen Messsucher besaß.
Die Selectronic kostete 1971 349,- DM, die Selectronic S 449,- DM.
Made in ?? ; 1978 - ... . For 126 cassette . Simple viewfinder camera with fixed focus and aperture . Two shutter speeds . Socket for flipflash flashbulb bar .
I have had some dust stuck on my sensor since getting my A7III and sadly the rocket blower couldn't remove it. I usually pay to get my sensor cleaned but decided to give cleaning it myself a try and I'm glad I did.
This is to compare 10 MP sensors in a digital SLR (DSLR) and a point and shoot (P&S) camera. I have tried to keep everything on equal footing with no unequal cropping of the original images. Both images were taken at the equivalent of 75 mm from about 1,000 feet away. View this FULL SIZE here: farm1.static.flickr.com/171/476181751_dae004f4a5_o.jpg and scroll through the image to compare the resolution at various points of the images. After you click on the link, you will have to mouse over the image to get a magnifying glass icon. Click while holding the magnifying glass over the image and you will be able to view it full size.
To me, the P&S sensor practically looks like an impressionist painting compared to the DSLR sensor. This is also the "large size" P&S sensor, as most are using the smaller 1/2.5" (5x4 mm) sensor.
See www.flickr.com/photos/samfeinstein/1928154854/ for a sharpened version.
Los 13699 fotogramas restantes se pueden ver acá:
Y de yapa, un bellísimo collage inspirado en esos fotogramas:
Mr Negative 700S, shot at 400.
Agfa Optima 1535 Sensor.
Dev/scan by Analogue Wonderland, High Wycombe, UK.
M240 / 50 Summilux
Thank you for visiting and viewing.
Jim
No Usage Authorized Without Prior Written Permission.
©2015 Jim Servies Photography
All Rights Reserved.
Agfa Optima Sensor compact 35mm camera
Specifications:-
Type: 35mm compact camera
Size: 104 mm x 68 mm x 54 mm (W x H x D)
Image Format: 24 x 36 mm (W x H)
Lens: Agfa Solitar, 40 mm f/2.8
Diaphragm: Automatic f/2.8 to f/22
Focusing: Manual scale pictograms on top of the focus ring/ meter/feet scale on bottom, focusing 3ft/1.09m - infinity
Shutter Speeds: 1/500 second - 15 seconds
Viewfinder: Large direct finder with parallax marks for near focus
Film Loading: Manual
Film Transport: Manual single stroke lever, also used to rewind film when the 'R' button is depressed and turned
Film Speeds: 25 ASA/15 DIN to 500 ASA/28 DIN, selected on a ring around the lens
Flash Contact: Hot shoe, aperture selected manually with flash
Cable Release Socket: On left hand side of the camera body
Tripod Socket: 1/4 in. on right hand side which doubles as camera strap attachment
Battery: 3 V625U batteries, located by opening the camera back
One of my Fuji X-Pro1 bodies is broken. It will power up, take a few shots, and then shut down. When I try to turn it on, it sometimes gives a message that says to turn the camera off and try turning it on again. I have also noticed a large, diffuse, white defect in the upper right quadrant of the sensor.
I later concluded that I had damaged my sensor while shooting a solar eclipse. Rather than repairing the camera, I decided to replace it with a Fuji X-Pro2.
Testing Minolta's Alpha 7D/Maxxum 7D. A 6.1 megapixel DSLR from 2004 with a CCD sensor. Lens used was a Minolta Maxxum 28-135mm f4.5 zoom. I think these images are surprisingly good for a 16 year old digital kit.
Satellite: Sentinel-2. Sensor: MSI (MultiSpectral Instrument).
Visualization RGB: bands 4 (red), 3 (green), 2 (blue). True color.
La imagen tiene 33 km de ancho (aprox.)
Waw an Namus se encuentra en el mismísimo centro geográfico de Libia, en el corazón más hostil e infernal del desierto del Sáhara. El oasis en sí tiene una anchura de 4 kilómetros, rodeada por un área mucho más amplia de tierra negra que contrasta con el color pálido de las arenas del desierto más grande del planeta. En su interior brillan las aguas de tres pequeños lagos salados. (ruta-33.blogspot.com/2013/12/waw-namus-un-oasis-en-un-cra...)
Esta imagen ha sido procesada con el navegador EO Browser (apps.sentinel-hub.com/eo-browser) de Sentinel Hub. Sentinel Hub es un motor de procesamiento de datos satelitales, dentro del programa de observación de la Tierra Copernicus (copernicus.eu) de la Unión Europea, operado por la empresa Sinergise. EO Browser es gratuito y fácil de usar. El norte siempre está arriba.
This image has been processed using the EO Browser (apps.sentinel-hub.com/eo-browser) by Sentinel Hub. Sentinel Hub is a satellite data processing engine, within the European Union's Earth observation programme Copernicus (copernicus.eu), operated by the Sinergise company. EO Browser is free and easy to use. North is always up.
Epic goddess video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtlVGi_K-Bk
Nikon D800E photography of Pretty Brunette Swimsuit Bikini Model Goddess @ the 45SURF Summer Beach House! Gorgeous Blue Eyes! I'm thinking about adding a deck and a pool to the beach house / surf shack with the famous black 45SURF surfboard, and some cool beach reading for goddesses--Shakespeare, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, and Melville's Moby Dick! You'll have to visit!
Join/like my facebook page! www.facebook.com/45surfHerosJourneyMythology
Follow me on facebook! facebook.com/elliot.mcgucken
Classic California--an athletic model goddess in a black Gold 45 Revolver bikini with the Moving Dimensions Theory Equation on it: dx4/dt=ic! Tall, thin, fit and very, very pretty!
Here's some new epic video of the epicly pretty brunette goddess--shooting stills & video @ the same time!:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHvI4Uyd_FY
www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtlVGi_K-Bk
Be sure to enjoy the epic videos in full screen HD! :)
Photos shot with the AMAZING Nikon D800 E and Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VR II AF-S Nikkor Zoom Lens and the B W 77mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. Classic California Brunette Beach Babe! Beautiful Swimsuit Bikini Model Goddess with Pretty Blue Eyes and wavy brown/black hair!
Shot in both RAW & JPEG, but all these photos are RAWs finished in Lightroom 5 ! :)
Modeling the classic 45surf t-shirts and the Gold 45 Revolver Gold'N'Virtue Bikini on a sunny Malibu summer afternoon--my favorite for shooting on the beautiful socal beach!
Shot with the new Nikon D800E and Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G ED VR II AF-S Nikkor Zoom Lens.
Captured in both RAW and JPEG.
Modeling the black & gold "Gold 45 Revolver" Gold'N'Virtue swimsuits with the main equation to Moving Dimensions Theory on the swimsuits: dx4/dt=ic. Yes I have a Ph.D. in physics! :) You can read more about my research and Hero's Journey Physics here:
herosjourneyphysics.wordpress.com/ MDT PROOF#2: Einstein (1912 Man. on Rel.) and Minkowski wrote x4=ict. Ergo dx4/dt=ic--the foundational equation of all time and motion which is on all the shirts and swimsuits. Every photon that hits my Nikon D800e's sensor does it by surfing the fourth expanding dimension, which is moving at c relative to the three spatial dimensions, or dx4/dt=ic!
May the Hero's Journey Mythology Goddess inspire you (as they have inspired me!) along your own artistic journey! Love, love, love the 70-200mm F/2.8 Lens! :)
All the Best on Your Epic Hero's Journey from Johnny Ranger McCoy!
May the classic California HJM Goddesses guide, inspire, and exalt ye along yer heroic artistic journey!
Olympus E-500 ( KODAK CCD sensor ) + Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 50mm f/2.0 Macro
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
After great demand and lots of encouragement from friend photographers, the result of this very work intensive project is finally available. Please check your respective amazon online store.
The paperback version is recommended over the kindle version
Content:
This book is unique, in that it focuses on greatly improving photography skills, both for amateurs and professionals, by understanding the image sensor & camera operation and the impact of parameters changes on image quality.
Are you one of those photographers who continuously fights excessive image noise when shooting birds-in-flight, a photographer who would like to understand why certain camera and lens settings do a great job and others don’t, or, are you a photographer who fails in creating top quality images, independent of the circumstances? Then stop looking, because you have found your comprehensively written expert guide, created by image sensor specialist George F. Vittman, PhD, who has worked with world-renowned specialists in the field since the mid-1980ies, and who is also an outstanding and award-winning photographer.
Without going into too much technical detail, this book introduces the basic image sensor operation, and it devotes a large fraction to the study of visible image noise. What is noise caused by, what is its dependence on the 3 camera exposure parameters, shutter time, lens aperture and ISO-value, how does post-processing affect noise, and most importantly, how can the image noise be minimized under different circumstances. Besides image noise, this book also reveals little known secrets regarding auto-focus, camera operation and optics, and it gives image sensor based recommendations for a camera choice in the different fields of photography.
Agfa Optima 200 Sensor (second version).
German viewfinder camera produced c.1969.
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So this is how the Exposure Value is automaticly determined on this camera.
The amount of light on the Selenium Cell drives the Meter. Right after pressing the Shutter Release Button the Needle of the Meter is clamped in a Stepped Trap.
The amount of degrees the Stepped Trap has to rotate before it clamps the Needle determines the Exposure Value for the interface to the Shutter.
btw That headpin is my own idea to set the Needle as the Selenium Cell did not work anymore.
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WARNING :
This image is intended as a reference for the more experienced camera service man. If you have no experience in camera repair please do yourself a favor and send your camera to a professional service shop. It would be a pity to lose a vintage camera in a failed repair attempt !
Million Dollar Highway US 550 Silverton to Ouray Colorado Autumn Colors Snow Stormy Moody Weather! Fall Foliage Aspens Fine Art Landscape Nature Photography DJI Mavic 2 Pro Drone Hasselblad L1D-20c Camera 20MP 1” CMOS Sensor! Elliot McGucken Master Fine Art Aerial Drone Photography Colorado Fine Art !
Dr. Elliot McGucken Fine Art Spacetime Sculpture dx4//dt=ic:
Epic Fine Art Photography Prints & Luxury Wall Art:
Support epic, stoic fine art: Hero's Odyssey Gear!
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All my photography celebrates the physics of light! The McGucken Principle of the fourth expanding dimension: The fourth dimension is expanding at the rate of c relative to the three spatial dimensions: dx4/dt=ic .
Lao Tzu--The Tao: Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.
Light Time Dimension Theory: The Foundational Physics Unifying Einstein's Relativity and Quantum Mechanics: A Simple, Illustrated Introduction to the Unifying Physical Reality of the Fourth Expanding Dimensionsion dx4/dt=ic !: geni.us/Fa1Q
"Between every two pine trees there is a door leading to a new way of life." --John Muir
Epic Stoicism guides my fine art odyssey and photography: geni.us/epicstoicism
“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.” --John Muir
Epic Poetry inspires all my photography: geni.us/9K0Ki Epic Poetry for Epic Landscape Photography: Exalt Fine Art Nature Photography with the Poetic Wisdom of John Muir, Emerson, Thoreau, Homer's Iliad, Milton's Paradise Lost & Dante's Inferno Odyssey
“The mountains are calling and I must go.” --John Muir
Epic Art & 45EPIC Gear exalting golden ratio designs for your Hero's Odyssey:
Support epic fine art! 45surf ! Bitcoin: 1FMBZJeeHVMu35uegrYUfEkHfPj5pe9WNz
Exalt the goddess archetype in the fine art of photography! My Epic Book: Photographing Women Models!
Portrait, Swimsuit, Lingerie, Boudoir, Fine Art, & Fashion Photography Exalting the Venus Goddess Archetype: How to Shoot Epic ... Epic! Beautiful Surf Fine Art Portrait Swimsuit Bikini Models!
Some of my epic books, prints, & more!
Exalt your photography with Golden Ratio Compositions!
Golden Ratio Compositions & Secret Sacred Geometry for Photography, Fine Art, & Landscape Photographers: How to Exalt Art with Leonardo da Vinci's, Michelangelo's!
Epic Landscape Photography:
A Simple Guide to the Principles of Fine Art Nature Photography: Master Composition, Lenses, Camera Settings, Aperture, ISO, ... Hero's Odyssey Mythology Photography)
All art is but imitation of nature.-- Seneca (Letters from a Stoic - Letter LXV: On the First Cause)
The universe itself is God and the universal outpouring of its soul. --Chrysippus (Quoted by Cicero in De Natura Deorum)
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells. --To Autumn. by John Keats
Photographs available as epic fine art luxury prints. For prints and licensing information, please send me a flickr mail or contact drelliot@gmail.com with your queries! All the best on your Epic Hero's Odyssey!
Mr Negative 700S, shot at 400.
Agfa Optima 1535 Sensor.
Dev/scan by Analogue Wonderland, High Wycombe, UK.
A simple, quick, and very cheap circuit to turn on an LED when it gets dark. Read more about this project here.
Part of my Serious Pictures from a Small Camera series. Just trying out a new coat pocket camera - This is a view of Cat Craig off of Skyreburn
+++ 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 AH-64 Apache originally started as the Model 77 developed by Hughes Helicopters for the United States Army's Advanced Attack Helicopter program to replace the AH-1 Cobra. The prototype YAH-64 was first flown on 30 September 1975. The U.S. Army selected the YAH-64 over the Bell YAH-63 in 1976, and later approved full production in 1982. After purchasing Hughes Helicopters in 1984, McDonnell Douglas continued AH-64 production and development. The helicopter was introduced to U.S. Army service in April 1986. The first production AH-64D Apache Longbow, an upgraded Apache variant, was delivered to the Army in March 1997. Production has been continued by Boeing Defense, Space & Security, and more than 2,000 AH-64s have been produced to date.
The Boeing AH-64 Apache is a four-blade, twin-turboshaft attack helicopter with a tailwheel-type landing gear arrangement and a tandem cockpit for a two-man crew. It features a nose-mounted sensor suite for target acquisition and night vision systems. It is armed with a 30 mm (1.18 in) M230 chain gun carried between the main landing gear, under the aircraft's forward fuselage. It has four hardpoints mounted on stub-wing pylons, typically carrying a mixture of AGM-114 Hellfire missiles and Hydra 70 rocket pods. The AH-64 has a large amount of systems redundancy to improve combat survivability.
The U.S. Army is the primary operator of the AH-64; it has also become the primary attack helicopter of multiple nations, including Greece, Japan, Israel, the Netherlands, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates; as well as being produced under license in the United Kingdom as the AgustaWestland Apache. American AH-64s have served in conflicts in Panama, the Persian Gulf, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Israel used the Apache in its military conflicts in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip; British and Dutch Apaches have seen deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Studies for a naval version of the Apache were begun during 1984 and since that time the McDonnell Douglas Helicopter Company has proposed several modified Apaches to both the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy. The navalized Apache was viewed as a replacement for the aging Bell AH-1 Sea Cobras that are in service with the Navy and Marines. With the introduction of a four-blade rotor system to the then current Marine Sea Cobra, the AH-1W, the Bell Cobra was believed to have reached the limit of its development. While older Sea Cobra airframes could be brought up to AH-1W standards, the Marines saw the need for a replacement for the Sea Cobra with some urgency.
The proposed Sea Apache (also known as the ‘Gray Thunder’) was intended for operations from smaller Navy ships such as frigates and cruisers and by the Marines from Amphibious Assault Ships (LHA) and smaller helicopter capable amphibious ships of a Marine Amphibious Ready Group (ARG). These ships would frequently operate outside the air cover of a carrier task group, so that the Sea Apache was also tasked with limited air defense duties and regarded as an offensive surface strike platform, with more capable weapons than the Army's version.
Since 1984, several design studies and formal proposals had evolved, with the Navy requesting changes in the Sea Apache configuration as it refined the aircraft's missions and roles. All in all the project went through no less than three stages, and each of these proposed navalized versions of the Apache differed in several ways from the standard Army AH-64A, although all three proposals had the same powerplants in common, two 1,723shp naval standard General Electric T700-GE-401 engines.
Also in common were increased corrosion preventive measures, improved electro-magnetic interference protection, a Doppler navigation system, upgraded brakes, additional tie down points, and a powered automatic rotor blade fold system.
Some of the missions envisioned by the Navy for the Sea Apache were:
- Escort for amphibious assault craft
- Anti-shipping strike
- Combat Air Patrol (CAP) with up to six Sidewinders
- Over the Horizon (OTH) targeting for surface ships
- Air support for SEAL special warfare teams
- Standoff surveillance
- Long range coastal patrol
Originally (designated “Stage 1”), the Sea Apache was to be a basic AH-64A airframe modified with a folding tail boom, a relocated tail wheel, a mast-mounted radar for surface/air search and attack, and provisions for Harpoon and Sidewinder missiles. Over time, however, the engineering studies and changing roles/missions requirements revealed that the Sea Apache's final configuration would have to be altered drastically.
One of the early problems encountered with navalizing the Apache was the narrow wheel base of the main landing gear. Engineering studies found that the standard Apache main wheel track was too narrow, causing the aircraft to be very unstable on the deck of a small ship. The roll of the deck in heavy seas, coupled with the aircraft's narrow wheel base and a relatively high center of gravity, could easily cause the Sea Apache to tip over. To solve this problem, McDonnell Douglas engineers redesigned the main landing gear, relocating it from the fuselage to the tips of the stub wings. The revised main landing gear was also retractable, with the gear retracting into streamlined housings (although the wheel itself remains uncovered) on the end of each reinforced stub wing. These housings also had provisions for mounting Sidewinder missile launcher rails.
The revised landing gear configuration was put forward in the second proposal (Stage 2) which also deleted the 30mm Chain Gun and its associated ammunition storage system. Furthermore, the Stage 2 Sea Apache featured a revised nose contour and replaced the TADS/PNVS with a nose mounted radar.
Extended fuselage side sponsons carried additional electronics and fuel cells. The sponsons themselves were smoothly faired into the fuselage to lower drag and extended almost to the tip of the nose. This aircraft was to also have provision for carrying two AIM-9L Sidewinder air-to-air missiles on short racks on the fuselage underside, a folding tail assembly and a retractable tail wheel.
This design had been refined still further, and the Stage 3 Sea Apache proposal had the side fuselage sponsons deleted and featured a larger nose radome intended to house an APG-65 Sea Search radar. This radar, developed from the multi-mode radar used on the F/A-18 Hornet fighter/attack aircraft, was compatible for both air-to-surface attack and air-to-air engagements. The forward fuselage was deepened to house additional fuel cells and the relocated avionics bays.
Projected armament included both the Harpoon or Penguin air-to-surface missiles (although the number of stations had been reduced to two) as primary weapons against surface targets, plus two Sidewinder air-to-air missiles for self-defense.
Additional weapons included Stinger, Sidearm, AMRAAM, and Hellfire missiles, as well as 127mm Zuni and 70mm FFAR rockets. Performance goals specified for the Sea Apache by the Navy at this stage included a 370km mission radius, and a four hour endurance on station. To extend the Sea Apache's time on station even further, an extendable in-flight refueling probe would be mounted on the starboard fuselage side below the cockpit. Consideration was also being given to installing the Canadian developed Bear Trap automatic haul-down landing system, which allowed operations during heavy sea states.
In 1989 the Navy gave serious consideration to the purchase of the Sea Apache once adequate funding was made available to finance prototype construction. The Navy desires the Sea Apache not only for its capabilities, but also because the aircraft would cost far less to acquire than to undertake the design of a totally new aircraft to replace the AH-1W in service.
It took until 1992 that the AH-64N, how the Sea Apache was now officially called, was given green lights and a total of seven prototypes were ordered (five for flight tests and in different configurations from Stage 2 and 3, plus two static airframes), and trials took another four years. During this time, one prototype was lost in a fatal crash and the overall budget for the new helicopter was slimmed down, so that the service aircraft became less drastically changed from the Army helicopter, and was eventually designated “Stage 2+”. It carried the Stage 3 avionics suite, but the performance goals became less ambitious, so that the deepened fuselage was not necessary anymore, improving aerodynamics and compensating a little for the reduced internal fuel capacity.
The first production AH-64Ns were delivered in 1998 and entered service on board of US Navy Wasp-class amphibious assault ships, e. g. the newly built USS Bataan (LHD-5), in 1999. Bataan was also one of many vessels in the Middle East region at the beginning of the Iraq war on or about 20 March 2003. After delivering her attack and transport helicopters, troops and vehicles she was employed as a "Harrier Carrier" with primary duties supporting two Marine AV-8B Harrier II squadrons along with USS Bonhomme Richard. USN AH-64Ns of the newly formed HLA-80 light attack helicopter squadron served successfully in the Combat Air Patrol (CAP) role, armed with AIM-120 AMRAAM and AIM-9L Sidewinders, as well as in the escort role for emergency medical care transports in the conflict region.
Until 2003, a total of 80 AH-64Ns were built, exclusively for the US Navy. The US Marines showed interest in the new helicopter, but budget restrictions forced the USMC to stay with its AH-1W helicopters and the AV-8B fleet. A proposed Marine Corps variant would retain the TADS/PNVS and Hellfire missile system, for use in the close air support role and for anti-shipping duties while escorting amphibious vessels. This variant would also relocate the radar dome back to the top of the rotor mast. Another option favored by the Marines was the capability to use the four tube TOW missile system as a back-up to the Hellfire missile system. But due to further budget restrictions, this variant that resembled the initial Stage 1 design of the AH-64N, never left the drawing board.
Further export ambitions received a blow when the British Army successfully deployed license-built AgustaWestland Apaches in 2003 upon the Royal Navy's HMS Ocean, a Landing Platform Helicopter, demonstrating that the land-based Army helicopter was quite capable of naval operations.
General characteristics:
Crew: 2 (pilot, and co-pilot/WSO)
Length: 58.17 ft (17.73 m) (with both rotors turning)
Fuselage length: 49 ft 5 in (15.06 m)
Rotor diameter: 48 ft 0 in (14.63 m)
Height: 12.7 ft (3.87 m)
Disc area: 1,809.5 ft² (168.11 m²)
Empty weight: 11,387 lb (5,165 kg)
Loaded weight: 17,650 lb (8,000 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 23,000 lb (10,433 kg)
Powerplant:
2× General Electric T700-GE-701C turboshaft engines, delivering 1,890 shp (1,409 kW) each,
driving a foldable 4 blade main rotor and a 4 blade tail rotor in non-orthogonal alignment
Performance:
Never exceed speed: 197 knots (227 mph, 365 km/h)
Maximum speed in level flight: 165 knots (190 mph, 306 km/h)
Cruise speed: 143 knots (165 mph, 265 km/h)
Range: 290 nmi (332 mi, 535 km) with two AGMs and four AAMs
Combat radius with two hours loitering time: 162 nmi (186 mi, 300 km)
Ferry range: 1,080 nmi (1,242 mi, 2,000 km)
Service ceiling: 21,000 ft (6,400 m) minimum loaded
Rate of climb: 2,500 ft/min (12.7 m/s)
Disc loading: 9.80 lb/ft² (47.9 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.18 hp/lb (0.31 kW/kg)
Armament:
No internal gun;
Four pylon stations on the stub wings; the inner pair under the wings can carry a wide range of
AGMs and AAMs, including AGM-84 Harpoon and AGM-119 Penguin against surface targets.
Alternatively, up to eight AGM-114 Hellfire missiles or pods with Hydra 70 70 mm, CRV7 70 mm,
and APKWS 70 mm air-to-ground rockets can be carried
Stations on each wingtip and under the fuselage can carry launch rails for up to four
AIM-120 AMRAAM and/or AIM-9 Sidewinder AAMs.
The kit and its assembly:
Another entry for the 2016 “In the Navy” group build at whatifmodellers.com, and to my surprise I was so far the only builder of this interesting “real” what-if project – even though the navalized Apache had been tackled by other modelers several times before.
The three design stages, plus USMC options, offer a wide range of potential builds – but I did not want to build a 1:1 copy of any of these. I wanted a sleek helicopter, purely armed with guided missiles, so I settled for “something between Stage 2 and 3”, or rather something that combines design elements from these:
- Nose radome (Stage 2)
- Recontoured upper fuselage (Stage 2 onwards)
- Retractable landing gear in wing tip pods & relocated tail wheel (Stage 2 onwards)
- Deleted sponsons (Stage 3), but also no deepened Stage 3 fuselage
A nice basis for my plan was Academy’s new AH-64 kit – it’s selling point in my case was the fact that it is the only kit that comes with separate sponson parts. Any other kit I know has them as integral part of the fuselage halves, so that Stage 1 would be fairly easy to build, Stage 2 challenging and Stage 3 a total re-sculpting of the forward fuselage. But in this case, the sponsons can simply be left away and a floor panel needs some modifications.
The thimble radome is an aftermarket resin piece, actually for a WWII FuG 240 Morgenstern radar on board of a Ju 88G night fighter. It simply replaces the original nose and it was blended into the fuselage through a 2C putty “plug”.
Stage 2 and 3 of the navalized Apache feature a higher upper deck around the rotor gear cover. On a 1:72 kit it’s not much, maybe 2mm, but recognizable to keen eyes. I scratched it through donation parts (including an air brake from an Airfix A-1 Skyraider…), styrene strips and some putty. The rotor mast was also extended by the same amount, compensating for the higher dorsal line. Subtle, but worked out fine.
I was a little uncertain concerning the stub wings. Stage 3 had a reduced span, and I found the OOB wings a little too small for the wingtip pods (scratched from styrene profiles and some 2C putty) with the landing gear. I eventually added 3mm depth to the wings through inserted styrene profiles – probably hard to recognize at all when hidden under paint, but proportions look IMHO more balanced, also with the missile ordnance on board and the longer nose. Any means to move the landing gear forward is helpful!
Work on struts and wheels started once the wings and the pods were in place, for a proper ground clearance. The struts are modified parts from the Academy kit, I just replaced the fat low-pressure main wheels for the land-based version with donations from a Hobby Boss MiG-15: similar diameter, but less wide and an interesting wheel hub cover.
For the retractable tail wheel, a well opening was cut of the tail boom and an interior plus covers added.
The whole tail wheel comes OOB from the kit, the struts were just re-arranged for a more vertical position in the well.
The ordnance comes from a Hasegawa US weapon set and encompasses a pair of AGM-119 Penguins, a pair of AIM-120 AMRAAM and a pair of AIM-9 Sidewinder, plus the missiles’ respective launch rails.
Anyway, nothing goes without trouble. In this case, disaster struck in the form of a cracked canopy while trying to dry-fit the clear part over the finished cockpit and fuselage. Sh!t.
I was lucky to have a spare AH-64A canopy at hand, from an early Italeri kit. While not as sharp in detail as the Academy part, the shape and outline of both pieces was almost identical, the Italeri part only turned out to be 2-3mm too short at its rear end, a gap that could be bridged with styrene strips, though.
Overall, the implantation called for some modifications around the cockpit opening, but for a donor part solution the result is thankfully pretty good, phew! When painting started, I was even more happier, because the putty work associated with the implantation turned out to be better than expected. On the downside, the donor part seems to bear a lot of micro-cracks – they are only visible from certain angles and in direct light, though, and once I discovered them the piece had already been blended into the fuselage, so I stuck with the solution.
Another final modification was a little rhinoplasty – I did not assess the amount of putty correctly that was needed to blend the radome with the rest of the fuselage, it added 4-5mm in length. The result, once the fuselage was completed and overall proportions clearer, looked a littel Pinocchio-esque, though. So, with a bleeding heart and shaky hands, I cut a 5mm disc out of the massive resin nose and fitted the two remaining parts together again, blending the cut and the differences in diameter with putty. This worked out fine, too, and I also used the opportunity to re-shape the radome’s underside a little, so that the whole outline would come closer to the Stage 2 sketches. Looks better, in the end.
Painting and markings:
I stuck to the livery many illustrations of this fictional helicopter show: a typical, all-gray low-viz scheme, similar to the USMC’s late AH-1 helicopters. Everything very straightforward and based on contemporary USN benchmarks.
Basic colors are FS 35237 for all upper surfaces and FS 36375 for the undersides – as a personal twist I added a third tone, FS 36320, to the flanks – after all, it’s a whif kit.
A light black ink wash and some dry-brushing on panels were used for weathering, as well as some grinded graphite around the engines and the stabilizers for exhaust soot stains.
The cockpit and visible parts of the rotor system became very dark gray (a mix of black and FS 36081), while the blades became neutral gray (FS 36173). The landing gear and its wells standard all-white in order to reveal leaks in the hydraulic system, as well as all six launch rails. The ordnance was painted according to the real world, I just chose a medium grey finish for the Penguins.
The decals were puzzled together from various sources, HLA-80 as a unit and its markings are purely fictional. The grey walkways are grey decal strips (TL Modellbau stuff).
Despite the canopy and nose trouble on the way, the result looks pretty good. O.K., my build does not match any of the three proposed design stages, but many characteristic details are there – and who knows how a real navalized AH-64 might finally have looked like?
My photographs are my private property and are copyright © by me, John Russell (aka “Zoom Lens”) and all my rights are reserved. Any use without permission is forbidden.
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The photographs in my set, "Weed Flower Micros," may appear to be close-ups of regular-sized flowers – they are not!
These are micro (macro) photos of tiny little flowers which bloom on ordinary weeds found in my lawn.
How tiny? The largest weed flower in the set is only, when measured across its widest part from petal tip to petal tip, 3/4" in diameter (19mm)!
Some of these miniscule flowers are so small that the entire blossom you are looking at is 1/4" in diameter (6mm)…or smaller! Again, that’s measuring from petal tip to petal tip across the widest part of the bloom!
The smallest part of a weed flower that I have managed to successfully shoot and achieve good detail in is a photo I made of a bud that measured LESS than 1/32" in diameter (0.7mm) across its widest part!
For size references I have included a photo of certain flowers and buds next to the head of an ordinary paper match, which dwarfs the blooms and buds.
It’s delightful to discover the beauty, complexity, and variety in something so small that it’s easily ignored, taken for granted, dismissed as a pest, or just downright difficult to see with the naked eye.
And it’s an even greater delight to realize that this incredible beauty has been growing wild in my lawn, year after year, right under my un-seeing eyes as I’ve repeatedly mown them down with my lawn mower, never realizing the unseen beauty that I was trampling under my feet.
I hope you enjoy viewing these as much as I do. I have a lot of fun making them for us to look at!
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See more of these incredible, tiny jewels in my set, "Weed Flower Micros:"