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120s f/10.0
These pavements at Kilve are becoming a bit of a project for me. See the series here
Wuzhen (Simplified Chinese: 乌镇; Traditional Chinese: 烏鎮; pinyin: Wūzhèn) is a historic scenic town, part of Tongxiang, in northern Zhejiang Province, China. It lies within the triangle formed by Hangzhou, Suzhou and Shanghai. Wuzhen's area is 46.5 square kilometers. Its total population is 60,000 of which 12,000 permanent residents.
Located in the center of the six ancient towns south of Yangtze River, 17 kilometers (10.56 miles) north of the city of Tongxiang, Wuzhen displays thousands of years of history in its ancient stone bridges floating on mild water, its stone pathways between the mottled walls and its delicate wood carvings. Also, setting it apart from other towns, it gives a unique experience through its profound cultural background.
I've wanted to design a Stegosaurus for a while now, and even made a few attempts at it that didn't work out.
I dusted off the idea last month and, this time, things just fell into place. I scrapped my previous attempts and used my Pureland Stegosaurus as a jumping off point instead. You can still see that model embedded in the core of this one.
I also designed a slightly more complicated version that has three additional small plates, in order to make the model look more accurate.
Couple (1970-1971)
Oil on plywood
— Pablo Picasso (Spanish, 1881-1973)
Musée national Picasso-Paris
Calder-Picasso Exhibition at the High Museum of Art
Atlanta (Midtown), Georgia, USA.
21 August 2021.
▶ More photos of the exhibition: here.
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▶ "Returning late in his career to the subject of the nude figure, Picasso remarked, 'I want to speak the nude; I don't want to just make a nude as a nude; I want only to speak breast, speak foot, speak hands, belly... Find the means to speak and that is enough.' Some of these simplified works with strong silhouettes resemble two-dimensional versions of his flattened and folded sculptures."
— High Museum placard
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▶ Photo by Yours For Good Fermentables.com.
▶ For a larger image, type 'L' (without the quotation marks).
— Follow on Twitter: @Cizauskas.
— Follow on Facebook: YoursForGoodFermentables.
— Follow on Instagram: @tcizauskas.
▶ Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M10 II.
— Lens: Lumix G 20/F1.7 II.
— Polarizing filter
— Edit: Photoshop Elements 15, Nik Collection.
▶ Commercial use requires explicit permission, as per Creative Commons.
Dense fog simplifies my view on such a day. There is a feeling of being 'cocooned' or swathed in a blanket of foam. #cy365 #captureyour365 #windowview Day242
Another dreary, stormy day made for bad conditions. I turned my attention to subjects right in front of me. Simplifying ended up being a good thing for me to do.
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Week 22
Sometimes it can be difficult to have time to take a picture of the week. This week was one of those weeks. But I went out into the woods. I had just a little while for me to take a good picture.
I thought I had a good picture, but when I got home, no one has been really good. I was stressed out to get a good picture, but I think a good picture needs time. Time to get a good kompostion, finding the right light, at the decisive moment.
Instead, I took this picture with my phone, when I was out running with my daughter. To shoot with your phone requires less to perform. The result is technically not as good as having a good image taken with a DSLR, but sometimes the result can still get better.
Photo taken on a Hike on the Diez Vistas Trail From Buntzen Lake on September 18th 2011. It rained all day and we spent most of the days up in the clouds.
I have a lot of interior design and vintage finds to sell
I love what I do but am out of energy at the end of the day to determine how to expand, to enterprise, to take it to the next level, so to speak
It's time to simplify
We are going to open everything up for sale
I've had a etsy banner done (by the talente Hijiri) for vintage wares for over a year
Haven't taken it to further to actually load my wares and set up shop
I promise
I've gathered some really cool pieces
Sweet and throwback
I love the 50's, the 60's, the 70's
This is throwing myself out there, getting honest, maybe it will help me be accountable.
Peace
Oil on canvas; 48.6 x 54.3 cm.
Fernand Léger was born at Argentan, France. He began his career as a an artist by serving an apprenticeship in architecture in Caen. In 1900 Léger went to Paris and was admitted to the École des Arts Décoratifs in 1903 and also attended the Académie Julian. The first profound influence on Léger's work came from Cézanne.
Léger became friends with Delaunay and maintained ties with great artists, including Matisse, Rousseau, Apollinaire and leading exponents of Cubism. From 1909 Léger himself developed a quirky Cubist style, distinguished by reduction to the simplest basic forms and formal austerity linked with a pure, sharply contrasting palette by 1913-14. Surrealismus also left its mark on Fernand Léger in the 1930s, loosening up his style and making it more curvilinear.
Along with Picasso, Braque, and Gris, Fernand Léger ranks among the foremost Cubist painters. By 1912, he had developed his own adaptation of Cubism. Utilizing pure color, he simplified the forms in his pictures into geometric components of the cone, cube, and sphere, leaving their contours unbroken.
Layers include a .jpg of the Google Earth generated globe which is inverted, stretched and manipulated in 3 other layers, ripples from an M. C. Escher print and a stunning photo by a Professor Andrew Davidhazy from Rochester, NY. described on a few of the 80, 000+ references to him on Google as modest, talented, a great teacher and a ghost expert for photography. I have just licensed my work on line with the Creative Commons. Their icon lets people know that they can use your work for non-commercial reasons if they attribute it to you; they can make derivatives but they have to share-alike. Of course the challenge with Goggle Images is some of the most striking images available are difficult to track down in terms of authorship because there are already so many derivatives. This was the case with this drop of water by this stellar professor who continues to do astounding work. I left a comment on his web blog but I re-entered it three times before I realized he had wisely included an administrator's block for unedited entries. It may take him ages to even check his comments. When he does he will find to his annoyance in his busy life, that I've inadvertently left three. As I do more research on simplifying the Creative Commons for the commoner I will be tracing this at my WordPress blog.
An Inuit friend reminded me that for the global perspective for many Inuit of Canada is from a circumpolar point of view. In honour of my Inuit friends and students from time to time I view the earth through their lens. So I have geotagged this to the north east of Baffin Island, perhaps somewhere near Pond Inlet. Hello to the family of Julia and Ernie! Their family photo with their children all wearing traditional clothing was taken when they visited you in Pond Inlet is on the walls of our home on Vancouver Island.
This image was reworked and uploaded to Flynn-Burhoe. 2007. "Ripple Effects: Wave Algorithm." Speechless.
I believe I uploaded this image to Flickr on October 22, 2006. By January 2009 25 people tagged this image as a favorite and it had been viewed 45,989 times. Because it was one of the earlier images I posted in my Flickr account, and since then I have continued to add more, once it hit the magic number of 200 images, this one and many others are no longer visible on my photostream. However, since it is well-tagged and has been highlighted and used by others through the Creative Commons Licensing, it is still being found through searches!
The more recent revised version is still available on my Flickr photostream.
I know a pro account would bring these missing images back into the photo stream, but I do not want to take the risk of album deletions, etc. And my cyber experiment has been with open source and free accounts.
ABOUT
- Single Frame
- ISO100, f/4.5, 1/13s
GEAR
- Canon 400D + Sigma 10-20mm f/4.0-5.6 DC EX HSM
- Tripod
PROCESSING
- Curves, Contrast Unsharp Mask
- Border
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the model, the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The Henschel Hs 126 was a German two-seat reconnaissance and observation aircraft of World War II that was derived from the stillborn Henschel Hs 122. The pilot was seated in a protected cockpit under the parasol wing and the gunner in an open rear cockpit. The first prototype was not entirely up to Luftwaffe standards; it was followed by two more development planes equipped with different engines. Following the third prototype, ten pre-production planes were built in 1937. The Hs 126 entered service in 1938 after operational evaluation with the Legion Condor contingent to the Spanish Civil War.
By the time the Hs 126 A-1 joined the Luftwaffe, the re-equipping of reconnaissance formations was already well advanced. By the start of World War II in September 1939, the Hs 126 served with many reconnaissance units. They were used with great success in the attack on Poland where it proved itself as a reliable observation and liaison aircraft. Its use continued after the end of the Phony War in May 1940, but with more and more Allied fighters appearing over the theatre of operations, the type’s main weakness became apparent: the Hs 126 was rather slow and could hardly avoid or even escape from fighter attacks. The losses were dramatic: alone twenty Hs 126s were lost between 10 and 21 May 1940!
The Hs 126 was initially produced in two versions, which only differed through their engines. 47 squadrons equipped with Hs 126 A/B participated in the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, and the Hs 126 was also successfully used in North Africa. However, low top speed was the Hs 126’s main weakness. To rectify this deficiency, the Hs 126 was in late 1940 experimentally outfitted with a more powerful BMW 132K which replaced the Hs 126 A’s Bramo or the B’s BMW 9-cylinder radial engine, which delivered around 625 kW (850 PS) each. The new powerplant delivered up to 809 kW (1,085 hp) with 96 octane fuel injection at take-off and as emergency power, and 705 kW (960 hp) at normal military power. This extra power, together with an aerodynamically more efficient cowling, pushed maximum speed to 400 km/h (250 mph), and after successful tests in the 1940/41 winter the RLM accepted it as the Hs 126 C for production and service.
Beyond the new engine the serial production Hs 126 C-1 did not differ much visibly from its predecessors, even though the internal structure was simplified and lightened by roughly 50 kg (110 lb). Various Reihenbildgeräte (reconnaissance cameras) could be installed in a compartment at the rear of the cabin, and the defensive armament was upgraded with heavy 13 mm MG 131 machine guns instead of the former 7.92 mm weapons. Sometimes, a MG 81Z 7.92 twin machine gun was alternatively fitted in the rear cockpit instead of the MG 131, which offered a higher rate of fire.
An interesting sub-variant of the Hs 126 C was the Hs 126 C-2, a dedicated observation and liaison floatplane for theatres of operation with difficult terrain where sufficient airfields were rare or hard to install and where alternatively bodies of water could be used for landing. Around thirty Hs 126 Cs were modified with twin floats instead of the type’s standard spatted fixed landing gear. They were, however, unlike the Arado Ar 196 shipboard reconnaissance floatplane, not capable of catapult starts and not intended for operations at high sea. Other changes included a ventral fin for improved directional stability, additional fuel tanks in the floats that compensated the loss of range through the floats’ drag, and the land-based Hs 126s optional shackles for light bombs under the fuselage were deleted to compensate for the floats’ extra weight, and there was no free space left to ensure a safe bomb release.
Another feature that was developed for the Hs 126 C after field experiences with the aircraft during winter operations was an extended cockpit glazing to better protect the observer from the elements. It covered the while rear section of the cockpit opening but still was open at the rear. It was mounted on rails and could be pushed forward, under the original glasshouse for the pilot. This canopy extension was offered as a Rüstsatz (field modification kit) for older Hs 126 variants, too, and modified aircraft received the suffix “R1” to their designation.
Only 150 Hs 126 Cs (32 of them C-2 floatplanes) were built between early 1941 and 1942, production of the Hs 126 A/B had already ended in 1941. Most of them were operated in Denmark and Norway, even though a few were also allocated to Aufklärergruppen in the Mediterranean where they operated in the Adriatic Sea.
The Hs 126 was well received for its good short takeoff and low-speed characteristics which were needed at the time. However, it was vulnerable and the Hs 126 A/Bs were already retired from frontline units in 1942, the better-performing Hs 126 Cs only a year later. The type was soon superseded by the light general-purpose STOL Fieseler Fi 156 Storch, which was simpler and cheaper to produce, and the medium-range two-engine twin-boom Focke-Wulf Fw 189 "flying eye" with a fully enclosed cockpit and a better defensive armament. However, many Hs 126s were still operated for some time in areas with little Allied aerial threat, or second-line duties as glider tugs or liaison aircraft.
General characteristics:
Crew: Two (pilot and observer/gunner)
Length: 10,90 m (35 ft 7 in) fuselage only
11,52 m (37 ft 9 in) overall
Wingspan: 14.5 m (47 ft 7 in)
Height: 4,61 m (15 ft 1 in) from waterline
Wing area: 31.6 m² (340 sqft)
Empty weight: 2,030 kg (4,480 lb)
Loaded weight: 3,090 kg (6,820 lb)
Powerplant:
1× BMW 132K air-cooled 9-cylinder radial engine with 809 kW (1,085 hp) emergency power
and 705 kW (960 hp) continuous output
Performance:
Maximum speed: 360 km/h (223 mph) at 3,000 m (9,850 ft) with floats
(C-1: 400 km/h (248 mph) with wheels)
Travelling speed: 280 km/h /174 mph)
(C-1: 300 km/h (186 mph)
Landing speed: 115 km/h (71 mph)
Range: 998 km (620 mi)
Service ceiling: 8,530 m (28,000 ft)
Rate of climb: 550 m/min (1,800 ft/min)
Time to height: 4,4 min to 1.000 m (3.275 ft)
14 min to 3.000 m (9826 ft)
Wing loading: 97.8 kg/m2 (20.1 lb/sqft)
Power/mass: 0.21 kW/kg (0.13 hp/lb)
Armament:
1× forward-firing 13 mm (.511 in) MG 131 machine gun
1× flexible, rearward-firing 13 mm (.511 in) MG 131 machine gun
The kit and its assembly:
This build was inspired by a similar project done by fellow modeler ericr at whatfimodellers.com in 1:48 a while ago: a combination of the German land-based Hs 126 observation aircraft with twin floats from an Ar 196 seaplane. This combo looked very natural and balanced, so I decided to re-create a personal interpretation in my “home scale” 1:72.
Basically, this what-if model is a straightforward combination of the Italeri Hs 126 A (a venerable but pretty good model, even today, despite raised panel lines) with floats from a Heller Ar 196 A (also a slightly dated but very nice model, also with raised panel lines). The selling point of both kits is their good fit and overall simplicity, even though mounting the Hs 126’s wings to the fuselage – it is held only at six points – is a tricky task. Furthermore, once the wing is in place, painting the area in front of the cockpit as well as the windscreen area is quite difficult, so that I did that ahead of the final assembly.
The Ar 196 floats feature lots of struts, and to mount them (only) under the fuselage the outer supports had to go, because they are normally attached to the Ar 196’s mid-wing section. What was a bit challenging is the struts’ attachment points on the floats: they come with square bases that offer relatively big surfaces to glue the party in place, adding stability to the whole construction. However, blending these areas into each other called for some PSR.
A similar attachment solution was chosen by Heller to mount the floats’ struts to the Ar 196 hull – again, the “end plates” had to go and the struts had to be trimmed to keep the floats parallel to the fuselage. Since the outer supports were gone, I added diagonal stabilizers between the front and rear struts cluster.
To add a personal twist and depict an evolutionary late version of the Hs 126, I decided to swap the engine for a donor part from a Matchbox He 115 – it is basically the same engine, but the cowling is slightly wider and cleaner. The engine part itself is simpler. Just a disc with an engine relief. But with the propeller in place (mounted on a metal axis to spin free), this is not obvious. With scratched exhaust pipes, the new cowling gives the aircraft a slightly more modern and beefier look?
Another personal addition is improved crew comfort: the original Hs 126 observer workplace was totally open, just protected by spoilers on the canopy that only covered the pilot’s station. Esp. at wintertime this must have been a real P!TA place, so that I tried to extend the glazing. A raid in the spares box revealed two things that created an almost perfect combo: a Hs 126 glazing from a Matchbox kit and a rear canopy section from the spurious ESCI Ka-34 “Hokum” kit. The Matchbox parts’ selling point: it fits perfectly into the respective opening on the Italeri kit and has a slightly “boxier” roof shape, which better too up the square profile of the Hokum cockpit, which, itself, perfectly fell into place over the observer station! To adapt the modern piece to the highly braced Hs 126 glazing I added fake stiffeners made from adhesive tape cross- and lengthwise. I thought that just painting braces onto the flat windows was not enough, and with some paint the tape’s 3D effect looks quite convincing!
Other small additions are a barrel for the machine gun the cowling, a stabilizing fin made from styrene sheet material and PE ladders from the floats into the cockpit on both sides.
Painting and markings:
I wanted an authentic Luftwaffe livery – but the Hs 126 and similar German recce planes of the mid-WWII era only offer a small range of camouflage options. The generic paint scheme was a splinter pattern in RLM 70/71/65 with a low, hard waterline. Africa as optional theatre of operations offered some variations with field-modifications of this basic scheme with German and Italian sand added on top – but that would not have been the right option for a floatplane, I guess?
Eventually I decided to locate the model’s unit far up North and to add improvised winter camouflage to the standard livery. It was applied just as in real life: first, the whole model received its standard splinter camouflage with Humbrol 30, 91 and 65, then the decals were applied. The latter were puzzled together from the scrap box, using simplified Eiserne Kreuze without black edges. The white unit emblems are fictional and come from an MPM He 100 kit with spurious PR markings. The tactical code is “plausible” (“9W” is the AufklGr. 122’s unit code, “D” denotes the 4th aircraft, and “C” is the verification letter for the Stabgeschwader of the unit’s 2nd group) and created from single letters/digits. The black and the green have no strong contrast to the camouflage, but this style was common Luftwaffe practice. The Stabflieger color green was also incorporated on the spinner, another very typical Luftwaffe marking to denote an aircraft’s operational unit.
The temporary whitewash was the applied with white acrylic paint (Revell 05) and a flat, soft brush. Once dry, the whole model received a light black ink washing, post-panel shading and a light treatment with wet sandpaper on the white areas to simulate wear and tear. After some exhaust stains were created with graphite, the model was finally sealed with matt acrylic varnish.
Well, not a spectacular what-if model, and mounting the Hs 126 on floats was trickier than one would expect at first glance. Pimping the rather dull Luftwaffe standard livery with whitewash was a good move, though, adding an interesting and individual twist to the aircraft. And the resulting whole “package” looks pretty convincing?
Taken a couple of weeks ago downtown Vancouver. A minimalist shot of what it looks like there during the playoffs this month. Game one in two hours!!
Aero Spacelines Super Guppy
The Pima Air & Space Museum, located in Tucson, Arizona, is one of the world's largest non-government funded aerospace museums. The museum features a display of nearly 300 aircraft spread out over 80 acres (320,000 m²) on a campus occupying 127 acres (610,000 m²). It is also been the home to the Arizona Aviation Hall of Fame since 1991.
A large number of the museum's aircraft are displayed outside with the remainder located in one of the museum's 4 display hangars. In addition to the display hangars, the museum has a restoration hangar.
Opened to the public in May 1976 with 48 aircraft then on display, the Museum's main hangar houses an SR-71A Blackbird, an A-10 Warthog, a United States Air Force Through the Years exhibit, and a mock-up of a control tower.
The museum is adjacent to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. The 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (AMARG), affiliated with the base, also known as the "Graveyard of Planes" or "The Boneyard", is the largest aircraft storage and preservation facility in the world. Bus tours of the boneyard leave from the museum several times a day from Monday to Friday, except Federal holidays.
The nearby Titan Missile Museum is located about 20 miles south of Tucson in Green Valley off of Interstate 19 and features a Titan II intercontinental ballistic missile still in its silo. Tours of the above-ground and underground installations around the missile are conducted daily. More extensive "top to bottom" tours take up to five hours and are conducted several times each month. Reservations required for top to bottom tour.
Both museums are overseen by the Arizona Aerospace Foundation and are governed by the Board of Trustees. They are non-profit 501 (c) 3 organization that relies on visitors paying admissions, for trams and AMARG tours, as well as what they spend in the Museum stores. They also rely on memberships and contracted events to pay to restore and acquire exhibits.
(Wikipedia)
The Aero Spacelines Super Guppy is a large, wide-bodied cargo aircraft that is used for hauling outsize cargo components. It was the successor to the Pregnant Guppy, the first of the Guppy aircraft produced by Aero Spacelines, which itself was named for its resemblance to a pregnant guppy. Five were built in two variants, both of which were colloquially referred to as the "Super Guppy".
The first, the Super Guppy, or "SG", was built directly from the fuselage of a C-97J Turbo Stratocruiser, the military version of the 1950s Boeing 377 "Stratocruiser" passenger plane. The fuselage was lengthened to 141 feet (43 m), and ballooned out to a maximum inside diameter of 25 ft (7.6 m), the length of the cargo compartment being 94 ft 6 in (28.8 m). The floor of the cargo compartment was still only 8 ft 9 in (2.7 m) wide, as necessitated by the use of the Stratocruiser fuselage.
In addition to the fuselage modifications, the Super Guppy used Pratt & Whitney T-34-P-7 turboprop engines for increased power and range, and modified wing and tail surfaces. It could carry a load of 54,000 pounds (24,494 kg) and cruise at 300 mph (480 km/h).
The second version was officially known as the Super Guppy Turbine (SGT), although it used turboprop engines like the first Super Guppy. This variant used Allison 501-D22C turboprops. Unlike the previous Guppy, the main portion of its fuselage was constructed from scratch. By building from scratch, Aero Spacelines was able to widen the floor of the cargo compartment to 13 ft (4.0 m). The overall cargo-compartment length was increased to 111 ft 6 in (34.0 m), and the improved fuselage and engines allowed for a maximum load of 52,500 lb (23,800 kg). These design improvements, combined with a pressurized crew cabin that allowed for higher-altitude cruising, allowed the SGT to transport more cargo than its predecessors.
The SGT retained only the cockpit, wings, tail, and main landing gear of the 377. The nose gear was taken from a Boeing 707 and rotated 180 degrees. This dropped the front of the aircraft slightly, leveling the cargo-bay floor and simplifying loading operations.
In the early 1970s, the two Super Guppy Turbines were used by Airbus to transport aeroplane parts from decentralised production facilities to the final assembly plant in Toulouse. In 1982 and 1983, two additional Super Guppy Turbines were built by Union de Transports Aériens Industries in France after Airbus bought the right to produce the aircraft. The four Super Guppies have since been replaced by the Airbus Beluga, capable of carrying twice as much cargo by weight.
(Wikipedia)
Das Pima Air & Space Museum (umgangssprachlich kurz: PASM) befindet sich im Südosten von Tucson, Arizona, USA am südlichen Ende der Start- und Landebahn der Davis-Monthan Air Force Base.
Auf einer Fläche von rund 320.000 m² werden rund 300, fast ausschließlich militärische Flugzeuge ausgestellt; diese verteilen sich einerseits auf eine Anzahl von Hangars und ähnliche Ausstellungshallen, andererseits auf das weitläufige Außengelände. Nördlich angrenzend befinden sich die Davis-Monthan Air Force Base sowie die 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group (kurz: AMARG) mit ihren mehreren Tausend eingelagerten militärischen Flugzeugen; diese Einrichtungen sind nicht Teil des PASM.
Die Liste der ausgestellten Flugzeuge ist mit rund 300 sehr umfangreich; teils handelt es sich um die letzten erhalten gebliebenen Exemplare, selten auch um Unikate. Auf Grund der intensiven Sonneneinstrahlung im Süden Arizonas ist insbesondere bei den Ausstellungsstücken im Außenbereich eine sonnenbedingte Verwitterung von Lackierungen, Kunststoffen und Gummi zu erwarten.
Das PASM ist Ansprechpartner und Organisator für Besuchertouren über das Gelände der AMARG.
(Wikipedia)
Als Guppy werden Umbauten von Flugzeugen der Typen Boeing 377 Stratocruiser und Boeing C-97 Stratofreighter bezeichnet, die durch eine Vergrößerung des Rumpfes auffallen. Ausgeführt wurden sie von der US-amerikanischen Firma Aero Spacelines (zunächst in Van Nuys bei Los Angeles, dann in Santa Barbara, ebenfalls in Kalifornien) sowie vom in Le Bourget (Frankreich) ansässigen Unternehmen UTA Industries. Frachtraumbreite und -höhe sind sogar etwas größer als beim Airbus Beluga, die Frachtraumlänge ist allerdings deutlich geringer. Ihren Namen haben die Flugzeuge von einem Fisch: Guppys sind lebendgebärende Fische, die während der Trächtigkeit einen erheblich aufgeblähten Bauch aufweisen – somit ergaben sich Assoziationen zwischen dem Flugzeug und dieser Fischart, die zum Namen des Flugzeugs führten. Seit 1998 ist nur noch ein einziges Exemplar aktiv (bei der NASA).
Der ehemalige Militärpilot John Conroy hatte, zusammen mit dem Flugzeughändler Lee Mansdorf, im Jahr 1961 die Firma Aero Spacelines gegründet.
Als die NASA begann, immer größere Raketenteile zu planen, wurde schnell klar, dass diese sinnvoll nur über den Luftweg transportiert werden konnten. So gab die NASA bei Aero Spacelines den Umbau einiger ausgemusterter Boeing 377 Stratocruiser in Auftrag. Die Boeing 377 war die zivile Version des C-97 Stratofreighter, einer Entwicklung auf Basis des Bombers Boeing B-29.
Beim Entwurf der C-97 wurden im Grunde genommen nur der Rumpf neu entworfen und der Antrieb geändert, das Tragwerk und die Leitwerke aber von der B-29 übernommen. Ab der siebten Maschine kamen dann das Seitenleitwerk und die Triebwerke der Boeing B-50 Superfortress zur Anwendung.
Die militärische C-97 Stratofreighter wurde in 77 Exemplaren gebaut; hinzu kamen 811 Stück der Tankerversion KC-97. Vom zivilen Passagierflugzeug Boeing 377 wurden nur 56 Maschinen produziert, die größtenteils am Ende der 1950er-Jahre ausgemustert wurden. Einige dieser Maschinen, die überwiegend in einem sehr guten Zustand waren und nur wenige Flugstunden aufwiesen, wurden für die Guppy-Umbauten verwendet.
Die Guppy-Umbauten lassen sich in drei Serien unterteilen, die als Pregnant Guppy, Super Guppy und Mini Guppy bezeichnet werden.
Airbus setzte lange Zeit Super Guppy-Flugzeuge ein, um Flugzeugteile zwischen den europäischen Fertigungsstätten transportieren zu können. Die Firma verwendet inzwischen jedoch einen selbst entworfenen, ähnlichen Flugzeugtyp, den Airbus Beluga (A300-600ST). Ein Exemplar der Super Guppy befindet sich im Airbuswerk Hamburg-Finkenwerder.
Boeing erarbeitete für den Transport der Teile für die Boeing 787 eine eigene Transportmaschine auf Basis umgebauter 747-400-Passagiermaschinen. Entwickelt wurde die Boeing 747 Large Cargo Freighter (747 LCF) (auch Dreamlifter genannt, in Anlehnung an den Marketingnamen Dreamliner der 787) von Boeing gemeinsam mit der Taiwanischen Evergreen Aviation Technologies Corporation (EGAT). Für den Umbau ist allein EGAT verantwortlich, während die fertiggestellten Maschinen von Evergreen International Airlines (eine US-Firma ohne Bindung an die Evergreen Group) betrieben werden.
Die Super Guppy (SG-201) absolvierte am 31. August 1965 ihren Erstflug. Sie war noch größer [als die Pregnant Guppy] und verfügte über einen Turbopropantrieb, bestehend aus vier T34-Propellerturbinen (Pratt & Whitney T-34P7), während die Pregnant Guppy noch mit Kolbentriebwerken angetrieben wurde. Die Rumpflänge wurde auf 43,05 m erhöht, die Frachtraumhöhe auf 7,77 m.
Der Bau und die damit zusammenhängende Notwendigkeit zum Transport der neuen Saturn-V-Raketenstufen (Apollo-Programm) machte den Bau dieses riesigen Transporters erforderlich. Nach dem Umbau wurde es möglich, maximal 18,6 Tonnen zuzuladen. Bei der NASA trug dieses Flugzeug das Kennzeichen NASA 940 und flog unter anderen für die Gemini-, Apollo-, Space-Shuttle- und Skylab-Programme der NASA.
1990 wurde es von der NASA außer Dienst gestellt, im Juli 1991 zur Davis-Monthan Air Force Base bei Tucson, Arizona, geflogen und ist nun im angrenzenden Pima Air & Space Museum ausgestellt.
(Wikipedia)