View allAll Photos Tagged Versatile
332 on scrap train (one flatbed truck) near Garryduff, the junction east of Kylemore. The job was moving the
remains of a scrapped tractor or bulldozer to road access. The excavator was used as a crane, here to load the
cab of the scrapped vehicle. 24th. July 2012.
The Kenworth K200 is an all purpose Australia built prime mover. This versatile truck has a massive 598 horsepower engine which delivers 2050 lb-ft of torque to the rear axles. Quite fun build, again on a 1:40 scale.
Versatile Equipment -V.Eqs- VEX-8000
Future heavy equipment for multi-purpose on biped.
Just tried to build some icons of heavy/construction equipment into heroic robot design.
Gun is the bowler...or just imagine how to use, as you need.
793 YJ14 BWX was new to former Arriva subsidiary Yorkshire Tiger in 2014 for the 'Flying Tiger' 757 service between Leeds City Centre and Leeds Bradford International Airport.
It is seen still earning it's keep in Leeds City Centre, having been internally transferred to Arriva Yorkshire's Castleford Depot for the 167 and 168 routes between Leeds and Castleford. Here, it is seen loading on York Street working a 168 service towards its abode of Castleford.
(13/11/2021)
+++ 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 Cessna Model 336 and 337 “Skymaster” were American twin-engine civil utility aircraft built in a unique push-pull configuration. Their engines were mounted in the nose and rear of its pod-style fuselage. Twin booms extended aft of the wings to the vertical stabilizers, with the rear engine between them. The horizontal stabilizer was aft of the pusher propeller, mounted between and connecting the two booms.
The first Skymaster, Model 336, had fixed landing gear and initially flew on February 28, 1961. It went into production in May 1963 with 195 being produced through mid-1964. In February 1965, Cessna introduced the larger Model 337 Super Skymaster with more powerful engines, retractable landing gear, and a dorsal air scoop for the rear engine (the "Super" prefix was subsequently dropped from the name). In 1966, the turbocharged T337 was introduced, and in 1973, the pressurized P337G entered production.
The type was very prolific and Cessna built 2.993 Skymasters of all variants, including 513 military O-2 (nicknamed "Oscar Deuce") versions from 1967 onwards. The latter featured underwing ordnance hard points to hold unguided rockets, gun pods or flares, and served in the forward air control (FAC) role and psychological operations (PSYOPS) by the US military between 1967 and 2010. Production in America ended in 1982, but was continued by Reims in France, with the FTB337 STOL and the military FTMA “Milirole”.
Both civil and military Cessna 336/337 version had long service careers, and some were considerably modified for new operators and uses. Among the most drastic conversions was the Spectrum SA-550, built by Spectrum Aircraft Corporation of Van Nuys, California, in the mid-1980s: Spectrum took the 336/337 airframe and removed the front engine, lengthened the nose to maintain the center of gravity, and replaced the rear piston engine with a pusher turboprop which offered more power than the combined pair of original petrol engines. The Spectrum SA-550 conversion also came together with an optional modernization package that prolonged the airframes’ service life, so that modified machines could well serve on for 20 years or more.
This drastic conversion was executed for both military and civil operators. The best-known military SA-550s were six former USAF O-2A airframes, which had been transferred to the U.S. Navy in 1983 for use as range controllers with VA-122 at NAS Lemoore, California. These aircraft were operationally nicknamed “Pelican”, due to the characteristic new nose shape, and the name unofficially caught on.
However, the SA-550 package was only adopted sporadically by private operators, but it became quite popular among several major police and fire departments. Typical duties for these machines included border/drug patrol, surveillance/observation duties (e.g. traffic, forest fire) and special tasks, including drug interdiction as well for SAR missions and undercover operations like narcotics and serialized criminal investigations. Some SA-550s were accordingly modified and individually outfitted with suitable sensors, including IR/low light cameras, searchlights, and internal auxiliary tanks. None were armed, even though some aircraft featured underwing hardpoints for external extra tanks, flare dispensers for nocturnal operations or smoke charge dispensers for ground target marking to guide water bombers to hidden forest fires.
The type’s versatility, low noise level, high travel speed and good loitering time in the operational area at low speed proved to be vital assets for these public service operators and justified its relatively high maintenance costs. A handful of the modernized Spectrum SA-550 machines were still in active service after the Millennium, primarily in the USA.
General characteristics:
Crew: 1 + 3 passengers (up to 5 passengers possible in special seat configuration)
Length: 32 ft 6½ in (9.94 m)
Wingspan: 38 ft ¾ in (11.62 m)
Height: 9 ft 2 in (2.79 m)
Wing area: 201 sq ft (18.81 m²)
Aspect ratio: 7.18:1
Airfoil: NACA 2412 at root, NACA 2409 at tip
Empty weight: 2,655 lb (1,204 kg)
Max takeoff weight: 4,400 lb (1,996 kg)
Fuel capacity: 92 US gal (77 imp gal; 350 l) normal,
128 US gal (107 imp gal; 480 l) with auxiliary tank
in the cabin instead of two passenger seats
Powerplant:
1× Pratt & Whitney PT6A-27 turboprop engine, delivering 550 shp (410 kW) and
driving a four-blade McCauley fully-feathering, constant-speed propeller, 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) diameter
Performance:
Maximum speed: 199 mph (320 km/h, 173 kn) at sea level
Cruise speed: 144 mph (232 km/h, 125 kn) at 10,000 ft (3,000 m) (econ cruise)
Stall speed: 69 mph (111 km/h, 60 kn)
Range: 1421 mi (2.288 km, 1.243 nmi) at 10.000 ft (3.050 m) altitude and economy cruise
Service ceiling: 19,500 ft (5,900 m)
Rate of climb: 1,200 ft/min (6.1 m/s)
Takeoff distance to 50 ft (15m): 1,545 ft (471 m)
Landing distance from 50 ft (15m): 1,650 ft (500 m)
The kit and its assembly:
This build is the combination of ingredients that had already been stashed away for a long time, and the “Red Lights” Group Build at whatifmodellers.com in early 2021 was a good motivator and occasion to finally put everything together.
The basis is an ARII 1:72 Cessna T337 model kit – I had purchased it long ago with the expectation to create a military Skymaster from it, but I was confused by a fixed landing gear which would make it a 336? Well, without a further concrete plan the kit preliminarily landed in The Stash™…
However, the ARII model features the optional observation windows in the doors on the starboard side, in the form of a complete(!) fuselage half, so that it lends itself to a police or firefighter aircraft of some sort. This idea was furthermore fueled by a decal sheet that I had been given from a friend, left over from a 1:72 Italeri JetRanger, with three optional police helicopter markings.
The final creative element was the real-world “Pelican” conversion of six O-2As for the US Navy, as mentioned in the background above: the front engine was replaced with a longer nose and the engine configuration changed to a pusher-only aircraft with a single powerful turboprop engine. This looked so odd that I wanted to modify the ARII Cessna in a similar fashion, too, and all these factors came together in this model.
My Arii Cessna 337 kit is a re-boxing from 2009, but its origins date back to Eidai in 1972 and that’s just what you get: a vintage thing with some flash and sinkholes, raised (but fine) surface details and pretty crude seams with bulges and gaps. Some PSR is direly necessary, esp. the fit of the fuselage halves is cringeworthy. The clear parts were no source of joy, either; especially the windscreen turned out to be thick, very streaky (to a degree that I’d almost call it opaque!) and even not fully molded! The side glazing was also not very clear. I tried to improve the situation through polishing, but if the basis is already poor, there’s little you can do about it. Hrmpf.
However, the kit was built mostly OOB, including the extra O-2 glazing in the lower doors, but with some mods. One is a (barely visible) extra tank in the cabin’s rear, plus a pilot and an observer figure placed into the tight front seats. The extended “Pelican” nose was a lucky find – I was afraid that I had had to sculpt a nose from scratch with 2C putty. But I found a radome from a Hasegawa RA-5C, left over from a model I built in the Eighties and that has since long fallen apart. However, this nose fitted almost perfectly in size and shape, I just “blunted” the tip a little. Additionally, both the hull in front of the dashboard and the Vigilante radome were filled with as many lead beads as possible to keep the nose down.
The kit’s OOB spatted, fixed landing gear was retained – even though it is dubious for a Cessna 337, because this type had a fully retractable landing gear, and the model has the landing gear covers actually molded into the lower fuselage. On the other side, the Cessna 336’s fixed landing gear looks quite different, too! However, this is a what-if model, and a fixed landing gear might have been a measure to reduce maintenance costs?
The propeller was replaced with a resin four-blade aftermarket piece (from CMK, probably the best-fitting thing on this build!) on my standard metal axis/styrene tube adapter arrangement. The propeller belongs to a Shorts Tucano, but I think that it works well on the converted Cessna and its powerful pusher engine, even though in the real world, the SA-550 is AFAIK driven by a three-blade prop. For the different engine I also enlarged the dorsal air intake with a 1.5 mm piece of styrene sheet added on top of the molded original air scoop and added a pair of ventral exhaust stubs (scratched from sprue material).
Another addition is a pair of winglets, made from 0.5 mm styrene sheet – an upgrade which I found on several late Cessna 337s in various versions. They just add to the modernized look of the aircraft. For the intended observation role, a hemispherical fairing under the nose hides a 180° camera, and I added some antennae around the hull.
However, a final word concerning the model kit itself: nothing fits, be warned! While the kit is a simple affair and looks quite good in the box, assembling it turned out to be a nightmare, with flash, sinkholes, a brittle styrene and gaps everywhere. This includes the clear parts, which are pretty thick and blurry. The worst thing is the windscreen, which is not only EXTRA thick and EXTRA blurry, it was also not completely molded, with gaps on both sides. I tried to get it clearer through manual polishing, but the streaky blurs are integral – no hope for improvement unless you completely replace the parts! If I ever build a Cessna 337/O-2 again, I will give the Airfix kit a try, it can only be better…
Painting and markings:
The choice between the operator options from the JetRanger sheet was hard, it included Sweden and Italy, but I eventually settled for the LAPD because the livery looks cool and this police department not only operates helicopters, but also some fixed-wing aircraft.
I adapted the LAPD’s classic black-and-white police helicopter livery (Gloss White and Black, Humbrol 22 and 21, respectively) to the Cessna and extended it to the wings. At this point – already upset because of the poor fit of the hardware – disaster struck in the form of Humbrol’s 22 turning into a pinkish ivory upon curing! In the tin, the paint and its pigments looked pretty white and “clean”, and I assume that it’s the thinner that caused this change. What a crap! It’s probably the third tin with 22 that causes trouble, even though in different peculiarities!
The result was total rubbish, though, and I tried to rub the paint off as good as possible on the small model with its many windows, the fixed, delicate landing gear and the wing support struts. Then I overpainted the areas with Revell 301 (Semi-matt White). While this enamel yielded the intended pure white tone, the paint itself is rather gooey and not easy to work with, so that the overall finish turned out worse than desired. At least the black paint worked properly. The demarcations were created with black decal stripes (TL Modellbau), because the tiny model left little room for complex masking measures – and I did not risk any more painting accidents.
Since the aircraft would be kept shiny and clean, I just did a light black ink washing to emphasize surface details and did a light panel post-shading on the black areas, not for weathering but rather to accent surface structures. No further weathering was done (and necessary).
The markings/decals come – as mentioned above – from an Italeri 1:72 JetRanger, but they were augmented with some additional markings, e. g. grey walkways on the wings and “L-A-P-D” in large black letters under the wings, to distract from the poor finish of the white paint around them…
Finally, the kit was sealed overall with Italeri semi-gloss acrylic varnish, just with a matt anti-glare shield in front of the windscreen, which received thin white trim lines (generic decal stripes).
A challenging build due to the Arii kit’s rather poor basis, the massive rhinoplasty and the crisp paint scheme. However, I like the result – what-if models do not always have to be armed military vehicles, there’s potential in other genres, too. And this mono-engine “Pelican” Skymaster plays its role as a “flying eye” in police service credibly and well. However, this was my first and last Eidai kit…
Bamboo has long been used as an assembly material in china, particularly Hong Kong, because of its versatility. One of the most interesting applications of the bamboo is its structural function for scaffolding.
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take a trip down the memory lane:
The Good Old Days In Their Good Old Ways
More Still Life by The Streets shots:
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45050 plus a Class 45 bogie midst a view of part of BREL Derby Works on 28th September 1985. Also to be seen is another Class 45 and an HST power car undergoing attention.
Hey! Pretty one in the green dress thing! Yes, you! Looking good! You don't speak english do you?
Tommy: "Let me see if my Chinese is still useful..."
Tommy says something in Chinese, and we get the same confused stare from the chick. Great way to get some, thats for sure. NOT! Uhg, come on Tommy, work your ching-chong magic! That was racist, wasn't it? Ah what the heck, I don't care. Stupid "political correctness".
Girl: "I'm sorry, this is just too sad to continue. Your Chinese, actually not half bad. The accent though, probably should do something about that. You guys are funny. I'm Shado, and from what I understood, you're Tommy, and you are Oliver, correct?"
Yep, but you can call me Ollie if you'd like, beautiful.
Shado: "I'm flattered, really, but, uh, no thanks. I have things I need to do. Really, it's nice meeting you though."
Damnit Ollie, you'e loosing her! Get it together man! Good hooker.. Haha hooker, get it? Cuz, ya know, whatever. Good hook line, good hook line... Got it!
Well, my friend and I, we really don't have much of anything to do. Maybe we could, help out? Get to know each other? Have a little fun?
Oh no, I got that look... The stare of death... Darnit man, it was going so well. And Tommy's looking all like "dood yuhoo skrood dis uhp shooo bayd. Y u doo dis? " Wow, this is pathetic. Get a handel Ollie!
Shado: "Trust me, you can't help. Not in your skill set."
You'd be surprised, I'm really versatile.
Tommy: "Look, if you need to go, go, thats ok. But maybe we'll see you around? I don't know."
TOMMY!! Da heck you doin? Don't let her get away! Yes, I elbowed you in the arm, man up! You are such an idiot!
Shado: "You know what, if you want to come along, knock yourselves out. Not literally, please don't. But come along. I'm just going to do some target practice with my bow here.
Ooh, archery! Hey, I'm actually pretty good at that. Watch out for me and my sneaky skills!
Tommy: "You haven't done anything without the rubber tips, Ollie. Me, on the other hand, I'm a good shot."
Well that's why you never get far with anyone. Protection can prevent unnecessary accidents
Oh man this is hilarious! Hahahahashahahaha!
Shado: "I sense an inside joke between you two?"
Tommy: "It's nothing. How about you give me a shot with this thing?"
Shado: "Go right ahead!"
Oh Tommy, you are such a noob. You're gonna fail so hard. He draws back the bowstring. He aims. He shoots. He barely hits the target. Bravo Tommy, Bravo. You're one heck of a shot, indeed. Hahahahahaha, this is good.
Hahah, yo call that a shot? Gimme that bow! I'll show you how to shoot.
Ok, breathe. Pull back the string. See the target, the center. Check the bow, raise it to account for drop, and check. For wind. And, release. Oh hell! What the heck was that? Better than tommy's, but still. Uhg.
Shado: "Nice shot. But how about you let me show you how. A real archer shoots?"
She pulls it back quickly, aims, and fires in a second. Swoosh, that thing goes straight into the bullseye! Well what do you know? She's got boobs and skills. I like her.
Hey, uh, you mind if we get some lessons?
The Beechcraft AT-11 Kansan, a World War II-era military trainer aircraft, played a crucial role in training Allied pilots. Derived from the Beech 18, it featured a twin-engine design and was utilized for navigation, bombing, and gunnery exercises. The Kansan's versatility contributed significantly to pilot preparation during the war.
The Cargo, All-Terrain Transport, or C.A.T.T., is a rugged and versatile utility vehicle used across the galaxy for moving cargo of all kinds. With its tough engineering and proprietary cargo connection system, the C.A.T.T. ensures safe and reliable delivery every time.
Worn to work, on a date, and to visit my Grandma.
Skirt - thrifted Addition Elle, size 20
T shirt - Old Navy, size XXL
Flats - Payless, size 11
Scarf - Joe Fresh
Ring - locally made sale in Camrose
Book bag - part of my "work uniform"
In northern Nevada a beautiful RV place to stay at, complete with horses in a pasture. Loved it, will stay here again!
The lack of public transport in Kyrat means one has to be resourceful when it comes to long distances.
Another from my candid attempts taken along the boardwalk in Ocean City, MD as I went out for a morning walk with the long lens.
As I was walking down the long boardwalk, this mother and daughter came out onto the walkway from the street (they were evidently out for a morning jog together, as they had their phones and earplugs ready) ... but being versatile in nature, they used their phones for some quick snap shots of the sunrise too. An interesting moment they shared together, and then it was off for the morning run ...
Now if I could only make a phone call on my 60D, I could compete with them ;)
Check out my set "Most Interesting 500" here!
Visit my Waldorfschool/Steinerschool related pinboards here!
The 'Most Versatile' challenge is set by the Compositionally Challenged Group. Loads of thanks to Sharon for setting these themes.
In this month's challenge, 10 member entered 74 photos, and 6 members completed all 10 themes. These members, in play order are: Maria, Sharon, Dave, Andy, Sandi and Linda.
This montage features at least one photo per person, and one photo per theme. To view the complete challenge and entries, click Here.
The modern safety pin was the invention of Walter Hunt. He invented this in 1849! Others in history had their own similar pins, but this invention included a spring at the bottom to keep the safety pin in place.
Versatile in it’s load out options the M-ASS can be just want you want it to be on the battlefield – as long as you have the right attachments. This is a little different loadout then last time, just switched a couple attachments around and took some out to give a better idea what the frame looks like without being so cluttered. Wanted a different quad walker then the normal insect looking variety.This one is more of a lumbering beast.
Check out my set "Most Interesting 500" here!
Visit my Waldorfschool/Steinerschool related pinboards here!
MrsParr & Andy were this months star photographers.
Decembers most Versatile is a Compositionally Challenged Group challenge theme and this is a representative selection from the Decembers entries of 48 photos by 6 photographers.
Challenge set by Sharon.