The Class 56 in recent years, has seen a downgrade in workload with most units being relegated to specialist bits and bobs such as drags or on Network Rail test trains.

 

It wasn't suprising to hear that GBRf were retiring their 56s and a farewell tour was taking place. It would be rude not to go and see it considering it was in Leicester so an outing there was in order!

 

56098 is seen here on the rear end of the consist, heading for Barrow Hill with 56081 destroying it out of the station, probably because of the large crowds of enthusiasts and the 11 minute delay in departure!

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

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

 

Some background

After Mil Helicopters' Mi-28 combat helicopter did not find takers, the design bureau decided in the 2000s to take a huge development step forward and question the basic helicopter layout. The result was the Mil Mi-62 (NATO reporting name: Hepcat), a single-seat attack gyrodyne/compound helicopter: a VTOL aircraft with a helicopter-like rotor system that is driven by its engine for take-off and landing but basically relies on conventional means of propulsion to provide forward thrust during cruising flight. Lift during forward flight is provided by a combination of the rotor, like an autogyro, as well as conventional wings, even though these alone would not keep the aircraft in the air.

 

The Mi-62 featured a tip-jet-powered rotor that burned a mixture of fuel and compressed air, bled from two wing-root-mounted jet engines. The rotor was only driven during the start/landing phase and at low speed. The air for the rotor was produced by compressors driven through a clutch off the main engines, though, which was fed through ducting up to the rotor head. Two Progress AI-222-25 turbofans, each rated at 24.52 KN (5.512 lbf), provided thrust for translational flight while the rotor autorotated, enabling VTOL and STOL start with overload. The cockpit controls included a cyclic and collective pitch lever, as in a conventional helicopter.

 

Each engine supplied air for a pair of opposite rotor blades. The rotor blades were a symmetrical airfoil around a load-bearing spar. The airfoil was made of carbon fiber and light alloy because of center of gravity concerns. The compressed air was channeled through three tubes within the blade to tip-jet combustion chambers, where the compressed air was mixed with fuel and burned, driving the rotor. As a torque-less rotor system, no anti-torque correction system was required. Propeller pitch was controlled by the rudder pedals for low-speed yaw control. To support handling at low speed, bleed air from the main engines was also ducted to a control vent system in the tail.

 

Transition from helicopter to autogiro took place at around 60 mph by extinguishing the tip-jets, and at higher speeds up to half the lift was provided by the fixed wings. At high cruising speed, the Mi-62 almost behaved like a standard aircraft. Cruising speed was to be at about 500 km/h (312 mph), coupled with a range of up to 1400 km (870 ml).

 

Since the speed of the advancing rotor tip is a primary limitation to the maximum speed of a helicopter, this arrangement allowed a faster maximum speed than pure helicopters such as the Mi-24/35 or the AH-64. The elimination of the tail rotor is a qualitative advantage, too, because the torque-countering tail rotor can use up to 30% of engine power. Furthermore, the vulnerable boom and rear gearbox are fairly common causes of helicopter losses in combat. The Mi-62’s entire transmission presents a comparatively small target to ground fire, and is a rather simple/rigid arrangement with much less moving parts than a standard helicopter.

 

The Mi-62 was designed as an alternative to Kamov's successful Ka-50/52 program, and regarded as a heavier alternative. While the Ka-50 was designed to be small, fast and agile to improve survivability and lethality, the Mi-62 was to rely on speed, quick acceleration and decelleration as well as on good low altitude handling, coupled with sufficient protection against small caliber weapons. Since operation would be primarily at low level and using the landscape as cover, not much emphasis was put on stealth features, even though many passive protection elements like RAM were incorporated into the aircraft.

 

One of the program priorities was to enhance the helicopter's survivability. With this goal in mind, the configuration and systems' arrangement were chosen, assemblies designed, and structural materials tested, beyond the robust rotor propulsion system. The following measures to enhance pilot survivability were taken:

 

• Engines were placed on both sides of the airframe to prevent a single hit from destroying both engines

• The gyroplane could fly on a single engine in various modes – even with a damaged rotor a controlled landing glide was possible

• The cockpit was armored and screened with combined steel/aluminum armor and armored Plexiglas

• The hydraulic steering system compartment was armored and screened

• Vital units were screened by less important ones

• Self-sealing fuel tanks were filled with polyurethane foam

• Composites were used to preserve the helicopter's efficiency when its load-carrying elements are damaged

• A two-contour rotor-blade spar was developed, integrating the air ducts

• Control rod diameter was increased by positioning most of them inside the armored cockpit

• The powerplant and compartments adjacent to the fuel tanks were fire-protected

• The hydraulic system is capable of operating for 30 minutes if the oil system is damaged

• The power supply systems, control circuits etc. were made redundant and placed on opposite sides of the airframe

 

The armor consisted of spaced-aluminum plates with a total weight of more than 300 kg. The armor is fitted into the fuselage load-bearing structure, which reduces the total weight of the helicopter. GosNIIAS tests confirmed the pilot's protection up to 20mm caliber cannon rounds and shell fragments.

 

Another unique feature of the Mi-62 is the use of a rocket-parachute ejection system in case of an emergency. The helicopter emergency-escape system uses the K-37-800 ejection seat that was developed by the Zvezda Scientific Production Association (Chief Designer Guy Severin). The pilot's safety was also ensured by the undercarriage design. The undercarriage is capable of absorbing large loads in an emergency landing, and the cockpit has a crunch zone of up to 10-15% upon impact.

 

Basic armament consists of a twin-barreled Sh2A42 30-mm gun. The gun is mounted in a shallow turret which can rotate full 360° near the center of fuselage. It has 460 rounds of ammunition, firing high-fragmentation, explosive incendiary rounds and armor-piercing rounds.

The cannon has a dual-feed, which allows for a cyclic rate of fire between 300 to 900 RPM. Its effective range varies from 1500 meters for ground vehicles to 2,500 meters for air targets. Stated penetration for the 3UBR8 is 25 mm of RHA at 1,500 meters.

 

Beyond that, the aircraft carries a substantial load of weapons in six external hardpoints under the stub wings. An total of some 2.000 kg mixed ordnance, including AAMs, AGMs, gun and unguided rocket pods which include the S-13 and S-8 rockets, can be carried. Even unguided and guided (IR, optical, laser) bombs have been successfully tested, so that the Mi-62 could eventually replace early Su-25 combat aircraft in the CAS role. The "dumb" rocket pods can be upgraded to laser guided with the proposed Ugroza system.

 

The main armament against moving ground targets consists of up to sixteen laser-guided Vikhr anti-tank missiles (transl. Vortex or whirlwind) with a maximum range of some 8 km. The laser guidance is reported to be virtually jam-proof and the system features automatic guidance to target, enabling evasive action immediately after missile launch.

 

Like the Ka-50, the Mil gyrodyne was from the outset to be operated by a single pilot only. Mil’s designers concluded after thorough research of helicopter combat in Afghanistan and other war zones that the typical attack mission phases of low-level approach, pop-up target acquisition and weapon launch would not simultaneously demand navigation, maneuvering and weapons operation of the pilot. Thus, with well-designed support automation, a single pilot was expected to carry out the entire mission alone.

 

During operational testing from 1995 to 1996 the workload on the pilot was found to be similar to that of a fighter-bomber pilot, and the pilot could perform both flying and navigation duties. Later flight tests of the Mi-62 prototypes proved that its handling was more like an aircraft with VTOL capabilities than a standard helicopter, so that jet pilots could master it with some training.

 

Initially the Mi-62 was to be have been fitted with the Merkury Low-Light TV (LLTV) system. Due to a lack of funding, the system was late and experienced reliability and capability issues. As a result, focus shifted to Forward Looking Infra-Red (FLIR) systems, including the Shkval-N sighting system with an infrared sensor. Many versions were tried; on some the original "Shkval" was supplemented by a thermal imaging system, while others saw a complete replacement by the "Samshit" day-and-night system, which has become the final sensor standard, mounted in a chin sensor turret.

 

The fire control system automatically shares all target information among the four Mi-62 of a typical flight in real time, allowing one helicopter to engage a target spotted by another, and the system can also input target information from ground-based forward scouts with personnel-carried target designation gear.

 

The Mi-62 was, after a lengthy development and constant lack of funds, eventually adopted for service in the Russian army in 2015. It is currently manufactured by the new Russian Helicopters company that was founded in 2009 in Moscow, and built at the Mil Moscow Helicopter Plant. It has been introduced to both Air Force (Mi-62 sans suffix, ‘Hepcat A’) and Naval Aviation (Mi-62K, ‘Hepcat B’) and is being used as a heavily armed attack helicopter against both ground and airborne targets.

 

The navalized Mi-62K derivative has been selected as the new ship-borne attack type for the Russian Naval Aviation (Aviatsiya Voenno-morskogo Flota Rossii). It will feature folding rotor blades and life-support systems for the crew, who will fly in immersion suits. The fuselage and systems will be given special anti-corrosion treatment and a new fire-control radar will be capable of operating in "Sea Mode" and of supporting anti-ship missiles. Aviatsiya Voenno-morskogo Flota Rossii will need no fewer than 20 Mi-62, which will be operated together with Ka-52Ks.

 

The first Mi-62K is tentatively slated to enter squadron service by late 2014 or early 2015, coinciding with the delivery of the first carrier of the new Mistral class amphibious assault ships, ordered by the Russian Defense Ministry. These small carriers will contain rotary-wing assets, formed into aviation groups, and each of these groups is planned to include eight attack and eight assault/transport helicopters.

  

General characteristics

Crew: One

Length (fuselage only): 13,46 m (44 ft 1 in)

Rotor diameter: 15,40 m (50 ft 5 1/2 in)

Height: 4.60 m (15 ft 1 in)

Disc area: 186.3 m² (1.998 ft²)

Empty weight: 7,700 kg (17,000 lb)

Loaded weight: 9,800 kg / 10,400 kg (21,600 lb / 22,930 lb)

Max. takeoff weight: 10,800 kg (23,810 lb)

Powerplant

2× Progress AI-222-25 turbofans, 24.52 KN (5.512 lbf) each plus

4× rotor tip jet burning compressed air/fuel, 4.4 kN (1,000 lbf) thrust each

Performance

Never exceed speed: 550 km/h (297 knots, 342 mph) in dive

Maximum speed: 515 km/h (278 knots, 320 mph) in level flight

Cruise speed: 370 km/h (200 knots, 230 mph)

Range: 545 km (339 ml)

Combat radius: 800 km (500 ml)

Ferry range: 1400 km (870 ml) with 4 drop tanks

Service ceiling: 5,500 m (18,000 ft)

Rate of climb: 10.7 m/s (2,105 ft/min)

 

Armament

1× turret-mounted, wtin-barreled 30 mm Shipunov Sh2A42 cannon (460 rounds total, dual feeding AP or HE-Frag) under the fuselage

6×wing hardpoints with a capacity of 2,000 kg and provisions to carry combinations of launch pods for 80 mm S-8 rockets or 122 mm S-13 rockets, APU-6 Missile racks or up to 20× 9K121 Vikhr anti-tank missiles, 6× Vympel R-73 (NATO: AA-11 Archer) air-to-air missiles, Kh-25 semi-active laser guided tactical air-to-ground missiles, 4× 250 kg (550 lb) bombs or 2x 500 kg (1,100 lb) bombs, plus 23 mm UPK-23-250 gun pods (240 rounds each) or 500 l (130 US gal) external fuel tanks.

Two compartments in the lower fuselage with flare and chaff countermeasure dispensers, typically 4× UV-26 dispensers each (total 512 chaff/flare cartridges in each pod)

  

The kit and its assembly:

Another entry for the “Za Rodinu - The Anthony P Memorial Build” at whatifmodelers.com, and this time it’s a modern and rather exotic whif. Helicopters are rare among whiffers, so I thought I’d give that subject a chance, and I actually had the basis kit in store for some time, as I intended to build it for another GB but never got that kick to start it.

 

The fictional Mi-62 is a conversion of a snap-fit kit from Kotobukiya from a series of generic, roughly 1:72 scale mecha vehicles that do not belong to a specific series or movie, but they seem to be intended to go well with Gundam or Dougram. These are rather toy-like, sturdy things, but they have potential for more – especially the gyroplanes (two different types exist).

 

These seem to be unmanned drones/UAVs, though, and that immediately leads to the conversions I made. Most important change is a manned cockpit with a clear canopy (from a KP Su-25) and the respective, scratched interior.

 

Another big change was the deletion of the original, gigantic gatling gun under the fuselage, replaced by a much smaller twin cannon turret. That left a lot of ground clearance – as a late modification I decided to chop the landing gear and the respective fin/wing endplates by more than 1cm, so that the gyroplane would sit closer to the ground.

 

Further small cosmetics include an asymmetrical radome and a protruding pitot boom, some antenna bulges, new engine exhausts, chaff dispensers in the fuselage flanks, and free-standing main wheels.

 

The ordnance comes from a Dragon Soviet-Air-To-Ground-Ordnance kit, hung onto six new wing hardpoints (from a 1:144 F-4E and an ESCI Ka-34 in 1:72, IIRC).

  

Painting and markings:

Choosing a proper scheme was tricky. The helicopter was to look realistic, but still exotic, at least for Russian standards. I considered various options:

● An all-mid-grey livery, inspired by current Mi-35 attack helicopters. Too dull & simple!

● A trefoil-style scheme in khaki and olive drab, with blue undersides. Flashy, but IMHO rather old-school.

 

I finally found an original scheme on a Ka-62 prototype (shown at MAKS-2009): a wraparound scheme in olive drab, medium grey and chocolate brown. The colors are enamels, I used Olive Drab ANA 613 (ModelMaster #2050), German Uniform “Feldgrau” (ModelMaster #2014) Grey and German Armor Red Brown (Humbrol 160), later highlighted through dry-brushing with lighter shades of the basic tones and a black ink wash, standard process.

 

The interior was to be Russian-style, too, but instead of the eye-boggling turquoise I went for PRU Blue (Humbrol 230) inside of the cockpit. Still looks odd, but it’s not so bright.

 

As a twist I decided to use Russian Navy markings – and the real world introduction of Mistral Class ships was a good excuse for a naval version of this attack helicopter. The Naval Aviation used to and does employ many land-based aircraft and helicopters, incl. e. g. the Mi-24, in similar liveries to the Air Force or Army cousins.

 

The markings were puzzled together from various aftermarket decal sheets from Begemot , Authentic Decals and TL Modellbau, as well as from the scrap box. After some additional dry-brushing with medium grey overall, the kit was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish.

Headland is a civil parish in the Borough of Hartlepool, County Durham, England. The parish covers the old part of Hartlepool and nearby villages.

 

History

The Heugh Battery, one of three constructed to protect the port of Hartlepool in 1860, is located in the area along with a museum.

 

The area made national headlines in July 1994 in connection with the murder of Rosie Palmer, a local toddler.

 

On 19 March 2002 the Time Team searched for an Anglo-Saxon monastery.

 

Dominating the skyline is the impressive architectural structure that is St Hilda’s Church. Remnant of Hartlepool’s Saxon heritage and undoubtedly the crowning glory of the Headland, this church is a must-see attraction. After her stay in Hartlepool, the Abbess of the church progressed along the coast to Whitby and this spiritual journey can be explored through ‘The Way of St Hild’ walking trail.

 

A great way to explore the historic Headland is by finding and following the Headland Story Trail. The trail features 18 different information boards, each telling a story of the areas fascinating heritage from tales of shipwreck to the legend of the Hartlepool monkey. A truly interactive and fun walking experience!

 

Other landmarks of note include the impressive Town Wall, dating from the 14th century. This grade I listed, scheduled ancient monument still guards the Headland, and was originally built to keep out the twin threats of raiding Scots and the rigours of the North Sea.

 

The Borough Hall is another striking building and dates back to 1865. This gorgeous entertainment venue hosts an action-packed events programme so be sure to keep an eye out for all upcoming events here.

 

Dive into the town’s military history at The Heugh Battery Museum – this restored coastal defence battery protected the town throughout both World Wars. An enchanting historical sight with the original barrack room, underground magazines, coastal artillery and observation tower, the exhibits tell the story of those who lost their lives and the brave men who defended the area. Refresh with a light bite or sweet treat at the Poppy Café, located within the museum.

 

Visit the Headland War Memorial to see the magnificent ‘Winged Victory’ – a stunning statue that tributes those who lost their lives during the two world wars.

 

At the very north of the Headland you will find Spion Kop Cemetery – this historic cemetery supports a species-rich dune grassland and offers fantastic views of the coastline.

 

Every summer Headland Carnival attracts lively visitors to the area. Packed with thrilling rides, amusing games and live entertainment this week of jam-packed fun is great for all the family.

 

Hartlepool is a seaside and port town in County Durham, England. It is governed by a unitary authority borough named after the town. The borough is part of the devolved Tees Valley area. With an estimated population of 87,995, it is the second-largest settlement (after Darlington) in County Durham.

 

The old town was founded in the 7th century, around the monastery of Hartlepool Abbey on a headland. As the village grew into a town in the Middle Ages, its harbour served as the County Palatine of Durham's official port. The new town of West Hartlepool was created in 1835 after a new port was built and railway links from the South Durham coal fields (to the west) and from Stockton-on-Tees (to the south) were created. A parliamentary constituency covering both the old town and West Hartlepool was created in 1867 called The Hartlepools. The two towns were formally merged into a single borough called Hartlepool in 1967. Following the merger, the name of the constituency was changed from The Hartlepools to just Hartlepool in 1974. The modern town centre and main railway station are both at what was West Hartlepool; the old town is now generally known as the Headland.

 

Industrialisation in northern England and the start of a shipbuilding industry in the later part of the 19th century meant it was a target for the Imperial German Navy at the beginning of the First World War. A bombardment of 1,150 shells on 16 December 1914 resulted in the death of 117 people in the town. A severe decline in heavy industries and shipbuilding following the Second World War caused periods of high unemployment until the 1990s when major investment projects and the redevelopment of the docks area into a marina saw a rise in the town's prospects. The town also has a seaside resort called Seaton Carew.

 

History

The place name derives from Old English heort ("hart"), referring to stags seen, and pōl (pool), a pool of drinking water which they were known to use. Records of the place-name from early sources confirm this:

 

649: Heretu, or Hereteu.

1017: Herterpol, or Hertelpolle.

1182: Hierdepol.

 

Town on the heugh

A Northumbrian settlement developed in the 7th century around an abbey founded in 640 by Saint Aidan (an Irish and Christian priest) upon a headland overlooking a natural harbour and the North Sea. The monastery became powerful under St Hilda, who served as its abbess from 649 to 657. The 8th-century Northumbrian chronicler Bede referred to the spot on which today's town is sited as "the place where deer come to drink", and in this period the Headland was named by the Angles as Heruteu (Stag Island). Archaeological evidence has been found below the current high tide mark that indicates that an ancient post-glacial forest by the sea existed in the area at the time.

 

The Abbey fell into decline in the early 8th century, and it was probably destroyed during a sea raid by Vikings on the settlement in the 9th century. In March 2000, the archaeological investigation television programme Time Team located the foundations of the lost monastery in the grounds of St Hilda's Church. In the early 11th century, the name had evolved into Herterpol.

 

Hartness

Normans and for centuries known as the Jewel of Herterpol.

During the Norman Conquest, the De Brus family gained over-lordship of the land surrounding Hartlepool. William the Conqueror subsequently ordered the construction of Durham Castle, and the villages under their rule were mentioned in records in 1153 when Robert de Brus, 1st Lord of Annandale became Lord of Hartness. The town's first charter was received before 1185, for which it gained its first mayor, an annual two-week fair and a weekly market. The Norman Conquest affected the settlement's name to form the Middle English Hart-le-pool ("The Pool of the Stags").

 

By the Middle Ages, Hartlepool was growing into an important (though still small) market town. One of the reasons for its escalating wealth was that its harbour was serving as the official port of the County Palatine of Durham. The main industry of the town at this time was fishing, and Hartlepool in this period established itself as one of the primary ports upon England's Eastern coast.

 

In 1306, Robert the Bruce was crowned King of Scotland, and became the last Lord of Hartness. Angered, King Edward I confiscated the title to Hartlepool, and began to improve the town's military defences in expectation of war. In 1315, before they were completed, a Scottish army under Sir James Douglas attacked, captured and looted the town.

 

In the late 15th century, a pier was constructed to assist in the harbour's workload.

 

Garrison

Hartlepool was once again militarily occupied by a Scottish incursion, this time in alliance with the Parliamentary Army during the English Civil War, which after 18 months was relieved by an English Parliamentarian garrison.

 

In 1795, Hartlepool artillery emplacements and defences were constructed in the town as a defensive measure against the threat of French attack from seaborne Napoleonic forces. During the Crimean War, two coastal batteries were constructed close together in the town to guard against the threat of seaborne attacks from the Imperial Russian Navy. They were entitled the Lighthouse Battery (1855) and the Heugh Battery (1859).

 

Hartlepool in the 18th century became known as a town with medicinal springs, particularly the Chalybeate Spa near the Westgate. The poet Thomas Gray visited the town in July 1765 to "take the waters", and wrote to his friend William Mason:

 

I have been for two days to taste the water, and do assure you that nothing could be salter and bitterer and nastier and better for you... I am delighted with the place; there are the finest walks and rocks and caverns.

 

A few weeks later, he wrote in greater detail to James Brown:

 

The rocks, the sea and the weather there more than made up to me the want of bread and the want of water, two capital defects, but of which I learned from the inhabitants not to be sensible. They live on the refuse of their own fish-market, with a few potatoes, and a reasonable quantity of Geneva [gin] six days in the week, and I have nowhere seen a taller, more robust or healthy race: every house full of ruddy broad-faced children. Nobody dies but of drowning or old-age: nobody poor but from drunkenness or mere laziness.

 

Town by the strand

By the early nineteenth century, Hartlepool was still a small town of around 900 people, with a declining port. In 1823, the council and Board of Trade decided that the town needed new industry, so the decision was made to propose a new railway to make Hartlepool a coal port, shipping out minerals from the Durham coalfield. It was in this endeavour that Isambard Kingdom Brunel visited the town in December 1831, and wrote: "A curiously isolated old fishing town – a remarkably fine race of men. Went to the top of the church tower for a view."

 

But the plan faced local competition from new docks. 25 kilometres (16 mi) to the north, the Marquis of Londonderry had approved the creation of the new Seaham Harbour (opened 31 July 1831), while to the south the Clarence Railway connected Stockton-on-Tees and Billingham to a new port at Port Clarence (opened 1833). Further south again, in 1831 the Stockton and Darlington Railway had extended into the new port of Middlesbrough.

 

The council agreed the formation of the Hartlepool Dock and Railway Company (HD&RCo) to extend the existing port by developing new docks, and link to both local collieries and the developing railway network in the south. In 1833, it was agreed that Christopher Tennant of Yarm establish the HD&RCo, having previously opened the Clarence Railway (CR). Tennant's plan was that the HD&RCo would fund the creation of a new railway, the Stockton and Hartlepool Railway, which would take over the loss-making CR and extended it north to the new dock, thereby linking to the Durham coalfield.

 

After Tennant died, in 1839, the running of the HD&RCo was taken over by Stockton-on-Tees solicitor, Ralph Ward Jackson. But Jackson became frustrated at the planning restrictions placed on the old Hartlepool dock and surrounding area for access, so bought land which was mainly sand dunes to the south-west, and established West Hartlepool. Because Jackson was so successful at shipping coal from West Hartlepool through his West Hartlepool Dock and Railway Company and, as technology developed, ships grew in size and scale, the new town would eventually dwarf the old town.

 

The 8-acre (3.2-hectare) West Hartlepool Harbour and Dock opened on 1 June 1847. On 1 June 1852, the 14-acre (5.7-hectare) Jackson Dock opened on the same day that a railway opened connecting West Hartlepool to Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool. This allowed the shipping of coal and wool products eastwards, and the shipping of fresh fish and raw fleeces westwards, enabling another growth spurt in the town. This in turn resulted in the opening of the Swainson Dock on 3 June 1856, named after Ward Jackson's father-in-law. In 1878, the William Gray & Co shipyard in West Hartlepool achieved the distinction of launching the largest tonnage of any shipyard in the world, a feat to be repeated on a number of occasions. By 1881, old Hartlepool's population had grown from 993 to 12,361, but West Hartlepool had a population of 28,000.

 

Ward Jackson Park

Ward Jackson helped to plan the layout of West Hartlepool and was responsible for the first public buildings. He was also involved in the education and the welfare of the inhabitants. In the end, he was a victim of his own ambition to promote the town: accusations of shady financial dealings, and years of legal battles, left him in near-poverty. He spent the last few years of his life in London, far away from the town he had created.

 

World Wars

In Hartlepool near Heugh Battery, a plaque in Redheugh Gardens War Memorial "marks the place where the first ...(German shell) struck... (and) the first soldier was killed on British soil by enemy action in the Great War 1914–1918."

The area became heavily industrialised with an ironworks (established in 1838) and shipyards in the docks (established in the 1870s). By 1913, no fewer than 43 ship-owning companies were located in the town, with the responsibility for 236 ships. This made it a key target for Germany in the First World War. One of the first German offensives against Britain was a raid and bombardment by the Imperial German Navy on the morning of 16 December 1914,

 

Hartlepool was hit with a total of 1150 shells, killing 117 people. Two coastal defence batteries at Hartlepool returned fire, launching 143 shells, and damaging three German ships: SMS Seydlitz, SMS Moltke and SMS Blücher. The Hartlepool engagement lasted roughly 50 minutes, and the coastal artillery defence was supported by the Royal Navy in the form of four destroyers, two light cruisers and a submarine, none of which had any significant impact on the German attackers.

 

Private Theophilus Jones of the 18th Battalion Durham Light Infantry, who fell as a result of this bombardment, is sometimes described as the first military casualty on British soil by enemy fire. This event (the death of the first soldiers on British soil) is commemorated by the 1921 Redheugh Gardens War Memorial together with a plaque unveiled on the same day (seven years and one day after the East Coast Raid) at the spot on the Headland (the memorial by Philip Bennison illustrates four soldiers on one of four cartouches and the plaque, donated by a member of the public, refers to the 'first soldier' but gives no name). A living history group, the Hartlepool Military Heritage Memorial Society, portray men of that unit for educational and memorial purposes.

 

Hartlepudlians voluntarily subscribed more money per head to the war effort than any other town in Britain.

 

On 4 January 1922, a fire starting in a timber yard left 80 people homeless and caused over £1,000,000 of damage. Hartlepool suffered badly in the Great Depression of the 1930s and endured high unemployment.

 

Unemployment decreased during the Second World War, with shipbuilding and steel-making industries enjoying a renaissance. Most of its output for the war effort were "Empire Ships". German bombers raided the town 43 times, though, compared to the previous war, civilian losses were lighter with 26 deaths recorded by Hartlepool Municipal Borough[19] and 49 by West Hartlepool Borough. During the Second World War, RAF Greatham (also known as RAF West Hartlepool) was located on the South British Steel Corporation Works.

 

The merge

In 1891, the two towns had a combined population of 64,000. By 1900, the two Hartlepools were, together, one of the three busiest ports in England.

 

The modern town represents a joining of "Old Hartlepool", locally known as the "Headland", and West Hartlepool. As already mentioned, what was West Hartlepool became the larger town and both were formally unified in 1967. Today the term "West Hartlepool" is rarely heard outside the context of sport, but one of the town's Rugby Union teams still retains the name.

 

The name of the town's professional football club reflected both boroughs; when it was formed in 1908, following the success of West Hartlepool in winning the FA Amateur Cup in 1905, it was called "Hartlepools United" in the hope of attracting support from both towns. When the boroughs combined in 1967, the club renamed itself "Hartlepool" before re-renaming itself Hartlepool United in the 1970s. Many fans of the club still refer to the team as "Pools"

 

Fall out

After the war, industry went into a severe decline. Blanchland, the last ship to be constructed in Hartlepool, left the slips in 1961. In 1967, Betty James wrote how "if I had the luck to live anywhere in the North East [of England]...I would live near Hartlepool. If I had the luck". There was a boost to the retail sector in 1970 when Middleton Grange Shopping Centre was opened by Princess Anne, with over 130 new shops including Marks & Spencer and Woolworths.

 

Before the shopping centre was opened, the old town centre was located around Lynn Street, but most of the shops and the market had moved to a new shopping centre by 1974. Most of Lynn Street had by then been demolished to make way for a new housing estate. Only the north end of the street remains, now called Lynn Street North. This is where the Hartlepool Borough Council depot was based (alongside the Focus DIY store) until it moved to the marina in August 2006.

 

In 1977, the British Steel Corporation announced the closure of its Hartlepool steelworks with the loss of 1500 jobs. In the 1980s, the area was afflicted with extremely high levels of unemployment, at its peak consisting of 30 per cent of the town's working-age population, the highest in the United Kingdom. 630 jobs at British Steel were lost in 1983, and a total of 10,000 jobs were lost from the town in the economic de-industrialization of England's former Northern manufacturing heartlands. Between 1983 and 1999, the town lacked a cinema and areas of it became afflicted with the societal hallmarks of endemic economic poverty: urban decay, high crime levels, drug and alcohol dependency being prevalent.

 

Rise and the future

Docks near the centre were redeveloped and reopened by Queen Elizabeth II in 1993 as a marina with the accompanying National Museum of the Royal Navy opened in 1994, then known as the Hartlepool Historic Quay.

 

A development corporation is under consultation until August 2022 to organise projects, with the town's fund given to the town and other funds. Plans would be (if the corporation is formed) focused on the railway station, waterfront (including the Royal Navy Museum and a new leisure centre) and Church Street. Northern School of Art also has funds for a TV and film studios.

 

Governance

There is one main tier of local government covering Hartlepool, at unitary authority level: Hartlepool Borough Council. There is a civil parish covering Headland, which forms an additional tier of local government for that area; most of the rest of the urban area is an unparished area. The borough council is a constituent member of the Tees Valley Combined Authority, led by the directly elected Tees Valley Mayor. The borough council is based at the Civic Centre on Victoria Road.

 

Hartlepool was historically a township in the ancient parish of Hart. Hartlepool was also an ancient borough, having been granted a charter by King John in 1200. The borough was reformed to become a municipal borough in 1850. The council built Hartlepool Borough Hall to serve as its headquarters, being completed in 1866.

 

West Hartlepool was laid out on land outside Hartlepool's historic borough boundaries, in the neighbouring parish of Stranton. A body of improvement commissioners was established to administer the new town in 1854. The commissioners were superseded in 1887, when West Hartlepool was also incorporated as a municipal borough. The new borough council built itself a headquarters at the Municipal Buildings on Church Square, which was completed in 1889. An events venue and public hall on Raby Road called West Hartlepool Town Hall was subsequently completed in 1897. In 1902 West Hartlepool was elevated to become a county borough, making it independent from Durham County Council. The old Hartlepool Borough Council amalgamated with West Hartlepool Borough Council in 1967 to form a county borough called Hartlepool.

 

In 1974 the borough was enlarged to take in eight neighbouring parishes, and was transferred to the new county of Cleveland. Cleveland was abolished in 1996 following the Banham Review, which gave unitary authority status to its four districts, including Hartlepool. The borough was restored to County Durham for ceremonial purposes under the Lieutenancies Act 1997, but as a unitary authority it is independent from Durham County Council.

 

Emergency services

Hartlepool falls within the jurisdiction of Cleveland Fire Brigade and Cleveland Police. Before 1974, it was under the jurisdiction of the Durham Constabulary and Durham Fire Brigade. Hartlepool has two fire stations: a full-time station at Stranton and a retained station on the Headland.

 

Economy

Hartlepool's economy has historically been linked with the maritime industry, something which is still at the heart of local business. Hartlepool Dock is owned and run by PD Ports. Engineering related jobs employ around 1700 people. Tata Steel Europe employ around 350 people in the manufacture of steel tubes, predominantly for the oil industry. South of the town on the banks of the Tees, Able UK operates the Teesside Environmental Reclamation and Recycling Centre (TERRC), a large scale marine recycling facility and dry dock. Adjacent to the east of TERRC is the Hartlepool nuclear power station, an advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR) type nuclear power plant opened in the 1980s. It is the single largest employer in the town, employing 1 per cent of the town's working age people.

 

The chemicals industry is important to the local economy. Companies include Huntsman Corporation, who produce titanium dioxide for use in paints, Omya, Baker Hughes and Frutarom.

 

Tourism was worth £48 million to the town in 2009; this figure excludes the impact of the Tall Ships 2010. Hartlepool's historic links to the maritime industry are centred on the Maritime Experience, and the supporting exhibits PS Wingfield Castle and HMS Trincomalee.

 

Camerons Brewery was founded in 1852 and currently employs around 145 people. It is one of the largest breweries in the UK. Following a series of take-overs, it came under the control of the Castle Eden Brewery in 2001 who merged the two breweries, closing down the Castle Eden plant. It brews a range of cask and bottled beers, including Strongarm, a 4% abv bitter. The brewery is heavily engaged in contract brewing such beers as Kronenbourg 1664, John Smith's and Foster's.

 

Orchid Drinks of Hartlepool were formed in 1992 after a management buy out of the soft drinks arm of Camerons. They manufactured Purdey's and Amé. Following a £67 million takeover by Britvic, the site was closed down in 2009.

 

Middleton Grange Shopping Centre is the main shopping location. 2800 people are employed in retail. The ten major retail companies in the town are Tesco, Morrisons, Asda, Next, Argos, Marks & Spencer, Aldi, Boots and Matalan. Aside from the local sports clubs, other local entertainment venues include a VUE Cinema and Mecca Bingo.

 

Companies that have moved operations to the town for the offshore wind farm include Siemens and Van Oord.

 

Culture and community

Festivals and Fairs

Since November 2014 the Headland has hosted the annual Wintertide Festival, which is a weekend long event that starts with a community parade on the Friday and culminating in a finale performance and fireworks display on the Sunday.

 

Tall Ships' Races

On 28 June 2006 Hartlepool celebrated after winning its bid to host The Tall Ships' Races. The town welcomed up to 125 tall ships in 2010, after being chosen by race organiser Sail Training International to be the finishing point for the race. Hartlepool greeted the ships, which sailed from Kristiansand in Norway on the second and final leg of the race. Hartlepool also hosted the race in July 2023.

 

Museums, art galleries and libraries

Hartlepool Art Gallery is located in Church Square within Christ Church, a restored Victorian church, built in 1854 and designed by the architect Edward Buckton Lamb (1806–1869). The gallery's temporary exhibitions change frequently and feature works from local artists and the permanent Fine Art Collection, which was established by Sir William Gray. The gallery also houses the Hartlepool tourist information centre.

 

The Heugh Battery Museum is located on the Headland. It was one of three batteries erected to protect Hartlepool's port in 1860. The battery was closed in 1956 and is now in the care of the Heugh Gun Battery Trust and home to an artillery collection.

 

Hartlepool is home to a National Museum of the Royal Navy (more specifically the NMRN Hartlepool). Previously known simply as The Historic Quay and Hartlepool's Maritime Experience, the museum is a re-creation of an 18th-century seaport with the exhibition centre-piece being a sailing frigate, HMS Trincomalee. The complex also includes the Museum of Hartlepool.

 

Willows was the Hartlepool mansion of the influential Sir William Gray of William Gray & Company and he gifted it to the town in 1920, after which it was converted to be the town's first museum and art gallery. Fondly known locally as "The Gray" it was closed as a museum in 1994 and now houses the local authority's culture department.

 

There are six libraries in Hartlepool, the primary one being the Community Hub Central Library. Others are Throston Grange Library, Community Hub North Library, Seaton Carew Library, Owton Manor Library and Headland Branch Library.

 

Sea

Hartlepool has been a major seaport virtually since it was founded, and has a long fishing heritage. During the industrial revolution massive new docks were created on the southern side of the channel running below the Headland, which gave rise to the town of West Hartlepool.

 

Now owned by PD Ports, the docks are still in use today and still capable of handling large vessels. However, a large portion of the former dockland was converted into a marina capable of berthing 500 vessels. Hartlepool Marina is home to a wide variety of pleasure and working craft, with passage to and from the sea through a lock.

 

Hartlepool also has a permanent RNLI lifeboat station.

 

Education

Secondary

Hartlepool has five secondary schools:

 

Dyke House Academy

English Martyrs School and Sixth Form College

High Tunstall College of Science

Manor Community Academy

St Hild's Church of England School

The town had planned to receive funding from central government to improve school buildings and facilities as a part of the Building Schools for the Future programme, but this was cancelled because of government spending cuts.

 

College

Hartlepool College of Further Education is an educational establishment located in the centre of the town, and existed in various forms for over a century. Its former 1960s campus was replaced by a £52million custom-designed building, it was approved in principle in July 2008, opened in September 2011.

 

Hartlepool also has Hartlepool Sixth Form College. It was a former grammar and comprehensive school, the college provides a number of AS and A2 Level student courses. The English Martyrs School and Sixth Form College also offers AS, A2 and other BTEC qualification to 16- to 18-year-olds from Hartlepool and beyond.

 

A campus of The Northern School of Art is a specialist art and design college and higher education, located adjacent to the art gallery on Church Square. The college has a further site in Middlesbrough that facilitates further education.

 

Territorial Army

Situated in the New Armoury Centre, Easington Road are the following units.

 

Royal Marines Reserve

90 (North Riding) Signal Squadron

 

Religion

They are multiple Church of England and Roman Catholic Churches in the town. St Hilda's Church is a notable church of the town, it was built on Hartlepool Abbey and sits upon a high point of the Headland. The churches of the Church of England's St Paul and Roman Catholic's St Joseph are next to each other on St Paul's Road. Nasir Mosque on Brougham Terrace is the sole purpose-built mosque in the town.

 

Sport

Football

Hartlepool United is the town's professional football club and they play at Victoria Park. The club's most notable moment was in 2005 when, with 8 minutes left in the 2005 Football League One play-off final, the team conceded a penalty, allowing Sheffield Wednesday to equalise and eventually beat Hartlepool to a place in the Championship. The club currently play in the National League.

 

Supporters of the club bear the nickname of Monkey Hangers. This is based upon a legend that during the Napoleonic wars a monkey, which had been a ship's mascot, was taken for a French spy and hanged. Hartlepool has also produced football presenter Jeff Stelling, who has a renowned partnership with Chris Kamara who was born in nearby Middlesbrough. Jeff Stelling is a keen supporter of Hartlepool and often refers to them when presenting Sky Sports News. It is also the birthplace and childhood home of Pete Donaldson, one of the co-hosts of the Football Ramble podcast as well as co-host of the Abroad in Japan podcast, and a prominent radio DJ.

 

The town also has a semi-professional football club called FC Hartlepool who play in Northern League Division Two.

 

Rugby union

Hartlepool is something of an anomaly in England having historically maintained a disproportionate number of clubs in a town of only c.90,000 inhabitants. These include(d) West Hartlepool, Hartlepool Rovers, Hartlepool Athletic RFC, Hartlepool Boys Brigade Old Boys RFC (BBOB), Seaton Carew RUFC (formerly Hartlepool Grammar School Old Boys), West Hartlepool Technical Day School Old Boys RUFC (TDSOB or Tech) and Hartlepool Old Boys' RFC (Hartlepool). Starting in 1904 clubs within eight miles (thirteen kilometres) of the headland were eligible to compete for the Pyman Cup which has been contested regularly since and that the Hartlepool & District Union continue to organise.

 

Perhaps the best known club outside the town is West Hartlepool R.F.C. who in 1992 achieved promotion to what is now the Premiership competing in 1992–93, 1994–95, 1995–96 and 1996–97 seasons. This success came at a price as soon after West was then hit by bankruptcy and controversially sold their Brierton Lane stadium and pitch to former sponsor Yuills Homes. There then followed a succession of relegations before the club stabilised in the Durham/Northumberland leagues. West and Rovers continue to play one another in a popular Boxing Day fixture which traditionally draws a large crowd.

 

Hartlepool Rovers, formed in 1879, who played at the Old Friarage in the Headland area of Hartlepool before moving to West View Road. In the 1890s Rovers supplied numerous county, divisional and international players. The club itself hosted many high-profile matches including the inaugural Barbarians F.C. match in 1890, the New Zealand Maoris in 1888 and the legendary All Blacks who played against a combined Hartlepool Club team in 1905. In the 1911–12 season, Hartlepool Rovers broke the world record for the number of points scored in a season racking up 860 points including 122 tries, 87 conversions, five penalties and eleven drop goals.

 

Although they ceased competing in the RFU leagues in 2008–09, West Hartlepool TDSOB (Tech) continues to support town and County rugby with several of the town's other clubs having played at Grayfields when their own pitches were unavailable. Grayfields has also hosted a number of Durham County cup finals as well as County Under 16, Under 18 and Under 20 age group games.

 

Olympics

Boxing

At the 2012 Summer Olympics, 21-year-old Savannah Marshall, who attended English Martyrs School and Sixth Form College in the town of Hartlepool, competed in the Women's boxing tournament of the 2012 Olympic Games. She was defeated 12–6 by Marina Volnova of Kazakhstan in her opening, quarter-final bout. Savannah Marshall is now a professional boxer, currently unbeaten as a pro and on 31 October 2020 in her 9th professional fight Marshall became the WBO female middleweight champion with a TKO victory over opponent Hannah Rankin at Wembley Arena.

 

Swimming

In August 2012 Jemma Lowe, a British record holder who attended High Tunstall College of Science in the town of Hartlepool, competed in the 2012 Olympic Games. She finished sixth in the 200-metre butterfly final with a time of 58.06 seconds. She was also a member of the eighth-place British team in the 400m Medley relay.

 

Monkeys

Hartlepool is known for allegedly executing a monkey during the Napoleonic Wars. According to legend, fishermen from Hartlepool watched a French warship founder off the coast, and the only survivor was a monkey, which was dressed in French military uniform, presumably to amuse the officers on the ship. The fishermen assumed that this must be what Frenchmen looked like and, after a brief trial, summarily executed the monkey.

 

Historians have pointed to the prior existence of a Scottish folk song called "And the Boddamers hung the Monkey-O". It describes how a monkey survived a shipwreck off the village of Boddam near Peterhead in Aberdeenshire. Because the villagers could only claim salvage rights if there were no survivors from the wreck, they allegedly hanged the monkey. There is also an English folk song detailing the later event called, appropriately enough, "The Hartlepool Monkey". In the English version the monkey is hanged as a French spy.

 

"Monkey hanger" and Chimp Choker are common terms of (semi-friendly) abuse aimed at "Poolies", often from footballing rivals Darlington. The mascot of Hartlepool United F.C. is H'Angus the monkey. The man in the monkey costume, Stuart Drummond, stood for the post of mayor in 2002 as H'angus the monkey, and campaigned on a platform which included free bananas for schoolchildren. To widespread surprise, he won, becoming the first directly elected mayor of Hartlepool, winning 7,400 votes with a 52% share of the vote and a turnout of 30%. He was re-elected by a landslide in 2005, winning 16,912 on a turnout of 51% – 10,000 votes more than his nearest rival, the Labour Party candidate.

 

The monkey legend is also linked with two of the town's sports clubs, Hartlepool Rovers RFC, which uses the hanging monkey as the club logo. Hartlepool (Old Boys) RFC use a hanging monkey kicking a rugby ball as their tie crest.

 

Notable residents

Michael Brown, former Premier League footballer

Edward Clarke, artist

Brian Clough, football manager who lived in the Fens estate in town while manager of Hartlepools United

John Darwin, convicted fraudster who faked his own death

Pete Donaldson, London radio DJ and podcast host

Janick Gers, guitarist from British heavy metal band Iron Maiden

Courtney Hadwin, singer

Jack Howe, former England international footballer

Liam Howe, music producer and songwriter for several artists and member of the band Sneaker Pimps

Saxon Huxley, WWE NXT UK wrestler

Andy Linighan, former Arsenal footballer who scored the winning goal in the 1993 FA Cup Final

Savannah Marshall, professional boxer

Stephanie Aird, comedian and television personality

Jim Parker, composer

Guy Pearce, film actor who lived in the town when he was younger as his mother was from the town

Narbi Price, artist

Jack Rowell, coached the England international rugby team and led them to the semi-final of the 1995 Rugby World Cup

Wayne Sleep, dancer and actor who spent his childhood in the town.

Reg Smythe, cartoonist who created Andy Capp

Jeremy Spencer, guitarist who was in the original Fleetwood Mac line-up

Jeff Stelling, TV presenter, famous for hosting Gillette Soccer Saturday

David Eagle, Folk singer and stand-up comedian,

Local media

Hartlepool Life - local free newspaper

Hartlepool Mail – local newspaper

BBC Radio Tees – BBC local radio station

Radio Hartlepool – Community radio station serving the town

Hartlepool Post – on-line publication

Local television news programmes are BBC Look North and ITV News Tyne Tees.

 

Town twinning

Hartlepool is twinned with:

France Sète, France

Germany Hückelhoven, Germany (since 1973)

United States Muskegon, Michigan

Malta Sliema, Malta

+++ 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:

Latil was a French automaker specializing in heavy duty vehicles, such as trucks, tractors and buses. Beyond the design and production of vehicles for civil use, Latil also built after World War I a number of military vehicles. For instance, in 1911, Latil designed and built its first four-wheel drive vehicle. This type of vehicle interested the French Army in 1913 for its ability to tow heavy artillery on every field and the TAR (Tracteur d'Artillerie Roulante) was built.

 

Beyond a number of field tractors, Latil also designed and built an armed combat vehicle for the French Army, the armored AMD-37 scout car. The origins of this design can be traced back until December 1931, when the French Cavalry conceived a plan for the future production of armored fighting vehicles. One of the classes foreseen was that of an Automitrailleuse de Découverte (AMD), a specialized long range reconnaissance vehicle. The specifications were formulated on 22 December 1931, changed again on 18 November 1932 and finally approved on 9 December 1932. They called for a weight of 4 metric tons (4.0 t), a range of 400 kilometers (250 mi), a road speed of 70 km/h, a cruising speed of 40 km/h, a turning circle of 12 meters (39 ft), 5–8 mm armor, a 20 mm gun and a 7.5 mm machine gun.

 

In 1933, several competing companies responded (including Latil, Renault, Panhard and Berliet) with their proposals. Being rooted in rather heavy machinery, Latil proposed two designs: one was a 4x4 vehicle which would meet the required specification profile, but it was eventually rejected due to poor off-road performance in favor of the Panhard design, which would become the highly successful Panhard 178.

The other proposal fell outside of the specification limits. It was a bigger and much heavier 8x8 design, certainly influenced by the German SdKfz. 232 heavy scout car family. However, despite falling outside of the requirements, the Commission de Vincennes was impressed enough to order a prototype of this vehicle.

 

The Latil prototype had basically a conservative layout and was ready in October 1933. It was presented to the Commission de Vincennes in January 1934 under the name Latil Automitrailleuse de Découverte, Modèle 1934 (AMD-34). The AMD-34 was, despite its 8x8 chassis and tank-like silhouette, based on modified Latil truck elements. Onto the ladder frame chassis, a hull made of screwed cast armor elements with a maximum thickness of 25 mm was mounted. The leaf spring suspension as well as the all-wheel drive were based on components of Latil’s heavy duty trucks. The eight large and steerable wheels were spaced apart as far as possible, with almost no overhang at the front and at the rear for a very good off-road performance and climbing capability. The crew consisted of three men: a driver and a radio operator, who both sat in the front of the hull, plus the commander, who, beyond directing the vehicle, also had to operate the weapons. The radio operator also had to support the commander as loader in the event of combat.

 

Power came from a water-cooled V8 petrol engine, an uprated version of Latil’s own V3 truck engine from 1933, with an output of 180 hp (132 kW). The engine was in the rear of the hull, separated from the fighting compartment at the front by a firewall bulkhead, and flanked side-by-side with two self-sealing fuel tanks with the large capacity of 80 and 320 liters capacity (the smaller tank fueled the engine and was constantly replenished from the bigger tank). A novel feature was an automatic fire extinguishing system, which used several tanks placed at critical spots of the vehicle, containing methyl bromide. The vehicle’s armament was mounted in a standardized, cast APX-R turret (which was also used on several light tanks like the Renault R-35) and consisted of a short-barreled Puteaux 37mm/L21 SA 18 gun as well as a coaxial 7.5 mm MAC31 Reibel machine gun. 42 armor-piercing and 58 high explosive rounds were typically carried, plus 2.500 rounds for the machine gun.

 

The hexagonal turret had a 30 mm thick, domed rotatable cupola with vertical vision slits. It had to be either hand cranked or moved about by the weight of the commander. The rear of the turret had a hatch that hinged down which could be used as a seat to improve observation. Driver and radio operator (who had an ER 54 radio set available) had no hatches on their own. They entered the vehicle through a relatively large door on the vehicle’s left side.

 

After testing between 9 January and 2 February 1934 and comparison with the lighter 4 ton types, the AMR-34 was, despite its weight of almost 10 tons, accepted by the commission on 15 February under the condition some small modifications were carried out. In the autumn, the improved prototype was tested by the Cavalry and in late 1934 the type was accepted under the name Latil Automitrailleuse de Découverte, Modèle 1935, better known under its handle “AMD-35”. Production started on a small scale in 1935 and by the end of the year the first AMD-35’s reached the Cavalry units. After complaints about reliability, such as cracking gun sights, and overheating, between 29 June and 2 December 1936 a new test program took place, resulting in many more detail modifications, including the fitting of a silencer, a ventilator on the turret and in the main cabin and a small, round hatch for the driver which allowed a better field of view when the crew did not have to work under armor cover.

The main weapon was also changed into a SA 38 37mm cannon with a longer (L33) barrel, since the original Puteaux cannon had only a very poor armor penetration of 12 mm at 500 meters. In this form, the vehicle was re-designated AMD-37. Several older vehicles were updated with this weapon, too, or they received a 25mm (0.98 in) SA35 L47.2 or L52 autocannon.

 

Overall, the AMD-37 proved to be an effective design. The eight-wheel armored car with all-wheel-drive and all-wheel-steering had a very good performance on- and off-road, even though with certain limits due to the vehicle’s weight and resulting ground pressure. The cabin was relatively spacious and comfortable, so that long range missions of 500 km (319 ml) and more could be endured well by the crews.

 

However, several inherent flaws persisted. One problem (which the AMD-37 shared with almost every French combat vehicle from the pre-WWII era) was that the commander was overburdened with tasks, especially under stressful combat conditions. The French Cavalry did not see this as a major flaw: A commander was supposed to acquire such a degree of dexterity that his workload did not negate the lack of need to coordinate the actions of two or even three men in a larger turret crew or the advantage of a quicker reaction because of a superior rotation speed. At first, a two-man-turret was required, but when it transpired that this would reduce the armor protection, it was abandoned in favor of thicker steel casts. However, the AMD-37’s armor level was generally relatively low, and hull’s seams offered attackers who knew where to aim several weak points that allowed even light hand weapons to penetrate the armor. Another tactical flaw associated with the turret was the hatchless cupola, forcing the commander to fight buttoned-up or leave the vehicle’s armor protection for a better field of view.

 

Operationally, though, the AMD-37 suffered from poor mechanical reliability: the suspension units were complicated and, since they were based on existing civil truck elements, too weak for heavy off-road operations under military conditions. The AMD-37’s weight of almost 10 tons (the comparable German SdKfz 231 was bigger but weighed only 8.3 tons) did not help, either. In consequence, the AMD-37 demanded enormous maintenance efforts, especially since the cast armor modules did not allow an easy access to the suspension and engine.

 

On 10 May 1940, on the eve of the German invasion in mainland France, the AMD-37 was part of 14 Divisions Légères Mécaniques (Mechanized Light Divisions; "light" meaning here "mobile", they were not light in the sense of being lightly equipped) battalions, each fielding dedicated reconnaissance groups with four to ten vehicles, which also comprised light Panhard 178 scout cars.

45 French AMD-37s were in Syria, a mandate territory, and 30 more were based in Morocco. The tanks in Syria would fight during the allied invasion of that mandate territory in 1941 and then partly be taken over by the Free French 1e CCC, those in North Africa during Operation Torch in November 1942.

The majority of AMD-37s in Western Europe fell into German hands, though: 78 were used as “Panzerkampfwagen 37R(f)” and mainly used in second line units for policy and security duties or for driver training. A small number of these German vehicles were sent to Finland, fighting on the Eastern Front, where they were outclassed by Soviet KV-1s and T-34s and quickly destroyed or abandoned.

 

Plans to augment the AMD-35’s armament with a bigger turret and a more powerful 47mm SA 35 gun (basically the same turret fitted to the SOMUA S-35 medium tank and the heavy Char B1bis) or an additional machine in the front bow for the radio operator were, due to the German invasion, never carried out.

  

Specifications:

Crew: Three (commander, radio operator/loader, driver)

Weight: 9,600 kg (21,145 lb)

Length: 5.29 m (17 ft 4 in)

Width: 2.52 m (8 ft 3 in)

Height: 2.44 metres (8 ft ½ in)

Suspension: Wheeled (Tires: 270–20, bulletproof), with leaf springs

Wading depth: 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in)

Trench crossing capability: 1.8 m (5 ft 11 in)

Ground clearance: 350 mm (13 3/4 in)

Climbing capability: 30°

Fuel capacity: 400 l

 

Armor:

9-30 mm (.35-1.18 in) cast steel

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 75 km/h (47 mph) on road, 55 km/h (34 mph) off-road

Operational range: 600 km (375 mi) on road

Power/weight: 18,7 PS/t

 

Engine:

Water-cooled Latil V8 gasoline engine with 7.336 cm³ displacement and 180 hp (132 kW) output

Transmission:

Latil gearbox with 4 forward and 1 reverse gears, eight-wheel drive and steering

 

Armament:

1× Puteaux 37mm/L33 SA 18 gun with 100 rounds

1× coaxial 7.5 mm MAC31 Reibel machine gun with 2.500 rounds

  

The kit and its assembly:

This build was inspired by a drawing that I came across at DeviantArt a while ago, created by someone called MedJoe:

www.deviantart.com/medjoe/art/Autoblinde-SOMUA-S35bis-679...

The picture showed a Somua S-35 tank, set on eight wheels that heavily resembled those of the SdKfz. 234/2 “Puma”, in French colors and markings and designated S-35bis. I found the idea weird (since a full-fledged S-35 would certainly have at 20 tons been too heavy for a wheeled chassis), but the overall look of this combo was very convincing to me. I kept the idea in the back of my mind, until I came across a cheap Heller Somua S-35 in 1:72 scale and decided to take the concept to the (model) hardware stage and offer a personal interpretation.

 

Work started when I was able to acquire a sprue from a Plastic Soldier SdKfz. 231 kit, which provided a total of nine wheels in a suitable size and style, as well as suspension elements.

 

Building the hull was a straightforward affair: The Heller S-35 was built OOB, just the parts for the tracked suspension were left away. Some details and attachment points in the lower hull sections had to be removed, too. From the SdKfz. 232 I took the leaf spring suspension parts (these came as two frames for four wheels each, rather crude and solid parts) and cut the outer leaf spring packs off, so that their depth was reduced but the attachment points for the wheels were still there. These were simply glued into the space for the former tracks, similar to the drawing. This resulted in a slightly wide track, but narrowing the lower hull for a better look would have been a complicated affair, so I stuck with the simple solution. It does not look bad, though.

 

In order to make the vehicle’s role as a scout car more plausible and to avoid a head-heavy look, I decided to replace the original S-35 turret with a smaller APX turret from a Renault R-35. I found a suitable resin donor at ModelTrans, which was easily integrated to the S-35 hull. I perfectly fits into the S-35’s rounded cast armor style, which is so typical for many early French WWII tanks. Unfortunately, the resin R-35 turret had an air bubble at the rear, which had to be filled with putty. In order to differentiate the turret a little and modernize it, I added a longer gun barrel – in this case a piece from a hollow steel needle.

 

Other small mods include a pair of scratched rear-view mirrors for the driver, the spare wheel at the front (certainly not the best position, but the only place that was available and practical, and other armored vehicles of the time like the British Humber scout car also carried a spare wheel at the front) and an antenna at the rear, made from heated black sprue material.

  

Painting and markings:

This was not easy and it took a while to settle on a design. There were rather gaudy camouflage designs in the French army, but due to the model’s small scale I did not want a too complex design. I eventually decided to apply a rather simple scheme, inspired by the painting suggestions from the Heller kit: a disruptive two-tone scheme in a pale beige tone and a rather bluish dark green, which was confirmed through museum tanks. An odd quirk of the Heller kit is that the instructions and the box art show the same camouflage, but in inverted colors!?

 

I stuck to Heller’s suggestions and decided to follow the box art camouflage, which uses dark green (Humbrol 30) as basic color with light sand blotches (Humbrol 103) on top, which I found more appropriate for the middle European theatre of operations. I assume that these two tones were in real life separated by very narrow black or dark brown lines for more contrast – but I did not try this stunt on the small 1:72 scale model, it would IMHO have looked rather awkward. And there are French vehicles of the era that show these colors without any additional lines, too.

 

Markings/decals were mostly puzzled together from the scrap box, since the Heller decals turned out to be rather stiff and lack any adhesion to the model. I only used the “license plates”, which were fixed to the model with acrylic varnish, the rest are spares.

 

The kit received an overall washing with dark brown and a careful dry-brushing treatment with light grey.

After the final coat of matt varnish had been applied and all parts assembled, I dusted the lower areas with a dull grey-brown mix of artist pigments, simulating dust.

  

An experimental build, since drawing a whif is easier than actually building it, where parts have to fit somehow and you cannot change the size of them. Even though the resulting 8x8 scout car looks a little weird with its minimal overhang at the front and the rear, I like the result a lot – it looks very plausible to me. I also think that the smaller turret underlines the vehicle’s role as a rather lightly armed reconnaissance vehicle. It lowers the size and the silhouette, and subdues the S-35 origin – but without neglecting the typical French cast armor look. Certainly not a 1:1 copy of the inspiring drawing, but true to the original idea.

 

French postcard in the World Collection, no. P.c. 980.

 

Welsh actress Catherine Zeta-Jones (1969) was typecast as the token pretty girl in British films, and therefore relocated to Los Angeles. She established herself in Hollywood with sexy action roles in The Mask of Zorro (1998), Entrapment (1999) and the black comedy Intolerable Cruelty (2003).

 

Catherine Zeta-Jones was born in Swansea in 1969. Herr parents were David Jones, the owner of a candy factory, and his wife Patricia (née Fair), a seamstress. In the 1980s, her parents won £100.000 at the game of Bingo and moved to St. Andrews Drive in Mayals, uptown Swansea. Because Zeta-Jones was a hyperactive child, her mother sent her to the Hazel Johnson School of Dance when she was four years old. Zeta-Jones participated in school stage shows from a young age and gained local media attention when her rendition of a Shirley Bassey song won a Junior Star Trail talent competition. As a child, she played roles in the West End productions of the musicals Annie and Bugsy Malone. When she was 15, Zeta-Jones dropped out of school and decided to live in London to pursue a full-time acting career. She studied musical theatre at the Arts Educational Schools, London. When she was 17 years old, she made her stage breakthrough with a leading role in a 1987 production of 42nd Street. Her next stage appearance was with the English National Opera at the London Coliseum in 1989 where she played Mae Jones in Kurt Weill's Street Scene. Her screen debut came in the unsuccessful French-Italian film 1001 Nights (Philippe de Broca, 1990), as Sheherezade opposite Thierry Lhermitte. She had greater success as a regular in the British television series The Darling Buds of May (1991–1993). Following a brief appearance as Beatriz Enríquez de Arana in the unsuccessful adventure film Christopher Columbus: The Discovery (John Glen, 1992), Zeta-Jones featured as a belly dancer in disguise in an episode of George Lucas' television series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992). She next took on the part of an aspiring duchess in the farcical period drama Splitting Heirs (Robert Young, 1993), about two children (Eric Idle and Rick Moranis) who are separated at birth. She then starred as the pragmatic girlfriend of Sean Pertwee's character in the surf film Blue Juice (Carl Prechezer, 1995). Dismayed at being typecast as the token pretty girl in British films, Zeta-Jones relocated to Los Angeles.

 

Catherine Zeta-Jones initially established herself in Hollywood with roles that highlighted her sex appeal such as in the action film The Mask of Zorro (Martin Campbell, 1998) opposite Antonio Banderas, and the heist film Entrapment (Jon Amiel, 1999), in which she starred opposite Sean Connery as a seductive insurance agent on the lookout for an art thief. Critics praised her portrayal of a vengeful pregnant woman in Traffic (Steven Soderbergh, 2000) and a murderous singer in the musical Chicago (Rob Marshall, 2002). For the first she was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress. The latter won her Academy and BAFTA Awards for Best Supporting Actress, among other accolades. In 2003, Zeta-Jones played alongside George Clooney in the Coen Brothers' black comedy Intolerable Cruelty. It was a commercial success. She starred in high-profile films for much of the decade, including the heist film Ocean's Twelve (Steven Soderbergh, 2004), the comedy The Terminal (Steven Spielberg, 2004), and the romantic comedy No Reservations (Scott Hicks, 2007). Parts in smaller-scale features were followed by a decrease in workload, during which she returned to stage and portrayed an ageing actress in A Little Night Music (2009), winning a Tony Award. Zeta-Jones continued to work intermittently in the 2010s, starring in the psychological thriller Side Effects (Steven Soderbergh, 2013) and the action film Red 2 (Dean Parisot, 2013). Zeta-Jones is the recipient of several accolades, including an Academy Award, a British Academy Film Award and a Tony Award, and in 2010 she was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for her film and humanitarian endeavours. She supports various charities and causes, and is a prominent celebrity endorser of brands. Her struggle with depression and bipolar II disorder has been well documented by the media. She was married to American actor Michael Douglas with whom she has two children. Catherine Zeta-Jones was last seen in the cinemas with Toby Jones and Michael Gambon in the British comedy Dad's Army (Oliver Parker, 2016), based on the legendary TV series.

 

Sources: Wikipedia and IMDb.

One of the last and most powerful steam locomotives ever built, the British Rail Standard Class 7 was BR's top express locomotive, and could have been utilised far better in its short lifespan, but ended up only serving the railways for 15 years, a blink of an eye compared to other mainline Pacifics of the time that had operated under the pre-nationalisation companies.

 

Designed by Robert Riddles, who had previously coined the design for the War Department Austerity 2-10-0 and 2-8-0 freight locomotives, the BR Standard Class 7's were conceived of as a result of the 1948 locomotive exchanges, which were done to test the best and worst aspects of locomotive design within the Big Four railway companies that had existed before nationalisation. The research gained from operating the best designs of the GWR, LMS, LNER and Southern railways on different areas of the British Railways network paved the way for several new classes of standardised locomotives to be constructed, largely to replace many of the ageing Victorian era engines that even in the late 1940's continued to ply their merry trade.

 

The first design requested by the Railway Executive was for a new express passenger Pacific locomotive, designed specifically to reduce maintenance and using the latest available innovations in steam technology from home and abroad. Various labour-saving devices were utilised to produce a simple, standard and effective design, able to produce equivalent power to some of the Pacifics that were still available as legacies of the Big Four.

 

The basic design of the Standard 7's can be traced to LMS construction practices, largely owed to Riddles' previous career with that company, but complimented this with the boiler and trailing wheel design of the Southern Railway's Merchant Navy Pacifics so as to follow the best design practice. The firebox was also similar in having a rocking grate, which allowed the fire to be rebuilt without stopping the locomotive, removing both ash and clinker on the move. A self-cleaning smokebox was used, which enabled ash to flow into the atmosphere, reducing the workload of the engine cleaner at the end of a working day. A single chimney was placed on top of the smokebox, which was unusual for a Pacific type of locomotive.

 

The Standard 7's were fitted with 6 ft 2 in driving wheels, allowing these engines greater capacity for use in mixed-traffic working, which made them available for both sustained fast running with heavy passenger trains, yet small enough to allow them to undertake more mundane tasks such as freight haulage.

 

55 of these engines were constructed between 1951 and 1954, with 70000 'Britannia' being the first and flagship of the fleet, with residual locomotives of the class being dubbed 'Britannia-Class'. Three batches were constructed at Crewe Works, before the publication of the 1955 Modernisation Plan.

 

Britannia was built at Crewe, completed on 2 January 1951. She was the first British Railways standard locomotive to be built and the first of 55 locomotives of the Britannia class. The locomotive was named at a ceremony at Marylebone Station by the then Minister for Transport Alfred Barnes on 30 January 1951. The BR Locomotive Naming Committee were determined not to use names already in use on other locomotives. They tried to observe this by not selecting the name Britannia for use on 70000 because it was already in use on one of the ex-LMS Jubilee Class locomotives, but Robert Riddles overruled them and the Jubilee had to be renamed.

 

The Britannias took their names from great Britons, former Star Class locomotives, and Scottish firths, although one locomotive, 70047, was never named. The success of these first Standard Pacifics gave birth to two other Pacific classes over the BR years, including the unique BR Standard Class 8, number 71000 'Duke of Gloucester', which was built in 1954 to replace the destroyed Princess Royal Class locomotive number 46202 Princess Anne, lost in the Harrow and Wealdstone rail disaster of 1952, and the fleet of 10 BR Standard Class 6 'Clan' Pacifics that were employed on services in the west of Scotland, but failed to gain a stellar reputation due to their employment on timetables for the more powerful Standard 7's they couldn't keep up to.

 

The class gained a warm response from locomotive crews across all British Railway Regions, with especially glowing reports from those operating them from Stratford depot on the Eastern Region, where its lower weight and high power transformed motive power over the restricted East Anglian lines. However, negative feedback was received from various operating departments, most notably on the Western Region. The criticism was primarily out of partisan preference for GWR-designed locomotive stock among Western Region staff; in particular, the class was 'left-hand drive' in contrast to 'right-hand drive' GWR locomotive and signalling practice, a factor in the Milton rail crash of 1955.

 

For this reason, the Western Region locomotive depots at Old Oak Common and Plymouth Laira declared that the class was surplus to requirements. However Cardiff Canton depot displayed its liking for the class (despite being part of the former GWR empire) and managed to obtain good results on South Wales passenger traffic.

 

The Midland Region also had favourable reports, but a marked consistency in losing time on the longer runs between Holyhead and Euston was recorded, although all complaints were down to the individual techniques of the operating crews. This was compounded by the irregular allocation of the class to depots all over the network, meaning that few crews ever had a great deal of experience in driving them. The Southern Region also had an allocation of seven in May 1953, when all Merchant Navy Class locomotives were temporarily withdrawn for inspection after 35020 "Bibby Line" sheared a crank axle on the central driving wheel.

 

Repairs to the class were undertaken at Crewe, Swindon and Doncaster Works until the financial constraints of the British Railways Modernisation Plan in terms of expenditure on steam began to preclude the regular overhaul of locomotives. During the mid-1960s overhauls were carried out exclusively at Crewe Works.

 

Britannia was initially based at Stratford in order to work East Anglian expresses to Norwich and Great Yarmouth, but was also particularly associated with the Hook Continental boat train to Harwich. Subsequently, the loco was based at Norwich Thorpe in January and March 1959 before spending the remainder of her career on the London Midland Region based at Willesden, Crewe North, Crewe South and finally Newton Heath.

 

The locomotive also had the distinction of hauling the funeral train for King George VI from King's Lynn, Norfolk to London following his death in February 1952 at Sandringham House, Norfolk. For this task, Britannia had her cab roof painted white, as was the custom with royal locomotives. Britannia has also worn the white roof in preservation.

 

However, as the locomotives entered the 1960's, the modernisation plan continued to gather pace, and diesel locomotives started to replace steam on most parts of the network. Very soon the Standard 7's placement on Top-Line expresses were demoted to the on-again-off-again work of freight and parcels, and cosmetic maintenance was reduced as their final years loomed. The lavish BR Brunswick Green soon faded to grey, and in some cases BR Lined Black was adopted for ease.

 

The first locomotive to be withdrawn from service was number 70007 Coeur-de-Lion in 1965, and the entire class was gradually transferred to Carlisle Kingmoor and Glasgow Polmadie depots. Britannia was withdrawn in May 1966, after 15 years of service.

 

A succession of bulk withdrawals began in 1967, culminating in the very last steam operation in British Railways service on August 11th, 1968, where Standard 7 number 70013 Oliver Cromwell, was chosen to assist in hauling the Fifteen Guinea Special, the last steam hauled British Railways passenger service from Liverpool to Carlisle via the S&C. 70013 was chosen as it was the last BR-owned steam locomotive to undergo routine heavy overhaul at Crewe Works, being out-shopped after a special ceremony in February 1967. The engine hauled the Manchester to Carlisle leg of the service via the Settle and Carlisle line, with LMS Class 5 45110, and LMS Stanier Class 5 locomotives, 44781 and 44871 double-heading the return working back to Manchester.

 

Upon withdrawal, 70000 was initially planned for preservation with the National Railway Museum due to it's cultural significance, but because of its prototypical nature, 70013 was instead chosen and bought up for preservation. 70000 would later be preserved by Britannia Locomotive Company Ltd.

 

After moving from one home to another, the engine wound up on the Severn Valley Railway, where she remained for a number of years in operational but non-mainline condition. With the society wishing to make more use of the locomotive, she was moved to the European gauge Nene Valley Railway in Peterborough, where she was also fitted with an air-brake compressor. Britannia made her return to the main line on 27 July 1991, successfully working enthusiast trips until 1997.

 

With an expired mainline boiler certificate, due to the high cost of refurbishment, the locomotive was sold to Pete Waterman in 2000. Stored at Waterman's workshops at the Crewe Heritage Centre, after initial assessment the amount of work resulted in Waterman selling her to Jeremy Hosking. The locomotive underwent restoration at Crewe which involved a newly refurbished cab, a new smoke box and major work on the boiler; replacement steel sides, new crown stays, new front section barrel section, new steel and copper tubeplate, repairs and patches to door plate and major work to copper firebox.

 

Transferred to the Royal Scot Locomotive and General Trust, the locomotive was returned to main line operational condition in 2011, initially out shopped in its prototype black British Railways livery. After a running-in period, in 2012 the locomotive was repainted in British Railways Brunswick Green, but with an early BR crest. On 24 January 2012, the loco hauled the Royal Train with Prince Charles on board to Wakefield Kirkgate, where he rededicated the locomotive. For the trip the loco again had a painted white cab roof, removed after the engine's appearance at the West Somerset Railway's Spring Gala.

Model: Scania R 410 Highline Euro6 6X2 (R-Series 6)

VIN: YS2R6X20002104316

1. Registration: 2014-11-05

Company: Braue Trans, Broager for DSV, Roskilde/Hedehusene (DK)

Fleet No.: -

Nickname: -

License plates: AP59919 (nov. 2014-?)

Previous reg.: n/a

Later reg.: n/a

Retirement age: still active jan. 2019

Photo location: Motorway 501 (Aarhus Syd Motorvejen), Viby J, Aarhus, DK

 

This ex-DSV Scania was bought by Braue Trans in september 2017, but both registration, workloads and even (to some degree) the livery remained unchanged. As this photo shows, it's even hauling a DSV-trailer.

 

Going down the steep hill leading northeast into Aarhus. The motorway ends by Åhavevej in Viby. From here, the trucks can continue straight on to Marselis Boulevard across Skanderborgvej before ending at the port of Aarhus, 6 km from here.

 

Tip: to locate trucks of particular interest to you, check my collections page, "truck collection" (www.flickr.com/photos/lavulv/collections/72157684190396672/ ) - here you will find all trucks organized in albums, by haulier (with zip-codes), year, brand and country.

 

Retirement age for trucks: many used trucks are offered for sale on international markets. If sold to a foreign buyer, this will not be listed in the danish motor registry, so a "retired" truck may or may not have been exported. In other words, the "retirement age" only shows the age, at which the truck stopped running on danish license plates.

 

Processed with VSCOcam with b6 preset

Porsche 917-001

Chassis 001, assembled in early March 1969, was the first of the twenty-five 917s completed for homologation. This chassis was used for a multitude of events, though never raced. Its workload consisted of testing at the Nürburgring and display duty in places such as the Geneva Motor Show in 1969 or Frankfurt International Auto Show in 1970.

By October 1970, 917-001 was part of the Press Department of Porsche and painted in the now famous Salzburg paint scheme of the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans winner.

 

Festival Automobile International 2017, Paris

Porsche 917-001

Chassis 001, assembled in early March 1969, was the first of the twenty-five 917s completed for homologation. This chassis was used for a multitude of events, though never raced. Its workload consisted of testing at the Nürburgring and display duty in places such as the Geneva Motor Show in 1969 or Frankfurt International Auto Show in 1970.

By October 1970, 917-001 was part of the Press Department of Porsche and painted in the now famous Salzburg paint scheme of the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans winner.

 

Festival Automobile International 2017, Paris

How to make a mirror in SL short 'n dirty version - Alchemy PBR Viewer I'm using which is my favorite. Its quite far ahead in terms of graphics and reliability from the other viewers.

 

Very rough quick cut to show the steps

1) Turn on sun / moon - reflections to manual - and crank your settings to HIGH (just turn it all up and change settings back down after so you know what they do)

2) IMPORTANT - Make sure when you make the reflection probe box, the TOP faces you- The top of the box always has to face you so spin it.

3) Make sure mirror is enabled in Preferences > Graphics > Advanced

4) Makes sure mirror is enabled in the probe under EDIT > Features

5) Line it up the mirror directly in the center of the probe. Its finicky when you are learning.

 

I had graphics down, but it can get smoother and clearer if you take the time and turn up the settings to 2048. Just make sure you have a good GPU as that doubles the workload on the GPU. You will want to turn off mirrors while wandering around the grid, You can also go into Nvidia Control Center settings and change MANAGE 3d Settings > Program settings > Alchemy/FS - set to GPU and enable Prefer Max Performance.

 

Alchemy Discord for latest viewer download - discord.gg/eng6bzbp

 

Here is more complete video of how to make a mirrorfrom beginning to end -

i.gyazo.com/a8112a4692b83d2a64cf29efce3cee3d.mp4

 

Alchemy

Gyazo

 

2022: A Year Unlike Any Other

By Andrew J. Karagianis

January 2, 2023

 

You know how there are some years where you just plod along and nothing really happens out of the ordinary, whereas there are other years where you experience something huge and life-changing?

 

My headline story of 2022 is that it’s the year in which I became a father. Definitely life-changing! The year was pretty evenly split into Ally being pregnant for the first half, and our baby’s first almost-six-months in the second half. But, because it’s me, you’re going to get all the minutiae of 2022, and not just a one-paragraph summary. Someone suggested years ago that I try to write a TL;DR version, but that’s not my style. I am a creator, not just a consumer. Plus, now that I have a kid, there’s someone who may be genuinely interested in reading about the details, many years from now.

 

So in light of that, I think it’s no longer appropriate to call this a summary of 2022, but rather, it’s my story of 2022.

 

Ally and I rang in the new year in bed – Get your mind out of the gutter! We had watched a show about Betty White (who died earlier that day), read our books, and went to sleep, only to be awoken by fireworks later.

 

The first song I listened to in 2022 was “You Said It All” by Ozzy Osbourne.

 

I was given the order to work exclusively from home again on January 7th to start January 10th, although it was an internal order rather than a provincial mandate this time. Fine by me!

 

In early January, I started typing a document to my as-yet-unborn child, documenting who their family members were – particularly those who have already died, since knowledge of their lives is fading, as they had the misfortune (or good fortune?) to have lived their lives before the age of the Internet.

 

On the week of January 19th, a local rabbit took up residence in our back yard. I would see him outside sitting by the shed during the day whilst working from home. After a week or two, I noticed I hadn’t seen him for several days, so that was that. Maybe he got evicted from his hole in the ground.

 

Also in January, I started typing a retrospective trip journal for my Europe 2008 trip, because I love writing trip journals but hadn’t started writing them yet back in 2008. In so doing, I realized there were parts of that trip that I didn’t really remember or have photo evidence for, so I got the idea to try to find the Europe 2008 pics that didn’t make it to Flickr in an attempt to fill in the blanks. I got my old 2003 eMac from storage on January 23rd, and fired it up on January 30th. It worked perfectly fine, but I discovered that I had deleted the vast majority of my pictures from that computer several years earlier (I hadn’t even turned the eMac on since 2013). I did find a few salvageable Europe 2008 pics on it, though, so that means it wasn’t a complete dead end. I transferred a handful of them to my red external hard drive via my blue 16GB USB key, and started posting them in a new album on Flickr on January 31st. I also decided I’d go back to the storage unit, because I knew I had also saved those pictures onto CDs (it was the late 2000s, remember). On February 5th, I got them, and started transferring them from the CDs to a USB key via my MacBookPro (which also still works), then plugged the USB key into my iMac, to transfer straight to my red external hard drive. I found lots of pics that I had no memory of taking, so it was neat to see those because it was like they were from a completely different trip. And to my delight, lots of the pics on the CDs were good enough to post online! I posted 26 to Flickr before I got back on track with posting my Europe 2020 pictures.

 

Ally got another ultrasound on January 31st, and she found out the baby’s permanent gender identity. We had talked about not finding out until the baby was born, but I guess curiosity got the better of her. The next day, I cracked, and Ally told me it looks like we’d be having a girl!

 

I’m going to take a few paragraphs to talk about external events now, because the winter of 2022 was pretty bad in that regard, if you recall. From late January into February, libertarian terrorists from the Flu Trux Klan and funded largely by American supporters held Ottawa hostage, in one of the biggest national embarrassments of my lifetime, protesting mandates that were largely Provincial (not Federal) in nature, and meant to save their lives. Remember, lives > jobs. Thankfully, peace, order, and good government prevailed over the American-style mentality of “give me liberty and give them death.”

 

Then within days of the Freedumb Convoy protestors being cleared out, Vladputeen decided to invade Ukraine, wreaking havoc on the global food supply and on my investments, which dropped in value by almost 20% this year. As of today, it still hasn’t escalated to nuclear war, which is remarkable, but I guess time will tell how that plays out.

 

And of course, the Omicron variant continued to rage across the planet, as governments (in Canada at least) gave up on mandates for fear of another armed trucker protest. Thankfully Omicron disease was less lethal than 2021’s Delta variant, but maybe that’s also because so many people have been vaccinated now.

 

Speaking of COVID-19, as I type this, it’s been nearly three years since this whole fiasco began. Remember how at the very end of December 2019, or in the early days of January 2020, you first heard the word “coronavirus”? Yeah. I still haven’t gone to a movie in a theater since December of 2019, or eaten indoors in a restaurant since March of 2020, or taken the TTC since June of 2020. But I did eat at my first family meal since 2019 on Thanksgiving this year, so that was an important step for me. That’s how long it took for me to feel moderately safe taking my mask off around other people who weren’t my wife and child. Remember folks, the virus doesn’t care if you’re family; the virus just sees another human and thinks “Mmm, fresh meat!”

 

Anyway, back to the personal stuff!

 

Throughout the winter, I lifted weights at home as an alternative to walking on the icy sidewalks.

 

In early March, Terrance had a fall and we took him to the vet. He was okay.

 

On March 23rd, we were awoken to the sound of two douchebags breaking into our shed and trying to steal stuff during a pissing rainstorm. Ally yelled at them through the window while I went outside to the front and saw them casually walk away empty-handed.

 

On March 26th, I went planespotting for the first time in an hwhile. On March 28th, I found out that my prediabetes had improved significantly, which I was very happy about. My fasting blood glucose went from 6.6 in September 2021 down to 6.1 in March 2022.

 

… Only to be overshadowed by finding out a few days later that I might have high blood pressure. That worried me throughout April as I kept getting worse results at the pharmacy machines. I got a few readings at my doctor’s office (as high as 161/97), and she referred me to a cardiologist to do some testing first.

 

On April 17th, I started shooting another roll of APS film for the first time since September 2021. It turned out awful. Every picture was blue, or as someone else put it, only the cyan showed up. In spite of this discouraging result, you could tell that the lens was doing its job perfectly well, and so I tried again. I almost became obsessed with APS film in the spring and I even had a dream about it. In fact, 2022 would be the year of film for me. Even though I got back into film photography in 2020, it really took off in 2022. I shot 20 rolls in 2022, and am on roll # 21 right now. That’s far more than I shot in any previous year, and it’s almost as many rolls as I shot during my entire childhood and youth. I also joined a Facebook group for APS film.

 

Sometime around April 20th, I planted a seed from Terrance’s seed mix, and within a few days it had sprouted and started growing quickly. Wanting to keep it safe from tree rats, I put it outside in a big planter and covered it with chicken wire. Over the summer it turned into a long pumpkin vine with nice yellow flowers, but the neighborhood vermin kept biting them off (the flowers on the vine that extended beyond the chicken wire).

 

On May 4th, Ally and I started a 5-week online parenting class hosted by a nurse from St. Joseph’s Hospital. I think I remember the nurse’s mannerisms and way of speaking more than I remember the content of the class, but we met some other first-time-parents-to-be on that class, and swapped Instagram usernames (yes, usernames) with each other.

 

On Monday May 9th, I went to the cardiology clinic to do an echocardiogram and an EKG, and then got my blood pressure checked and it was 111/71! So that was baffling, but good news. Then they hooked up a Holter monitor and I went home to wear it for three days, during which time I couldn’t get a shower. The Holter monitor was pretty painless, but by Tuesday day my chest started itching, as the tech had to shave parts of it in order to stick the electrodes on. I ripped it all off on Thursday morning at the designated time, and had a nice shower that evening right after work-from-home.

 

In mid-May, I first heard the term “Monkeypox”, and how it had been found in Canada, and how we had been told not to panic. Ugh, not again!

 

Thankfully, monkeypox didn’t seem to take off (in the media at least) to anywhere close to the same degree that COVID-19 did. Obviously a lot of people have gotten it, but I don’t personally know any of them, unlike COVID.

 

On May 22nd, I shot my first-ever roll of 35mm film. Yes, ten years shooting film as a kid/teenager and two years shooting it as an adult, and not once had I used the most-popular format. Until now. I carefully popped and wound a roll of Fujifilm into my grandfather’s old Kodak Retinette camera (which I later found out was probably made in 1957), and tried out this ancient technology. It turned out better than I expected, so that was encouraging. I joined a Facebook group dedicated to Kodak Retina and Retinette cameras.

 

Throughout the spring, Ally would regularly put my hand on her belly and I would feel the baby kicking or moving around. By May or June, I could feel more-distinct parts; perhaps a foot or a knee.

 

On May 28th (my 5th wedding anniversary; hard to believe it’s been 5 years already!), I went to Mom’s house for her 60th birthday party. Elliot ordered an ice cream truck and I got lots of pictures, so that was a good time.

 

Throughout May and June, I continued working, taking film pics, and going on bike rides as we awaited the arrival of our bébé. On June 15th, I bought a Canon EOS Elan IIe 35mm film SLR on eBay for $70. I liked the Retinette, but the lens isn’t connected to the viewfinder, so getting the right focus distance involves making your best guess. When it works out, it looks great, but it doesn’t always work out. So I got a film SLR that I could use my detachable lenses with.

 

On I believe June 12th, I met Rob Chew from Flickr; we walked around Roncesvalles and I took the Retinette for that outing.

 

Not wanting to take any chances getting stuck in traffic 30km from home when Ally’s water broke, I decided to take my parental leave at the start of her 39th week. On my first day of parental leave, we went to the Zoo for the first time since 2016. I saw Andrew and Jay, and got some good APS film pics, but we only got to see Indo, Africa and Savannah, as it would have been too much walking for Ally to visit my old slacking grounds of Eurasia.

 

On June 23rd, I started a public Instagram account for my film pics -- @36filmpics.

 

Ally’s due date came and went, but still no bébé. We went on walks, and she did exercises, and went to midwife appointments, but still no bébé. It was decided that she would be induced. On the morning of Saturday July 2nd, I took my last photo of Ally with her belly visible, a week past her due date, with my little old Kodak Advantix T500 APS film camera. We went to St. Joe’s that evening, and Ally had a Foley catheter installed (yes, Ally reviewed and approved this story before I posted it). We went home at 12:12am.

 

On Sunday July 3rd, we got up before 6:15am and got to the hospital at 8:06am; the longest day of Ally’s life (her words). And I documented everything! We were brought to the birthing room just before 9:00am. A doctor broke Ally’s water at 9:49am, and started her on oxytocin at 10:29am. Ally’s contractions were getting more frequent by 12:40pm, but by mid-afternoon she was in more pain. Around 4:30pm she said she felt like pushing, but the anesthesiologist wasn’t available to give an epidural until around 5:50pm. At 10:10pm, Ally was fully dilated, and a nurse said we’d talk about pushing in an hour or two, so we tried to sleep a bit. We woke up at 11:53pm.

 

Ally started pushing at midnight, and I have never seen her strain like that before. Her face was beet-red, her eyes were squeezed shut, and I felt so bad for her. After an hour being assisted by me, a nurse and the midwives, the doctor came back and determined that the baby’s head was still not engaged, so Ally would have to have a c-section. It was not what Ally wanted to hear, but she was brave. They wheeled her into the OR around 1:23am while the midwives took me to get suited up into scrubs. I waited in the hall for about 20 minutes with my camera (digital this time; I couldn’t take any chances with film in a moment like this), and then the midwife student brought me into the OR and around the table, and I sat on a metal stool near Ally’s head. She was awake, so I held her hand. Barely two minutes after I sat down, the midwife told me to get my camera ready. On cue, I stood up and took two pictures of our baby, only about ten seconds old, covered in blood, screaming, and very much alive.

 

Rae was born at 1:54am on Monday July 4th, 2022, nine days after her due date. At that moment, I became a father, and we love her more than she will ever know.

 

A pediatrician and respiratory therapist roughly massaged and patted Rae to get the lung fluids out on a table nearby (which happens with c-section babies), while Ally looked over and I took a few pictures. Then the midwife brought Rae over to rest on Ally’s chest and took a few pictures of us while the doctors repaired Ally’s body.

 

The midwives led me out of the OR after less than ten minutes while the doctors finished patching Ally up. I went to a recovery room and took off my shirt, and the midwives put Rae on my chest. She immediately started rooting toward my nipple, but I told her she wouldn’t get much there. A few minutes later, Ally was hwheeled in on a bed and held Rae to breastfeed her for the first time. Ally looked exhausted, but completely natural at being a mother.

 

So many things happened that day that it’s sort of a blur. Due to my work benefits, we got a private room, which we were grateful for. I finally got ready for bed around 4:10am. We hardly slept at all that first night, but it’s all worth it, for the little girl that we now have in our lives.

 

Rae had jaundice, so we had to stay in the hospital a bit longer than expected. After two and a half days full of feeding, crying, and napping, we were given the go-ahead to go home at 8:04am on Wednesday July 6th. But it was delayed when the nurse found out that Ally needed to see an obstetrician first. That didn’t happen, but she was given a prescription, so we packed up the rest of our things and left the hospital with Rae in the car seat around noon.

 

I spent the next month and a half with Ally, getting to know our baby together and figuring out how to be parents. I took 8 weeks off work for parental leave (the maximum that EI would pay for), so we went on a lot of walks and spent a lot of time outside this summer. We went to the Centennial Park Conservatory; the Beltline Trail; Sam Smith Park; the Humber River Recreational Trail; and I took Rae on a walk around Leslieville and Little India (our old stomping grounds) one afternoon while Ally went to the dentist.

 

On July 20th, Ally and I got our 4th COVID-19 vaccines. This time, I felt like crap the next day, but I was back to normal the following day.

 

On August 2nd, we took Rae on her first roadtrip/overnight trip, to Spring Lake Resort just outside Algonquin [Provincial] Park. Ally and I had gone there in 2018 and thought it’d be a safe place as far as COVID was concerned, as there were no shared indoor hallways (it’s a multi-storey motel). We went into Algonquin and Arrowhead Provincial Parks and I got some nice film pics, and we took Rae on her first ride in a canoe. I also found out on that trip that Good Shepherd was looking for a GACW again, as Akua had left. I guess I was right in my assumption back in 2020 that they wouldn’t find funding to hire me back as a GACW, but they must have had enough funding to keep Akua going. I declined to apply, because the external circumstances that made the GACW job a good job in the past were largely gone. I didn’t live nearby anymore; the pandemic still exists, and so on. During that trip, I found out that my Canon EOS IX Lite APS SLR camera had stopped working, so that pissed me off. I bought a new one in October, and by “new” I mean “new used”, since those cameras haven’t been made since 2001.

 

On August 13th, I went up to Vicki’s cottage for Dad’s 60th birthday party, and the following weekend I went to Wasaga Beach for a Shaka Wasaga tiki bar cruise, also for Dad’s birthday.

 

On August 15th, I went back to work. I found out that while I was away, 7 coworkers had ceased to work at the organization, and another full-timer took a job somewhere else and went down to relief. But I thankfully didn’t come back to a shitshow in terms of workload. Nobody was calling angrily or asking WTF was going on with their referral, although there was a backlog of referrals. Most of the actual waitlist was made up of guys who I’d interviewed prior to my parental leave; only about 8 guys had been interviewed while I was away. But I guess that shows how irreplaceable I was, right? Right!

 

At some point in the summer, I gave my old Canon EOS Rebel XSi camera to Heather, as Matt wanted it.

 

On August 27th, I went to ServiceOntario and downgraded my F licence to a G licence rather than do the written test again. After almost ten years, it wasn’t needed anymore – my employer got rid of the bus while I was on parental leave. I decided that I won’t be taking any more jobs in the future that require driving, as it’s too much of a liability.

 

On September 4th, I was out for a walk with Rae by myself, and sat down on a bench to feed her a bottle of formula. A woman of about 50 and presumably her teenage daughter stopped, looked at me, and said “God bless you, sir!” I went home and told Ally about how that’s all I had to do, as a man, to receive praise from a random stranger about my parenting skills. As much as I complain about some aspects of parenting, I do realize that Ally does the vast majority of the work. But I spend 40 hours a week at my job (plus about 8 hours a week commuting), so that’s the trade-off, as neither of us can do it all.

 

Ally got me what will probably be our last cake from Hype Food Co. for my birthday (as the company is moving to Quebec). I took my 37th birthday off work and we went on our second overnight roadtrip with Rae; this time to go to a few places around Lake Erie. We went to Turkey Point Provincial Park and walked a trail and sat on the beach. Being mid-September, there were hardly any other people there, but the flies were biting and there were wasps aplenty…perhaps that’s part of the reason why. The next day, we went to the Long Point Bird Observatory and Long Point Provincial Park. I got frustrated with Rae, and sat on the beach with Ally after going for a walk by myself, talking about the challenges of parenting that I wasn’t ready for. In my life in general, I take steps to prevent problems from happening, every day, with pretty much every decision, but with Rae, it felt like I wasn’t able to do that. I felt ineffective.

 

On September 20th, as I was stuck in another traffic jam on the way to work, I sat in a mostly-silent rage about my reputation being affected by other people’s fuck-ups (i.e., me being late for work because of other people’s car accidents). As I sat in my car eating lunch later that day, I e-mailed a therapy organization and said I need help dealing with stress. They got back to me that afternoon and that evening I spoke to a therapist. I spoke to another the next day, and decided to start working with her. The idea is to learn how to better prevent and deal with stress so I can be a good role model for Rae.

 

On September 22nd, I took the GO train to work for the first time ever, after being repeatedly made late for work due to the aforementioned traffic jams. I ended up taking the train to/from work 6 or 7 times in the fall, and it was a good idea. I got way more exercise on those days; I could read my book; I didn’t have to worry about liability (the main thing motivating me to take transit); and I didn’t catch COVID, either (which was the main thing keeping me from taking transit). However, at $16/day, I can’t justify taking the GO train every day. It only costs $4/day in gas, and driving saves me about an hour each day. So unfortunately, transit will remain an occasional thing, done for health benefits rather than saving time or money.

 

Around the same date, I found out we had our first client COVID cases and COVID outbreak at work – remarkably, it didn’t happen until two and a half years into the pandemic. They isolated the clients and it didn’t spread out of control, so that was fortunate. As much as I’m often on edge about people not taking the still-existing pandemic seriously enough anymore, my workplace has been very effective (and/or lucky) in keeping it under control thus far.

 

On November 6th, Ally and I got our flu shots. On November 15th, I got an ambulatory blood pressure monitor, to wear for 24 hours and figure out what’s really going on with my blood pressure. Turns out my daytime readings were okay, but my nighttime readings were a little high, so the cardiologist told me to eat less salt. He also said he’d arrange a sleep study to look into sleep apnea. If it’s not one thing, it’s something else!

 

Work really slowed down in the second half of November, as we knew we weren’t admitting any more men to treatment for a few months due to the staffing shortage. It was nice to catch my breath and allow my heart rate to slow down – and that’s no joke; my Fitbit graph shows a clear and persistent decrease since that time, compared to the previous two months where it was go-go-go all the time. On December 14th, I passed the ten-year mark with that organization. I didn’t get a card this time, though.

 

In late November, in another act of nostalgia, I moved aside the storage locker door and resurrected my very first camera; a Kodak Star 110, given to me by Granny and Grandad for Christmas of probably 1994. Why? More like “Why not?” I hadn’t used that camera in about 23 years. I shot a roll between November 28th and December 17th, and am waiting for it to come back from West Camera. ‘pparently 110 film is even more troublesome than APS film to develop, so I was told to expect a two-week wait for scans.

 

The only problem with all this film photography in 2022 is that it’s very expensive, especially considering I have a perfectly-good DSLR that takes better-quality photos on a huge memory card that I only had to buy once. Each roll of film costs between $9-$17 to buy, and about $13 to develop. So it hasn’t been a cheap year in terms of photography, but I have to say, shooting film has been a challenge I’ve enjoyed.

 

On December 18th, we put Rae in the crib to sleep at night for the first time, finishing her time sleeping in the bassinette in the bedroom with us for her first five-and-a-half months. It’s been more difficult for Ally and I because now we have to walk to another room to tend to Rae when she wakes up, but she had reached a milestone as far as the bassinette manufacturer’s instructions were concerned, so…safety first! Ally and I were sad about that change. Ally had said around November that she doesn’t want the bébé to grow up, and I felt the same way. It seems like yesterday that Rae’s head easily fit in the palm of my hand, and now she’s almost 18 pounds. She sits up in her high chair and eats pulverized vegetable slop a few times a day now. Pretty soon she’ll be walking, having temper tantrums in the grocery store, asking to borrow my car, and paying from her six-figure income for me to move into a reputable retirement home. Dad told me this summer that kids grow up in the blink of an eye, and these first almost-six-months have flown by indeed. On December 28th, we packed up the bassinette and brought it back to Gill, from whom we borrowed it.

 

I’ve learned lots of things about babies this year, having had no experience with babies since my sister was born in 1992, when I was a kid myself. For example:

 

•Babies will be laughing one second; freaking out the next (this was our motto for Rae for the first few months. Call me a jerk, but we needed humor).

•Babies will fuss and whine while you’re satiating their basic need for food or milk. They don’t understand cause-and-effect yet.

•Babies will wake up before the sun and not go back to sleep, which is okay during the workweek when I also get up before the sun, but they do it on weekends, too.

•Sometimes a car ride will make them fall asleep, and sometimes a car ride will make them scream bloody murder.

•Sometimes nothing works to calm an upset baby, whereas other times it’s easy to placate them simply by lifting them up in the air like Rafiki in the Lion King, except facing you, the baby-holder.

 

But for now, I’m 37, and she’s still a baby. So I’ll enjoy this time with her, before she starts telling me to fuck off and that I don’t understand, or before she starts using words out of context like “mid”, “vibe”, or “mood”. Of course, by the time she’s a teenager, those improperly-used words, like their Gen-Z proponents, will be cheugy.

 

Anyway, here we are at the beginning of 2023. Although the pandemic is not over, I have a wife and a baby and a job and a roof over my head. I’ve already set up an RESP for Rae (because science knows how much a postsecondary education will cost by the time she’s 18 – either it’ll be free, or it’ll be a million dollars). And although my health has started showing some cracks in the last few years that shouldn’t have become visible in my 30s and considering my body weight, at least they were identified early enough to make changes and incorporate them into my lifestyle before it’s too late. Let’s finish off this year’s summary with a few lists, shall we?

 

Books read in 2022 (in order):

1.Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari (finished in 2022)

2.With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge (if you’ve watched The Pacific, Eugene Sledge is the solider portrayed by Joseph Mazzello, a.k.a. Tim from Jurassic Park).

3.Talking to Canadians by Rick Mercer

4.You’re Going to be a Dad! By Daddilife Books

5.Canada’s Baby Care Book by Drs. Friedman & Saunders/The Hospital for Sick Children (perhaps if I had finished this book, I would better know how to take care of Rae).

6.The Underground Railroad: Authentic Narratives and First-Hand Accounts by William Still.

7.Confess by Rob Halford (the book I enjoyed most in 2022)

8.21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act by Bob Joseph

9.How to Prevent the Next Pandemic by Bill Gates

10.An Embarrassment of Critch’s by Mark Critch

11.Son of Hitler by Del Col/Moore/McComsey/McClelland

12.The Bullet: Stories from the Newfoundland Railway by Robert Hunt (started)

 

Indeed, 2022 was just as much a Newfoundland renaissance year for me as any previous year, even though it’s now been five years since I’ve been back, and seven years since I’ve been back to St. John’s. But with three Newfoundland[er] books; a Newfoundland-based TV show; four Simani songs and four Great Big Sea songs purchased, I think that counts.

 

TV shows watched in 2022:

•Son of a Critch

•Lincoln’s Dilemma

•The Boba Fett Show

•The Obi-Wan Kenobi Show (probably my favorite show of 2022)

•The G Word with Adam Conover (some of it, anyway)

•The Kids In The Hall Revival Show

•Our Great National Parks (narrated by my man-crush, Barack Obama)

•The first few seasons of Seinfeld again

•The Crown Season 5

•The Harry & Meghan Ruin Everything Show

 

A sample of songs I got into in 2022:

•“Bad Boy (Razor Ramon)” and “Snake Bit (Jake ‘The Snake’ Roberts)” by Jim Johnston

•“Turbo Lover” and “You’ve Got Another Thing Coming” by Judas Priest

•“Catfish’s Maw” and “Face Shrine” from The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening

•“The Rock Show” and “Try, Try, Try” by Rockabye Baby!

•“Santa’s a Bayman Like Us” by Shanneyganock

•“Step Into Christmas” by Elton John

•“If Not For You” by George Harrison

•“Head First” by Home

•“Mining Melancholy” from Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy’s Kong Quest

 

I went through a bit of a Queen revival in the summer. I bought Ozzy’s new album (Patient Number 9) and the Chili Peppers new album (Unlimited Love), but I wasn’t impressed with either. The songwriting just wasn’t there in Ozzy’s album. The songwriting on the Chili Peppers album was okay, and it was nice to hear John Frusciante back with them, but there weren’t any songs on it that I loved.

 

I hardly recorded any music in 2022, especially compared to 2021. I didn’t record any original songs; just a drum solo, some birds out the window; a few attempts to get Terrance and Rae to vocalize; a part of a cover song that Ally and I were working on, and an interview with Nanny in which I forgot to record the first half (whoops!).

 

I was a bit less active on Flickr this year (184 photos/videos posted) vs. last year (211 posted), but that’s still quite a lot. The reason I couldn’t post as often in 2022 is because Rae and Ally were sleeping in the bedroom (which is also my computer room) in the mornings while I was getting ready for work, and I tended not to use the computer after work, so I was really only posting pics on weekends from mid-August to mid-December.

 

Favorite things in 2022 not otherwise specified:

•Store: West Camera

•Snack food: Yogurt mixed with low-sugar ice cream, frozen berries, cinnamon and peanuts.

•Health: Finding out my fasting blood glucose had improved since last year.

•People: Seeing my baby daughter smile at me.

•Work: The afternoon commute occasionally being faster than usual for no apparent reason.

•Quotes:

----“Yeah, that’s right”/”It’s gonna be rough” – David Puddy;

----“Here I am” – Steve Bridges as George W. Bush;

----“I’m terribly sorry I’m dressed as a tree…shall we get unhappily married?” “I don’t want to marry you; I hate you; yes.” – Princess Diana and Prince Charles as portrayed by Kieran Hodgson;

----Saying “Take the piss” when I mean “Take a piss”.

•Politics: The local Big Development city councillor being ousted and replaced by a woman of color, who surprisingly got elected in Ford Nation.

•Travel: Actually being able to go on two multi-day trips with a newborn baby, even if they were frustrating at times and I haven’t left the province in almost three years.

 

And there you have it! Tune in again next year for my Story of 2023!

 

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More to come during this week, stay tuned!

Some Background:

The Space Defense Robot-04-Mk. XIV Destroid Nimrod was an anti-air/heavy artillery mecha, and intended as a replacement for the SDR-04-Mk. XII Phalanx, a Destroid specifically designed for space operations to defend the SDF-1 Macross, along with its sister unit, the cannon-armed ADR-04-Mk. X Destroid Defender.

 

The Phalanx had been developed in a hurry under the pressure of the raging war against the Zentraedi and suffered, as a consequence, from several disadvantages. For instance, its combat operation capability decreased substantially once the missile ordnance (a total of forty-four 430mm caliber missiles, half of them ready to fire and the rest held in reserve in internal magazines) had been exhausted. To counter this, a few models were modified in the field, e.g. with additional light Gatling guns mounted within the head unit, as well as other variations, but most Phalanx’ remained basically bipedal heavy missile launchers. A sub-variant with improved sensors and missile guidance systems, as well as the ability to deploy the new reflex missiles, the Phalanx Mk. XIII, was also built, but only in small numbers, and it could not overcome the flaws of the original design.

 

The Nimrod was the attempt to mend these shortcomings after initial combat experience with the type. The so-called SDR-04-Mk. XIV utilized the proven MBR-04 ambulatory system and shared a common hip and leg structure with a wide range of other Destroids. Like the Phalanx, the Nimrod’s newly designed upper body was a simple core structure that neglected any silliness for a weapon composition consisting of missiles, radar, and propulsion system, all mounted on the main rotating body which could be detached from the lower torso for maintenance of in case of emergency.

The Nimrod filled the same tactical niche as the Phalanx but was a more sophisticated design with improved capabilities and a – though limited – secondary close-range combat capability. The radar and sensor suites for target acquisition as well as missile guidance were improved, so that the Nimrod became even suited for air space surveillance and as a guidance/coordination unit for other Destroids. Due to this additional workload, the Nimrod’s crew was expanded by a WSO to two in a tandem cockpit.

 

The armament remained tailored to medium and long range, but there were some improvements. On the Nimrod, the Phalanx’ bulbous drum-shaped missile magazines gave way to more streamlined 540 mm caliber reflex missile containers, which were carried in staggered clusters of four twin-pods on each shoulder, holding a total of 48 missiles with sixteen of them ready to fire and the rest in reserve. This modification reduced weight and frontal area, and in a case of emergency the missile containers could be jettisoned.

In order to improve the Nimrod’s tactical value after its missiles had been deployed, it was furthermore provided with a secondary close-range combat capability in the form of a pair of particle beam guns. These were integrated into the arms, protected by the missile containers, and these reliable weapons could be effectively used against both air as well as ground targets. Thermal smoke dischargers completed the Nimrod’s defensive measures.

 

Like the Phalanx and other Destroids, the Nimrod was capable of limited space operations due to its vernier thrusters all over the hull. This allowed for units that were stationed on the deck of the SDF-1 to propel themselves back to the battle fortress if they were knocked off.

 

The Nimrod was, like the Phalanx, first deployed on the SDF-1 and was used to augment the ship's own weapon system to protect the vessel from Zentraedi attacks, even though the type came relatively late and was only used in the final phase of the war and only in limited numbers. After the conflict, production was throttled down (only a total of fifty SDR-04-Mk. XIVs were eventually built), and the surviving Nimrods from the SDF-1 were stationed at airbases in New Macross City and in nearby cities, such as Monument City.

  

Specifications:

Designation: SDR-04-Mk XIV

Mecha Class: Destroid

Crew: 2 (Pilot, WSO)

Weight: 21.8 tons (dry)

45.5 tons (loaded)

Height: 12.36 m (hull only, incl. radome)

13,50 m (with raised arms)

Breadth: 9,32 m

Depth: 5.0m

Max. walking speed: 72 kph loaded

 

Armament:

2x weapon clusters in shoulder locations, each with:

- Eight launch tubes for 540mm caliber mid-/long-range missiles (typically with anti-air capacity, artillery

rockets as alternative), with eight missiles ready and another sixteen as reserve (for a total of 48)

- One Mauler PBG-06 liquid-cooled electrically-charged twin particle beam gun

- Three thermal smoke dischargers

  

The kit and its assembly:

This is a fictional Macross Destroid, with a highly modified Imai Phalanx kit at its core. It depicts a potential successor for the missile-only-armed Phalanx, but it has been totally made up. Inspiration came when I recently procured a bunch of Kotobukiya’s MSG sets for mecha conversions – one of these sets included the quadruple missile launchers that now make up the Nimrod’s new “arms”. I was torn between using a Defender or a Phalanx as conversion basis, but due to the weapon pods’ bulkiness I went for the more massive Phalanx.

 

Beyond the MSG parts and the replacement of the Phalanx “missile drums”, there was initially no real plan for the conversion – things evolved gradually, depending on the donor parts at hand. However, several fundamental changes were made. The most important improvement measure that works for all Destroid kits with the “04” chassis is the integration of a completely now hip joint arrangement. OOB, the model's posture is pretty stiff, with the legs and feet facing straight forward. The model is just supposed to stand upright, and with the model’s OOB joint options it is really hard to create a vivid poise. Furthermore, the bolts that hold the legs are prone to break off, even more so because the Imai kit is from the 1st generation of mecha kits, without vinyl caps and just relying on a very tight joint fit for hold.

 

My proven solution: the implantation of a new hip “bone” made from plastic-coated steel wire, which is stiff in itself but can be bent in two dimensions. The thighs had to be modified accordingly, since the wire is much thinner than the original bolts. Inside of the pelvis, the W-shaped wire was attached with the help of sprue material and styrene profiles, a thorough fixation is necessary because a lot of load has to be held in place in a very small space.

 

In order to attach the legs to the wire, there’s a convenient trick: the receptor holes in the thighs were simply filled with small vinyl rings, standard material from other mecha kits (e.g. from Arii’s 1:100 VF-1 Battroids or the Gunze Sangyo/Aoshima Dorvack PAs), the rings’ outer AND inner diameter fit perfectly into the new arrangement. With this trick, a much more dynamic and "natural" leg position could be achieved, also thanks to the large feet and their joints of the “04” Destroid chassis. This tuning measure improves the model considerably. The legs were otherwise taken OOB, just some small styrene bits were added to the lower legs’ front sides (improving another small detail flaw of the model), and some openings on the lower legs’ rear side were filled with putty and styrene sheet. Furthermore, the open insides of the “heels” were filled with putty, too.

 

In order to integrate the new missile bins, suitable adapters for the shoulder had to be found. Being somewhat lazy and trying to use as many parts from the Phalanx kit as possible, I decided to integrate a styrene tube all through the upper body, so that I got better attachment points. This tube was extended so far that I could re-use the Phalanx’ blast exhausts from the original missile bins as shoulder joint covers. This looks very natural and these re-dedicated parts fit well over the implanted central styrene tube channel as well as into the channel that runs along the MSG missile containers’ inner side. In order to attach the new arms/containers, a smaller diameter styrene tube was glued into these channels, so that the new pods could be moved vertically.

 

As a weapon improvement over the Phalanx, a pair of particle beam guns was added to the new missile containers – they come originally from a Dorvack PA-36K “Berlon” kit, but they were tailored considerably in order to fit into their new position. They also help to hide the new shoulder joint, which was covered from above with parts from the Phalanx kit (the boxed that are normally attached to the upper legs) and the space between them with paper tissue, drenched with white glue. The result is a good visual transition.

 

The central hull was changed in order to move the look away from the Phalanx base. The rear side uses OOB parts, but these were modified and attached to the hull in a different way, so that the back is not as deep as on the Phalanx. The front received a vertical pair of searchlights (formerly return rollers from a 1:35 tank…), set into the breast plate. The cockpit bulge between the shoulders as well as the head unit are completely new. The cockpit cover is a leftover hull piece from a Kotobukiya helicopter drone, and it was moved forward, so that a crew of two is more plausible. The head unit on the elongated spine behind and above it consists primarily of a donor from a wrecked VT-61 “Tulcas” mecha (Dorvack), plus a small dish antenna for a tracking radar on the right (left over from a Dorvack PA-36K “Berlon” kit) and a round radome for target acquisition – scratched from main wheels of a Matchbox PB2Y and set upon a mount made from styrene profiles. Looks strange, esp. with that flat, square head unit underneath, but I wanted a unique and different look that sets the Nimrod apart from other canonical Destroid designs. And this certainly worked.

 

A final word concerning the Phalanx kit itself: like all other Destroids models, this is basically a simple affair and the model goes together well – but expect some PSR on every seam, and there are some improvements possible that IMHO raise the model’s quality. The lack of vinyl caps makes later movement a tricky affair, though, and it is interesting to see that while the “04” chassis Destroids (Phalanx, Tomahawk and Defender) share the same lower body, all three kits are different! As a positive trait concerning the finish, the Phalanx is also the only kit of this trio that comes with decals for the typical white trim on the lower legs of these Destroids.

  

Painting and markings:

Once more I wanted to stay true to the original look of a typical Macross Destroid from the “04” series. These tend to carry a uniform livery in murky/dull tones of green, brown and ochre: unpretentious "mud movers". Anything else is rare (I am aware of dark blue Phalanx’ on board of the SDF-1), and complex camouflage patterns are AFAIK not seen (probably a tribute to the TV series’ cel production). In consequence, I gave the Nimrod an overall livery in a rather unidentifiable brownish tone, namely RAL 7008 (Khakigrau), a tone that was carried by German WWII Afrikakorps tanks and very similar to the tone IDF vehicles like the Merkava typically carry nowadays. Since I only had this tone in a rattle can available, the model and its components were painted accordingly, with an additional hushed spray over the upper surfaces with a slightly lighter tone as a shading measure. After this basic painting, the parts received a washing with thinned black ink.

 

Decals mostly come from the OOB sheet, plus some extra stencils, including the "nose art" painted on the left leg (from a P-38); many Destroids and also Armored Valkyries seem to bear such markings. Gives the mecha a personal touch, though.

 

Finally, before everything was assembled, the kit received a dry-brushing treatment with light grey and an overall coat with matt acrylic varnish. As a final step, mineral pigments were dusted over the model, esp. around the feet and the lower areas of the mecha.

  

A rather straightforward conversion project that gradually evolved – but with a postive outcome, after some twists and turns. The fictional Destroid Nimrod turned out more believable than expected, thanks to the good donor parts that went into it, and the simple livery also adds to the design’s “realism” within the Macross universe. Even though the thing still looks odd – but not worse than the other canonical Destroids from the original TV series!

Note: this photo was published in a Mar 20, 2010 Norwegian blog titled "Entertainment guide 20.03 – 21.03.10." It was also published in an Apr 17, 2010 blog titled "Embodied rationality." And it was published in a Sep 30, 2010 blog titled "Bezuiniging kinderopvang zorgt voor Japanse toestanden." It was also published in an Aug 9, 2011 blog titled "Are NYC parents crazy?", as well as an Oct 5, 2011 blog titled "Why Quitters Prosper," as well as an Oct 21, 2011 blog titled "Helping Career Parents Keep Their Sanity." And it was published in a Dec 22, 2011 blog titled "Work-life balance, and leaning in."

 

Moving into 2012, the photo was published in an undated (early Jan 2012) blog titled "4 helpful tips when your kids ask about an absent parent." It was also published in a Jan 23, 2012 blog titled "Norwegians’ workload evenly distributed." And it was published in a Feb 20, 2012 blog titled "Como afecta la reforma laboral en la conciliación de la vida familiar." It was also published in a Mar 9, 2012 blog titled "Raising Confident Sons Who Have Respect for Others." And it was published in a Jun 5, 2012 blog titled "Why you can’t afford to be an insecure mom." It was also published in an undated (mid-Jun 2012) "And Then She Saved" blog titled "Stay Home With The Kids or Return To Work To Pay Off Debts?" And it was published in a Jul 11, 2012 blog titled "FORELDRE BØR KUNNE HA ALT." It was also published in a Jul 31, 2012 blog titled "Norway immigration affects labour market efficiency." And it was published in a Nov 14,2012 blog titled "Ciao Mamma parto per un anno… ma non ti preoccupare!", as well as a Dec 7, 2012 blog titled "Eine Reise durch die Welt berufstätiger Mütter."

 

Moving into 2013, the photo was published in a Feb 13, 2013 blog titled "Cheap and easy beauty tips for busy mums." And it was published in a Mar 6, 2013 blog titled "‘Fear of foreigners groundless’, researcher says," as well as a Mar 7, 2013 blog titled "8 Ways to Say No at Work – Without Feeling Guilty." It was also published in a Mar 22, 2013 Norwegian blog titled "EFTA challenges Norwegian policies on benefits for foreigners."

 

Moving into 2014, the photo was published in a Mar 1, 2014 blog titled "Norway’s new immigration and asylum policies." It was also published in a Mar 8, 2014 blog titled "Work-Life Balance Still a Woman's Problem, According to Execs." And it was published in a Jul 4, 2014 blog titled "Immigrants contribute to employment growth." It was also published in an Aug 12, 2014 blog titled "21 Signs You're Meant to Be a Mom."

 

Moving into 2015, the photo was published in an Apr 21, 2015 blog titled "s5 Sexy and Sensual Tips for Busy Moms."

 

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

 

The streets were wet when I got up this morning, and the weather forecast called for rain throughout the day. As it turned out, the forecasters were wrong; but not wanting to expose my digital camera to a potential downpour, I decided to spend my half-hour of free time, during my lunch-break, down in the local subway station, where I knew I could stay dry. It was also my second opportunity to try out the combination of a new 70-300mm VR full-frame zoom lens with the high-ISO capability of my Nikon D700 full-frame camera. So I set the ISO meter to 6400 (yeah, yeah, I know that the newly-announced Nikon D3X can go all the way up to ISO 110,000 -- but 6,400 is still a pretty awesome to me), found a quiet bench on the downtown side of the 96th Street IRT line (as opposed to last week's adventure on the uptown side), and sat patiently to see what would happen across the tracks, on the uptown side...

 

For the first 15 minutes, I didn't see anything at all worth photographing. But then, little by little, interesting people began shuffle past, or sit for a few moments on the wooden bench across the tracks. Or maybe they were there all along, and maybe it just took me a while to get "in the zone" and begin to appreciate why they were interesting and photogenic. I got a consistent sense of solitude, isolation, wistfulness and even loneliness in today's collection of subjects; maybe the gloomy weather up above made them all pensive, or maybe they were just tired at the end of a long work-week. Or maybe they just had a lot on their minds, what with the economy and the swine flu and all of life's other frustrations and disappointments. Whatever the reason, there were only one or two cases where I saw people laughing, smiling, or chatting cheerfully with one another.

 

I also took a couple of shots of people inside a subway car -- sometimes through the window of the uptown train on the other side of the track, and occasionally of the downtown train when it stopped right in front of me (temporarily blocking my view of the activity across the track). In one case, the subway door opened right in front of me, and a young woman stared vacantly in my general direction while various other passengers wandered into, and out of, various subway cars. I pointed my camera in her general direction while I sat on the wooden bench, opened up the zoom as far as I could -- i.e., 70mm -- aimed it in her direction, and pushed the shutter button. With a wide-angle lens, this kind of "hip shot" often works reasonably well, even if I have to do a lot of cropping; but it was sheer luck that I got the woman framed almost perfectly with the 70mm setting on the long-telephoto I was using today.

 

As with the last subway group that I shot at ISO 6400, there's a little bit of noise/graininess in these images -- but I decided to leave them that way. I did adjust the "hot spots" (areas over-exposed from the fluorescent lighting in the subway station) and "cold spots" (shadows and dark areas), and punched up the color a little bit. But aside from that, this is yet another view of the typical daytime scene on a typical NYC subway line...

 

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

 

Over the years, I've seen various photos of the NYC subway "scene," usually in black-and-white format. But during a recent class on street photography at the NYC International Center of Photography (ICP), I saw lots and lots of terrific subway shots taken by my fellow classmates ... so I was inspired to start taking a few myself.

 

So far, I'm taking photos in color; I don't feel any need to make the scene look darker and grimier than it already is. To avoid disruption, and to avoid drawing attention to myself, I'm not using flash shots; but because of the relatively low level of lighting, I'm generally using an ISO setting of 800 or 1600 -- except for my most recent photos with my new D700, which are all shot at ISO 6400.

 

I may eventually use a small "pocket" digital camera, but the initial photos have been taken with my somewhat large, bulky Nikon D300 DSLR; and today's were taken with an even bulkier Nikon D700. If I'm photographing people on the other side of the tracks in a subway station, there's no problem holding up the camera, composing the shot, and taking it in full view of everyone -- indeed, hardly anyone pays attention to what's going on across the tracks, and most people are lost in their own little world, reading a book or listening to music. But if I'm taking photos inside a subway car, I normally set the camera lens to a wide angle (18mm) setting, point it in the general direction of the subject(s), and shoot without framing or composing.

 

So far it seems to be working ... we'll see how it goes...

 

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

 

Note: This is one of 12 photos that I've culled from several thousand that I took in 2009, for possible presentation at a Jan 2010 class I'm taking at the International Center of Photography (ICP), called "On Seeing What's Right In Front of You." The photos already exist in various other Flickr sets -- often just one or two out of a group of hundreds of related images -- and I've just pulled them together for this occasion.

 

In the spirit of the ICP class title, all of these photos were taken "right in front" of where I live -- i.e., within a hundred feet of my apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

 

The photos are organized as 6 separate pairs -- each pair illustrating a specific situation, close to home, where I had a particular motivation or strategy for taking photos. This particular photo illustrates the principle that if you've avoided taking photos "right in front of you" because you don't like the "style" of the ones taken by other people, then choose your own style. Case in point: every subway photo I've seen for the past 40 years has been black-and-white. I don't like black-and-white, so I didn't take subway photos. Then it occurred to me I could take color photos. Duh. Now I've got hundreds of interesting subway photos.

Taken in 1973.

 

This is my very favorite shot of Bob, even with the damage to the image. He looks so thoughtful and somber -- wonder what's on his mind.

 

It's a bit convoluted how I'm related to Bob. His dad, Bert, and my great-grandmother, Bess, were brother and sister, two of eight children born to my great-great grandparents, C.A. and Ida. At some point in time in the 30's, Bert and Bess had a falling out and never really spoke to each other again; in fact, other than exchanging letters with two of her siblings over the years, I don't know if Bess ever saw any of her family in the last 30 years of her life. So, that meant that our whole side of the family never really knew any of these uncles, aunts, cousins until I started delving into the family history a few months ago. Curious about these long-lost relatives, I started searching for their children and grandchildren and have found all kinds of Griffins, who, I'm happy to say, have been thrilled to hear from me and re-establish our family connection. It is through them that I have gotten to know Bob and all of his funny, quirky ways.

 

Bob's parents, Bert and Sadie, were married three years when Bob came along in the summer of 1922, and to say that he was greatly loved and doted on as the first child would be an understatement. I have probably 200 or so photos of Bob as a young child, something I think is quite remarkable considering that this was the 20's and Bert and Sadie were not in any way affluent; photography must have been one of their few luxuries in life. When Bob was born, the family lived in a small apartment building just a block or two from downtown Granite City, where Bert worked as an insurance agent for Prudential. Granite City was (and I guess still is) a blue collar, one-company steel town, so, while being an insurance agent in other parts of the country may have been quite a lucrative profession, I don't think it was for Bert. He eeked out a living, but the family never lived in a home larger than a little bungalow with a converted attic for Bob's room. But, that was fine by the Griffins because they had each other and a great number of friends and family, so they were a very happy bunch.

 

A few years after Bob was born, his little sister, Carol, came along. With a precocious but very sweet little boy and a beautiful baby girl to love and adore, the Griffin family was complete. Like most mothers do, Sadie logged all of her childrens' special moments in their baby books, sentimentally packed away a few of their baby clothes as mementos (a wool bathing suit, hand-stitched collar, a silk onesie), and snapped photo after photo of her dear little ones. [Sadie kept all of these special baby items her entire, very long life (she died at the age of 99 in 1996), and I am now the proud owner of them.]

 

As Carol grew older, it quickly became apparent that she had severe mental deficiencies. Since mental retardation was such a huge stigma back in those days, I feel confident that Carol's doctors encouraged Bert and Sadie to hide her away in an institution somewhere and throw away the key. I also know that, among others, my great-grandmother, Bess, who wasn't Sadie's biggest fan on a good day, blamed Sadie for Carol's condition (this accusation may have occurred after the feud with Bert started). With all of this pressure, stress, and guilt, Bert and Sadie could have easily buckled and committed Carol, but they didn't. They loved their little girl, no matter what, and they wanted her with them and Bob. I think they were very brave.

 

Although they adored Carol, Bert and Sadie knew her options in life would be limited, so they put all of their hopes and dreams for the future in Bob, and he had no problem living up to them. He was smart, funny, gregarious, popular, and always open for adventure.

 

During high school, Bob was the quintessential big fish in a small pond, working as the editor of the school newspaper and being elected as class president. By the time he graduated in January 1941, great things were expected of Bob, but, like many graduates sick of spending their lives in dull classrooms, he opted to forego college and get to work in the real world instead. He got an office job at the local steel mill and quickly realized that he could work there for decades without ever moving up the ladder. With parents who couldn't afford to put him through college and little prospect of ever achieving success at the mill, Bob saw his options rapidly dwindling, and the gloom of Granite City overcame him, as it had so many others before him.

 

Then the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.

 

Within a year, Bob was inducted into the Army Air Corps and hoped to become a pilot, but he didn't pass the physical and transferred to the Army, where he spent almost two years working in various offices stateside and in Hawaii. He's the only WWII vet I've ever heard of who said he spent the entire war bored as hell. But, his two years of service made him eligible for the G.I. Bill, and suddenly, Bob's world opened up again.

 

In the meantime, Carol's options became even bleaker as she got older. As she grew into a teenager, her condition greatly deteriorated: she became nervous, angry, and easily agitated; her ability to take care of herself and communicate with others diminished drastically; and she had to be hospitalized several times for her increasingly violent outbursts.

 

Finally, in 1945, when Carol was 16, a financially strapped and emotionally exhausted Bert and Sadie realized they could no longer take care of Carol and made the heartbreaking decision to relinquish their parental rights and institionalize their beloved daughter (I guess that's how it was done back then). She moved to a school for the mentally disabled in a nearby town, and a devastated Bert and Sadie sat down to write to Bob overseas and tell him the sad news. According to Sadie's diary entry for that day, "we dreaded to do that."

 

Although Carol no longer lived with them, Bert, Sadie, and Bob visited her frequently, wrote bags full of letters to her, and took her out for family holidays as often as they could. I have a lot of photos of family gatherings and picnics, and Carol is always front and center. As she grew older, Carol's ability to communicate became more and more limited, but there are photos of her in classes at the school and in later homes, and I have a whole box of her art and letters her caregivers wrote to the family about Carol's day-to-day life when they weren't around. She seemed to be very happy in her new surroundings and was always anxious to get back "home" after time spent with her family.

 

Meanwhile, a freshly discharged Bob enrolled for his first semester of college at the University of Missouri in the fall of 1946. After five years of dead-end jobs working at the mill and in wartime offices, Bob was thrilled to be in the vibrant college town of Columbia discussing ideas with fellow students and writing creatively again for the first time since high school (some of Bob's college stories are in my photostream). His writing was so good, in fact, that he decided to major in journalism, specializing in feature writing. Now that Bob had a plan for the future for the first time since high school, he spent the next four years devouring books, writing, and thoroughly embracing the college life.

 

After graduation in February 1950, Bob began his career in journalism working on the Maryville Daily Forum in Maryville, MO, earning $50 a week as a general reporter. For a bachelor living in the Midwest with no responsibilities or debt, this was probably quite decent money, the first real money Bob ever had. Yet, after a year there, opportunity knocked elsewhere, and Bob moved on to Jefferson City, MO, working at the News-Tribune and spending four years there as the assistant city editor earning a whopping $75 a week.

 

It was during this time that Bob met Ruth Perrey, a lively, petite blonde with an easy smile and a vivacious personality that matched Bob's perfectly. Ruth was from a nearby small town and moved to Jefferson City after high school to attend the local junior college, and, after graduation, she stayed in town and went to work for the Missouri Farm Bureau. Bob's new sweetheart was independent, confident, and spirited, and he was instantly and hopelessly smitten. They were 27 when they met and didn't feel the need to waste a lot of time courting, so they married without much pomp or circumstance in a small ceremony at the First Christian Church in Jefferson City on May 31, 1953.

 

Two years later, Bob decided to give up newspaper life in search of something more stable and profitable. He opted to give big business a try and submitted an application to Shell Oil. I have a copy of this hand-written application, dated September 1955, and in it, he expresses the desire to work for Shell as a writer in some capacity. Luck was on Bob's side because he got the job and became a writer and editor for several of the company's publications. He and Ruth moved to NYC, where Shell was based, and enjoyed the big city life of parties, museums, plays, and concerts.

 

It was a happy time for the newly-married couple. Bob was making good money, and he and Ruth were able to decorate their Manhattan apartment in fine mid-century modern style (see photos in my stream) and make frequent trips home to see Bert, Sadie, Carol, and Ruth's family. Also, Bob's job enabled him to travel around the country, meeting various Shell station owners and writing feature stories about them for several intra-company publications. The only thing missing was a little Bob or Ruth to love and adore and make little boxes of mementos for. Although they tried for a long time, Ruth never conceived, so they resigned themselves to their fate and became an adoring aunt and uncle to their various nieces and nephews.

 

After 14 years living in NYC, Shell moved its headquarters to Chicago in 1970, and Bob and Ruth went along for the ride. By this time, Bob had become a collector of something rather peculiar ... names. I have no idea how this hobby started, but I am the proud owner of 40 yellowed pages of typed, single-spaced, very unusual and funny names that Bob compiled over the span of about 30 years. Here's a very small sampling of Bob's unique collection:

 

Orville E. Turnipseed (Shell dealer in Sunnyvale, Calif.)

Silk Sourjohn (resident of Madison County, Ill.)

Zephyr Psychedelic Chunky (Rhodesian burglary suspect)

Queen Sneed (Bronx waitress)

Practical Love (former employee of Owens-Illinois Glass)

Gotthilf Bopple (resident of Cleveland)

Socrates G. Poppajohn (attorney in Mason City, Iowa)

Poxie Propst (resident of Fulton, MO)

 

In addition to collecting names, Bob also became the go-to man for limericks and poetry. If someone needed a funny line or two written about a colleague for a birthday, retirement, or other occasion, Bob was only too happy to sit down and pen a line or two that surely had everyone laughing when he read it aloud to the gathering of whatever the special event was. Ever the performer (or, some might say, clown), I can so easily see a bespectacled Bob standing atop a paper-littered, metal work desk, cigarette in one hand and his poem in the other, with all eyes focused on him and only him, the star, as he grandly builds up the mood for the great punchline he wrote just for them. Yes, I think that Bob was quite a popular guy and never hesitated for the chance to entertain a crowd.

 

Here are a couple of his little ditties:

 

TO MELVIN:

May your skin be filled with bourbon,

As I pen this epigram,

May you always fill your stomach

From a pot of beans and ham.

 

May you never know frustration

Of a blank day fraught with stress,

May you never have to listen

To the nonsense you express.

 

There are many things to wish you,

To complete the Season's cheer,

But I know the way you'll end it --

With your belly full of beer.

  

And one of his limericks:

 

Said Stella to a fella named Earl:

"You know I'm an old-fashioned girl.

But if you're really keen

For some kinky routine,

Just ask, and we'll give it a whirl."

 

And one more in the vein of Dr. Seuss:

 

It's odd, it's weird,

It's almost laughable

That a grapefruit is

Precisely un-halfable.

 

I feel I'm a failure.

I'm hopeless. Don't laugh.

I can't cut a grapefruit

Precisely in half.

 

As the years passed, Bob also took up photography and genealogical research. He and Ruth would pack up and drive to a remote cemetery and take photos of family tombstones or make the long trek to a falling down, abandoned farm out in the middle of nowhere that once belonged to a distant uncle's cousin. (All of these things are exactly what I like to do, too, and I've found myself on more than one occasion following in Bob's photographic and genealogical footsteps.)

 

By the mid-1970s, Shell decided to move operations again, this time to Houston, and Bob and Ruth followed one last time. They bought a house, tended to their garden as if it were their children, and, as they say, "went Texan." But, times in corporate America were hard, and the stress of layoffs, an increasingly heavy workload, and unresponsive management began to take its toll on Bob. All of these emotions were exaserbated when Bert died back in Granite City at the age of 80 in 1977. Bob began to take stock of his life and realized that the headache of so much work would soon kill him, so, in 1980, he decided to retire at the relatively young age of 58. Co-workers, friends, and family (including Ruth) worried that Bob would get bored without a job to go to every day, but I think that he was one of those people who always found something to be interested in, so once he left, he never looked back.

 

Bob and Ruth stayed in Houston for another 10 years, but it was never really home to them. They wanted to return to their roots together and to be near family, so they picked up and moved one last time to the place where they started their lives together -- Jefferson City. They spent their quiet days together visiting family, taking photos, or taking trips to places like Hawaii with their favorite niece and her husband.

 

Then Ruth was diagnosed with cancer. She fought it and recovered, but several years later, it came back, and this time she wasn't so lucky. She died in 1998. Bob's sister, Carol, followed three years later, and Bob was all alone.

 

Although his smile was forever tinged with sadness, Bob managed to pull himself together and continue writing funny poetry about his aging friends and collecting unusual names. He was okay on the surface, but perhaps to fill the void left by Ruth's passing, Bob also started collecting other things, and lots of them -- paper clips, marbles, little jacks balls, trinkets, pens, you name it. Soon, his house became overrun with all of the little collections he amassed, but without Ruth there to keep his life in order, he just didn't care anymore.

 

Around this same time, Bob, a lifelong smoker (you will rarely see a photo of him sans cigarette), was diagnosed with OCPD, and he had to be on oxygen for hours a day. But that didn't stop him from writing funny missives, such as this one he sent to a pestering company wanting him to buy something:

 

"I am an 84-year-old widower who bought all the essentials a half-century ago.

 

Since then, I've picked up more than my share of knick-knacks, trinkets, and other miscellaneous bric-a-brac.

 

Therefore, I'm not a prime prospect for purchasing your peachy merchandise.

 

You'll save me some time, my mailbox some wear and tear, and yourselves some printing and mailing costs by removing my name from your mailing list.

 

Do it now!

 

Thanks"

 

In his last years, I'm happy to say that Bob developed a friendship with a lovely, equally lonely widow down the street. They went to dinners together, spent holidays together with their families, and took little trips because, even in old age, Bob liked to explore and learn. He was old and in poor health, but Bob was content.

 

In April 2007, Bob's long adventure ended when he had a heart attack and later died at a local hospital. Ever the clown and wise guy, Bob had decided before his death that he wanted two headstones -- one with Ruth's family plot and one with his own family. So, he got his wish. Ruth and Bob are technically in two places, which will likely lead to great confusion for future family researchers. Bob will be a pill for generations to come, and I like that.

 

I wish I could say that I met Bob, but I missed him by three years. A few months ago, my mom gave me Bess's old family albums with images of her siblings from the 1920's and 30's (when she was still on good terms with them). I loved the photos so much that I started looking around for lost relatives, and, as you know from the beginning of this long story, I found them. One relative told me that all of Bob's personal belongings were stored in a basement at Ruth's niece's house in St. Louis, so I called the niece and offered to help her sort through Bob's things to take back to members of the Griffin family. She happily obliged me, and I came away with Bob's stories, poems, photos, diaries, business papers, baby clothes and book, briefcase, etc., along with all of Bert, Sadie, and Carol's papers and photos.

 

Somehow, I ended up with quite a collection of Griffin ephemera, which is odd considering I never knew them, and the rest of the family is happy to just have copies of the photos and that's it. So, I am the keeper of all things Bob (and Bert, Sadie, and Carol), and I feel very lucky, indeed. I will take good care of him and ensure that the person in the next generation who gets Bob will take good care of him, too.

See this locomotive in the video here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHozMGsntFI

 

Ploughing and whistling north out of Teignmouth with the 1Z28 'Torbay Express' from Kingswear to Bristol Temple Meads is preserved British Railways Standard Class 7, 70000 'Britannia'.

 

One of the last and most powerful steam locomotives ever built, the British Rail Standard Class 7 was BR's top express locomotive, and could have been utilised far better in its short lifespan, but ended up only serving the railways for 15 years, a blink of an eye compared to other mainline Pacifics of the time that had operated under the pre-nationalisation companies.

 

Designed by Robert Riddles, who had previously coined the design for the War Department Austerity 2-10-0 and 2-8-0 freight locomotives, the BR Standard Class 7's were conceived of as a result of the 1948 locomotive exchanges, which were done to test the best and worst aspects of locomotive design within the Big Four railway companies that had existed before nationalisation. The research gained from operating the best designs of the GWR, LMS, LNER and Southern railways on different areas of the British Railways network paved the way for several new classes of standardised locomotives to be constructed, largely to replace many of the ageing Victorian era engines that even in the late 1940's continued to ply their merry trade.

 

The first design requested by the Railway Executive was for a new express passenger Pacific locomotive, designed specifically to reduce maintenance and using the latest available innovations in steam technology from home and abroad. Various labour-saving devices were utilised to produce a simple, standard and effective design, able to produce equivalent power to some of the Pacifics that were still available as legacies of the Big Four.

 

The basic design of the Standard 7's can be traced to LMS construction practices, largely owed to Riddles' previous career with that company, but complimented this with the boiler and trailing wheel design of the Southern Railway's Merchant Navy Pacifics so as to follow the best design practice. The firebox was also similar in having a rocking grate, which allowed the fire to be rebuilt without stopping the locomotive, removing both ash and clinker on the move. A self-cleaning smokebox was used, which enabled ash to flow into the atmosphere, reducing the workload of the engine cleaner at the end of a working day. A single chimney was placed on top of the smokebox, which was unusual for a Pacific type of locomotive.

 

The Standard 7's were fitted with 6 ft 2 in driving wheels, allowing these engines greater capacity for use in mixed-traffic working, which made them available for both sustained fast running with heavy passenger trains, yet small enough to allow them to undertake more mundane tasks such as freight haulage.

 

55 of these engines were constructed between 1951 and 1954, with 70000 'Britannia' being the first and flagship of the fleet, with residual locomotives of the class being dubbed 'Britannia-Class'. Three batches were constructed at Crewe Works, before the publication of the 1955 Modernisation Plan.

 

Britannia was built at Crewe, completed on 2 January 1951. She was the first British Railways standard locomotive to be built and the first of 55 locomotives of the Britannia class. The locomotive was named at a ceremony at Marylebone Station by the then Minister for Transport Alfred Barnes on 30 January 1951. The BR Locomotive Naming Committee were determined not to use names already in use on other locomotives. They tried to observe this by not selecting the name Britannia for use on 70000 because it was already in use on one of the ex-LMS Jubilee Class locomotives, but Robert Riddles overruled them and the Jubilee had to be renamed.

 

The Britannias took their names from great Britons, former Star Class locomotives, and Scottish firths, although one locomotive, 70047, was never named. The success of these first Standard Pacifics gave birth to two other Pacific classes over the BR years, including the unique BR Standard Class 8, number 71000 'Duke of Gloucester', which was built in 1954 to replace the destroyed Princess Royal Class locomotive number 46202 Princess Anne, lost in the Harrow and Wealdstone rail disaster of 1952, and the fleet of 10 BR Standard Class 6 'Clan' Pacifics that were employed on services in the west of Scotland, but failed to gain a stellar reputation due to their employment on timetables for the more powerful Standard 7's they couldn't keep up to.

 

The class gained a warm response from locomotive crews across all British Railway Regions, with especially glowing reports from those operating them from Stratford depot on the Eastern Region, where its lower weight and high power transformed motive power over the restricted East Anglian lines. However, negative feedback was received from various operating departments, most notably on the Western Region. The criticism was primarily out of partisan preference for GWR-designed locomotive stock among Western Region staff; in particular, the class was 'left-hand drive' in contrast to 'right-hand drive' GWR locomotive and signalling practice, a factor in the Milton rail crash of 1955.

 

For this reason, the Western Region locomotive depots at Old Oak Common and Plymouth Laira declared that the class was surplus to requirements. However Cardiff Canton depot displayed its liking for the class (despite being part of the former GWR empire) and managed to obtain good results on South Wales passenger traffic.

 

The Midland Region also had favourable reports, but a marked consistency in losing time on the longer runs between Holyhead and Euston was recorded, although all complaints were down to the individual techniques of the operating crews. This was compounded by the irregular allocation of the class to depots all over the network, meaning that few crews ever had a great deal of experience in driving them. The Southern Region also had an allocation of seven in May 1953, when all Merchant Navy Class locomotives were temporarily withdrawn for inspection after 35020 "Bibby Line" sheared a crank axle on the central driving wheel.

 

Repairs to the class were undertaken at Crewe, Swindon and Doncaster Works until the financial constraints of the British Railways Modernisation Plan in terms of expenditure on steam began to preclude the regular overhaul of locomotives. During the mid-1960s overhauls were carried out exclusively at Crewe Works.

 

Britannia was initially based at Stratford in order to work East Anglian expresses to Norwich and Great Yarmouth, but was also particularly associated with the Hook Continental boat train to Harwich. Subsequently, the loco was based at Norwich Thorpe in January and March 1959 before spending the remainder of her career on the London Midland Region based at Willesden, Crewe North, Crewe South and finally Newton Heath.

 

The locomotive also had the distinction of hauling the funeral train for King George VI from King's Lynn, Norfolk to London following his death in February 1952 at Sandringham House, Norfolk. For this task, Britannia had her cab roof painted white, as was the custom with royal locomotives. Britannia has also worn the white roof in preservation.

 

However, as the locomotives entered the 1960's, the modernisation plan continued to gather pace, and diesel locomotives started to replace steam on most parts of the network. Very soon the Standard 7's placement on Top-Line expresses were demoted to the on-again-off-again work of freight and parcels, and cosmetic maintenance was reduced as their final years loomed. The lavish BR Brunswick Green soon faded to grey, and in some cases BR Lined Black was adopted for ease.

 

The first locomotive to be withdrawn from service was number 70007 Coeur-de-Lion in 1965, and the entire class was gradually transferred to Carlisle Kingmoor and Glasgow Polmadie depots. Britannia was withdrawn in May 1966, after 15 years of service.

 

A succession of bulk withdrawals began in 1967, culminating in the very last steam operation in British Railways service on August 11th, 1968, where Standard 7 number 70013 Oliver Cromwell, was chosen to assist in hauling the Fifteen Guinea Special, the last steam hauled British Railways passenger service from Liverpool to Carlisle via the S&C. 70013 was chosen as it was the last the last BR-owned steam locomotive to undergo routine heavy overhaul at Crewe Works, being out-shopped after a special ceremony in February 1967. The engine hauled the Manchester to Carlisle leg of the service via the Settle and Carlisle line, with LMS Class 5 45110, and LMS Stanier Class 5 locomotives, 44781 and 44871 double-heading the return working back to Manchester.

 

Upon withdrawal, 70000 was initially planned for preservation with the National Railway Museum due to it's cultural significance, but because of its prototypical nature, 70013 was instead chosen and bought up for preservation. 70000 would later be preserved by Britannia Locomotive Company Ltd.

 

After moving from one home to another, the engine wound up on the Severn Valley Railway, where she remained for a number of years in operational but non-mainline condition. With the society wishing to make more use of the locomotive, she was moved to the European gauge Nene Valley Railway in Peterborough, where she was also fitted with an air-brake compressor. Britannia made her return to the main line on 27 July 1991, successfully working enthusiast trips until 1997.

 

With an expired mainline boiler certificate, due to the high cost of refurbishment, the locomotive was sold to Pete Waterman in 2000. Stored at Waterman's workshops at the Crewe Heritage Centre, after initial assessment the amount of work resulted in Waterman selling her to Jeremy Hosking. The locomotive underwent restoration at Crewe which involved a newly refurbished cab, a new smoke box and major work on the boiler; replacement steel sides, new crown stays, new front section barrel section, new steel and copper tubeplate, repairs and patches to door plate and major work to copper firebox.

 

Transferred to the Royal Scot Locomotive and General Trust, the locomotive was returned to main line operational condition in 2011, initially out shopped in its prototype black British Railways livery. After a running-in period, in 2012 the locomotive was repainted in British Railways Brunswick Green, but with an early BR crest. On 24 January 2012, the loco hauled the Royal Train with Prince Charles on board to Wakefield Kirkgate, where he rededicated the locomotive. For the trip the loco again had a painted white cab roof, removed after the engine's appearance at the West Somerset Railway's Spring Gala.

Some Background:

The Space Defense Robot-04-Mk. XIV Destroid Nimrod was an anti-air/heavy artillery mecha, and intended as a replacement for the SDR-04-Mk. XII Phalanx, a Destroid specifically designed for space operations to defend the SDF-1 Macross, along with its sister unit, the cannon-armed ADR-04-Mk. X Destroid Defender.

 

The Phalanx had been developed in a hurry under the pressure of the raging war against the Zentraedi and suffered, as a consequence, from several disadvantages. For instance, its combat operation capability decreased substantially once the missile ordnance (a total of forty-four 430mm caliber missiles, half of them ready to fire and the rest held in reserve in internal magazines) had been exhausted. To counter this, a few models were modified in the field, e.g. with additional light Gatling guns mounted within the head unit, as well as other variations, but most Phalanx’ remained basically bipedal heavy missile launchers. A sub-variant with improved sensors and missile guidance systems, as well as the ability to deploy the new reflex missiles, the Phalanx Mk. XIII, was also built, but only in small numbers, and it could not overcome the flaws of the original design.

 

The Nimrod was the attempt to mend these shortcomings after initial combat experience with the type. The so-called SDR-04-Mk. XIV utilized the proven MBR-04 ambulatory system and shared a common hip and leg structure with a wide range of other Destroids. Like the Phalanx, the Nimrod’s newly designed upper body was a simple core structure that neglected any silliness for a weapon composition consisting of missiles, radar, and propulsion system, all mounted on the main rotating body which could be detached from the lower torso for maintenance of in case of emergency.

The Nimrod filled the same tactical niche as the Phalanx but was a more sophisticated design with improved capabilities and a – though limited – secondary close-range combat capability. The radar and sensor suites for target acquisition as well as missile guidance were improved, so that the Nimrod became even suited for air space surveillance and as a guidance/coordination unit for other Destroids. Due to this additional workload, the Nimrod’s crew was expanded by a WSO to two in a tandem cockpit.

 

The armament remained tailored to medium and long range, but there were some improvements. On the Nimrod, the Phalanx’ bulbous drum-shaped missile magazines gave way to more streamlined 540 mm caliber reflex missile containers, which were carried in staggered clusters of four twin-pods on each shoulder, holding a total of 48 missiles with sixteen of them ready to fire and the rest in reserve. This modification reduced weight and frontal area, and in a case of emergency the missile containers could be jettisoned.

In order to improve the Nimrod’s tactical value after its missiles had been deployed, it was furthermore provided with a secondary close-range combat capability in the form of a pair of particle beam guns. These were integrated into the arms, protected by the missile containers, and these reliable weapons could be effectively used against both air as well as ground targets. Thermal smoke dischargers completed the Nimrod’s defensive measures.

 

Like the Phalanx and other Destroids, the Nimrod was capable of limited space operations due to its vernier thrusters all over the hull. This allowed for units that were stationed on the deck of the SDF-1 to propel themselves back to the battle fortress if they were knocked off.

 

The Nimrod was, like the Phalanx, first deployed on the SDF-1 and was used to augment the ship's own weapon system to protect the vessel from Zentraedi attacks, even though the type came relatively late and was only used in the final phase of the war and only in limited numbers. After the conflict, production was throttled down (only a total of fifty SDR-04-Mk. XIVs were eventually built), and the surviving Nimrods from the SDF-1 were stationed at airbases in New Macross City and in nearby cities, such as Monument City.

  

Specifications:

Designation: SDR-04-Mk XIV

Mecha Class: Destroid

Crew: 2 (Pilot, WSO)

Weight: 21.8 tons (dry)

45.5 tons (loaded)

Height: 12.36 m (hull only, incl. radome)

13,50 m (with raised arms)

Breadth: 9,32 m

Depth: 5.0m

Max. walking speed: 72 kph loaded

 

Armament:

2x weapon clusters in shoulder locations, each with:

- Eight launch tubes for 540mm caliber mid-/long-range missiles (typically with anti-air capacity, artillery

rockets as alternative), with eight missiles ready and another sixteen as reserve (for a total of 48)

- One Mauler PBG-06 liquid-cooled electrically-charged twin particle beam gun

- Three thermal smoke dischargers

  

The kit and its assembly:

This is a fictional Macross Destroid, with a highly modified Imai Phalanx kit at its core. It depicts a potential successor for the missile-only-armed Phalanx, but it has been totally made up. Inspiration came when I recently procured a bunch of Kotobukiya’s MSG sets for mecha conversions – one of these sets included the quadruple missile launchers that now make up the Nimrod’s new “arms”. I was torn between using a Defender or a Phalanx as conversion basis, but due to the weapon pods’ bulkiness I went for the more massive Phalanx.

 

Beyond the MSG parts and the replacement of the Phalanx “missile drums”, there was initially no real plan for the conversion – things evolved gradually, depending on the donor parts at hand. However, several fundamental changes were made. The most important improvement measure that works for all Destroid kits with the “04” chassis is the integration of a completely now hip joint arrangement. OOB, the model's posture is pretty stiff, with the legs and feet facing straight forward. The model is just supposed to stand upright, and with the model’s OOB joint options it is really hard to create a vivid poise. Furthermore, the bolts that hold the legs are prone to break off, even more so because the Imai kit is from the 1st generation of mecha kits, without vinyl caps and just relying on a very tight joint fit for hold.

 

My proven solution: the implantation of a new hip “bone” made from plastic-coated steel wire, which is stiff in itself but can be bent in two dimensions. The thighs had to be modified accordingly, since the wire is much thinner than the original bolts. Inside of the pelvis, the W-shaped wire was attached with the help of sprue material and styrene profiles, a thorough fixation is necessary because a lot of load has to be held in place in a very small space.

 

In order to attach the legs to the wire, there’s a convenient trick: the receptor holes in the thighs were simply filled with small vinyl rings, standard material from other mecha kits (e.g. from Arii’s 1:100 VF-1 Battroids or the Gunze Sangyo/Aoshima Dorvack PAs), the rings’ outer AND inner diameter fit perfectly into the new arrangement. With this trick, a much more dynamic and "natural" leg position could be achieved, also thanks to the large feet and their joints of the “04” Destroid chassis. This tuning measure improves the model considerably. The legs were otherwise taken OOB, just some small styrene bits were added to the lower legs’ front sides (improving another small detail flaw of the model), and some openings on the lower legs’ rear side were filled with putty and styrene sheet. Furthermore, the open insides of the “heels” were filled with putty, too.

 

In order to integrate the new missile bins, suitable adapters for the shoulder had to be found. Being somewhat lazy and trying to use as many parts from the Phalanx kit as possible, I decided to integrate a styrene tube all through the upper body, so that I got better attachment points. This tube was extended so far that I could re-use the Phalanx’ blast exhausts from the original missile bins as shoulder joint covers. This looks very natural and these re-dedicated parts fit well over the implanted central styrene tube channel as well as into the channel that runs along the MSG missile containers’ inner side. In order to attach the new arms/containers, a smaller diameter styrene tube was glued into these channels, so that the new pods could be moved vertically.

 

As a weapon improvement over the Phalanx, a pair of particle beam guns was added to the new missile containers – they come originally from a Dorvack PA-36K “Berlon” kit, but they were tailored considerably in order to fit into their new position. They also help to hide the new shoulder joint, which was covered from above with parts from the Phalanx kit (the boxed that are normally attached to the upper legs) and the space between them with paper tissue, drenched with white glue. The result is a good visual transition.

 

The central hull was changed in order to move the look away from the Phalanx base. The rear side uses OOB parts, but these were modified and attached to the hull in a different way, so that the back is not as deep as on the Phalanx. The front received a vertical pair of searchlights (formerly return rollers from a 1:35 tank…), set into the breast plate. The cockpit bulge between the shoulders as well as the head unit are completely new. The cockpit cover is a leftover hull piece from a Kotobukiya helicopter drone, and it was moved forward, so that a crew of two is more plausible. The head unit on the elongated spine behind and above it consists primarily of a donor from a wrecked VT-61 “Tulcas” mecha (Dorvack), plus a small dish antenna for a tracking radar on the right (left over from a Dorvack PA-36K “Berlon” kit) and a round radome for target acquisition – scratched from main wheels of a Matchbox PB2Y and set upon a mount made from styrene profiles. Looks strange, esp. with that flat, square head unit underneath, but I wanted a unique and different look that sets the Nimrod apart from other canonical Destroid designs. And this certainly worked.

 

A final word concerning the Phalanx kit itself: like all other Destroids models, this is basically a simple affair and the model goes together well – but expect some PSR on every seam, and there are some improvements possible that IMHO raise the model’s quality. The lack of vinyl caps makes later movement a tricky affair, though, and it is interesting to see that while the “04” chassis Destroids (Phalanx, Tomahawk and Defender) share the same lower body, all three kits are different! As a positive trait concerning the finish, the Phalanx is also the only kit of this trio that comes with decals for the typical white trim on the lower legs of these Destroids.

  

Painting and markings:

Once more I wanted to stay true to the original look of a typical Macross Destroid from the “04” series. These tend to carry a uniform livery in murky/dull tones of green, brown and ochre: unpretentious "mud movers". Anything else is rare (I am aware of dark blue Phalanx’ on board of the SDF-1), and complex camouflage patterns are AFAIK not seen (probably a tribute to the TV series’ cel production). In consequence, I gave the Nimrod an overall livery in a rather unidentifiable brownish tone, namely RAL 7008 (Khakigrau), a tone that was carried by German WWII Afrikakorps tanks and very similar to the tone IDF vehicles like the Merkava typically carry nowadays. Since I only had this tone in a rattle can available, the model and its components were painted accordingly, with an additional hushed spray over the upper surfaces with a slightly lighter tone as a shading measure. After this basic painting, the parts received a washing with thinned black ink.

 

Decals mostly come from the OOB sheet, plus some extra stencils, including the "nose art" painted on the left leg (from a P-38); many Destroids and also Armored Valkyries seem to bear such markings. Gives the mecha a personal touch, though.

 

Finally, before everything was assembled, the kit received a dry-brushing treatment with light grey and an overall coat with matt acrylic varnish. As a final step, mineral pigments were dusted over the model, esp. around the feet and the lower areas of the mecha.

  

A rather straightforward conversion project that gradually evolved – but with a postive outcome, after some twists and turns. The fictional Destroid Nimrod turned out more believable than expected, thanks to the good donor parts that went into it, and the simple livery also adds to the design’s “realism” within the Macross universe. Even though the thing still looks odd – but not worse than the other canonical Destroids from the original TV series!

With having to do my job online and teach kids at a distance, has doubled my workload and I've had very little time for dolls lately. I've just done some redressing and a couple of silly snapshots of the girls. ;) I hope everyone's keeping safe and healthy! ((hugs))

Chassis n° 2071GT

Engine n° 2071GT

 

Bonhams : the Zoute Sale

Estimated : € 1.200.000 - 1.600.000

 

Zoute Grand Prix 2019

Knokke - Zoute

België - Belgium

October 2019

 

By the early 1960s, road car production had ceased to be a sideline for Ferrari and was seen as vitally important to the company's future stability. Thus the 250, Ferrari's first volume-produced model, can be seen as critically important, though production of the first of the line - the 250 Europa, built from 1953 to '54 - amounted to fewer than 20. Before the advent of the Europa, Ferrari had built road-going coupés and convertibles in small numbers, usually to special customer order using a sports-racing chassis as the basis. Ghia and Vignale of Turin and Touring of Milan were responsible for bodying many of these but there was no attempt at standardisation for series production and no two cars were alike.

 

The introduction of the 250 Europa heralded a significant change in Ferrari's preferred coachbuilder; whereas previously Vignale had been the most popular carrozzeria among Maranello's customers, from now on Pinin Farina (later 'Pininfarina') would be Ferrari's number one choice, bodying no fewer than 48 out of the 53 Europa/Europa GTs built. Pinin Farina's experiments eventually crystallised in a new Ferrari 250 GT road car that was first displayed publicly at the Geneva Salon in March 1956. However, the Torinese Carrozzeria was not yet in a position to cope with the increased workload, resulting in production being entrusted to Carrozzeria Boano after Pinin Farina had completed a handful of prototypes.

 

The 250 GT featured the lighter and more compact Colombo-designed 3.0-litre V12 in place of its predecessor's bulkier Lampredi unit. Power output of the single-overhead-camshaft all-aluminium engine was 220bhp at 7,000rpm. Shorter in the wheelbase (by 200mm) than that of the Europa, the 250 GT chassis followed Ferrari's established practice, being a multi-tubular frame tied together by oval main tubes, though the independent front suspension now employed coil springs instead of the previous transverse leaf type. A four-speed all-synchromesh gearbox transmitted power to the live rear axle, while braking was looked after by hydraulic drums all round.

 

True series production began with the arrival of Pininfarina's 'notch back' Coupé on the 250 GT chassis, some 353 of which were built between 1958 and 1960 within the sequence '0841' to '2081'. However, the relatively small scale of production meant that cars could still be ordered with subtle variations according to customer choice, as well as enabling a handful of show cars and 'specials' to be constructed on the 250 GT chassis.

 

A number of prominent European coachbuilders offered a variety of body styles on the 250 GT chassis, with Scaglietti and Pininfarina producing elegant open-top spyder and cabriolet models. Exhibited at the 1957 Geneva Salon, the latter's first 250 GT Cabriolet, which, unusually, featured a Vintage-style cut-down driver's door, was snapped up by Ferrari works driver Peter Collins, who later had the car converted to disc brakes. After a handful of alternative versions had been built, series production began in July 1957, around 40 Series I Pininfarina Cabriolets being completed before the introduction of the Series II in 1959. Effectively an open-top version of the Pininfarina-built 250 GT Coupé, whose chassis and mechanicals it shared, the Cabriolet was built alongside its closed cousin until 1962. Overall design followed that of the Coupé, with short nose and long rear overhang, while a more-vertical windscreen provided greater headroom in the generously sized cockpit. As well as the aforementioned improvements to brakes and transmission, the Series II cars benefited from the latest, 240bhp V12 with outside sparkplugs, coil valve springs, and 12-port cylinder heads. The 250 GT was the most successful Ferrari of its time, production of all types exceeding 900 units, of which 200 were Series II Cabriolets like that offered here.

 

A number of important developments occurred during 250 GT production: the original 128C 3.0-litre engine being superseded by the twin-distributor 128D, which in turn was supplanted in 1960 by the outside-plug 128F engine which did away with its predecessor's Siamesed inlets in favour of six separate ports. On the chassis side, four-wheel disc brakes arrived late in 1959 and a four-speeds-plus-overdrive gearbox the following year, the former at last providing the 250 GT with stopping power to match its speed. More refined and practical than any previous road-going Ferrari, yet retaining the sporting heritage of its predecessors, the 250 GT is a landmark model of immense historical significance. Despite this, original survivors are relatively few, as many have been modified and converted into replicas of more exotic Ferraris such as the 250 GTO, Testarossa, etc.

 

According to the accompanying Massini Report, chassis number '2071' is the 66th of the 200 units built, and as a Series II car has the added advantage of disc brakes all round. Originally finished in the handsome combination of Grigio Argento with Nero interior, the Ferrari was sold new in 1960 via Jacques Swaters' Garage Francorchamps, the official Ferrari importer for Belgium, to its first owner, Jean Blaton. A wealthy Belgian industrialist, Ferrari aficionado and gentleman racing driver, who raced under the name 'Beurlys', Jean Blaton had an excellent taste and was a personal friend of Jacques Swaters, from whom he bought numerous Ferraris over the years.

 

Blaton is best remembered for his daring exploits in the Le Mans 24-Hour Race in which he drove a succession of Ferraris over a 10-year period between 1958 and 1967, finishing on the podium on nearly every outing. On many occasions he drove his own Ferraris, including a 250 GT MM, 250 GT Testarossa, 250 GT LWB Tour de France, 250 GT SWB, 250 GTO, 250 LM, and 330 P3/P4. He secured his best result at Le Mans in 1963 when he finished 2nd overall with co-driver Langlois van Ophen at the wheel of a Ferrari 250 GTO, winning the GT Class for Swaters' racing team, Écurie Francorchamps.

 

Jean Blaton was also a friend of Enzo Ferrari, who was only too happy to accommodate his highly regarded customer's special requests. In the case of his 250 GT Cabriolet, Blaton specified that the car should have large side vents in the front wings, similar to those of the Series III 410 Superamerica, which were incorporated by Pinin Farina on Mr Ferrari's instruction. These vents not only make the car appear more sporting, they also serve to break up its lengthy flanks to good effect. Blaton's car, with its special features, was prominently displayed in Ferrari's 1960 yearbook.

 

In 1964, Blaton sold '2071' to Luigi Chinetti, another gentleman racing driver and sole importer of Ferraris into the USA. The car was then sold to a Mr Gilbertson from Vista, California. Following Mr Gilbertson's death, the Ferrari was acquired from his widow in 1978 by Mr Ken Gerber of San Diego, California, who kept it for the next 32 years. A member of the Ferrari Owners' Club, Mr Gerber enjoyed the car throughout the 1980s, attending various events.

 

During Mr Gerber's ownership (in 1992-1994) a fastidious restoration was carried out, the precision machining work on the engine and mechanical systems being entrusted to recognised specialist Bob Wallace of Phoenix, Arizona. Original parts were retained wherever possible and the few that were not saveable were either replaced with originals or perfect reproductions. The car was refinished in Rosso Rubino and completed in time for the 1994 International Ferrari Concours in Monterey.

 

Ken Gerber sold the Ferrari in 2010 and the following year the car moved to the UK having been bought by DK Engineering. The car was sold to Belgium in 2012, since when it has belonged to the current lady owner. Carrying the very suitable registration, '250 – GTS', the car has been enjoyed by its owner on numerous occasions and at prestigious events including the Zoute Rally. Now presented in excellent condition after recent cosmetic re-commissioning, it affords the prospect of comfortable open-top cruising in unparalleled style. Possessing links to Belgian and excellent provenance, this unique Ferrari 250 GT Cabriolet is worthy of the closest inspection.

Blog updated!

 

I just want to thank everybody who voted for me in that competition. Myself and Charlotte Rutherford both made the Top 25! :D

 

My week is going really bumpy. Like highs and lows, mostly because of my workload, when all I want to do is chill and watch a movie or something!

  

In a yard, I spent about 20 minutes twisting and turning trying to shot two of these fliers. Each would land and soon fly off about when I was ready. Their attraction to it meant that if I just stayed near the butterfly-weed, I might just do it well for each of you. Enjoy! Your visits etc. are much appreciated here, though major workloads limit my return-visits to your fine streams. Please be patient, for I will return.

 

I learned below at www.quotegarden.com/flying.html

 

The butterfly is a flying flower... ~Ponce Denis Écouchard Lebrun

 

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to our society. The optimist invents the airplane and the pessimist the parachute. ~Gil Stern

   

+++ 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 AH-1 Cobra was developed in the mid-1960s as an interim gunship for the U.S. Army for use during the Vietnam War. The Cobra shared the proven transmission, rotor system, and the T53 turboshaft engine of the UH-1 "Huey". By June 1967, the first AH-1G HueyCobras had been delivered. Bell built 1,116 AH-1Gs for the U.S. Army between 1967 and 1973, and the Cobras chalked up over a million operational hours in Vietnam.

The U.S. Marine Corps was very interested in the AH-1G Cobra, too, but it preferred a twin-engine version for improved safety in over-water operations, and also wanted a more potent turret-mounted weapon. At first, the Department of Defense had balked at providing the Marines with a twin-engine version of the Cobra, in the belief that commonality with Army AH-1Gs outweighed the advantages of a different engine fit. However, the Marines won out and awarded Bell a contract for 49 twin-engine AH-1J SeaCobras in May 1968. As an interim measure the U.S. Army passed on thirty-eight AH-1Gs to the Marines in 1969. The AH-1J also received a more powerful gun turret with a three-barrel 20 mm XM197 cannon based on the six-barrel M61 Vulcan cannon.

 

During the 1990s, the US forces gradually phased out its Cobra fleet. The withdrawn AH-1s were typically offered to other potential operators, usually NATO allies. Some were also given to the USDA's Forest Service for fire surveillance, and a handful AH-1s went into private hands, including the NASA. Among these airframes were some USMC AH-1Js, which had in part been mothballed in the Mojave Desert since their replacement through more powerful and modern AH-1 variants and the AH-64.

About twenty airframes were, after having been de-militarized, bought by the Kaman Corporation in 2003, in a bold move to quickly respond to more than 20 inquiries for the company’s K-1200 ‘K-Max’ crane synchropter since the type’s end of production in 2001 from firefighting, logging and industry transport requirements. While not such a dedicated medium lift helicopter as the K-1200, which had from the outset been optimized for external cargo load operations, the twin-engine AH-1J promised to be a very effective alternative and a powerful basis for a conversion into a crane helicopter.

 

The result of this conversion program was the Kaman K-1300, also known as the “K-Cobra” or “Crane Cobra”. While the basic airframe of the AH-1J was retained, extensive detail modifications were made. To reduce weight and compensate for the extensive hardware changes, the SeaCobra lost its armor, the chin turret, and the stub wings. Beyond that, many invisible changes were made; the internal structure between the engine mounts was beefed up with an additional cage structure and a cargo hook was installed under the fuselage in the helicopter’s center of lift.

 

To further optimize the K-Cobra’s performance, the dynamic components were modified and improved, too. While the engine remained the same, its oil cooler was enlarged and the original output limit to 1.500 shp was removed and the gearbox was strengthened to fully exploit the twin-engine’s available power of 1,800 shp (1,342 kW). The rotor system was also modified and optimized for the transport of underslung loads: the original UH-1 dual-blade rotors were replaced with new four-blade rotors. The new main rotor with rugged heavy-duty blades offered more lift at less rotor speed, and the blades’ lift sections were moved away from the hub so that downwash and turbulences directly under the helicopter’s CoG and man hook were reduced to keep the cargo load more stable. Due to the main rotor’s slightly bigger diameter the tail rotor was changed into a slightly smaller four-blade rotor, too. This new arrangement made the K-1300 more stable while hovering or during slow speed maneuvers and more responsive to steering input.

 

The Cobra’s crew of two was retained, but the cockpit was re-arranged and split into two compartments: the pilot retained the original rear position in the tandem cockpit under the original glazing, but the gunner’s station in front of him, together with the secondary dashboard, was omitted and replaced by a new, fully glazed cabin under the former gunner position. This cabin occupied the former gun station and its ammunition supply and contained a rearward-facing workstation for a second pilot with full controls. It was accessible via a separate door or a ladder from above, through a trap door in the former gunner’s station floor, where a simple foldable bench was available for a third person. This arrangement was chosen due to almost complete lack of oversight of the slung load from the normal cockpit position, despite a CCTV (closed circuit television) system with two cameras intended for observation of slung loads. The second pilot would control the helicopter during delicate load-handling maneuvers, while the primary pilot “above” would fly the helicopter during transfer flights, both sharing the workload.

 

To accommodate the cabin under the fuselage and improve ground handling, the AH-1J’s skids were replaced by a stalky, fixed four-wheel landing gear that considerably increased ground clearance (almost 7 feet), making the attachment of loads on the ground to the main ventral hook easier, as the K-1300 could be “rolled over” the cargo on the ground and did not have to hover above it to connect. However, an external ladder had to be added so that the pilot could reach his/her workstation almost 10 feet above the ground.

 

The bulky ventral cabin, the draggy landing gear and the new lift-optimized rotor system reduced the CraneCobra’s top speed by a third to just 124 mph (200 km/h), but the helicopter’s load-carrying capacity became 35% higher and the Cobra’s performance under “hot & high” conditions was markedly improved, too.

For transfer flights, a pair of external auxiliary tanks could be mounted to the lower fuselage flanks, which could also be replaced with cargo boxes of similar size and shape.

 

K-1300 buyers primarily came from the United States and Canada, but there were foreign operators, too. A major operator in Europe became Heliswiss, the oldest helicopter company in Switzerland. The company was founded as „Heliswiss Schweizerische Helikopter AG“, with headquarters in Berne-Belp on April 17, 1953, what also marked the beginning of commercial helicopter flying in Switzerland. During the following years Heliswiss expanded in Switzerland and formed a network with bases in Belp BE, Samedan GR, Domat Ems GR, Locarno TI, Erstfeld UR, Gampel VS, Gstaad BE and Gruyères FR. During the build-up of the rescue-company Schweizerische Rettungsflugwacht (REGA) as an independent network, Heliswiss carried out rescue missions on their behalf.

 

Heliswiss carried out operations all over the world, e. g. in Greenland, Suriname, North Africa and South America. The first helicopter was a Bell 47 G-1, registered as HB-XAG on September 23, 1953. From 1963 Heliswiss started to expand and began to operate with medium helicopters like the Agusta Bell 204B with a turbine power of 1050 HP and an external load of up to 1500 kg. From 1979 Heliswiss operated a Bell 214 (external load up to 2.8 t).

Since 1991 Heliswiss operated a Russian Kamov 32A12 (a civil crane version of the Ka-27 “Helix”), which was joined by two K-1300s in 2004. They were frequently used for construction of transmission towers for overhead power lines and pylons for railway catenary lines, for selective logging and also as fire bombers with underslung water bags, the latter managed by the German Helog company, operating out of Ainring and Küssnacht in Germany and Switzerland until 2008, when Helog changed its business focus into a helicopter flight training academy in Liberia with the support of Germany's Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

A second Kamov 32A12 joined the fleet in 2015, which replaced one of the K-1300s, and Heliswiss’ last K-1300 was retired in early 2022.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 2, plus space for a passenger

Length: 54 ft 3 in (16,56 m) including rotors

44 ft 5 in (13.5 m) fuselage only

Main rotor diameter: 46 ft 2¾ in (14,11 m)

Main rotor area: 1,677.64 sq ft (156,37 m2)

Width (over landing gear): 12 ft 6 in (3.85 m)

Height: 17 ft 8¼ in (5,40 m)

Empty weight: 5,810 lb (2,635 kg)

Max. takeoff weight: 9,500 lb (4,309 kg) without slung load

13,515 lb (6,145 kg) with slung load

 

Powerplant:

1× P&W Canada T400-CP-400 (PT6T-3 Twin-Pac) turboshaft engine, 1,800 shp (1,342 kW)

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 124 mph (200 km/h, 110 kn)

Cruise speed: 105 mph (169 km/h, 91 kn)

Range: 270 mi (430 km, 230 nmi) with internal fuel only,

360 mi (570 km 310 nmi) with external auxiliary tanks

Service ceiling: 15,000 ft (4,600 m)

Hovering ceiling out of ground effect: 3,000 m (9,840 ft)

Rate of climb: 2,500 ft/min (13 m/s) at Sea Level with flat-rated torque

 

External load capacity (at ISA +15 °C (59.0 °F):

6,000 lb (2,722 kg) at sea level

5,663 lb (2,569 kg) at 5,000 ft (1,524 m)

5,163 lb (2,342 kg) at 10,000 ft (3,048 m)

5,013 lb (2,274 kg) at 12,100 ft (3,688 m)

4,313 lb (1,956 kg) at 15,000 ft (4,600 m)

  

The kit and its assembly:

This is/was the second contribution to the late 2022 “Logistics” Group Build at whatifmodellers.com, a welcome occasion and motivation to tackle a what-if project that had been on my list for a long while. This crane helicopter conversion of a HueyCobra was inspired by the Mil Mi-10K helicopter – I had built a 1:100 VEB Plasticart kit MANY years ago and still remembered the helicopter’s unique ventral cabin under the nose with a rearward-facing second pilot. I always thought that the AH-1 might be a good crane helicopter, too, esp. the USMC’s twin-engine variant. And why not combine everything in a fictional model?

 

With this plan the basis became a Fujimi 1:72 AH-1J and lots of donor parts to modify the basic hull into “something else”. Things started with the removal of the chin turret and part of the lower front hull to make space for the ventral glass cabin. The openings for the stub wings were faired over and a different stabilizer (taken from a Revell EC 135, including the end plates) was implanted. The attachment points for the skids were filled and a styrene tube was inserted into the rotor mast opening to later hold the new four-blade rotor. Another styrene tube with bigger diameter was inserted into the lower fuselage as a display holder adapter for later flight scene pictures. Lead beads filled the nose section to make sure the CraneCobra would stand well on its new legs, with the nose down. The cockpit was basically taken OOB, just the front seat and the respective gunner dashboard was omitted.

 

One of the big challenges of this build followed next: the ventral cabin. Over the course of several months, I was not able to find a suitable donor, so I was forced to scratch the cabin from acrylic and styrene sheet. Size benchmark became the gunner’s seat from the Cobra kit, with one of the OOB pilots seated. Cabin width was less dictated through the fuselage, the rest of the cabin’s design became a rather simple, boxy thing – not pretty, but I think a real-life retrofitted cabin would not look much different? Some PSR was done to hide the edges of the rather thick all-clear walls and create a 3D frame - a delicate task. Attaching the completed thing with the second pilot and a dashboard under the roof to the Cobra’s lower hull and making it look more or less natural without major accidents was also a tricky and lengthy affair, because I ignored the Cobra’s narrowing nose above the former chin turret.

 

With the cabin defining the ground helicopter’s clearance, it was time for the next donors: the landing gear from an Airfix 1:72 Kamow Ka-25, which had to be modified further to achieve a proper stance. The long main struts were fixed to the hull, their supporting struts had to be scratched, in this case from steel wire. The front wheels were directly attached to the ventral cabin (which might contain in real life a rigid steel cage that not only protects the second crew member but could also take the front wheels’ loads?). Looks pretty stalky!

Under the hull, a massive hook and a fairing for the oil cooler were added. A PE brass ladder was mounted on the right side of the hull under the pilot’s cockpit, while a rear-view mirror was mounted for the ventral pilot on the left side.

 

The rotor system was created in parallel, I wanted “something different” from the UH-1 dual-blade rotors. The main rotor hub was taken from a Mistercraft 1:72 Westland Lynx (AFAIK a re-boxed ZTS Plastyk kit), which included the arms up to the blades. The hub was put onto a metal axis, with a spacer to make it sit well in the new styrene tube adapter inside of the hull, and some donor parts from the Revell EC 135. Deeper, tailored blades were glued to the Lynx hub, actually leftover parts from the aforementioned wrecked VEB Plasticart 1:100 Mi-10, even though their length had to be halved (what makes you aware how large a Mi-6/10 is compared with an AH-1!). The tail rotor was taken wholesale from the Lynx and stuck to the Cobra’s tail with a steel pin.

  

Painting and markings:

Another pushing factor for this build was the fact that I had a 1:72 Begemot aftermarket decal sheet for the Kamow Ka-27/32 in The Stash™, which features, among many military helicopters, (the) two civil Heliswiss machines – a perfect match!

Using the Swiss Helix’ as design benchmark I adapted their red-over-white paint scheme to the slender AH-1 and eventually ended up with a simple livery with a white belly (acrylic white from the rattle can, after extensive masking of the clear parts with Maskol/latex milk) and a red (Humbrol 19) upper section, with decorative counter-colored cheatlines along the medium waterline. A black anti-glare panel was added in front of the windscreen. The auxiliary tanks were painted white, too, but they were processed separately and mounted just before the final coat of varnish was applied. The PE ladder as well as the rotors were handled similarly.

 

The cockpit and rotor opening interior were painted in a very dark grey (tar black, Revell 06), while the interior of the air intakes was painted bright white (Revell 301). The rotor blades became light grey (Revell 75) with darker leading edges (Humbrol 140), dark grey (Humbrol 164) hubs and yellow tips.

 

For the “HELOG/Heliswiss” tagline the lower white section had to be raised to a medium position on the fuselage, so that they could be placed on the lower flanks under the cockpit. The white civil registration code could not be placed on the tail and ended up on the engine cowling, on red, but this does not look bad or wrong at all.

The cheatlines are also decals from the Ka-32 Begemot sheet, even though they had to be trimmed considerably to fit onto the Cobra’s fuselage – and unfortunately the turned out to be poorly printed and rather brittle, so that I had to improvise and correct the flaws with generic red and white decal lines from TL Modellbau. The white cross on the tail and most stencils came from the Begemot sheet, too. Black, engine soot-hiding areas on the Cobra’s tail were created with generic decal sheet material, too.

 

The rotor blades and the wheels received a black ink treatment to emphasize their details, but this was not done on the hull to avoid a dirty or worn look. After some final details like position lights the model was sealed with semi-matt acrylic varnish, while the rotors became matt.

  

A weird-looking what-if model, but somehow a crane-copter variant of the AH-1 looks quite natural – even more so in its attractive red-and-white civil livery. The stalky landing gear is odd, though, necessitated by the ventral cabin for the second pilot. I was skeptical, but scratching the latter was more successful than expected, and the cabin blend quite well into the AH-1 hull, despite its boxy shape.

 

Quick post chiefly for friends/family reference. It's been a while since I've been on Flickr for more than quick glances; a mix of workloads professional and private. For much of the year I've had to choose between either taking pictures or posting them - and I chose the former. Just back from three weeks in California, with close to 65 Gb of images shot.

 

I'm looking forward to re-juggling a few things, getting those shots online and catching up with Flickr friends I've not chatted with in a while. Will be cool to see what you've all been shooting.

 

Hope everyone is well and having a great weekend!

Bloor St W, west of Dufferin, Toronto ON 26 Oct 2023

 

Workload is intense at the moment. Updates are few. Apologies.

Pasted from Wikipedia: Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey

 

• • • • •

 

The Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey is a multi-mission, military, tiltrotor aircraft with both a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capability. It is designed to combine the functionality of a conventional helicopter with the long-range, high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft.

 

The V-22 originated from the U.S. Department of Defense Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program started in 1981. It was developed jointly by the Bell Helicopter, and Boeing Helicopters team, known as Bell Boeing, which produce the aircraft.[4] The V-22 first flew in 1989, and began years of flight testing and design alterations.

 

The United States Marine Corps began crew training for the Osprey in 2000, and fielded it in 2007. The Osprey's other operator, the U.S. Air Force fielded their version of the tiltrotor in 2009. Since entering service with the U.S. Marine Corps and Air Force, the Osprey has been deployed for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

Contents

 

• 1 Development

•• 1.1 Early development

•• 1.2 Flight testing and design changes

•• 1.3 Controversy

•• 1.4 Recent development

• 2 Design

• 3 Operational history

•• 3.1 US Marine Corps

•• 3.2 US Air Force

•• 3.3 Potential operators

• 4 Variants

• 5 Operators

• 6 Notable accidents

• 7 Specifications (MV-22B)

• 8 Notable appearances in media

• 9 See also

• 10 References

• 11 External links

 

Development

 

Early development

 

The failure of the Iran hostage rescue mission in 1980 demonstrated to the United States military a need[5] for "a new type of aircraft, that could not only take off and land vertically but also could carry combat troops, and do so at speed."[6] The U.S. Department of Defense began the Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program in 1981, under U.S. Army leadership. Later the U.S. Navy/Marine Corps took the lead.[7][8] The JVX combined requirements from the Marine Corps, Air Force, Army and Navy.[9][10] A request for proposals (RFP) was issued in December 1982 for JVX preliminary design work. Interest in the program was expressed by Aérospatiale, Bell Helicopter, Boeing Vertol, Grumman, Lockheed, and Westland. The DoD pushed for contractors to form teams. Bell partnered with Boeing Vertol. The Bell Boeing team submitted a proposal for a enlarged version of the Bell XV-15 prototype on 17 February 1983. This was the only proposal received and a preliminary design contract was awarded on 26 April 1983.[11][12]

 

The JVX aircraft was designated V-22 Osprey on 15 January 1985; by March that same year the first six prototypes were being produced, and Boeing Vertol was expanded to deal with the project workload.[13][14] Work has been split evenly between Bell and Boeing. Bell Helicopter manufactures and integrates the wing, nacelles, rotors, drive system, tail surfaces, and aft ramp, as well as integrates the Rolls-Royce engines and performs final assembly. Boeing Helicopters manufactures and integrates the fuselage, cockpit, avionics, and flight controls.[4][15] The USMC variant of the Osprey received the MV-22 designation and the Air Force variant received CV-22; reversed from normal procedure to prevent Marine Ospreys from having a conflicting designation with aircraft carriers (CV).[16] Full-scale development of the V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft began in 1986.[2] On 3 May 1986 the Bell-Boeing partnership was awarded a $1.714 billion contract for V-22 aircraft by the Navy, thus at this point the project had acquisition plans with all four arms of the U.S. military.[17]

 

The first V-22 was rolled out with significant media attention in May 1988.[18][19] However the project suffered several political blows. Firstly in the same year, the Army left the program, citing a need to focus its budget on more immediate aviation programs.[20] The project also faced considerable dialogue in the Senate, surviving two votes that both could have resulted in cancellation.[21][22] Despite the Senate's decision, the Department of Defense instructed the Navy not to spend more money on the Osprey.[23] At the same time, the Bush administration sought the cancellation of the project.[23]

 

Flight testing and design changes

 

The first of six MV-22 prototypes first flew on 19 March 1989 in the helicopter mode,[24] and on 14 September 1989 as a fixed-wing plane.[25] The third and fourth prototypes successfully completed the Osprey's first Sea Trials on the USS Wasp in December 1990.[26] However, the fourth and fifth prototypes crashed in 1991-92.[27] Flight tests were resumed in August 1993 after changes were incorporated in the prototypes.[2] From October 1992 until April 1993, Bell and Boeing redesigned the V-22 to reduce empty weight, simplify manufacture and reduce production costs. This redesigned version became the B-model.[28]

 

Flight testing of four full-scale development V-22s began in early 1997 when the first pre-production V-22 was delivered to the Naval Air Warfare Test Center, Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland. The first EMD flight took place on 5 February 1997. The first of four low rate initial production aircraft, ordered on 28 April 1997, was delivered on 27 May 1999. Osprey number 10 completed the program's second Sea Trials, this time from the USS Saipan in January 1999.[2] During external load testing in April 1999, Boeing used a V-22 to lift and transport the M777 howitzer.[29] In 2000, Boeing announced that the V-22 would be fitted with a nose-mounted GAU-19 Gatling gun,[30] but the GAU-19 gun was later canceled.[31]

 

In 2000, there were two further fatal crashes, killing a total of 19 Marines, and the production was again halted while the cause of these crashes was investigated and various parts were redesigned.[32] The V-22 completed its final operational evaluation in June 2005. The evaluation was deemed successful; events included long range deployments, high altitude, desert and shipboard operations. The problems identified in various accidents had been addressed.[33]

 

Controversy

 

The V-22's development process has been long and controversial, partly due to its large cost increases.[34] When the development budget, first planned for $2.5 billion in 1986, increased to a projected $30 billion in 1988, then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney tried to zero out its funding. He was eventually overruled by Congress.[32] As of 2008, $27 billion have been spent on the Osprey program and another $27.2 billion will be required to complete planned production numbers by the end of the program.[2]

 

The V-22 squadron's former commander at Marine Corps Air Station New River, Lt. Colonel Odin Lieberman, was relieved of duty in 2001 after allegations that he instructed his unit that they needed to falsify maintenance records to make the plane appear more reliable.[2][35] Three officers were later implicated in the falsification scandal.[34]

 

The aircraft is incapable of autorotation, and is therefore unable to land safely in helicopter mode if both engines fail. A director of the Pentagon's testing office in 2005 said that if the Osprey loses power while flying like a helicopter below 1,600 feet (490 m), emergency landings "are not likely to be survivable". But Captain Justin (Moon) McKinney, a V-22 pilot, says that this will not be a problem, "We can turn it into a plane and glide it down, just like a C-130".[31] A complete loss of power would require the failure of both engines, as a drive shaft connects the nacelles through the wing; one engine can power both proprotors.[36] While vortex ring state (VRS) contributed to a deadly V-22 accident, the aircraft is less susceptible to the condition than conventional helicopters and recovers more quickly.[5] The Marines now train new pilots in the recognition of and recovery from VRS and have instituted operational envelope limits and instrumentation to help pilots avoid VRS conditions.[32][37]

 

It was planned in 2000 to equip all V-22s with a nose-mounted Gatling gun, to provide "the V-22 with a strong defensive firepower capability to greatly increase the aircraft's survivability in hostile actions."[30] The nose gun project was canceled however, leading to criticism by retired Marine Corps Commandant General James L. Jones, who is not satisfied with the current V-22 armament.[31] A belly-mounted turret was later installed on some of the first V-22s sent to the War in Afghanistan in 2009.[38]

 

With the first combat deployment of the MV-22 in October 2007, Time Magazine ran an article condemning the aircraft as unsafe, overpriced, and completely inadequate.[31] The Marine Corps, however, responded with the assertion that much of the article's data were dated, obsolete, inaccurate, and reflected expectations that ran too high for any new field of aircraft.[39]

 

Recent development

 

On 28 September 2005, the Pentagon formally approved full-rate production for the V-22.[40] The plan is to boost production from 11 a year to between 24 and 48 a year by 2012. Of the 458 total planned, 360 are for the Marine Corps, 48 for the Navy, and 50 for the Air Force at an average cost of $110 million per aircraft, including development costs.[2] The V-22 had an incremental flyaway cost of $70 million per aircraft in 2007,[3] but the Navy hopes to shave about $10 million off that cost after a five-year production contract starts in 2008.[41]

 

The Bell-Boeing Joint Project Office in Amarillo, Texas will design a new integrated avionics processor to resolve electronics obsolescence issues and add new network capabilities.[42]

 

Design

 

The Osprey is the world's first production tiltrotor aircraft, with one three-bladed proprotor, turboprop engine, and transmission nacelle mounted on each wingtip. It is classified as a powered lift aircraft by the Federal Aviation Administration.[43] For takeoff and landing, it typically operates as a helicopter with the nacelles vertical (rotors horizontal). Once airborne, the nacelles rotate forward 90° in as little as 12 seconds for horizontal flight, converting the V-22 to a more fuel-efficient, higher-speed turboprop airplane. STOL rolling-takeoff and landing capability is achieved by having the nacelles tilted forward up to 45°. For compact storage and transport, the V-22's wing rotates to align, front-to-back, with the fuselage. The proprotors can also fold in a sequence taking 90 seconds.[44]

 

Most Osprey missions will use fixed wing flight 75 percent or more of the time, reducing wear and tear on the aircraft and reducing operational costs.[45] This fixed wing flight is higher than typical helicopter missions allowing longer range line-of-sight communications and so improved command and control.[2] Boeing has stated the V-22 design loses 10% of its vertical lift over a Tiltwing design when operating in helicopter mode because of airflow resistance due to the wings, but that the Tiltrotor design has better short takeoff and landing performance.[46]

 

The V-22 is equipped with a glass cockpit, which incorporates four Multi-function displays (MFDs) and one shared Central Display Unit (CDU), allowing the pilots to display a variety of images including: digimaps centered or decentered on current position, FLIR imagery, primary flight instruments, navigation (TACAN, VOR, ILS, GPS, INS), and system status. The flight director panel of the Cockpit Management System (CMS) allows for fully-coupled (aka: autopilot) functions which will take the aircraft from forward flight into a 50-foot hover with no pilot interaction other than programming the system.[47] The glass cockpit of the canceled CH-46X was derived from the V-22.[48]

 

The V-22 is a fly-by-wire aircraft with triple-redundant flight control systems.[49] With the nacelles pointing straight up in conversion mode at 90° the flight computers command the aircraft to fly like a helicopter, with cyclic forces being applied to a conventional swashplate at the rotor hub. With the nacelles in airplane mode (0°) the flaperons, rudder, and elevator fly the aircraft like an airplane. This is a gradual transition and occurs over the rotation range of the nacelles. The lower the nacelles, the greater effect of the airplane-mode control surfaces.[50] The nacelles can rotate past vertical to 97.5° for rearward flight.[51][52]

 

The Osprey can be armed with one M240 7.62x51mm NATO (.308 in caliber) or M2 .50 in caliber (12.7 mm) machine gun on the loading ramp, that can be fired rearward when the ramp is lowered. A GAU-19 three-barrel .50 in gatling gun mounted below the V-22's nose has also been studied for future upgrade.[31][53] BAE Systems developed a remotely operated turreted weapons system for the V-22,[54] which was installed on half of the first V-22s deployed to Afghanistan in 2009.[38] The 7.62 mm belly gun turret is remotely operated by a gunner inside the aircraft, who acquires targets with a separate pod using color television and forward looking infrared imagery.

 

U.S. Naval Air Systems Command is working on upgrades to increase the maximum speed from 250 knots (460 km/h; 290 mph) to 270 knots (500 km/h; 310 mph), increase helicopter mode altitude limit from 10,000 feet (3,000 m) to 12,000 feet (3,700 m) or 14,000 feet (4,300 m), and increase lift performance.[55]

 

Operational history

 

US Marine Corps

 

Marine Corps crew training on the Osprey has been conducted by VMMT-204 since March 2000. On 3 June 2005, the Marine Corps helicopter squadron Marine Medium Helicopter 263 (HMM-263), stood down to begin the process of transitioning to the MV-22 Osprey.[56] On 8 December 2005, Lieutenant General Amos, commander of the II MEF, accepted the delivery of the first fleet of MV-22s, delivered to HMM-263. The unit reactivated on 3 March 2006 as the first MV-22 squadron and was redesignated VMM-263. On 31 August 2006, VMM-162 (the former HMM-162) followed suit. On 23 March 2007, HMM-266 became Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 266 (VMM-266) at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina.[57]

 

The Osprey has been replacing existing CH-46 Sea Knight squadrons.[58] The MV-22 reached initial operational capability (IOC) with the U.S. Marine Corps on 13 June 2007.[1] On 10 July 2007 an MV-22 Osprey landed aboard the Royal Navy aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious in the Atlantic Ocean. This marked the first time a V-22 had landed on any non-U.S. vessel.[59]

 

On 13 April 2007, the U.S. Marine Corps announced that it would be sending ten V-22 aircraft to Iraq, the Osprey's first combat deployment. Marine Corps Commandant, General James Conway, indicated that over 150 Marines would accompany the Osprey set for September deployment to Al-Asad Airfield.[60][61] On 17 September 2007, ten MV-22Bs of VMM-263 left for Iraq aboard the USS Wasp. The decision to use a ship rather than use the Osprey's self-deployment capability was made because of concerns over icing during the North Atlantic portion of the trip, lack of available KC-130s for mid-air refueling, and the availability of the USS Wasp.[62]

 

The Osprey has provided support in Iraq, racking up some 2,000 flight hours over three months with a mission capable availability rate of 68.1% as of late-January 2008.[63] They are primarily used in Iraq's western Anbar province for routine cargo and troop movements, and also for riskier "aero-scout" missions. General David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, used one to fly around Iraq on Christmas Day 2007 to visit troops.[64] Then-presidential candidate Barack Obama also flew in Ospreys during his high profile 2008 tour of Iraq.[65]

 

The only major problem has been obtaining the necessary spare parts to maintain the aircraft.[66] The V-22 had flown 3,000 sorties totaling 5,200 hours in Iraq as of July 2008.[67] USMC leadership expect to deploy MV-22s to Afghanistan in 2009.[66][68] General George J. Trautman, III praised the increased range of the V-22 over the legacy helicopters in Iraq and said that "it turned his battle space from the size of Texas into the size of Rhode Island."[69]

 

Naval Air Systems Command has devised a temporary fix for sailors to place portable heat shields under Osprey engines to prevent damage to the decks of some of the Navy's smaller amphibious ships, but they determined that a long term solution to the problem would require these decks be redesigned with heat resistant deck coatings, passive thermal barriers and changes in ship structure in order to operate V-22s and F-35Bs.[70]

 

A Government Accountability Office study reported that by January 2009 the Marines had 12 MV-22s operating in Iraq and they managed to successfully complete all assigned missions. The same report found that the V-22 deployments had mission capable rates averaging 57% to 68% and an overall full mission capable rate of only 6%. It also stated that the aircraft had shown weakness in situational awareness, maintenance, shipboard operations and the ability to transport troops and external cargo.[71] That study also concluded that the "deployments confirmed that the V-22’s enhanced speed and range enable personnel and internal cargo to be transported faster and farther than is possible with the legacy helicopters it is replacing".[71]

 

The MV-22 saw its first offensive combat mission, Operation Cobra's Anger on 4 December 2009. Ospreys assisted in inserting 1,000 Marines and 150 Afghan troops into the Now Zad Valley of Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan to disrupt communication and supply lines of the Taliban.[38] In January 2010 the MV-22 Osprey is being sent to Haiti as part of Operation Unified Response relief efforts after the earthquake there. This will be the first use the Marine V-22 in a humanitarian mission.[72]

 

US Air Force

 

The Air Force's first operational CV-22 Osprey was delivered to the 58th Special Operations Wing (58th SOW) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico on 20 March 2006. This and subsequent aircraft will become part of the 58th SOW's fleet of aircraft used for training pilots and crew members for special operations use.[73] On 16 November 2006, the Air Force officially accepted the CV-22 in a ceremony conducted at Hurlburt Field, Florida.[74]

 

The US Air Force's first operational deployment of the Osprey sent four CV-22s to Mali in November 2008 in support of Exercise Flintlock. The CV-22s flew nonstop from Hurlburt Field, Florida with in-flight refueling.[5] AFSOC declared that the 8th Special Operations Squadron reached Initial Operational Capability on 16 March 2009, with six of its planned nine CV-22s operational.[75]

 

In June 2009, CV-22s of the 8th Special Operations Squadron delivered 43,000 pounds (20,000 kg) of humanitarian supplies to remote villages in Honduras that were not accessible by conventional vehicles.[76] In November 2009, the 8th SO Squadron and its six CV-22s returned from a three-month deployment in Iraq.[77]

 

The first possible combat loss of an Osprey occurred on 9 April, 2010, as a CV-22 went down near Qalat, Zabul Province, Afghanistan, killing four.[78][79]

 

Potential operators

 

In 1999 the V-22 was studied for use in the United Kingdom's Royal Navy,[80] it has been raised several times as a candidate for the role of Maritime Airborne Surveillance and Control (MASC).[81]

 

Israel had shown interest in the purchase of MV-22s, but no order was placed.[82][83] Flightglobal reported in late 2009 that Israel has decided to wait for the CH-53K instead.[84]

 

The V-22 Osprey is a candidate for the Norwegian All Weather Search and Rescue Helicopter (NAWSARH) that is planned to replace the Westland Sea King Mk.43B of the Royal Norwegian Air Force in 2015.[85] The other candidates for the NAWSARH contract of 10-12 helicopters are AgustaWestland AW101 Merlin, Eurocopter EC225, NHIndustries NH90 and Sikorsky S-92.[86]

 

Bell Boeing has made an unsolicited offer of the V-22 for US Army medical evacuation needs.[87] However the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency issued a report that said that a common helicopter design would be needed for both combat recovery and medical evacuation and that the V-22 would not be suitable for recovery missions because of the difficulty of hoist operations and lack of self-defense capabilities.[88]

 

The US Navy remains a potential user of the V-22, but its role and mission with the Navy remains unclear. The latest proposal is to replace the C-2 Greyhound with the V-22 in the fleet logistics role. The V-22 would have the advantage of being able to land on and support non-carriers with rapid delivery of supplies and people between the ships of a taskforce or to ships on patrol beyond helicopter range.[89] Loren B. Thompson of the Lexington Institute has suggested V-22s for use in combat search and rescue and Marine One VIP transport, which also need replacement aircraft.[90]

 

Variants

  

• V-22A 

•• Pre-production full-scale development aircraft used for flight testing. These are unofficially considered A-variants after 1993 redesign.[91]

  

• HV-22 

•• The U.S. Navy considered an HV-22 to provide combat search and rescue, delivery and retrieval of special warfare teams along with fleet logistic support transport. However, it chose the MH-60S for this role in 1992.[92]

  

• SV-22 

•• The proposed anti-submarine warfare Navy variant. The Navy studied the SV-22 in the 1980s to replace S-3 and SH-2 aircraft.[93]

  

• MV-22B 

•• Basic U.S. Marine Corps transport; original requirement for 552 (now 360). The Marine Corps is the lead service in the development of the V-22 Osprey. The Marine Corps variant, the MV-22B, is an assault transport for troops, equipment and supplies, capable of operating from ships or from expeditionary airfields ashore. It is replacing the Marine Corps' CH-46E[57] and CH-53D.[94]

  

• CV-22B 

•• Air Force variant for the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). It will conduct long-range, special operations missions, and is equipped with extra fuel tanks and terrain-following radar.[95][96]

 

Operators

 

•  United States

 

• United States Air Force

 

•• 8th Special Operations Squadron (8 SOS) at Hurlburt Field, Florida

•• 71st Special Operations Squadron (71 SOS) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico

•• 20th Special Operations Squadron (20 SOS) at Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico

 

• United States Marine Corps

 

•• VMM-161

•• VMM-162

•• VMM-261

•• VMM-263

•• VMM-264

•• VMM-266

•• VMM-365

•• VMMT-204 - Training squadron

•• VMX-22 - Marine Tiltrotor Operational Test and Evaluation Squadron

 

Notable accidents

 

Main article: Accidents and incidents involving the V-22 Osprey

 

From 1991 to 2000 there were four significant crashes, and a total of 30 fatalities, during testing.[32] Since becoming operational in 2007, the V-22 has had one possible combat loss due to an unknown cause, no losses due to accidents, and seven other notable, but minor, incidents.

 

• On 11 June 1991, a mis-wired flight control system led to two minor injuries when the left nacelle struck the ground while the aircraft was hovering 15 feet (4.6 m) in the air, causing it to bounce and catch fire.[97]

 

• On 20 July 1992, a leaking gearbox led to a fire in the right nacelle, causing the aircraft to drop into the Potomac River in front of an audience of Congressmen and other government officials at Quantico, killing all seven on board and grounding the aircraft for 11 months.[98]

 

• On 8 April 2000, a V-22 loaded with Marines to simulate a rescue, attempted to land at Marana Northwest Regional Airport in Arizona, stalled when its right rotor entered vortex ring state, rolled over, crashed, and exploded, killing all 19 on board.[37]

 

• On 11 December 2000, after a catastrophic hydraulic leak and subsequent software instrument failure, a V-22 fell 1,600 feet (490 m) into a forest in Jacksonville, North Carolina, killing all four aboard. This caused the Marine Corps to ground their fleet of eight V-22s, the second grounding that year.[99][100]

 

Specifications (MV-22B)

 

Data from Boeing Integrated Defense Systems,[101] Naval Air Systems Command,[102] US Air Force CV-22 fact sheet,[95] Norton,[103] and Bell[104]

 

General characteristics

 

• Crew: Four (pilot, copilot and two flight engineers)

• Capacity: 24 troops (seated), 32 troops (floor loaded) or up to 15,000 lb (6,800 kg) of cargo (dual hook)

• Length: 57 ft 4 in (17.5 m)

• Rotor diameter: 38 ft 0 in (11.6 m)

• Wingspan: 45 ft 10 in (14 m)

• Width with rotors: 84 ft 7 in (25.8 m)

• Height: 22 ft 1 in/6.73 m; overall with nacelles vertical (17 ft 11 in/5.5 m; at top of tailfins)

• Disc area: 2,268 ft² (212 m²)

• Wing area: 301.4 ft² (28 m²)

• Empty weight: 33,140 lb (15,032 kg)

• Loaded weight: 47,500 lb (21,500 kg)

• Max takeoff weight: 60,500 lb (27,400 kg)

• Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce Allison T406/AE 1107C-Liberty turboshafts, 6,150 hp (4,590 kW) each

 

Performance

 

• Maximum speed: 250 knots (460 km/h, 290 mph) at sea level / 305 kn (565 km/h; 351 mph) at 15,000 ft (4,600 m)[105]

• Cruise speed: 241 knots (277 mph, 446 km/h) at sea level

• Range: 879 nmi (1,011 mi, 1,627 km)

• Combat radius: 370 nmi (426 mi, 685 km)

• Ferry range: 1,940 nmi (with auxiliary internal fuel tanks)

• Service ceiling: 26,000 ft (7,925 m)

• Rate of climb: 2,320 ft/min (11.8 m/s)

• Disc loading: 20.9 lb/ft² at 47,500 lb GW (102.23 kg/m²)

• Power/mass: 0.259 hp/lb (427 W/kg)

 

Armament

 

• 1× M240 machine gun on ramp, optional

 

Notable appearances in media

 

Main article: Aircraft in fiction#V-22 Osprey

 

See also

 

• Elizabeth A. Okoreeh-Baah, USMC - first female to pilot a V-22 Osprey

 

Related development

 

• Bell XV-15[106]

• Bell/Agusta BA609

• Bell Boeing Quad TiltRotor

 

Comparable aircraft

 

• Canadair CL-84

• LTV XC-142

 

Related lists

 

• List of military aircraft of the United States

• List of VTOL aircraft

 

References

 

Bibliography

 

• Markman, Steve and Bill Holder. "Bell/Boeing V-22 Osprey Tilt-Engine VTOL Transport (U.S.A.)". Straight Up: A History of Vertical Flight. Schiffer Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0-7643-1204-9.

• Norton, Bill. Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, Tiltrotor Tactical Transport. Midland Publishing, 2004. ISBN 1-85780-165-2.

 

External links

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: V-22 Osprey

 

• Official Boeing V-22 site

• Official Bell V-22 site

• V-22 Osprey web, and www.history.navy.mil/planes/v-22.html

• CV-22 fact sheet on USAF site

• www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/v-22.htm

• www.airforce-technology.com/projects/osprey/

• Onward and Upward

• "Flight of the Osprey", US Navy video of V-22 operations

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Last week, I expressed my opinion on subcontracting post work out. This past week has once again been slammed to the point that I wish I had someone I trusted enough to help ease the load. I’ve shot and edited for a combined time of just under 100 hours.

  

Its now Sunday and I’m no where near finished with edits. I’m starting to think I’m going to need a new chair as my ass has most definitely made a groove in the chair. I’ve briefly considered moving my office to the other room thinking it might offer a change of scenery and maybe a little more comfort as its carpeted. However, it seemed like it would take too much time so I just let that idea fall to the cold, hard floor of my boring office.

  

I’m shooting again Tuesday or Wednesday and then, flying out to Charlotte, NC for a shoot. How do I wish I spent the past week? Not any other way. Thank you! If I wasn’t burdened by the need for sleep and food, I'd have way more time!

  

With the workload this week, I wasn’t able to put something elaborate together. However, I really like the image that I ended up using. Director Troy Heard has been unafraid to make ridiculous faces for me since the very first time he was in front of my camera in September of 2012. This time I was shooting promo work for a parady show titled Pawn Shop Live. A comedic take on the characters of the Gold and Silver Pawn Shop here in Las Vegas. You better know them from History Channel’s Pawn Stars. Troy is directing and, of course, that means another chance for me to capture one of his faces. I swear, he gives me 100% each time. So much so that I fear one day he’ll cramp his face and have to go to the ER!

  

The background you see in the shot has seen more than a few composites but never saw the light of day until now. It just didn’t fit with anything I tried, until this shot. My first instinct was to “zombie” him up. But, after a little thought, I decided to not mask that face but rather to let it shine! So, thanks again, Troy, for not being afraid of the lens! I promise, one day I’ll take a photo of you that doesn’t involve facial contortions and clear views of your uvula.

  

Moving right along, some of you know, but most of you have no idea, that I’m utterly alone in my house right now and have been for most of November and now most of December. My photo-critiquing, body-heat blast-furnace, bed-hogging, candy-stashing, seafood-hating, Bob Villa with a vagina, and less facial hair of a girlfriend, Joyce, is up north. I’ve seen her for all of 5 days in the past 6 weeks. I’m thankful for the amount of work I have because, if it wasn’t for that work, I’d probably be rocking back and forth singing Christmas songs in the corner in my pajamas. Its just too quiet here! The bed is so cold at night that when I need to get up in the morning, I simply put the alarm on the nightstand on the other side of the bed. When the alarm goes off, I have to slide over to the other side to turn it off. The other side is SO cold that I’m instantly awake. I’d say it's like laying naked on a frozen lake!

  

Over the past 6 weeks, my eating habits have gone to shit. I just don’t have the energy to cook some big, fancy meal for just me. I think I hit an all time low the other night when I cut up a hotdog and threw it in with some canned tomato sauce. The only thing that saved the meal from being really sad was that I used tri-colored pasta. It fancied it up just enough to hold onto my self-respect! Although, my lack of culinary creativity may have hit an all time low, my brother, Cory’s, seemed to reach new heights. I’m here eating my sad meal in my cold, dark house and he sends me a message with this bull shit. I imagine him saying this in a fancy, Italian accent: "I made a ricotta-, fontina-, asiago-, and parmesan-cheese stuffed chicken breasts, wrapped in pancetta, with a savory side of garlic mashed potatoes and fresh green beans." Um...my hotdog was a Hebrew National, that should account for something. Those things aren’t cheap! He does lose points for sending me a crappy cell phone picture of his meal. Shit, he didn’t even add an instagram filter to it!

  

Friend and photographer, Eric Ortiz, came over the other day. He walked into a frigid house, void of nearly all light. "Why is it so creepy in here?" he mutters as he goes to find a light. I’ve spent the past week in my office and only my office. I make about 2 trips to the kitchen a day and one to the bedroom to sleep. If I had a bed in my office, I’d sleep in there to save time. Okay. So now I’m making myself out to be some sort of strange hermit. It’s just been a busy week.

  

The house is so cold because I feel it is a waste to heat it all. I use a space heater in the room I'm in and let the rest of the house find its natural balance with the exterior temperature. That just so happens to be pretty damn cold. I awoke the other morning after sleeping in full winter attire. I said to myself, “There's cold but, this is a bit ridiculous." The thermostat was buried past 50. I couldn't tell what the temp really was but I’d be willing to bet it was way below 50. I didn’t even have to refrigerate the soda that was sitting out. Frosty cold from the counter! It just makes me laugh!

  

No matter how odd this past few weeks have been, I’ve still managed to shower and dress like a normal human being. I’m not going off the deep end just yet! Soon I’ll be off to California to spend christmas with my brother and his family. It should be a fantastic time. I may even leave my gear at home...Okay, I probably won’t but it was worth a momentary thought!

  

Until next week...

Chassis n° 2071GT

Engine n° 2071GT

 

Bonhams : the Zoute Sale

Estimated : € 1.200.000 - 1.600.000

 

Zoute Grand Prix 2019

Knokke - Zoute

België - Belgium

October 2019

 

By the early 1960s, road car production had ceased to be a sideline for Ferrari and was seen as vitally important to the company's future stability. Thus the 250, Ferrari's first volume-produced model, can be seen as critically important, though production of the first of the line - the 250 Europa, built from 1953 to '54 - amounted to fewer than 20. Before the advent of the Europa, Ferrari had built road-going coupés and convertibles in small numbers, usually to special customer order using a sports-racing chassis as the basis. Ghia and Vignale of Turin and Touring of Milan were responsible for bodying many of these but there was no attempt at standardisation for series production and no two cars were alike.

 

The introduction of the 250 Europa heralded a significant change in Ferrari's preferred coachbuilder; whereas previously Vignale had been the most popular carrozzeria among Maranello's customers, from now on Pinin Farina (later 'Pininfarina') would be Ferrari's number one choice, bodying no fewer than 48 out of the 53 Europa/Europa GTs built. Pinin Farina's experiments eventually crystallised in a new Ferrari 250 GT road car that was first displayed publicly at the Geneva Salon in March 1956. However, the Torinese Carrozzeria was not yet in a position to cope with the increased workload, resulting in production being entrusted to Carrozzeria Boano after Pinin Farina had completed a handful of prototypes.

 

The 250 GT featured the lighter and more compact Colombo-designed 3.0-litre V12 in place of its predecessor's bulkier Lampredi unit. Power output of the single-overhead-camshaft all-aluminium engine was 220bhp at 7,000rpm. Shorter in the wheelbase (by 200mm) than that of the Europa, the 250 GT chassis followed Ferrari's established practice, being a multi-tubular frame tied together by oval main tubes, though the independent front suspension now employed coil springs instead of the previous transverse leaf type. A four-speed all-synchromesh gearbox transmitted power to the live rear axle, while braking was looked after by hydraulic drums all round.

 

True series production began with the arrival of Pininfarina's 'notch back' Coupé on the 250 GT chassis, some 353 of which were built between 1958 and 1960 within the sequence '0841' to '2081'. However, the relatively small scale of production meant that cars could still be ordered with subtle variations according to customer choice, as well as enabling a handful of show cars and 'specials' to be constructed on the 250 GT chassis.

 

A number of prominent European coachbuilders offered a variety of body styles on the 250 GT chassis, with Scaglietti and Pininfarina producing elegant open-top spyder and cabriolet models. Exhibited at the 1957 Geneva Salon, the latter's first 250 GT Cabriolet, which, unusually, featured a Vintage-style cut-down driver's door, was snapped up by Ferrari works driver Peter Collins, who later had the car converted to disc brakes. After a handful of alternative versions had been built, series production began in July 1957, around 40 Series I Pininfarina Cabriolets being completed before the introduction of the Series II in 1959. Effectively an open-top version of the Pininfarina-built 250 GT Coupé, whose chassis and mechanicals it shared, the Cabriolet was built alongside its closed cousin until 1962. Overall design followed that of the Coupé, with short nose and long rear overhang, while a more-vertical windscreen provided greater headroom in the generously sized cockpit. As well as the aforementioned improvements to brakes and transmission, the Series II cars benefited from the latest, 240bhp V12 with outside sparkplugs, coil valve springs, and 12-port cylinder heads. The 250 GT was the most successful Ferrari of its time, production of all types exceeding 900 units, of which 200 were Series II Cabriolets like that offered here.

 

A number of important developments occurred during 250 GT production: the original 128C 3.0-litre engine being superseded by the twin-distributor 128D, which in turn was supplanted in 1960 by the outside-plug 128F engine which did away with its predecessor's Siamesed inlets in favour of six separate ports. On the chassis side, four-wheel disc brakes arrived late in 1959 and a four-speeds-plus-overdrive gearbox the following year, the former at last providing the 250 GT with stopping power to match its speed. More refined and practical than any previous road-going Ferrari, yet retaining the sporting heritage of its predecessors, the 250 GT is a landmark model of immense historical significance. Despite this, original survivors are relatively few, as many have been modified and converted into replicas of more exotic Ferraris such as the 250 GTO, Testarossa, etc.

 

According to the accompanying Massini Report, chassis number '2071' is the 66th of the 200 units built, and as a Series II car has the added advantage of disc brakes all round. Originally finished in the handsome combination of Grigio Argento with Nero interior, the Ferrari was sold new in 1960 via Jacques Swaters' Garage Francorchamps, the official Ferrari importer for Belgium, to its first owner, Jean Blaton. A wealthy Belgian industrialist, Ferrari aficionado and gentleman racing driver, who raced under the name 'Beurlys', Jean Blaton had an excellent taste and was a personal friend of Jacques Swaters, from whom he bought numerous Ferraris over the years.

 

Blaton is best remembered for his daring exploits in the Le Mans 24-Hour Race in which he drove a succession of Ferraris over a 10-year period between 1958 and 1967, finishing on the podium on nearly every outing. On many occasions he drove his own Ferraris, including a 250 GT MM, 250 GT Testarossa, 250 GT LWB Tour de France, 250 GT SWB, 250 GTO, 250 LM, and 330 P3/P4. He secured his best result at Le Mans in 1963 when he finished 2nd overall with co-driver Langlois van Ophen at the wheel of a Ferrari 250 GTO, winning the GT Class for Swaters' racing team, Écurie Francorchamps.

 

Jean Blaton was also a friend of Enzo Ferrari, who was only too happy to accommodate his highly regarded customer's special requests. In the case of his 250 GT Cabriolet, Blaton specified that the car should have large side vents in the front wings, similar to those of the Series III 410 Superamerica, which were incorporated by Pinin Farina on Mr Ferrari's instruction. These vents not only make the car appear more sporting, they also serve to break up its lengthy flanks to good effect. Blaton's car, with its special features, was prominently displayed in Ferrari's 1960 yearbook.

 

In 1964, Blaton sold '2071' to Luigi Chinetti, another gentleman racing driver and sole importer of Ferraris into the USA. The car was then sold to a Mr Gilbertson from Vista, California. Following Mr Gilbertson's death, the Ferrari was acquired from his widow in 1978 by Mr Ken Gerber of San Diego, California, who kept it for the next 32 years. A member of the Ferrari Owners' Club, Mr Gerber enjoyed the car throughout the 1980s, attending various events.

 

During Mr Gerber's ownership (in 1992-1994) a fastidious restoration was carried out, the precision machining work on the engine and mechanical systems being entrusted to recognised specialist Bob Wallace of Phoenix, Arizona. Original parts were retained wherever possible and the few that were not saveable were either replaced with originals or perfect reproductions. The car was refinished in Rosso Rubino and completed in time for the 1994 International Ferrari Concours in Monterey.

 

Ken Gerber sold the Ferrari in 2010 and the following year the car moved to the UK having been bought by DK Engineering. The car was sold to Belgium in 2012, since when it has belonged to the current lady owner. Carrying the very suitable registration, '250 – GTS', the car has been enjoyed by its owner on numerous occasions and at prestigious events including the Zoute Rally. Now presented in excellent condition after recent cosmetic re-commissioning, it affords the prospect of comfortable open-top cruising in unparalleled style. Possessing links to Belgian and excellent provenance, this unique Ferrari 250 GT Cabriolet is worthy of the closest inspection.

My god !. lots of work to be done.

Barcelona's port workload

Well... I'll be looking at this shot every now and then for the next few days while I work long hours. Seems like the workload litterally exploded when I came back yesterday at the office after a 3 week break... Big presentation Thursday, wish me luck!

In the 1930s, industrial works alongside this part of the coastline, extracted magnesia (magnesium carbonate), used in the lining of kilns and incinerators, from dolomitic lime and seawater. Today, all that remains of this industrial site are some derelict buildings, old pipes and the dangerous, magnificent remains of Steetley Pier, a long, derelict structure, which stretches out into the sea here.

 

To get the most from this beach, check tidal tables and time your visit to coincide with low tide, when a vast amount of golden sand, interspersed with pipes is exposed. The beach is often deserted, and has no restrictions on dog walking.

 

The sands can be accessed by parking at West View Road and walking through the tunnel which passes under the railway line. Then walk towards the sea, past the former industrial buildings, and turn right, towards the old pier. The beach is backed by a cemetery and further north, by Hartlepool Golf Course, beyond which lies the Durham Coast Nature Reserve. Hartlepool Marina lies to the south of the beach.

 

There is a fish and chip shop nearby, and more places to eat and shops can be found in Hartlepool.

 

Hartlepool is a seaside and port town in County Durham, England. It is governed by a unitary authority borough named after the town. The borough is part of the devolved Tees Valley area. With an estimated population of 87,995, it is the second-largest settlement (after Darlington) in County Durham.

 

The old town was founded in the 7th century, around the monastery of Hartlepool Abbey on a headland. As the village grew into a town in the Middle Ages, its harbour served as the County Palatine of Durham's official port. The new town of West Hartlepool was created in 1835 after a new port was built and railway links from the South Durham coal fields (to the west) and from Stockton-on-Tees (to the south) were created. A parliamentary constituency covering both the old town and West Hartlepool was created in 1867 called The Hartlepools. The two towns were formally merged into a single borough called Hartlepool in 1967. Following the merger, the name of the constituency was changed from The Hartlepools to just Hartlepool in 1974. The modern town centre and main railway station are both at what was West Hartlepool; the old town is now generally known as the Headland.

 

Industrialisation in northern England and the start of a shipbuilding industry in the later part of the 19th century meant it was a target for the Imperial German Navy at the beginning of the First World War. A bombardment of 1,150 shells on 16 December 1914 resulted in the death of 117 people in the town. A severe decline in heavy industries and shipbuilding following the Second World War caused periods of high unemployment until the 1990s when major investment projects and the redevelopment of the docks area into a marina saw a rise in the town's prospects. The town also has a seaside resort called Seaton Carew.

 

The place name derives from Old English heort ("hart"), referring to stags seen, and pōl (pool), a pool of drinking water which they were known to use. Records of the place-name from early sources confirm this:

 

649: Heretu, or Hereteu.

1017: Herterpol, or Hertelpolle.

1182: Hierdepol.

 

A Northumbrian settlement developed in the 7th century around an abbey founded in 640 by Saint Aidan (an Irish and Christian priest) upon a headland overlooking a natural harbour and the North Sea. The monastery became powerful under St Hilda, who served as its abbess from 649 to 657. The 8th-century Northumbrian chronicler Bede referred to the spot on which today's town is sited as "the place where deer come to drink", and in this period the Headland was named by the Angles as Heruteu (Stag Island). Archaeological evidence has been found below the current high tide mark that indicates that an ancient post-glacial forest by the sea existed in the area at the time.

 

The Abbey fell into decline in the early 8th century, and it was probably destroyed during a sea raid by Vikings on the settlement in the 9th century. In March 2000, the archaeological investigation television programme Time Team located the foundations of the lost monastery in the grounds of St Hilda's Church. In the early 11th century, the name had evolved into Herterpol.

 

Normans and for centuries known as the Jewel of Herterpol.

During the Norman Conquest, the De Brus family gained over-lordship of the land surrounding Hartlepool. William the Conqueror subsequently ordered the construction of Durham Castle, and the villages under their rule were mentioned in records in 1153 when Robert de Brus, 1st Lord of Annandale became Lord of Hartness. The town's first charter was received before 1185, for which it gained its first mayor, an annual two-week fair and a weekly market. The Norman Conquest affected the settlement's name to form the Middle English Hart-le-pool ("The Pool of the Stags").

 

By the Middle Ages, Hartlepool was growing into an important (though still small) market town. One of the reasons for its escalating wealth was that its harbour was serving as the official port of the County Palatine of Durham. The main industry of the town at this time was fishing, and Hartlepool in this period established itself as one of the primary ports upon England's Eastern coast.

 

In 1306, Robert the Bruce was crowned King of Scotland, and became the last Lord of Hartness. Angered, King Edward I confiscated the title to Hartlepool, and began to improve the town's military defences in expectation of war. In 1315, before they were completed, a Scottish army under Sir James Douglas attacked, captured and looted the town.

 

In the late 15th century, a pier was constructed to assist in the harbour's workload.

 

Hartlepool was once again militarily occupied by a Scottish incursion, this time in alliance with the Parliamentary Army during the English Civil War, which after 18 months was relieved by an English Parliamentarian garrison.

 

In 1795, Hartlepool artillery emplacements and defences were constructed in the town as a defensive measure against the threat of French attack from seaborne Napoleonic forces. During the Crimean War, two coastal batteries were constructed close together in the town to guard against the threat of seaborne attacks from the Imperial Russian Navy. They were entitled the Lighthouse Battery (1855) and the Heugh Battery (1859).

Porsche 917-001

Chassis 001, assembled in early March 1969, was the first of the twenty-five 917s completed for homologation. This chassis was used for a multitude of events, though never raced. Its workload consisted of testing at the Nürburgring and display duty in places such as the Geneva Motor Show in 1969 or Frankfurt International Auto Show in 1970.

By October 1970, 917-001 was part of the Press Department of Porsche and painted in the now famous Salzburg paint scheme of the 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans winner.

 

Festival Automobile International 2017, Paris

BNSF 6680 rolls through KC Junction on the BNSF main passing Elmwood Cemetery in the process.

The temperature has fallen, the days are short, and Thanksgiving will be here before you know it. With the holidays and end-of-the-year workload upon me, it's hard not to look ahead to 2015. The other day I went through all of my approximately 300 photos to date, and it was amazing. Not necessarily the photos themselves, but what they reflected in each day of "a year in the life". I was reminded of how lucky I am. What a wonderful family I have. What a great job I have. And how fortunate I am to live where I live (earthquakes, fires and all). I was also reminded of the pain of losing a friend, and the loss of the best pet I've ever had. I saw 3/4 of the year in the lives of my kids, who clearly changed 4 X that many days. While I will certainly keep up with photography in 2015, I won't be doing anything close to Project 365. So 2014 will remain a day-by-day chronicle of a whirling, crazy year, as I guess they all are. Looking ahead, I hope to be as fortunate in 2015.

 

Strobist: AB800 at 1/16 power, through medium PBuff octabox, camera left. Fired with PWs.

deVries - ALBERTA

 

Universal Carrier with mixer workload body.

 

Camion Universal carrier équipé avec bétonnière.

 

Photo: Murray Markanen

Win Sky Hotel, Seogwipo, Jeju Island, South Korea

 

+1' Anniversary

+2' Anniversary

+3' Anniversary

+4' Anniversary

+5' Anniversary

+6' Anniversary

+7' Anniversary

+8' Anniversary

+9' Anniversary

 

Ten years, ya... marking the day we put our signatures together, vowing the oaths together, exchanged our wedding rings, kisses and thenceforth became husband and wife officially since 2009.

 

Throughout the decade I have been through fire and rain, in some ways, you have shown me the strength to carry on. I never took my vows lightly because I was hell-bent on making it no matter what life threw at us. In my deepest, darkest days, I once lost myself miserably. I appreciated your silently supportive and waiting for my return, it dawned on us the course of true love never runs smooth. The toughest period warrants our deepest love for each other, I knew in our heart that we were going to see a rainbow after the storm.

 

In the past of half-decade, I gave my lightest kissed on your forehead, light enough not to wake you up every 530 early in the morning before start of my route to work, and dealt with the following hectic workload. I wish I've more time so that I can take a good closer look at you and whisper in your ear how much I love you.

 

As you may aware, every year we gotta accomplish our little project together, I can't recall when we started but somehow it has become our very own tradition. The challenge doesn't stop there, it gets tough and tougher as years rolled by, plus the additional tasks being assigned this very special year, I am blessed and grateful that you still walking with me all these years.

 

I am not a brilliant man, I could only come up with something that records every bit of us through photography. It is the only skillset I am comfortable with. You have supported my poor grammar writing, my humble artwork, and my recent venture videography, every tiny challenge I've taken on, all without blinking an eye or making me feel guilty once.

 

It is a milestone witness our journey from the day we got married, 10 years for some, could be just a number, could be short period of time from elderly perspective, could be just another ordinary anniversary, could be anything... But for those who really walked through the ups and downs, rise and fall, long-cherished arduous path, it is remarkable retribution in our life.

 

I knew I said this once last year, not because I ran out of juice, it is simply the undeniable truth. Thank you for compromising my laziness, forgiving my mistakes, tolerating my occasional bad temper and understanding my impatience. There is one saying "The success of marriage comes not in finding the “right” person, but in the ability of both partners to adjust to the real person they inevitably realize they married''-John Fischer.

 

Happy 10th anniversary wifey, let's strive toward another decade to come.

 

#d80

#nikon

#jejuisland

#seogwipo

#nikkor1024mm

#southkoreatravel

#winskyhoteljejuisland

 

----

View On White and View On Black

Cowangie, Victoria

On 13 March, 1916 the Victorian Bush Nursing Association inaugurated its 24th centre at Cowangie. Alec Pritchard of Danyo was elected President and honoury Sectretary ws Mr E. Best of Cowangie. Nurse Hunder was officially appointed on 12 March 1916. It is thought, but has not been confirmed by records, that Nurse Hunter had practiced for sometime in the district before the commencement of the Bush Nursing Centre.

In May 1916, it was reported in the Pinnaroo Border Times that the Danyo residents had discovered the benefits of the Bush Nurse who was giving every satisfaction and had been kept very busy. Nurse Hunter was farewelled on the 25 August 1916. During her time at Cowangie she had become very popular, she had a sweet and gentle disposition and was loved by all who were fortunate to make her acquaintance. She was known for her prompt manner for answering calls. Nurse Gollen replaced her.

A successful Euchre Party and dance was held in the Cowangie Hall on 1 June 1917 to raise funds for the Cowangie Bush Nursing Centre. A raffle of a pig donated by Mr D. J. McGrath was won by E. C. Clarkson was held, money went to the building fund. Mr Hecht who occupied the chair, explained that the committee had decided to raise funds for a house for the nurse. Mr Dayman had given over his rights to a township allotment. The following promises had been made towards the fund: Messrs F. E. Helyar, G. H. B. Harley, G. J. B. Harley, W. Davies, J. Williams and F. J. J. Schultz all promised £5 each.

During the following months discussions over the advisablity of erecting a two room stone cottage in Cowangie for use of the Bush Nurse took place. At a meeting on 31 August 1917 it was decided to proceed with building. Several working bees were held to clear the block and cart stone.

On November 1917 the following trustees were appointed: Messrs G. H. B. Harley Snr, Hecht, F. E. Helyard, J. Williams and H. Gorham. The annual meeting took place on 2 February 1918 with Mr Hecht President, Vice President G. H. B. Harley, Secretary V. Jonasson. Mr Hecht resigned on 28 February 1918 and Mr Dayman became President. Representatives from Cowangie, Danyo, Tyalla and Bunurouk were present, the balance sheet showed some overdraught on account of the building. The Nurse had been provided with a horse, gig, harness, rug and lamps. The nurse's rooms had been stared but were progressing slowly.

During the 1918, the Nurse attended 298 cases, necessitating 865 visits, which proved that the Association has doing good work in the district. Her service are included Kow Plains, Danyo, Boinka, Tutye, Duddo Wells. The Bush Nurse is thought to have operated from Kow Plains Homestead until the stone cottage was built.

Nurses at Cowangie were Sister M. Hunter, Sister Homewood, Nurse Gollen and Sister Rossbotham (1919-1922) Sister Rossbotham had her salary increased to ₤175 per annum in 1922 in recognition of her excellent care and heavy workload. In 1922 she made 93 house calls and treated 102 patients at the cottage.

The Bush Nurse Cottage at Cowangie has been restored and has been furnished and is maintained by the Cowangie CWA and the community.

Text source: Murrayville 1910-2007; A History of the Development of Murrayville & District. By Murrayville Liason Committee and Jocelyn Lindner

Use of cottage from 1923-1989

1923- 1932 Gwen & Katie Wills cut hair and served teas.

1932 -1936 The Sherrits served meals.

1936-Dec 1944 The Bertalli family lived here and the three boys slept in a tent at the rear of the cottage,

1944-1989 The Cottage was occupied by - Mrs Drendell, the Rook family, Edna Millikin & family, F, M & G. Conlin, Teakel family.

Preservation & Restoration

In August 1995 an application was made to the Historic Building Council to have the building placed on the State Register, this was unsuccessful.

1998 The family of the late David Boseley offered to donate building and land to the Shire.

August 1999 verandah posts & roof & glass in windows replaced. Doors window frames & fence replaced.

2002 The Management of the Bush Nurse Cottage was placed under the Kow Plains Committee of Management. The Cowangie CWA have furnished and maintain the cottage & garden.

  

Source: www.murrayriver.com.au/cowangie/cowangie-bush-nurse-cottage/

A quick portrait session recently to brighten up the heavy workload

Glenn Millar conducting his band during a concert for the 834th Engineer Aviation Battalion in 1943

Miller is considered to be the father of the modern US military bands. In 1942, he volunteered to join the US military and subsequently entertained troops at many venues during World War II. His workload was just as heavy as the civilian band's had been, with a full string section added. The Major Glenn Miller Army Air Forces Orchestra was the forerunner of many US military big bands.

Thanks to Jeff Wharton for photo of re enactor lady support singer flic.kr/p/2qTGfdp Background photo from Bing Images

The Royal Air Force unveiled impressive images of a unique aircraft formation to celebrate the forty years of service of the Panavia Tornado GR4 attack jet.

  

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

The Panavia Tornado is a family of twin-engine, variable-sweep wing multirole combat aircraft, jointly developed and manufactured by Italy, the United Kingdom, and West Germany. There are three primary Tornado variants: the Tornado IDS (interdictor/strike) fighter-bomber, the suppression of enemy air defences Tornado ECR (electronic combat/reconnaissance) and the Tornado ADV (air defence variant) interceptor aircraft.

 

The Tornado was developed and built by Panavia Aircraft GmbH, a tri-national consortium consisting of British Aerospace (previously British Aircraft Corporation), MBB of West Germany, and Aeritalia of Italy. It first flew on 14 August 1974 and was introduced into service in 1979–1980. Due to its multirole design, it was able to replace several different fleets of aircraft in the adopting air forces. The Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) became the only export operator of the Tornado in addition to the three original partner nations. A tri-nation training and evaluation unit operating from RAF Cottesmore, the Tri-National Tornado Training Establishment, maintained a level of international co-operation beyond the production stage.

 

The Tornado was operated by the Royal Air Force (RAF), Italian Air Force, and RSAF during the Gulf War of 1991, in which the Tornado conducted many low-altitude penetrating strike missions. The Tornados of various services were also used in conflicts in the former Yugoslavia during the Bosnian War and Kosovo War, the Iraq War, Libya during the Libyan civil war, as well as smaller roles in Afghanistan, Yemen, and Syria. Including all variants, 992 aircraft were built.

  

Development

 

Origins

 

During the 1960s, aeronautical designers looked to variable-geometry wing designs to gain the manoeuvrability and efficient cruise of straight wings with the speed of swept wing designs. The United Kingdom had cancelled the procurement of the TSR-2 and subsequent F-111K aircraft, and was still looking for a replacement for its Avro Vulcan and Blackburn Buccaneer strike aircraft.[1] Britain and France had initiated the AFVG (Anglo French Variable Geometry) project in 1965, but this had ended with French withdrawal in 1967. Britain continued to develop a variable-geometry aircraft similar to the proposed AFVG, and sought new partners to achieve this.[3] West German EWR had been developing the swing-wing EWR-Fairchild-Hiller A400 AVS Advanced Vertical Strike (which has a similar configuration to the Tornado).

 

In 1968, West Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy and Canada formed a working group to examine replacements for the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter, initially called the Multi Role Aircraft (MRA), later renamed as the Multi Role Combat Aircraft (MRCA). The participating nations all had ageing fleets that required replacing; but, as the requirements were so diverse, it was decided to develop a single aircraft that could perform a variety of missions that were previously undertaken by a fleet of different aircraft.[10] Britain joined the MRCA group in 1968, represented by Air Vice-Marshal Michael Giddings, and a memorandum of agreement was drafted between Britain, West Germany, and Italy in May 1969.

 

By the end of 1968, the prospective purchases from the six countries amounted to 1,500 aircraft. Canada and Belgium had departed before any long-term commitments had been made to the programme; Canada had found the project politically unpalatable; there was a perception in political circles that much of the manufacturing and specifications were focused on Western Europe. France had made a favorable offer to Belgium on the Dassault Mirage 5, which created doubt as to whether the MRCA would be worthwhile from Belgium's operational perspective.

 

Panavia Aircraft GmbH

 

On 26 March 1969, four partner nations – United Kingdom, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands, agreed to form a multinational company, Panavia Aircraft GmbH, to develop and manufacture the MRCA. The project's aim was to produce an aircraft capable of undertaking missions in the tactical strike, reconnaissance, air defence, and maritime roles; thus allowing the MRCA to replace several different aircraft then in use by the partner nations. Various concepts, including alternative fixed-wing and single-engine designs, were studied while defining the aircraft. The Netherlands pulled out of the project in 1970, citing that the aircraft was too complicated and technical for the RNLAF's preferences, which had sought a simpler aircraft with outstanding manoeuvrability. An additional blow was struck by the German requirement reduced from an initial 600 aircraft to 324 in 1972. It has been suggested that Germany deliberately placed an unrealistically high initial order to secure the company headquarters and initial test flight in Germany rather than the UK, so as to have a bigger design influence.

 

When the agreement was finalised, the United Kingdom and West Germany each had a 42.5% stake of the workload, with the remaining 15% going to Italy; this division of the production work was heavily influenced by international political bargaining. The front fuselage and tail assembly was assigned to BAC (now BAE Systems) in the United Kingdom; the centre fuselage to MBB (now EADS) in West Germany; and the wings to Aeritalia (now Alenia Aeronautica) in Italy.[19] Similarly, tri-national worksharing was used for engines, general and avionic equipment. A separate multinational company, Turbo-Union, was formed in June 1970 to develop and build the RB199 engines for the aircraft, with ownership similarly split 40% Rolls-Royce, 40% MTU, and 20% FIAT.

 

At the conclusion of the project definition phase in May 1970, the concepts were reduced to two designs; a single seat Panavia 100 which West Germany initially preferred, and the twin-seat Panavia 200 which the RAF preferred (this would become the Tornado). The aircraft was briefly called the Panavia Panther, and the project soon coalesced towards the two-seat option. In September 1971, the three governments signed an Intention to Proceed (ITP) document, at which point the aircraft was intended solely for the low-level strike mission, where it was viewed as a viable threat to Soviet defences in that role. It was at this point that Britain's Chief of the Defence Staff announced "two-thirds of the fighting front line will be composed of this single, basic aircraft type".

  

Prototypes and testing

 

The first of more than a dozen Tornado prototypes took flight on 14 August 1974 at Manching, Germany; the pilot, Paul Millett described his experience: "Aircraft handling was delightful... the actual flight went so smoothly that I did begin to wonder whether this was not yet another simulation". Flight testing led to the need for minor modifications. Airflow disturbances were responded to by re-profiling the engine intakes and the fuselage to minimise surging and buffeting experienced at supersonic speeds.

 

According to Jim Quinn, programmer of the Tornado development simulation software and engineer on the Tornado engine and engine controls, the prototype was safely capable of reaching supercruise, but the engines had severe safety issues at high altitude while trying to decelerate. The triple shaft engine, designed for maximum power at low altitude, resulted in severe vibrations while attempting to decelerate at high altitude. At high altitude and low turbine speed the compressor did not provide enough pressure to hold back the combustion pressure and would result in a violent vibration as the combustion pressure backfired into the intake. To avoid this effect the engine controls would automatically increase the minimum idle setting as altitude increased, until at very high altitudes the idle setting was so high, however, that it was close to maximum dry thrust. This resulted in one of the test aircraft being stuck in a mach 1.2 supercruise at high altitude and having to reduce speed by turning the aircraft, because the idle setting at that altitude was so high that the aircraft could not decelerate.

 

The British Ministry of Supply[when?] ordered Chief Engineer Ted Talbot from the Concorde development team to provide intake design assistance to the Tornado development team in order to overcome these issues, which they hesitantly agreed to after noting that the Concorde intake data had apparently already been leaked to the Soviet Union. The German engineers working on the Tornado intake were unable to produce a functional Concorde style intake despite having data from the Concorde team. To make the problem worse, their management team incorrectly filed a patent on the Concorde design, and then tried to sue the British engineers who had provided the design to them. The German lawyers realized that the British had provided the designs to the German team, and requested further information to help their engineers overcome the problems with the Tornado intake, but Chief Engineer Talbot refused. According to Talbot, the Concorde engineers had determined the issue with the Tornado intake was that the engine did not respond to unexpected changes in the intake position, and therefore the engine was running at the wrong setting for a given position of the intake ramps. This was because the Concorde had similar issues due to control pressure not being high enough to maintain proper angles of the intake ramps. Aerodynamic forces could force the intakes into the improper position, and so they should have the ability to control the engines if this occurs. The Tornado intake system did not allow for this. Due to the behaviour of the German management team, the British engineers declined to share this information, and so the Tornado was not equipped with the more advanced intake design of the Concorde.

 

Testing revealed that a nose-wheel steering augmentation system, connecting with the yaw damper, was necessary to counteract the destabilising effect produced by deploying the thrust reverser during landing rollouts.

 

From 1967 until 1984 Soviet KGB agents were provided details on the Tornado by the head of the West German Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm Planning department, Manfred Rotsch.

 

Two prototypes were lost in accidents, both of which had been primarily caused by poor piloting decisions and errors leading to two ground collision incidents; a third Tornado prototype was seriously damaged by an incident involving pilot-induced pitch oscillation. During the type's development, aircraft designers of the era were beginning to incorporate features such as more sophisticated stability augmentation systems and autopilots. Aircraft such as the Tornado and the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon made use of these new technologies. Failure testing of the Tornado's triplex analogue command and stability augmentation system (CSAS) was conducted on a series of realistic flight control rigs; the variable-sweep wings in combination with varying, and frequently very heavy, payloads complicated the clearance process.

  

Production

 

The contract for the Batch 1 aircraft was signed on 29 July 1976. The first aircraft were delivered to the RAF and German Air Force on 5 and 6 June 1979 respectively. The first Italian Tornado was delivered on 25 September 1981. On 29 January 1981, the Tri-National Tornado Training Establishment (TTTE) officially opened at RAF Cottesmore, remaining active in training pilots from all operating nations until 31 March 1999. The 500th Tornado to be produced was delivered to West Germany on 19 December 1987.

 

Export customers were sought after West Germany withdrew its objections to exporting the aircraft; Saudi Arabia was the only export customer of the Tornado. The agreement to purchase the Tornado was part of the controversial Al-Yamamah arms deal between British Aerospace and the Saudi government. Oman had committed to purchasing Tornados and the equipment to operate them for a total value of £250 million in the late 1980s, but cancelled the order in 1990 due to financial difficulties.

 

During the 1970s, Australia considered joining the MRCA programme to find a replacement for their ageing Dassault Mirage IIIs; ultimately the McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet was selected to meet the requirement. Canada similarly opted for the F/A-18 after considering the Tornado. Japan considered the Tornado in the 1980s, along with the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon and F/A-18, before selecting the Mitsubishi F-2, a domestically produced design based on the F-16. In the 1990s, both Taiwan and South Korea expressed interest in acquiring a small number of Tornado ECR aircraft. In 2001, EADS proposed a Tornado ECR variant with a greater electronic warfare capability for Australia.

 

Production came to an end in 1998; the last batch of aircraft being produced went to the Royal Saudi Air Force, who had ordered a total of 96 IDS Tornados. In June 2011, it was announced that the RAF's Tornado fleet had flown collectively over one million flying hours. Aviation author Jon Lake noted that "The Trinational Panavia Consortium produced just short of 1,000 Tornados, making it one of the most successful postwar bomber programs". In 2008, AirForces Monthly said of the Tornado: "For more than a quarter of a century ... the most important military aircraft in Western Europe."

Now you can see the stuff I have to do everyday but don't, much. Crazy.

2 second exposure.

A slow shutter speed gives flight to fallen autumn leaves.

 

Probably not the best shot to launch a "comeback," but none the less, it's good to be back Flickr'ing again. Postings may be a little sporadic for the first while until I get some of my heavy workload behind me. Hope y'all come back now. ;-)

 

Best on black

 

This is a look at the wall of steel inside a rear loader, but only being an example of what it looks like inside a Heil 4000 body. The shot on the left is within a US model, whereas the right picture is a Euro model, captured from inside a brand new truck before any rubbish had gone through. The ejectors generally always serve the same purpose, but there are still different designs and engineering aspects that set various makes apart. Typically these eject blades ride a set of rails on the left and right edges of the body, however sometimes dual rails run along the middle of the body floor. Often a single telescopic cylinder of varying stage extensions provides the driving power for the blade, with a lower pressure to retract the wall of steel, whereas a higher pressure is required for extending to achieve push out of the load. Even though these eject blades do just what their name suggests, they can also play a crucial role in compaction. When aiming for maximum density payload, the concept is to pack material against this wall of steel right throughout the length of the body, where it gradually moves backwards due to the resulting pressure from the compaction process (or by manual means). This helps achieve the best load possible in every square metre of available volume, although maximum compaction in a rear loader isn’t always necessary depending on the workload circumstances and waste stream being handled.

In a room normally used as a women’s prayer space, children in the village of Guéchémé, including Zanoibana (12) and Fatima (7), pursue their studies while a new village school is being built. The prayer room also serves as a training center. In Niger, where 80 percent of the population is rural, two-thirds of inhabitants are illiterate. The Ministry of Population, Advancement of Women and Protection of Children has established programs designed to lighten women’s workload, especially in rural areas, by providing access to mills and hulling devices. Its chief aim is to free up the time demands on young girls, enabling them to go to school instead of helping their mothers work In this village, women organized their own cooperative and received modern equipment to process grains and increase their revenue. They are also able to send their children to school. In Niger, the Ministry of Education adopted the slogan for the 2015 – 2016 school year “I’m standing up for girls’ education, because it changes lives.” Photo: © Stephan Gladieu / World Bank

  

Camera: Canon PowerShot A560

Location: Dhaka, Bangladesh

 

Actually it reminds us our those childhood where we used to study with a Candle and we had not sufficient electricity supply... Bunch of books and lots of workload.. need to be done under one Candle night....

 

Here is the other version: flickr.com/photos/munaz/2517170549/

   

+++ DISCLAIMER +++

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

  

Some background:

The Latvian Air Force was first founded during the Latvian War of Independence in 1919. In 1939, the Aviation Regiment consisted of three fighter squadrons, armed with 24 Gloster Gladiator and 6 Bristol Bulldog (a fourth squadron was in organization), three reconnaissance squadrons, armed with up to 12 Letov Š-16LS, 2 Hawker Hind and 10 Stampe SV.5, and a naval reconnaissance squadron with 4 Fairey Seal and two other planes. The Soviet occupation in 1940 ended the activities of the Air Force. At that time there were almost 130 aircraft in service.

 

The post-Soviet Latvian Air Force was formed on 24 February 1992 at Spilve Airport. In August 1994, the air force moved to an ex-soviet Lielvārde Air Base. In the beginning of the new century two new and more heavy Mi-8MTV Hip helicopters were bought for search and rescue equipment duties, but they were also used for transportation of troops, evacuation and support of the Special Forces. In March 2004 Latvia joined NATO and the Ministry of Defense made the decision to improve the small country’s air defense with a dedicated fighter squadron. The country also bought two more Mi-8MTV's at the Russian Ulan Ude helicopter (rework) factory that year, augmenting the SAR fleet.

 

In 2005, soldiers of the Air Force Air Defense Wing started a training course in order to prepare an upgraded air defense. At the same time, the Latvian Air Force commenced the modernization of the surface air defense capabilities by signing a contract regarding procurement of RBS-70 manpads missiles from Sweden and negotiated the purchase or leasing of 2nd hand Saab JAS 39 Gripen. Coming from a neutral country, the Gripen was the LAF’s wish candidate for the new interceptor aircraft, but eventually Latvia could be convinced (primarily through the USA and with generous financial support thorugh the “Baltic Peace II” program) to buy eight F-5E fighters and two F-5F trainers with relatively low flying hours and in good overall condition from Switzerland. Besides the financial support, the type’s ruggedness and relatively low maintenance costs led to this choice.

 

The Northrop F-5E/F Tiger II itself was part of a highly successful supersonic light fighter family, initially designed in the late 1950s by Northrop Corporation. Being smaller and simpler than contemporaries such as the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II, the F-5 cost less to both procure and operate, making it a popular export aircraft. The F-5 started life as a privately funded light fighter program by Northrop in the 1950s. The design team wrapped a small, highly aerodynamic fighter around two compact and high-thrust General Electric J85 engines, focusing on performance and low cost of maintenance. Though primarily designed for the day air superiority role, the aircraft was also a capable ground-attack platform.

After winning the International Fighter Aircraft competition in 1970, a program aimed at providing effective low-cost fighters to American allies, Northrop introduced the second-generation F-5E Tiger II in 1972. This upgrade included more powerful engines, higher fuel capacity, greater wing area and improved leading edge extensions for a better turn rate, optional air-to-air refueling, and improved avionics including air-to-air radar. A total of 1,400 Tiger IIs were built before production ended in 1987, and the type is still in operational use in many countries round the world.

 

The Swiss F-5E airframes for Latvia were overhauled and the avionics suite modernized in 2006 and 2007 by SAI in Italy. Elbit Systems from Israel became the sub-contractor responsible for systems integration. Upgrades for the fighters included an Italian FIAR Grifo-F X band multi-mode radar with BVR (beyond-visual-range) missile and Look-down/shoot-down capabilities, making the modernized F-5E capable of deploying AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles, which were, together with AIM-9 Sidewinder AAMs, part of the Baltic Peace II support for Latvia. The new radar necessitated an enlarged radome for its scanner antenna, resulting in a duckbill shape. The fighters’ port side M39 20 mm cannon was removed to make way for the additional avionics.

 

All machines received a revamped cockpit with new MIL-STD-1553R databuses, a GEC/Ferranti 4510 Head-up display/weapons delivery system, two BAE Systems MED-2067 Multi-function displays, Litton LN-93 inertial navigation system and Hands On Throttle-And-Stick controls (HOTAS) to reduce pilot workload. Reportedly, the Elisra SPS2000 radar warning receiver and countermeasure system was also installed.

 

The modernization process was completed by early 2007 and the machines were re-designated F-5L/M. By late 2007, the Latvian air defense had become operational and worked closely together with its Baltic neighbors and the NATO forces that were frequently deployed to the Baltic NATO countries.

The small Latvian F-5 fleet is expected to remain in service until 2024, even tough, if there is sufficient funding, the machines will certainly be replaced beforehand by more capable models. The Saab Gripen is still a favored candidate, but F-16C/Ds from USAF stocks are a potential option, too.

By end of 2009, the LAF’s Fighter Squadron moved to Lielvārde Air Base, in an attempt to ensure centralization of Air Force units and to establish an efficient command and control system, which will result in a reduction of the Air Force units’ maintenance costs. With the Fighter Squadron the Air Force carries out Latvian airspace surveillance, control and defense and provides air defense support to the Land Forces units.

  

General characteristics:

Crew: 1

Length: 47 ft 4¾ in (14.45 m)

Wingspan: 26 ft 8 in (8.13 m)

Height: 13 ft 4½ in (4.08 m)

Wing area: 186 ft² (17.28 m²)

Airfoil: NACA 65A004.8 root, NACA 64A004.8 tip

Empty weight: 9,558 lb (4,349 kg)

Loaded weight: 15,745 lb (7,157 kg)

Max. take-off weight: 24,722 lb (11,214 kg)

Zero-lift drag coefficient: 0.02

Drag area: 3.4 ft² (0.32 m²)

Aspect ratio: 3.82

Internal fuel: 677 U.S. gal (2,563 L)

External fuel: up to 3× 275 U.S. gal (1,040 L) drop tanks

 

Powerplant:

2× General Electric J85-GE-21B turbojet with 3,500 lbf (15.5 kN) dry thrust

and 5,000 lbf (22.2 kN) thrust with afterburner each

 

Performance:

Maximum speed: 917 kn (Mach 1.6, 1,060 mph, 1,700 km/h) at altitude

Range: 760 nmi (870 mi, 1,405 km)

Ferry range: 2,010 nmi (2,310 mi, 3,700 km)

Service ceiling: 51,800 ft (15,800 m)

Rate of climb: 34,400 ft/min (175 m/s)

Lift-to-drag ratio: 10.0

 

Armament:

1× 20 mm (0.787 in) M39A2 Revolver cannon in the nose with 280 rounds

7 hardpoints (2× wing-tip AAM launch rails, 4× under-wing & 1× under-fuselage pylon stations,

only pylon stations 3, 4 and 5 are wet-plumbed) with a capacity of 7,000 pounds (3,200 kg)

  

The kit and its assembly:

A relatively simple build, originally inspired by a Blue Rider decal sheet for Latvian Air Force aircraft that I had bought some time ago, as part of a vague plan to build a modern what-if aircraft for each of the young and small Baltic states’ air forces. The first one had been a Lithuanian MiG-21, Estonia is still pending (even though there’s a vague idea), and the Lithuanian interceptor was recently spawned when I bought an Italeri F-5E as part of a kit lot, even though it lacked box, decals and instructions and had a slight damage.

 

The Tiger II was built mostly OOB, the only changes I made are replaced wing tip launch rails (they were damaged beyond repair), I omitted port side cannon and created a modified “shark nose” radome, which was sculpted with putty; in real life, the enlarged radome for the upgraded radar is 33cm deeper than the original F-5E radome, even though the aircraft’s overall length remained the same, as well as the nose profile. In order to make the model look a little less static I slightly lowered the slats and the flaps – easy to realize on this model. The leftover cannon received a better barrel, made from a hollow steel needle. The pair of AIM-120s and their respective launch rails come from a Hasegawa air-to-air weapons set. The ventral drop tank came from the kit.

 

The Italeri F-5E is a simple affair and goes together well, even though the section ahead of the air intakes called for considerable PSR work – not certain if that’s my fault or an innate flaw of the kit (which comes with an upper and lower fuselage half)? The raised panel lines are another weak point – the kit cannot conceal its age, and there are certainly better options today (e .g. from Hobby Boss).

  

Painting and markings:

I wanted something that would neither look too Western, nor a typical Soviet-style livery. The resulting paint scheme is purely fictional and was inspired by a grey North Korean MiG-21 and USAF aggressor schemes for F-5Es – both reminiscent of the Soviet “Pumpkin” paint scheme for export MiG-21s. For the choice of colors, the complex “Norm 81” scheme from German Luftwaffe F-4Fs had an influence.

 

The result became a primarily grey air superiority scheme with uniform light grey undersides (FS 36495, Humbrol 147) and light Ghost Grey (FS 36375, Humbrol 127) fuselage and fin. The wings’ upper surfaces became mostly Dark Gull Grey (FS 36231, Testors 1740) and patches of the same tone were applied to the fuselage and the fin, too. On the wings’ upper surfaces, some patches in a dull, greenish grey (Humbrol 111, Uniform Grey) were finally added in order to break the aircraft’s outlines from above. The result somewhat reminds of German WWII camouflage, even though unintentionally.

 

The radome was painted in Revell 75 (Light Grey, with a brownish hue) to set it apart from the rest of the aircraft. Humbrol 140 was used for the cockpit interior. The landing gear became classic glossy white, while the air intake interior was painted in Humbrol 127, matching the aircraft’s flanks. Only subtle post-shading and weathering was done.

 

As mentioned above, the Latvian air force markings came from a Blue Rider decal sheet. The tactical codes and the matching serial number come from a Begemot MiG-21sheet. Other fictional elements are the NATO emblem on the fin and a small squadron emblem on the nose, which is a vintage Polish air force motif.

Most stencils had to be salvaged from secondary sources, since the kit came without a decal sheet. Fortunately, I had a spare F-5E sheet left over from a Hobby Boss kit. As a final step, the kit was sealed with matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).

  

A rather simple project, but re-sculpting the nose was a tedious task. However, I am happy with the outcome and how the fictional paint scheme works. Together with the exotic Latvian roundels, this creates an interesting, if not plausible, look.

 

Had a run out to Woodlesford this morning to see Tornado at Woodlesford. Sue came along with me and with the extra workload taking the wheelchair, blue badge and various other items which are so necessary these days plus the fact that I'm now in my 80s and probably loosing it a bit I forgot to put the most important item in the car (the camera) so as I had my phone with me a video was my best option.

 

60163 Tornado arrives at Woodlesford with 1Z42 the 0928 York to Carlisle, I wonder how long it is since a steam train stopped at Woodlesford it's got to be something like 60 years.

  

See this locomotive in the video here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDP5mgPXMf0&feature=youtu.be

 

At last! A steam tour comes to town after months of silence, today in the form of flagship British Railways Standard Class 7, 70000 'Britannia', hauling the 'Torbay Express' from Bristol Temple Meads to Kingswear and return. Here, the train works the return service along the banks of the River Teign, whistling loudly and proudly to the sound of the the water and the Seagulls.

 

One of the last and most powerful steam locomotives ever built, the British Rail Standard Class 7 was BR's top express locomotive, and could have been utilised far better in its short lifespan, but ended up only serving the railways for 15 years, a blink of an eye compared to other mainline Pacifics of the time that had operated under the pre-nationalisation companies.

 

Designed by Robert Riddles, who had previously coined the design for the War Department Austerity 2-10-0 and 2-8-0 freight locomotives, the BR Standard Class 7's were conceived of as a result of the 1948 locomotive exchanges, which were done to test the best and worst aspects of locomotive design within the Big Four railway companies that had existed before nationalisation. The research gained from operating the best designs of the GWR, LMS, LNER and Southern railways on different areas of the British Railways network paved the way for several new classes of standardised locomotives to be constructed, largely to replace many of the ageing Victorian era engines that even in the late 1940's continued to ply their merry trade.

 

The first design requested by the Railway Executive was for a new express passenger Pacific locomotive, designed specifically to reduce maintenance and using the latest available innovations in steam technology from home and abroad. Various labour-saving devices were utilised to produce a simple, standard and effective design, able to produce equivalent power to some of the Pacifics that were still available as legacies of the Big Four.

 

The basic design of the Standard 7's can be traced to LMS construction practices, largely owed to Riddles' previous career with that company, but complimented this with the boiler and trailing wheel design of the Southern Railway's Merchant Navy Pacifics so as to follow the best design practice. The firebox was also similar in having a rocking grate, which allowed the fire to be rebuilt without stopping the locomotive, removing both ash and clinker on the move. A self-cleaning smokebox was used, which enabled ash to flow into the atmosphere, reducing the workload of the engine cleaner at the end of a working day. A single chimney was placed on top of the smokebox, which was unusual for a Pacific type of locomotive.

 

The Standard 7's were fitted with 6 ft 2 in driving wheels, allowing these engines greater capacity for use in mixed-traffic working, which made them available for both sustained fast running with heavy passenger trains, yet small enough to allow them to undertake more mundane tasks such as freight haulage.

 

55 of these engines were constructed between 1951 and 1954, with 70000 'Britannia' being the first and flagship of the fleet, with residual locomotives of the class being dubbed 'Britannia-Class'. Three batches were constructed at Crewe Works, before the publication of the 1955 Modernisation Plan.

 

Britannia was built at Crewe, completed on 2 January 1951. She was the first British Railways standard locomotive to be built and the first of 55 locomotives of the Britannia class. The locomotive was named at a ceremony at Marylebone Station by the then Minister for Transport Alfred Barnes on 30 January 1951. The BR Locomotive Naming Committee were determined not to use names already in use on other locomotives. They tried to observe this by not selecting the name Britannia for use on 70000 because it was already in use on one of the ex-LMS Jubilee Class locomotives, but Robert Riddles overruled them and the Jubilee had to be renamed.

 

The Britannias took their names from great Britons, former Star Class locomotives, and Scottish firths, although one locomotive, 70047, was never named. The success of these first Standard Pacifics gave birth to two other Pacific classes over the BR years, including the unique BR Standard Class 8, number 71000 'Duke of Gloucester', which was built in 1954 to replace the destroyed Princess Royal Class locomotive number 46202 Princess Anne, lost in the Harrow and Wealdstone rail disaster of 1952, and the fleet of 10 BR Standard Class 6 'Clan' Pacifics that were employed on services in the west of Scotland, but failed to gain a stellar reputation due to their employment on timetables for the more powerful Standard 7's they couldn't keep up to.

 

The class gained a warm response from locomotive crews across all British Railway Regions, with especially glowing reports from those operating them from Stratford depot on the Eastern Region, where its lower weight and high power transformed motive power over the restricted East Anglian lines. However, negative feedback was received from various operating departments, most notably on the Western Region. The criticism was primarily out of partisan preference for GWR-designed locomotive stock among Western Region staff; in particular, the class was 'left-hand drive' in contrast to 'right-hand drive' GWR locomotive and signalling practice, a factor in the Milton rail crash of 1955.

 

For this reason, the Western Region locomotive depots at Old Oak Common and Plymouth Laira declared that the class was surplus to requirements. However Cardiff Canton depot displayed its liking for the class (despite being part of the former GWR empire) and managed to obtain good results on South Wales passenger traffic.

 

The Midland Region also had favourable reports, but a marked consistency in losing time on the longer runs between Holyhead and Euston was recorded, although all complaints were down to the individual techniques of the operating crews. This was compounded by the irregular allocation of the class to depots all over the network, meaning that few crews ever had a great deal of experience in driving them. The Southern Region also had an allocation of seven in May 1953, when all Merchant Navy Class locomotives were temporarily withdrawn for inspection after 35020 "Bibby Line" sheared a crank axle on the central driving wheel.

 

Repairs to the class were undertaken at Crewe, Swindon and Doncaster Works until the financial constraints of the British Railways Modernisation Plan in terms of expenditure on steam began to preclude the regular overhaul of locomotives. During the mid-1960s overhauls were carried out exclusively at Crewe Works.

 

Britannia was initially based at Stratford in order to work East Anglian expresses to Norwich and Great Yarmouth, but was also particularly associated with the Hook Continental boat train to Harwich. Subsequently, the loco was based at Norwich Thorpe in January and March 1959 before spending the remainder of her career on the London Midland Region based at Willesden, Crewe North, Crewe South and finally Newton Heath.

 

The locomotive also had the distinction of hauling the funeral train for King George VI from King's Lynn, Norfolk to London following his death in February 1952 at Sandringham House, Norfolk. For this task, Britannia had her cab roof painted white, as was the custom with royal locomotives. Britannia has also worn the white roof in preservation.

 

However, as the locomotives entered the 1960's, the modernisation plan continued to gather pace, and diesel locomotives started to replace steam on most parts of the network. Very soon the Standard 7's placement on Top-Line expresses were demoted to the on-again-off-again work of freight and parcels, and cosmetic maintenance was reduced as their final years loomed. The lavish BR Brunswick Green soon faded to grey, and in some cases BR Lined Black was adopted for ease.

 

The first locomotive to be withdrawn from service was number 70007 Coeur-de-Lion in 1965, and the entire class was gradually transferred to Carlisle Kingmoor and Glasgow Polmadie depots. Britannia was withdrawn in May 1966, after 15 years of service.

 

A succession of bulk withdrawals began in 1967, culminating in the very last steam operation in British Railways service on August 11th, 1968, where Standard 7 number 70013 Oliver Cromwell, was chosen to assist in hauling the Fifteen Guinea Special, the last steam hauled British Railways passenger service from Liverpool to Carlisle via the S&C. 70013 was chosen as it was the last the last BR-owned steam locomotive to undergo routine heavy overhaul at Crewe Works, being out-shopped after a special ceremony in February 1967. The engine hauled the Manchester to Carlisle leg of the service via the Settle and Carlisle line, with LMS Class 5 45110, and LMS Stanier Class 5 locomotives, 44781 and 44871 double-heading the return working back to Manchester.

 

Upon withdrawal, 70000 was initially planned for preservation with the National Railway Museum due to it's cultural significance, but because of its prototypical nature, 70013 was instead chosen and bought up for preservation. 70000 would later be preserved by Britannia Locomotive Company Ltd.

 

After moving from one home to another, the engine wound up on the Severn Valley Railway, where she remained for a number of years in operational but non-mainline condition. With the society wishing to make more use of the locomotive, she was moved to the European gauge Nene Valley Railway in Peterborough, where she was also fitted with an air-brake compressor. Britannia made her return to the main line on 27 July 1991, successfully working enthusiast trips until 1997.

 

With an expired mainline boiler certificate, due to the high cost of refurbishment, the locomotive was sold to Pete Waterman in 2000. Stored at Waterman's workshops at the Crewe Heritage Centre, after initial assessment the amount of work resulted in Waterman selling her to Jeremy Hosking. The locomotive underwent restoration at Crewe which involved a newly refurbished cab, a new smoke box and major work on the boiler; replacement steel sides, new crown stays, new front section barrel section, new steel and copper tubeplate, repairs and patches to door plate and major work to copper firebox.

 

Transferred to the Royal Scot Locomotive and General Trust, the locomotive was returned to main line operational condition in 2011, initially out shopped in its prototype black British Railways livery. After a running-in period, in 2012 the locomotive was repainted in British Railways Brunswick Green, but with an early BR crest. On 24 January 2012, the loco hauled the Royal Train with Prince Charles on board to Wakefield Kirkgate, where he rededicated the locomotive. For the trip the loco again had a painted white cab roof, removed after the engine's appearance at the West Somerset Railway's Spring Gala.