The "true" story of that Mystery

[Dork the kit slayer]

[nev]

oooh, I like it

[Dork the kit slayer]

Don't forget to add shadows under the plane on the tarmac (since you can see them under the wings, etc.)

Really how can you be so hurtful...I mean...would I , a well respected JMN and sayer of sooth  :dum: ,ever try to decieve my fellow kit slayers.  As if!!!  

Although I have yet to collate my findings on this previously unknown aircraft, I have a contact at the MOD ,one Sir Arthur Groin-Whippet,(who preferes not to be named) and it has been muted in a letter post dated next Friday,that it was operated by the XXX Sqdn RAF,a distinguished group that were known as the "Peter Pan" sqdn....this may account for the missing shadows   ,but I believe Damian2 has hit the nail on the head and the original print was "doctored" to hide the airfield location.



I shall now,lay down in a darkened room.......................and hope my nose stops growing :zzz:  :zzz:  :zzz:

[Gary]

Huh... model.  


Ok, that does it. I thought this was a please identify this airplane pic thing again. I was laughing my arce off 'cause no one figured out it was an A-26, and then someone says model... Seriously, I am not kidding or making a complement here, I really thought it was.


Sigh, it's back to the meds for me I guess.

Great model.

[Dork the kit slayer]

This is the finished article,its been on the work bench for awhile (from where I posted the original pics) I was going to use this in reply to the thread about perfection,really to show that I dont do perfection ...no matter how I try,and my mind races off in all directions to modify the airframe even before its built.



This side view shows the cooling radiators fitted to the side,for cooling the gizmos and operators in the former bomb bay space.



This view shows the altered "British" radar nose

These two just general camo scheme layout and arials lumps and bumps.






In my mind this is a "living" project similar to the "real"one with various modifications and ariels and engine fits being applied throughout its "life" The story of which is being written (concocted ) at the moment. :zzz:  

Im thinking flare dispensers in the engine pods (ala Tracker) maybe a glass nose with a Meteor radar,underwing jamming pods ,searchlights and of course different paint schemes.

There again ,it may (like many other of my projects) lay in a box in the attic while some othe flight of fancy takes my creative juices to the boil ( well simmer) and may well never see light of day again.  :dum:

[Damian2]

I love your A-26...  

Ypu've actually inspired me to turn mt 1/48 A-26C into a P-2/3 esque plane! I'm looking for something to make a MAD boom out of right now

AWESOME ONE DORK!

[Dork the kit slayer]

"Mad boom"? a suitable thickness piece of sprue (gate) should do it. An old drop tank blended into the tail should be able to house it.    

What do you think??  

[Dork the kit slayer]

The story starts with a grainy photograph ( ok I doctored the other one....sue me),taken at an unknown location possibly in Europe (Germany??) in 1956 of an RAF twin engined aircraft type (A-26) the order for which had been cancelled before the end of WW2.



Further research brought up no record of the type ever being used and no RAF squadron ever having them on strength. The squadron markings on an otherwise drab finish was found to be 500sqdn, a training unit, with no record of this type  being used.

The serial number was (after enhancement) found to be for an RAF "Havard"  belonging to said 500 sqdn.

From the colour scheme it is believed that the airframe was finished in standard RAF camo green /grey over PRU blue,and judging by the various odd lumps ,bumbs and ariel array that it was used as an "ELINT" spy plane. Or thought more likely a "spoof" spy plane doctored to feed false information to our enemies of the time.

It was not until 50 years later that a document uncovered by the well known aviation historian  Tarquin  "Kevin " Molestrangler,researching his now famous tome, " The ups and downs and round and rounds of a Falklands war fighter pilot" ( the book being published in landscape for obvious reasons) cast not light but even more shadow onto this unusual airframe.

Molstrangler came across a reference that, during a commando raid on Argentine Pucaras, an aircraft  bearing the same faded serial,only this time wearing Argentine roundels was photographed and then destroyed alongside anything else on the field. The plot indeed thickened. ( although quietly).

In 2006 when various British government officials were being evicted from their "perk" houses and old offices.(during the shake up) a letter,(found in the back of a desk drawer,belonging to a former minister) from the USAF(E) in denial of the British claim for compensation because "they" used an RAF camo scheme as the basis of what was known as "Europe 1" on USAF airframes. The aircraft mentioned was RAF "Wrath's" used as electronic and photo ferrets during the cold war. The standard scheme apparently being darkened in the field ,by RAF ground crew, to allow these machines to operate over the Baltic coast as well as border areas.

Wing Commander (rtd)James  Wat-Fitzme-Fitz Loosly who published in his diaries just before his untimely death (aged 123) that when he served with Triple x squadron in Germany during the fifties,the squadron operated six classified aircraft which he thinks were called Wraths, in what he called "hanky panky" missions along the Soviet border. These aircraft being supplied from CIA stocks and modified in situ for each individual mission. He jokingly refered to the spurious markings and serials as "erk" markings. This because ;if the aircraft was caught violating "enemy" airspace they could blame the spotty erk makee learnee navigator in the back for the transgression. .....Which probably accounts for training colours.  

From Mr Groinwhippet my anonymous source at the MOD the "Wraths" were a five place  electronic and photographic recce ship. The ex bomb bay being fitted as a twin operator station with belly escape chute and access . A counter measure operator was seated facing the rear in the aft glazed space and a pilot and navigator in the cockpit fitted with early ejector seats....they both must have been officers.  

There are rumours to the fact that one of these aircraft was fitted with a F 104 Starfighter radar nose and trained four Starfighter pilots seated in the bomb bay area in low flying in Germany and especially the Fulda gap area. A job that was later turned over to Canadian DC3's.........but thats just a rumour.

After over fifty years  only a few other photos of this unusual aircraft have come to light ...and those were so secret my source had to swallow them before reading.

All enquiries into the Argentine involvment with this aircraft have met with stoney silence and complete denial............but the answer is in here somewhere    ( said whilst tapping side of head)





So the original Euro I was two greys and a green.................................as if.

[seavixen]

What you been drinking buddy?    

[John Howling Mouse]

Heh, it's "The Davinci Code" of camo schemes: I like it!    

[Martin H]

What you been drinking buddy?  

with his warped mind he dont need no drink.  

nice job thou dork, love it mate  

[Dork the kit slayer]

What you   (been drinking)   buddy? 

Why thats very nice of you Seavixen....Ill have a pint of Timothy Taylors Landord...........and a bag of Twiglets.      


Zac: its the Italeri kit........a cross betwen an A26 A/B  and the K,but I liked the kit.

[datguy]

[SNIP] Further research brought up no record of the type ever being used and no RAF squadron ever having them on strength. The squadron markings on an otherwise drab finish was found to be 500sqdn, a training unit, with no record of this type  being used.

The serial number was (after enhancement) found to be for an RAF "Havard"  belonging to said 500 sqdn.

From the colour scheme it is believed that the airframe was finished in standard RAF camo green /grey over PRU blue,and judging by the various odd lumps ,bumbs and ariel array that it was used as an "ELINT" spy plane. Or thought more likely a "spoof" spy plane doctored to feed false information to our enemies of the time.

[SNIP]
... in Germany during the fifties,the squadron operated six classified aircraft which he thinks were called Wraths, in what he called "hanky panky" missions along the Soviet border. These aircraft being supplied from CIA stocks and modified in situ for each individual mission.

[SNIP]
...the "Wraths" were a five place  electronic and photographic recce ship. The ex bomb bay being fitted as a twin operator station with belly escape chute and access . A counter measure operator was seated facing the rear in the aft glazed space and a pilot and navigator in the cockpit fitted with early ejector seats....they both must have been officers. 
[SNIP]

Here it is worth quoting an actual letter to Air Enthusiast , about USAF Special Operations Force Intruder missions in Europe, which appeared in AE No.116 p.75:

"Commanders in West Germany adjusted their tactical assessments upon receipt of photos from B-26s flown by pilots, solo, who scooted across East Germany at low level, crossing the East-West border moments ahead of intercept by Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17s in the late 1940s, 1950s."

Spooky coincidence, or what?

DG

[Dork the kit slayer]

DG  that  IS  "spooky". I must admit to never having heard of those operations before. Single pilot missions ?,looks like they were trying to keep down "casualties"
Testing Soviet air defence reation times must have been a ver hairy assignment.  

[Dork the kit slayer]

I will see what can be done...alas at the moment stuck offshore  with severe weather that has grounded our choppers.