Re: Spinners' Strike Fighters Thread

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Sukhoi Su-24 'Fencer' - 735th BAP, Soviet Air Force, 1986













Added white undersurfaces and some drop tanks.

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Don't know if you can do this, but the Russians sometimes put LOTS of those little bombs on Su-24s using 6-position racks similar to US MERs. 4 x MERs on the wing pylons loaded up with Russian bombs would therefore look very credible.

OK. I created a Soviet MER (a simple 'cut and paste' minor editing exercise) and the first shot shows all four MERs loaded with a total of 24 FAB100 bombs the smallest stock Soviet bomb. The other two shots show wing tank tanks with outer MERs loaded with the smallest bomb currently in my install (a WW2 Luftwaffe 50kg bomb).

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Yakovlev Yak-34 'Buckshot-B' - Soviet Naval Aviation, 1972

The swept-wing Yak-28 had only limited success in it's 'Firebar' (interceptor) and 'Brewer' (tactical bomber) variants but a follow-on programme was authorised with the Yakovlev OKB expected to use the same general configuration. However, during the early stages of development the interceptor requirement soon evolved into a jagged highly swept-wing Mach 2 derivitive of the 'Firebar' whilst the tactical bomber evolved into a much more conservative subsonic design.

Designated Yak-34 the new tactical bomber had large non-afterburning Mikulin turbojet engines adjoining the strong and durable fuselage outboard of which were fully blown swept-wings to improve low-speed performance for short-field tactical operations whilst remaining thin enough for high transonic speed for low-level penetrability. The new design featured an internal bomb bay in which a wide range of conventional and nuclear bombs could be carried supplemented by four underwing pylons designed to carry the new family of Soviet tactical air-to-surface missiles as well as conventional bombs and rockets.

In Soviet and WarPac service the Yak-34 became a hugely succesful tactical platform with a longevity rivalling the Tu-95 and MiG-21 families.












Fleet Defence today was kindly provided by the F-111B's of VF-1 'Wolfpack' (easily outfoxed).

I was going to make this a land-based Soviet Buccaneer in a 'Fencer' blue scheme but when I started the mission and found myself on a carrier I thought it would be rude not to continue! There are two excellent Buccaneers available including this highly detailed version by 'ravenclaw_007' who has also provided equally highly detailed templates. The last shot of the Buccaneer/Buckshot isn't me returning to my home carrier it's me just about to die during an attack on an Essex-class carrier! At least I avoided the pretty poor F-111B's...

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Hawker Tempest V - No.1 (Black Watch) Squadron, Independent Scottish Air Force, 1947













Just an affectionate nod to the City of Glasgow for putting on a memorable Commonwealth Games.

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Lavochkin La-19 'Flipflop' - Soviet Naval Aviation, South Atlantic, 1982







In 'Strike Fighters 2:North Atantic' the Yak-38 'Forger' comes in this blue/green scheme and I've used those colours for a simple 'Skyhawkski'. My Soviet Naval Ensign needs a bit of work but hopefully you get the idea...


Now available for download at Combat Ace!

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Yakovlev Yak-34 'Buckshot-B' - Soviet Naval Aviation, South Atlantic, 1982












Lol - The last 8 seconds of my life!

Just trying the 'Forger' scheme on the Buccaneer. The carrier I'm taking off from is a USN carrier converted to Soviet use but the Sea King's are missing their texture, not too sure why. The carrier I'm attacking is a Nimitz class and the SAM's were murderous!

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PZL-60 Meteor F.8 - No.302 Squadron, Polish Air Force, 1952

The stunning success of Operation Market Garden and the subsequent push through Holland and across the North German Plain during the Autumn of 1944 shook the German Military High Command to it's core and eventually led to the assassination of Adolf Hitler on November 10th, 1944 when his Ju-52 transport aircraft was shot down by unknown rogue Luftwaffe pilots as the part of the Fighter Pilots Conspiracy.

The new German Military High Command concluded that it would be in the best interests of the country to throw everything into the defence of the Eastern Front and allow Allied forces in the West to advance without opposition, although the logistical chain made this advance slower than expected. On the Eastern Front there was an almost immediate slowdown in the rate of the Soviet advance and soon Soviet forces inside Poland were held at the Bialystok-Rzeszow line. By January 1944 Allied forces in the West were reaching the borders of Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland hampered only by roads clogged by evacuees and surrendering German troops but by the middle of January 1945 General Patton's Third US Army had punched through to liberate Warsaw before swinging north to meet up with Montgomery's 21st Army Group at Gdańsk. By February 8th it was all over and the formal German surrender was signed at Lublin in Eastern Poland by Grand Admiral Karl Donitz and General Walter Bedell Smith and witnessed by Russian General Ivan Susloparov and French General Francois Sevez.

The rescheduled Yalta Conference held on March 1st, 1945 saw Stalin demanding a "Soviet sphere of political influence" in Eastern and Central Europe in return for Soviet support in the Pacific War against Japan by invading Japan through Manchuria. However a last minute briefing made to President Roosevelt by Major General Kenneth Nichols on the progress on the Manhattan Project led to President Roosevelt's decision not to rely on Soviet support in the Pacific and to wholeheartedly support Winston Churchill's demand for free elections and democratic governments in Eastern and Central Europe and specifically in Poland. Churchill reminded all present that in September 1939 Britain and France had gone to war with Germany in support of Poland and nothing other than a free and democratic Poland would suffice. Roosevelt knew that Soviet spies at Los Alamos were aware of the power of the atomic bombs and also how close to operational status and used this knowledge that Stalin also knew to stiffen his resolve. In the horsetrading that followed the Western Allies essentially got what they wanted with regard to Poland with the new border essentially following the 1940 version of the Curzon Line but the the rest of Central and Eastern were handed over to the Soviet sphere of political influence.

The Allied withdrawl from Poland followed during the Spring and Summer of 1945 and culminated in the declaration of "The Third Polish Republic" on November 11th, 1945 a date chosen to coincide with the existing National Independence Day. Also on this day, and wisely for a country now surrounded by Communist states and within the Soviet sphere of influence, the new Polish Government declared its neutrality as an Act of Parliament as part of the Constitution of Poland. Led by Stanisław Mikołajczyk the new Republic of Poland had a difficult birth but the Polish people reconstructed their battered country with such vigour that by 1948 they had recovered their economy and infrastructure to pre-WW2 levels and continued this economic miracle into the 1950's and beyond.

During this tumultuous time the new Polish Air Force had a similarly difficult birth commencing with the dove-tailing of the Polish elements of the Royal Air Force (active since 1940) with the Polish People's Air Force (created in 1943 in defence of the Soviet Union). Some RAF Spitfire IX's and USAAF P-51D's were left behind at airfields in the West of the country to reform No.302 Squadron at Świdwin and a handful of elderly Yak-1 and damaged Yak-9 fighters were scraped together in the East of the country to reform the the 1st Fighter Regiment at Warsaw later renamed No.303 Squadron. During the Spring of 1946 ex-RAF Tempest V's replaced the Spitfires and Mustangs of No.302 Squadron but No.303 Squadron had to wait until 1948 to re-equip with the unpopular Avia S-199 supplied by Czechoslovakia. During 1950 both squadrons began to receive Gloster Meteor F.8's from a cancelled Egyptian order following the UN arms embargo and No.302 Squadron operated the type until 1961 when they were replaced by Dassault Super Mystères. A production licence was granted to PZL (Państwowe Zakłady Lotnicze - the State Aviation Works) to manufacture the Gloster Meteor F.8 and a total of 96 aircraft were manufactured between 1952 and 1956.















I like this one! The Third Wire Meteor F.8 is a cracker and the stock silver skin makes an ideal base for a fictional Polish Meteor F.8. I've added the Polish Coat of Arms to the pilot's bonedome and also added it to the Polish flag to create a fictional Polish finflash as repeating the checkerboard as a finflash is a bit too 'Warpac' for my (admittedly twisted) tastes.

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PZL-60 Meteor F.8 - No.317 Squadron, Polish Air Force, 1956









I thought I'd do a Polish Meteor in standard RAF Camo but then remembered that the IDF camo is also available for the Third Wire Meteor F.8 and think that the earthier tones are a better match.

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PZL-60R Meteor - No.318 Fighter-Reconnaissance Squadron, Polish Air Force, 1959













I've previously shown my fighter-recon Meteor, created by making a camera port decal and adding it to the nose, and here it is wearing a Dutch Meteor skin with PRU Blue undersides  and Polish markings.

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Sukhoi Su-19K 'Fisher' - Soviet Naval Aviation, 1983











An improved version of the Dassault Super Etendard was released recently and I fancied putting Soviet markings on the Aeronavale two-tone grey scheme.

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Supermarine Spitfire XIVe - No.302 Squadron, Polish Air Force, 1946









Strike Fighters 2 has stock Spitfires available in it's Mark 9, 14, 18, 22 and 24 versions but the 14 and 18 have the cut-down rear fuselage and I do like the classic lines of the Mark 14 so I was delighted to hear that a XIVe was being released by the Development A-Team. It comes with standard RAF Camo and the skinner has very generously given me blank skins for both camo and NMF so expect to see some 'what if' Spitfire 14's based around those two schemes. For this Polish Mark 14 I've just added a red spinner and Polish markings. Sadly, the 3D model has a couple of tears in it but I can work around that.

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Supermarine Spitfire XIVe - HävLLv 31, Ilmavoimat, 1947











I normally show HävLLv 31 'what ifs' with their famous Lynx motif but used the earlier bat motif seen on their Me-109G's. The blank NMF has been given a blue spinner and new Ilmavoimat decals including 'SP' codes for Spitfire.

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Hispano Aviación Spitfire XIVe - Ala 36, Ejército del Aire, 1952

The UN Conference on International Organisation opened in San Francisco on April 25th, 1945 and quickly drafted the historic United Nations Charter with the United Nations officially coming into existence on October 24th, 1945 and headed by the five permanent members of the Security Council; France, the Republic of China, the Soviet Union, the UK and the US. The first meetings of the United Nations General Assembly took place in London in early 1946 and in an effort led by the Allied Powers, the United Nations placed a trade embargo on Spain for it's part in aiding Germany and the Axis Powers during WW2. In February 1946, France closed it's border to commerce with Spain following the execution of an exiled Republican who had fought in the French Resistance. These events quickly resulted in the economic and diplomatic isolation of Spain, badly hindering any hope of progress for the Spanish economy.

During December 1946, the United Nations recommended that all member states should withdraw their ambassadors from Madrid and in early 1947 Spain was excluded from the Marshall Plan for the economic recovery of Europe as long as the Franco dictatorship remained. Economically and culturally isolated from the outside world, the Spanish people quickly became disillusioned with the military dictatorship seeing all trade unions and political parties banned (except for the official Falange party). In June 1947, just when it seemed that a violent revolution or re-ignition of the Spanish Civil War would result, Franco made an unexpected approach to the United Nations for assistance and applied to join the European Recovery Program. Only in later years, and after Franco's death in 1975, would it be revealed that this event was due to the political horse-trading between President Truman and Franco with the former appreciative of Franco's aggressive anti-communist policies and the latter seeking the support of the United States over the retention of it's African colonies and the return of Gibraltar from the United Kingdom.

In the Autumn of 1947, Ejército del Aire (EDA) officials began the slow modernisation of the EDA with the acquisition of 38 ex-RAF Spitfire XIVe's that were refurbished by Hispano Aviación at it's Tablada factory in Seville with the first Spitfires entering EDA service with Ala 36 at Alcantarilla Air Base near Murcia in May 1948. Although outdated by modern Western standards, the EDA's Spitfires were well-suited for the task of controlling Spanish colonial territories in Africa where a higher level of technology was unnecessary. In EDA service the Spitfire's armament consisted of two 20 mm Hispano-Suiza 404/408 cannons plus two Oerlikon-built M2 Browning machine guns. It remained in service until late 1965 and surviving examples then embarked upon a successful theatrical career starting with the 1969 film 'Battle of Britain'.













I've made a shortlist of nations who didn't operate the Spitfire and decided to do a Spanish Spitfire. For a bit of guidance I looked at Spain's main post-war piston-engined fighter the distinctive Hispano Aviación HA-1112-M1L 'Buchon' and dressed my Spitfire up in a similar style by matting down the silver to grey and adding suitable markings including a new Ala 36 motif. The forwardmost top of the rudder could do with a lick of paint but the 'Aspa de San Andrés' is a right fiddle to do on anything that I place into Ejército del Aire service!

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Valmet T-100 Myrsky - Hävittäjälentolaivue 11, Ilmavoimat, 1947

In September 1944 the new Finnish Government led by Prime Minister Urho Jonas Castrén began to plan ahead for an uncertain future after the end of WW2 and maintaining the independence of the country was right at the top of the agenda. During the winter of 1944-1945 Jari Kijanen, a young aeronautical engineer from Kouvola, began the design of an interceptor fighter for the Ilmavoimat with a heavy armament and good endurance. Designated as the T-100 interceptor project, Kijanen's radical design used an unusual canard configuration with tricycle landing gear, a rear mounted engine and a jettisonable propeller to prevent the pilot from hitting the rear-mounted propeller when bailing out. Whilst Finland had no suitable aero engines Kijanen gambled on the availability of the Rolls-Royce Merlin but cleverly designed a modular engine bay that could accommodate any contemporary liquid-cooled engine such as the Klimov VK-107 or DB605. The new Prime Minister Juho Kusti Paasikivi approved the T-100 design and in February 1945 a production order was given to the newly formed Kijanen Ilmailu Company to produce 2 prototype and 80 production aircraft although this company was quickly absorbed into the state owned Valtion Metallitehtaat (Valmet) in 1946.

A mixture of national pride and state ownership saw the design progress quickly and Valmet benefited from the British Government's decision to grant an export licence to Rolls-Royce for the export of the Merlin 66 engine rated at 1,720 hp and fitted with a Bendix-Stromberg anti-g carburetor although the first prototype was temporarily equipped with a DB605 borrowed from an Ilmavoimat Me-109G-6. Production machines, by now christened 'Myrsky' (Tempest), were all powered by Merlin 66 engines and were armed with four of the new lightweight Soviet Berezin B-20 cannons in the nose. Under the terms of the 1947 Paris Agreement the aircraft had no facility for carrying offensive weapons and no pylons were ever fitted to the T-100, not even for drop tanks. Entering service in June 1948, the T-100 served with five Ilmavoimat squadrons and although the flight performance was inferior to contemporary fighter aircraft already in service the T-100 was a rugged aircraft with generally good handling charcteristics. Consideration was given to modifying the T-100 airframe to accommodate the De Havilland Ghost jet engine (in very much the same way that Saab did with the J21) but by this time Kijanen was already sketching the Valmet T-122 Nuoli delta-winged supersonic interceptor and the proposed conversion was dropped in favour of the new design.













This is the Curtiss P-55 Ascender masquerading as the Valmet T-100 Myrsky (Tempest). It's an older 3D model but it's always great to see this very futuristic-looking aircraft in action - it definitely has a 'Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow' look about it! The P-55 was probably one of the first aircraft that I made my own simple templates for as I wanted to make an RAF version (search this thread using 'Ascender') and it's just a matter of recolouring and adding the decals.

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Wedell-Williams P-34A Excalibur - 78th Pursuit Group, United States Army Air Corps, Hawaii, 1941

During the early 1930's United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) officials noticed that many private racing aircraft were reaching speeds far faster than the front-line pursuit aircraft types then in service and soon identified that the Wedell-Williams Model 44 air racer, as flown by Jimmy Wedell, had the most potential of being adapted to military service. In April 1934, USAAC officials met Marguerite Clark Williams (widow of millionaire Harry P. Williams) and offered the Wedell-Williams Air Service Corporation a contract to urgently produce a pursuit fighter with a maximum speed in excess of 300mph and with an armament of four .30 calibre M2 AN Browning machine guns.

By the Summer of 1935 the Wedell-Williams proposal had evolved into a sleek design powered by a Rolls-Royce Kestrel inline engine and characterised by an extremely long nose that set the cockpit towards the rear of the fuselage. Whilst the Kestrel engine was based on the excellent Curtiss D-12 'cast-block' engine the Kestrel introduced a new pressurised cooling system allowing a far lower frontal area for cooling and a corresponding increase in speed due to the reduced drag which was further reduced by the early adoption of a retractable landing gear and a new wing airfoil profile. On October 31st, 1935 the USAAC issued the XP-34 designation and ordered 1 prototype, 9 pre-production and 190 production aircraft. The prototype XP-34 took to the air for the first time on August 15th, 1936 and the maiden flight of the first production aircraft took place on December 24th, 1937. Entering service as the P-34A in March 1938 with the 78th Pursuit Group at Wheeler Army Airfield, Hawaii the P-34A's of the 78th and 15th Pursuit Groups were responsible for air defense of the Hawaiian Islands Territory and were scheduled to be replaced by P-40C's during December 1941 when Wheeler Army Airfield was hit by the first Japanese attack on December 7th, 1941 as a prelude to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Most of the P-34A's were destroyed on the ground but 12 pilots assigned to the 15th Pursuit Group managed to get their P-34A's into the air to score some of the first American victories of World War II.











A really sweet Caudron-Renault C.714 Cyclone was released recently and I've taken some time out to make my own simple template for it and took some time out to learn how to do fabric control surfaces but then chose to do a USAAC version that has rudder stripes which almost completely mask the effect. Ho-hum.