Re: Spinners' Strike Fighters Thread

[SPINNERS]

Dassault Super Mystère - 2nd Squadron, Belgian Air Force, 1966





This USAF SEA Camo for the Super Mystère by 'Kulbit(80)' originally had French markings but makes a good Belgian Air Force SMB2. I've now found a really good template and will come back to this handsome aircraft.

[SPINNERS]

Dassault Super Mystère B.2N - 2nd Squadron, Belgian Air Force, 1966

Dassault Super Mystère B.2N - Eskadrille 726, Royal Danish Air Force, 1968

Dassault Super Mystère B.2N - Jagdgeschwader 71 "Richthofen", German Air Force, 1960

Dassault Super Mystère B.2L - 8th Squadron, Lebanese Air Force, 1967


I'm thinking that the B.2N was a NATO standard Super Mystère (along the lines of the NATO NBMR-1 competition) operated by many NATO members in the late 1950's and 1960's. The Lebanese B.2L has been shown before.

[SPINNERS]

Dassault Super Mystère B.2N - Eskadrille 726, Royal Danish Air Force, 1968

[SPINNERS]

Dassault Dart FGR.2 - No.54 Squadron, 38 Group, Royal Air Force, 1982







An updated Mirage F.1CT was released recently and it's a stunning 3D model with awesome skins. I've needed to overpaint the painted-on national markings before adding my own RAF markings as decals and also painting the radome black. The skins are super hi-rez so overpainting the multitude of stencilling (including NE PAS MARCHER) just ain't going to happen! In my 'what if' world, the RAF had already purchased the delta-winged Mirage as a Hunter replacement and I don't think it's right to call the totally different F.1 by the same name so I've gone for Dart... but I'm not too happy about it, but just can't get another name sorted.

[SPINNERS]

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15bis - Grupo Aéreo de Caza 32, Fuerza Aérea Boliviana, 1960








I've been having a play with this 'beta' MiG-15bis from the DAT boys which comes with a blank silver skin that can be repurposed as grey but I'm sticking with the silver (or NMF). I thought I'd look for a 'what if' South American operator and plumped for Bolivia - don't ask why! It is my first Bolivian 'what if' and I've had a blast with it. The painted rudder (and also the tiger on the fin) has been added directly onto the skin bitmap with the roundels and numbers added as decals. I quite like the chunky nose numbers but they take much longer to make!

[SPINNERS]

Avro Canada CF-100 Mk4 - 21°Gruppo, 53°Stormo, Aeronautica Militare, 1960







by
Back in the mid-1970's I knew nothing about the Avro Canada CF-100 until it was covered in depth in 'Wings' (a weekly aviation magazine) and I've always liked it despite its rather pedestrian shape. Bill Gunston regarded it as the best long-range interceptor of the first half of the 1950's and could not understand why it was not adopted by the RAF. Anyway, this is a cracking 3D model with awesome NMF and Camo skins and I've used the latter with Italian markings (21°Gruppo would later operate the Starfighter) although I'm not happy with the codes - they are not quite right but I can't seem to find the exact typeface.

[SPINNERS]

'What If' CF-100 export customers


1. Avro Canada CF-100 Mk.4 - 21° Gruppo, 53° Stormo, Aeronautica Militare, 1960

2. Avro Canada CF-100 Mk.4 - 101 Squadron, Israeli Air Force, 1967

3. Avro Canada CF-100 Mk.4 - No.153 Squadron, Royal Air Force, 1957

4. Avro Canada CF-100 Mk.4 - Fliegerstaffel 16, Swiss Air Force, 1962

I've shown all of these before individually but just love knocking up these 'colour plates' (lol) created using GIMP and also a splendid bit of software created for Strike Fighters called LODViewer (LOD is the 3D model) by 'mue'. It comes in handy in so many ways for skinning and decaling and this ability to photograph the profile view (as well as plan view and head-on view) is the cherry on the cake for me! You'll note that the ejection seats are not shown and that's because they are different 3D models so do not show up when viewing the aircraft and whilst I could photoshop them in I'm really not that bothered.

[SPINNERS]

Supermarine Swift Mk.56 - No.24 Squadron, Indian Air Force, 1959






This is the Swift FR.5, quite an old 3D model now, but I'm pretending it's somewhere between an F.Mk.3 and an FR.5 in Indian Air Force service instead of the Hunter

[SPINNERS]

'What If' F-100 Super Sabres



Only the third one down (JG71) is new and I'll do a photoset for that one asap.

[SPINNERS]

Just found the back story

North American (Rockwell) F-100G Super Sabre - 131st TFS, 104th TFW, Massachusetts ANG, 1982

President James Earl 'Jimmy' Carter started his presidency in January 1977 with a detailed review of the US military budget and his most high-profile decision was the cancellation of the Rockwell B-1A bomber programme in June 1977. But many smaller programmes were cut or cancelled too along with the postponement of the re-equipping of TAC and ANG units with new aircraft types. F-16A and A-10A production was slowed down and many TAC and ANG units were instructed to hold on to their F-100's and F-105's for an indefinite period. In a genuine (but actually insulting) compensatory gesture Rockwell were given a $45million contract to upgrade 90 F-100D's for continued service with the ANG with the aircraft emerging from their Columbus, Ohio plant as F-100G's with refurbished engines, partially re-skinned wings and minor avionics upgrades.

The first unit to receive F-100G's was the 131st Tactical Fighter Squadron based at Barnes Municipal Airport in Westfield who had been scheduled to convert from the F-100D to A-10A's but instead received F-100G's which served until 1986.

[SPINNERS]

North American F-100D Super Sabre - JG71, German Air Force, 1964










Pellson has a thread going at the Current and Finished Projects section entitled 'The F-100S - or what the Hun should have become' and he starts with some pretty amazing artwork of a 'Black Tulip' F-100D but in camo. I thought I'd give it a go but on a NMF skin and I'm generally happy with how it finished. I started with some trepidation as the intake area is spread over six segments and the triangular petals need to join at their tips and also bend around the curves. The generally flat vertical tail should have been a doddle but the rudder is separate and the painted areas need to cut out and moved to where the rudder is mapped. Ugh! I scaled up the stock NMF skins from 1024x1024 to 2048x2048 to make it a bit easier on the eyes and painted the colourful black petal markings onto the skin and used my normal method of decals for everything else. It's taken quite a few hours but I'm actually surprised how good it looks. Unfortunately, there are a couple of little vents towards the nose intake that clash with the painted-on petals and can't be painted with any accuracy so they have been left in NMF and the rudder doesn't quite blend into the fin. I quite enjoyed working out how to do this and might try it again sometime... but not just yet!

[SPINNERS]

Grumman F8F Bearcat - Fighter Leaders School, Royal New Zealand Air Force, 1946






I quite like the Grumman Bearcat and thought I'd do one in RNZAF markings but decided to remake the roundels/starbars as my previous versions were a bit wonky. To cover all the various versions of roundel/starbar would take forever so I focused on the two types seen on real world Kiwi Corsairs and used the Ventura decal sheet (or rather a photo of it) as a guide to the proportions. I'm quite happy with them but they do get lost against the blue skin as did my original black serial numbers so I remade them in the same yellow as the fuselage roundel/starbar.

[SPINNERS]

Supermarine Swift F.6 - No.56 Squadron, RAF Fighter Command, 1958








This is the Swift FR.5 masquerading as the Swift F.6 interceptor fighter equipped with reheat and Firestreak missiles (apparently, there was to be a PR.6 unarmed photo reconnaissance version). I removed the draggy looking belly tank off the FR.5 3D model and gave it underwing fuel tanks that actually slightly clash with the main undercarriage. It doesn't have proper A.I. radar and the small black nose cone covers the nose-mounted ranging radar just like on the Hawker Hunter. Once again, No.56 Squadron have the misfortune of operating a fighter variant of the Swift...

[SPINNERS]

Gloster Meteor F.Mk.V - No.74 Squadron, RAF Fighter Command, 1946

With a forecast shortage of Rolls-Royce Derwent jet engines the designers at Gloster's quickly introduced the Meteor F.Mk.V an interim design powered by two Bristol Centaurus 18-cylinder, air-cooled, two-row radial engine each enclosed in an extremely neat installation and utilising direct fuel injection to produce 2,750 h.p. per engine. Entering service with No.74 Squadron in the Spring of 1946 the Meteor F.Mk.V was used to combat the 'tip and run' attacks by Luftwaffe Blohm & Voss P 170 fast bombers in the Summer of 1946 before being transferred to RAF South-East Asia Command as part of 'Tiger Force'.










This is NOT the Trent Meteor (an F.MkI converted to use the Rolls-Royce Trent turbo-prop) although by chance one of my serial numbers (EE227) is the actual Trent Meteor. Doh! Anyway, back in 2014 the DAT released this prop-powered Meteor as the Gloster Comet with a fairly rough skin and I noticed that the skin for their lovely Meteor F.MkIII fits it a treat with just a tiny modification of adding the prop and spinner. As a Meteor fan I really like this and the Meteor is really well covered in Strike Fighters with the F.8 covered by Third Wire and all main variants covered elsewhere included the NF's.

[SPINNERS]

Gloster Meteor F.Mk.V - No.34 Squadron, RAF Pacific Command, 1946







Ooooh, I quite like this! I've used the NMF skin from the Meteor Mk.III and I've overpainted the post-war red/white/blue markings with BPF 'starbars' and a simple blue & white finflash. Prop spinners and squadron codes are in blue and I've added in some legacy SEAC stripes in blue as they might have been used in the Pacific. As the finflash occupies the space where a SEAC fin band would go I've used some blue square numbers lower down the fin.