Re: Spinners' Strike Fighters Thread

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Clunk Miscellany






I've been playing around with the 'Clunk' lately and thought I'd show some piccies of it with the wing-tip rocket pods and with some missiles under it's very broad wings.

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BAC Jet Provost T.5A - No.234 (Reserve) Squadron, No.1 Tactical Weapons Unit, Royal Air Force, 1985




Just playing around with 1980's pale insignia on a grey skin. Not my favourite era for RAF markings but I do like the Jet Provost.

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Makes me wonder about a Jet Provost in desert pink (with pale/subdued markings) as a FAC aircraft during the Ninties Gulf War, as an alternative to the Buccs?

What warload are you envisaging?

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BAC Strikemaster FGA.1 - No.208 Squadron, RAF Middle East, 1991







I don't have a template for the JP or Strikemaster so I've had to screw around with GIMP's hue, chroma and lightness settings to get close to Desert Pink but, despite this short cut, it's still taken quite a few hours to get it to this stage and there's more details that I could have added. I've used small GBU-12 Paveway II's on the outer pylons with a AVQ-23E 'Pave Spike' balanced out with an ALQ-101v10 ECM pod (donated by a neighbouring Buccaneer squadron) on the inner pylons. I made good use of the Strikemasters machine guns!

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McDonnell Voodoo S.1 - No.20 Squadron, RAF Middle East, 1991







If you think the Strikemaster was unsuitable for Gulf War One (in 'what if' land) then this beast is totally unsuitable... unless you are delivering a special weapon! Hands up. I've boxed myself into a corner doing this one and I should have stopped and done a recce Voodoo instead. I might come back to that and there is also scope for doing this in anti-flash white as an emergency Valiant replacement when those cracks appeared in the Valiants wing rear spar attachment forgings.

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McDonnell CF-101A Voodoo - No.422 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force, 1964

2





Upon starting this I immediately remembered why I don't do that many Canadian what if's... there's just too many variations of national insignia!! Anyway, I much prefer the 'Big Leafy Roundel' era so I've made this with them but did wonder whether the wing roundels should be 'handed' in some way. The three-digit nose numbers use the last three of the original USAF F-101A serial numbers and the small fin numbers use the same numbers but prefixed with a '16' to make a five-digit number - this follows the real world example of the RCAF's F-101B's (which used a '17' to make a five-digit number). The piccies above show a Mk.84 2,000lb bomb on the centreline but the piccie below shows something far more sinister... a Mk.28 nuke and also some nicer fuel tanks using a quick skin I made.

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McDonnell CF-101C Voodoo - No.421 Squadron, Canadian Air Force, 1977









The skin and decals were the relatively easy part on this. The time-consuming part was getting the bomb racks (off a Jaguar) to fit and appear but the BL755's do look good under the Voodoo. Last picture: Keep the cannons!

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McDonnell RF-101D Voodoo - Voodoo Reconnaissance Flight, Grupo 2, Fuerza Aérea Argentina, 1982

After President Juan Perón was ousted during the short 'Revolución Libertadora' in 1955, US-Argentine relations improved to the extent that, in 1959, President Arturo Frondizi became the first Argentine president to visit the United States. Soon after, Argentina supported the isolation of Cuba after 1960 and also supported the American Alliance for Progress and also the American invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965. US President Lyndon Baines Johnson rewarded Argentinian President Arturo Umberto Illia with a military aid package with the main beneficiary being the Fuerza Aérea Argentina who received 20 North American F-100C Super Sabres, 15 Convair F-102A Delta Dagger interceptors and 15 McDonnell RF-101A Voodoo reconnaissance aircraft. All 50 aircraft were drawn from USAF stocks and delivered during the latter part of 1965 and early 1966.

The RF-101A Voodoo's were hastily refurbished by McDonnell to emerge as RF-101D's with all classified equipment removed and entered service in May 1966. By early 1982 the Fuerza Aérea Argentina's force of RF-101D's had dwindled to just the six aircraft of the Voodoo Reconnaissance Flight attached to the Canberra equipped Grupo 2 de Bombardeo based at Río Grande on the Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego. During the Falklands War of 1982, the RF-101D's flew several missions to locate the British fleet with a final sortie over the north-west coast of East Falkland on May 22nd to photograph the position of the British Amphibious Task Group after the landings of the previous evening. In total, the Voodoo Reconnaissance flight flew 21 'Malvinas' missions with no losses.










Another reason for pressing ahead with Operation Mikado!

N.B. The on ground & over land shots are not the Falklands and the RN aircraft carrier is a Nimitz class carrier masquerading as a fictional Elizabeth class carrier. North Sea oil revenues were buoyant back then!

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Dassault Aviation Mirage IIIOX - No.79 Squadron, Royal Australian Air Force, 1996






Basically, this an Aussie Mirage IIIO with a longer F.1 style pointed nose, IFR probe and canards added to the stock Mirage IIIO by a clever add-on by 'denissoliveira' which he made to create the real world Mirage IIIEX prototype of 1988. My version uses the stock Aussie Grey skin so I've had to recolour these attached parts and the area behind the nosecone is just a bit off (but not too bad) and I made some lo-viz Roos to complete the look.

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McDonnell Voodoo FAW.4 - No.111 Squadron, RAF Fighter Command, 1967







I've shown a 'Treble-One' Voodoo before but this one has an addition; a fixed IFR probe made for me by one of the 3D modellers over at Combat Ace (this after I'd seen one on Devilfish's Voodoo). Of course, in reality, the Voodoo was already equipped for both types of US air-to-air refuelling methods and it's retractable probe is just about where I've placed this. I'll make good use of this bolt-on probe on other stuff!

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McDonnell Voodoo FAW.4 - No.74 Squadron (The Tigers), RAF Fighter Command, 1965







Another Spinners' patented 'quickie skin' that uses the original silver skin with the areas where I want black to appear masked off and then inverted with a 65% black layer added to those areas to dampen things down. This works up to a point but it would have been loads better if the Voodoo had a proper spine like the Lightning or Hunter.

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Lockheed Nighthawk GR.1 - No.15 Squadron, RAF Middle East, 1991








Templates for the F-117A were released recently but I'm just not in the mood for camo schemes at the moment so I've knocked-up a relatively easy 'Desert Pink' scheme for the RAF's Nighthawk GR.1. Normally, the RAF finflash would go onto the fixed part of the fin (or vertical stabilizer) and not the rudder but as the butterfly tail of the F-1117A is essentially two all-moving rudders then I thought I'd do a tall finflash placed well to the rear that follows the angle of the trailing edge - I think it looks cool!

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Allo, allo. This is Nighthawk! Are you receiving me?

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McDonnell Douglas A-4H Skyhawk - Escuadrón Aéreo 2, Fuerza Aérea Uruguaya, 1989





One for Dizzyfugu!

This was a request from someone over at Combat Ace who has seen Dizzy's Uruguyan Skyhawk. It's not meant to be an exact replica and uses a nearest match camo scheme (adapted to fit the A-4H) and whilst I've added a new squadron badge the hog's face decal is not as good as Dizzy's.

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McDonnell Douglas A-4H Skyhawk - Aggressor Flight, Escuadrón Aéreo 2, Fuerza Aérea Uruguaya, 1996







Real life has slowed me down a bit over the past week and will continue to do so until well into April but I've grabbed a few hours this morning to do this Uruguayan Aggressor Skyhawk complete with lo-viz insignia, false canopy, training Sidewinders and a unit badge that gives a hint of just who is in the gunsights!