THE EMPIRES TWILIGHT

[thedarkmaster]

Next civil aircraft is ready and should be photoed and backstoried by tomorrow 

[thedarkmaster]

Beoing 707, British United Island Airways, London-Heathrow 1972

British United Island Airways (BUIA) was formed in November 1968 as part of a reorganisation of the BUA group of companies. It was a regional sister airline of British United Airways (BUA), Britain's largest wholly private, independent airline of the 1960s. It operated a network of regional, short-haul scheduled routes linking a variety of destinations within the British Isles and Continental Europe, including year-round services from both Channel Islands to BUA's Gatwick base.

BUIA's origins could be traced to the BUA group's acquisition of Jersey Airlines and Silver City Airways in 1962. BUA's management amalgamated the Channel Islands scheduled passenger and freight services of these airlines (named the Duchess Services by Jersey Airlines) and Silver City's northern division to create a single airline, BUA (C

BUIA's creation followed the BUA group's 1968 reorganisation. It involved merging the operations of Channels Islands based BUA (C.I.), Isle of Man based British United (Manx) Airways and Morton Air Services, operating a diverse fleet including  Vikers Viscounts, ex RAF surpus Dakotas, and on it's flagship route from London to Paris Beoing 707's.





























the BUIA is a real airline,  (it operated Viscounts and DC3's in and around the channel islands mainly but never 707's, the colour scheme is the same as on the dc3s) it was absorbed by British Caladonian in 1970 i believe.

Decals are home made not sure about the aircraft came out of a bag in the loft !!

another in the civil part of the thread, which seems to be taking over at the moment


A/c 134

[hurricanemk1c]

Hmm , nice 707!

[Taiidantomcat]

Great!! 

[Luis Almeida]

awesome 707

[PR19_Kit]

Nice one Tim! 

That 707 looks like the old Frog kit, re-moulded by Novo and others. It was quite accurate apart from having four turb-alternator fairings on top of the engines, just as yours has. In reality most 707s only had two or three of them, the other engines having a 'straight in' pylon.

I used three of the Novo 707s to make my 707-800, and I can attest to how nicely it goes together, much better than the Airfix one.

[thedarkmaster]

Vickers Viscount V800, Royal Libiyan Airlines, Tripoli 1969.

Royal Libyan Airlines was established in 1964 as Kingdom of Libya Airlines and started services in October 1965 using Viscount Turboprpos to London. It later operated as Libyan Arab Airlines and finally as Royal Libyan  Airlines. Boeing 727 aircraft were operated on European services during the late 1970s and early 1980s, however the mainstay of the fleet until the early 1990's was the Viscount with over 20+ operated mostly on the european and African parts of the network.




































loosely based upon Lbiyan Arab Airlines but with no anti monachary coup in this timeline it stays a " Royal " airline. Decals are based upon other Viscounts schemes i could get but are essentially home made. Many thanks to Jaybee for the kit    ,


I know this bit is not part of the thread but look what I have been Given to look after as crew chief at the local air museum








how happy do i look             

Hunter T7         


A/C 135

[Howard of Effingham]

who did that hunter T7 used to belong to? [air force wise....]

the libyan viscount floats me boat.

what paint did you use for the fuselage stripe?

[thedarkmaster]

the strip on the viscount is decal printed from my inkjet printer,

the Hunter is ex RAF, used to be on the Stength of 11sqd during their Bucaneer days as a two seat type for  " on the job" training.

[hurricanemk1c]

Nice Viscount!

Who made the kit?

[JayBee]

S&M

Hannants may still have it.

JayBee

[thedarkmaster]

Die Arbeitskraft- und Landwirtluftfahrtindustrie, Erich Mielke 211, Luftstreitkräfte der NVA, Cottbus 1961

The Erich Mielke 211 was developed by East German stste aviation as a point defence fighter for it and other warpac members. however due to behind the scenes Soviet pressure only the East German Airforce adoppted the aircraft and only in limited numbers.

Never used in combat and from records examined after the 91 disaster it seems that the aircraft was hardly combat worthy with severe handling problems and a high accident rate, which accounts for the low numbers ever in service, however the east German regime persavered with production and would accept no critasism from it's airforce of the aircraft.

kept in service until the middle 1980's well past its obsalecance and need for retirement all where almost imediatly scrapped and none remain to this day.







































not sure about this one but hey........you never know.    

made from bits and bobs from the spares box, I think the basic aircraft is a Vacform Lavochkin of some sort and the wing tip tanks come from that endless box of spares Chadders gave me, decals are just spares from the box.



A/C 136

[JayBee]

The La-15 was a much liked aircraft by the pilots that got to fly it, it was not used in great numbers by the Soviet Union.
Why?
The Mig-15 was a much tougher airframe that could stand up to the handling of the average squadron pilot, the La-15 was less robust, but in terms of handling it was the better aircraft.
However I am not surprised that with those tip tanks, which the real La-15 never had, it could have been a right biiiiitch (Russian spelling ) to fly.

JimB

[Geoff]

Like this one a lot La-15 with F-100 tanks (?) on the wingtips.
I suspect a spin would rip the wings off lol.

[Tophe]

Wonderful Do you count it as triplex boom or what (in aeronautical taxonomy)?