THE EMPIRES TWILIGHT

[sotoolslinger]

Tell the boy I said that it is excellent

[pyro-manic]

Looks mighty good from here! Nice to see another update on this epic thread.

[BlackOps]

Quite nice. 

[Taiidantomcat]

Sweet!! 

[Brian da Basher]

Your son has some serious painting skills and that Twin Otter is hot!

Brian da Basher

[thedarkmaster]

After the end of WWII the various allies walked away with amounts of Nazi technology, the Westland Company found itself with the blueprints to various Horten aircraft.
However the then UK govenment was more interested in saving money than cutting edge military designs and the whole project slowly limped along until the early 1950's when a much need boost was given to all uk design teams.
Westland used this boost to revive the long overlooked Horten blueprints to make an offer to the RAF for a flying-wing type craft.
Thus was born the Westland Albatross, a recon and fighter design, looking much like a Horten but with added stabilisers to please a conservative RAF.
By the time the design had entered service in 1958 the New Commonwealth was the Major customer for the aircraft with the RAF RSAAF and RNzAF all taking the design though by this time someone at Westland had remembered the old Pterodactyl design and renamed the "bird" accordingly.
The craft served mainly with oversea bases and was in service with the RNzAF until 1979, though it was only in RAF service until 1964.
The craft is portrayed as a 231sqd machine based at RAF Akritouri in 1962.
















The aircraft is an mpm kit with the fins from an east german kit of a BE12, other bits come from the spares box and the decals are a mixture of Freightdog and Fantasy printshop.
The paint is my usual Wilkinson's white with the red fron Humberol.

[sotoolslinger]

COOOL

[Taiidantomcat]

Excellent 

[Captain Canada]

Boy...I've got some catching up to do !

Avro Arrow-Wow. What a beautiful rendition. Love the paint and the weathering, makes her look so tough. And the refueling probe is a great idea, really seems to shake up the look, make it more workman like. I really like the pic from the rear of the a/c. Looks perfect !

Canberra-What an idea ! And again, the paint and panles look awesome, make it look like she's out there working hard.

Tutor ! Nice one. Looks like it could sneak right into a Snowbirds formation ! Mind you, the pilot probably wouldn't be able to keep up with all those CDNs.....



Firestorm- A very cool looking aeroplane. That's the kind you want to fly around the room and do some touch-and-goes with.

Twotter- Awesome ! I thought it was an Antarctic Flight bird at first, until I read the story. If you ever see Princess Royal again, tell her it's been long enough, and we want our plane back !

Keep up the great work !

[pyro-manic]

The Pteradon is really nice! I do think the wingtip fins are a touch too big, but it's a great-looking bird, and a unique take on the Ho229.

[ChernayaAkula]

Yeah! The Pteranodon rocks! 

[thedarkmaster]

During the early eighties the govenment of New Zealand got more and more socialist and pasifist in it's outlook, whilst they did not want to leave the New Commonwealth they did not want to spend the money on front line combat aircraft nor put too many of their citizens in harms way.

At the head of nations conferance in Durban in 1984 New Zealand announced that hence forth its only air defence fighter would be some aging Lightnings and Phantoms, which would only be based in country and that it's future New Commonwealth commitments would be met by the deployment of transport aircraft to support member nations.

New Zealand started to search the world for suitabls aircraft for it's needs, at the time the US was just too expensive but the USSR was in desperate need of foreign reserves and to earn them by selling off surplus military stock siuted the Kremlin fine.

So New Zealand found itself in possesion of Antonov 2's, 12's, 14's, 22's, 26's and 74's as well as Beriev 12's and Ilyushin 76's.

The aircraft below is an Antonov 74, named the Auckland in RNzAF sevice. It is in the four colour wrap around scheme the aircraft came delivered in, a scheme that New Commonwealth garrisons and deployments would come to recognise in the next few years.

this Particular aircraft was seving in Malaya supporting British forces in the ongoing confrontation with Indonesia in 1989' and in fact probably saw more combat than a front line fighter ever would have !



















The aircraft is painted in the excellant White Ensigh modern Russian range, the decals are Extradecal and a gift from a site member.

[ChernayaAkula]

Wow! Looks great and those colours! 

[thedarkmaster]

THE B.A.C. GRIFFEN FR3

The RAF and the New Commonwealth Air Committe issued in late 1987 a memoramdum of understanding concerning a light weight fighter for tactical defence of New commonwealth naval bases and other isolated garrisons ,ie Aden, Belize and the Falklands.

Many of the worlds fighter manufactures responded with offers for such aircraft as f16's Mirage F1's and even Mig products, but the Commonwealth wanted a home grown product and so turned to the B.A.C for its design.

The B.A.C. design was based upon information gained from the old Fairey aviation research and from information passed on from France's Nord and Dassult, the aircraft was a delts wing with fully movable front canards creating a unstable dogfighter capable of exceptional dog fight manouvers.

A real breakthrough in RAF capability the Griffen was the first flr by wire craft in service, the first with the new mk7 fireflash and the fist with the new generation of Rolls Royse engines currently under development and the first with built in potential for upgrades.

The craft below is modeled as a craft from 23sqd serving in Belize in early 1991, all that is known of this craft is that it was destroyedin combay with unidentifyed raiders during the 91 disaster.















the a/c is a Nord Griffen with a few bits from the spares box, paint is my usual method

[ysi_maniac]

Love Nord Griffon!