1:35 Aussie Mi-24 Hind

[GrubbyFingers]

Hi Guys, I'm a newby here. Jeffry found my post in another place and invited me here to play.

I hope you enjoy the build.

Graeme.

By the way, Jschmus, you are quite right, they are 19 shot pods. Tell me about your load-out thoughts, I'm always open to new ideas and I'd like to hear yours.

1:35 Mil Mi-24 Kangaroo Model Build

I was fortunate enough to be given this mammoth kit as a leaving present from my last job. I can only think they were really happy to see me go! I've been researching colour and marking schemes since. I found many schemes, but none that I found attractive. I'm a visual kinda guy and I knew I wouldn't be able to do the kit, and the thought behind the present, justice if my heart wasn't in it.
Then the final flight of the Australian Army Hueys was announced and it got me thinking: What if the Tiger hadn't been selected as a replacement, but we bought some Mi-24s instead? Bingo. All the pieces fell into place and the decision was made. I'd build the Mi-24 as a second-generation Bushranger gunship. The colour scheme would be taken directly from the Army Black Hawk and the weapons and some of the systems would be Westernised. A name for this beast? Looking at the shape, it just had to be "Kangaroo".



Mi-24K "Kangaroo" colour scheme

<h2>The Kit</h2>



I'm sure most of you would be aware of the existence of this kit. It caused quite a stir when it was released in 2005 and has proven very popular with many examples appearing in model comps and website builds.
<p>Cybermodeler's review can be found here. There are pics of the sprues etc there, so I won't reproduce them here. There's also a build thread in the Large Scale Planes forum where one guy has really gone to town to correct the small errors in the kit's shape. More power to him! You can see his work here.
<p>My point of view is that the kit is close enough to keep me VERY happy, and seeing as I'm doing a "What-if?" build anyway, it hardly seems relevant.

<h2>Modifications</h2>

So, time to raid the spares box and see what I have lying around to Westernise this Rhino. The R.A.A.F. Bushranger Huey gunships had seven-tube rocket pods and 7.62mm miniguns on the racks and two pairs of M60s on pintle mounts. In keeping with the spirit of the original, I'm thinking guns and rockets as primary weapons are the go. A pair of floor-mounted Miniguns poking out the doors would be nice. I can get these from the Dragon UH-1N kit, along with their ammo bin.



Under the wings, a pair of 19 tube launchers from the Black Hawk DAP kit and the canon pods from the Hind should work well. For the wingtips, what could be better than a full complement of four Hellfires under each tip. These are from the MRC AH-1W.



For defence against air attack a pair of Sidewinders mounted over the wings, or on the outer ends, will be added too. I can scrounge these from a Revell 1:32 Phantom II I have in Pandora's Box (the garage).
<p>Under the nose, replacing the Russian gun with a Bushmaster chain gun would seem most appropriate. I may have to scratch that one up, based on the Tiger unit. Or see if I can get one from an Apache. An internal fuel tank, ala DAP Black Hawk, would be good too. That particular part is way too wide for the Hind, so I'll use something else.
<p>The list of intended mods includes:

- Refuelling Probe from DAP Black Hawk

- Internal fuel tank in cabin

- Miniguns firing out cabin doors

- 14-tube rocket launchers, cannon pods, Hellfire missiles and Sidewinders on, under and around the wings

- Bushmaster chain gun under nose

- IR beacon from AH-1W

- Aerial suite as per the ADF Tigers

- Other bits and pieces like steps, tie-downs, Black Hawk seats, cabin interior walls etc.


<h2>The Build Begins</h2>
First thing is to plan where all the different new bits are going to fit in the interior. So the fuselage and main interior bits are dry assembled so the real planning can begin (Has horrible thought: What if none of this stuff actually fits?)

We shall see!

[Jeffry Fontaine]

Graeme,

Welcome aboard the WHIF Forums.  Looking forward to seeing more of your work.  The Hind/Kangaroo is definitely a great way to make a good first impression here. 

[philp]

Nice entry, looking forward to the build.

Did you consider Stingers instead of Sidewinders?

[Logan Hartke]

Great minds think alike, Graeme.

Have you seen my Aussie Hind profile?

Here's the full size and full backstory.

I even have 19-round rocket pods and four-packs of Hellfires on each wing.  My camo is a bit more directly inspired by the Tiger as mine was meant to complement it more than replace it.  I replaced the Russian 12.7mm machine gun with an AH-1W's 20mm cannon but in the original turret.  The US Army and at least one European have done the same 20mm mod for the Hind.  It works.

Welcome to the forum!  I look forward to seeing your model finished!

Cheers,

Logan

[upnorth]

I love that Idea!

However, from a plausibility standpoint, you might want to consider reducing your Hellfire wingtip loads to two Hellfires per wingtip. I'm not sure how much those wingtip stations are stressed to carry in real life, but I have a feeling that four Hellfires plus the mounting rack for them would be pushing it.

There is also the more important issue of ground clearance. The Hind sits at a distinctly tail down angle and without armament, the wingtips sit almost directly in line with the fuselage bottom. So youd have no greater clearance for anything hanging from them than you would anything mounted on the underside of the fuselage in line with them.

If you had the Hind on a level, paved tarmac you might be able to get the four Hellfires to fit, but once out in the bush, if you had to put it on unlevel or soft natural ground to extract troops, you'd likely have some very serious ground clearance issues.

Here's a few pictures I've taken of Hinds that might give you some idea of the ground clearance. Bear in mind that these aircraft are largely unburdened so there isn't really much but the aircraft's own weight on the main gear:

[Sauragnmon]

The Hind is just beefy, and the Aussie Hind is sexy.

Door Miniguns - I question that loading option, as I wonder if those weapons are oversized for the positions, as they are not a traditional fixed mounting similar to the MG mountings on the Hueys.

Hellfires - you'd want to hang those on the Inner pylons, which are stressed for heavier payloads, such as the 500L drop tanks, Fuel Air bombs and the like.

Rockets - standard rocket pods can be hung from the outer wing pylons.

Wingtips - might I suggest... Stingers?  The wingtips don't carry a lot of payload, so you can't put a whole lot there.

Chaingun - seriously, wicked idea.

[upnorth]

As I think about it, even if you wanted to put a cluster of four Hellfires on an inner pylon, you'd have to shift the position of the inner pylons a bit to spread them enough to get clearance between the load on one and the load on the other. They are fairly close together on the actual aircraft.

[GrubbyFingers]

Hi Guys,  Thanks for the feedback.

Logan, that's a ripper, mate! It's nice to see such a good render, it let's me know this is going to look half decent when it's done. very nice work.

As far as the load-out goes, don't forget the Aussie hinds are the "K" variant with the strengthened wing spars and shortened wing-end pylons, so ground clearance and load aren't an issue. (I could get used to the WHIF stuff, you can just make it up as you go along!). It looks good with the AH-1W cannon, too. I have one of those ...hmmm. Nah, it's gotta be a chain gun. And as for disembarking the troops, take a look at the photos ... there won't be any troops in that cabin!

I thought of fuel tanks from the Black Hawk too, but I didn't like the idea of an over-zealous door gunner sawing into one with his minigun. Goodnight Irene.

I do have plenty of Stingers in the spares box. I just like the over-the-top grunt of the Hellfire.

Anyway: On with the build ...

I've snipped off a few of the critical interior parts and put them together in a bit of a dry run to see if the whole thing will actually fit.





It looks like I can shorten the fuel tank back to the outside straps and that should then fit within the fuselage. That's good. The ammo bins sit nicely in front of the tank, that's good too. I can see the ammo belts being run along the ceiling and dropping down to the guns.

I found the minigun base plates from the Dragon UH-1N were very large, and that the Black Hawk had similar mounts, but considerably smaller. With space at a premium, the smaller ones have been dropped in with some Black Hawk seats behind. It is all looking a bit squishy. I may need to shorten the squabs on the gunner's seats. I'll decide that once the guns are positioned. It appears that sometimes the gunners didn't have seats and stood or crouched behind the miniguns. The miniguns and seats may need to be slid backward so they match up with the door openings. This would also facilitate access to the avionics area.

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

Woah...... a 1:35 Hind What If project !

Now that's a way to get folks attention. Good luck DirtyDigits !

Ian

[upnorth]

As far as the load-out goes, don't forget the Aussie hinds are the "K" variant with the strengthened wing spars and shortened wing-end pylons, so ground clearance and load aren't an issue. (I could get used to the WHIF stuff, you can just make it up as you go along!). It looks good with the AH-1W cannon, too. I have one of those ...hmmm. Nah, it's gotta be a chain gun. And as for disembarking the troops, take a look at the photos ... there won't be any troops in that cabin!

I hate to be a nitpicker, especially on this site

Shortening the wing tip pylons certainly will help you bring up the loading that you can put on them, but it could cause clearance issues in the opposite way, that being clearance from the wing itself if you try to put the four Hellfires on it.

I think it would still look pretty mean with clusters of three Hellfires on the wingtips as opposed to four. With shortened wingtips you could get the ground clearance for one Hellfire directly below the wingtip and mount the other two on either side and just above it. Sort of like the arrangement you sometimes see with AGM-65 Mavericks on triple carrier racks

The British forces have this triple carrier for their Brimstone missiles:



It doesn't look like it would be too much of a chore to kitbash or scratchbuild one if you did want to try mounting your Hellfires in threes.

[Logan Hartke]

Logan, that's a ripper, mate! It's nice to see such a good render, it let's me know this is going to look half decent when it's done. very nice work.

As far as the load-out goes, don't forget the Aussie hinds are the "K" variant with the strengthened wing spars and shortened wing-end pylons, so ground clearance and load aren't an issue. (I could get used to the WHIF stuff, you can just make it up as you go along!). It looks good with the AH-1W cannon, too. I have one of those ...hmmm. Nah, it's gotta be a chain gun. And as for disembarking the troops, take a look at the photos ... there won't be any troops in that cabin!

Thanks.  I liked the way the Aussie Hind I did turned out.  The camo suits it well.  I did the 19-round on the inner pylon and the Hellfires on the middle one with the outboard being left empty, though Stingers are definitely a way to go.  As for the troops go, there are few countries that actually use the Hind as an assault helo like we think of it in all the Cold War propaganda, coming in fully loaded with 8 guys and guns-a-blazin' like a Star Wars drop ship.  They were more commonly used for a flight engineer, mechanic, or two door gunners and extra rockets, ammo, and/or spare parts.

Be mindful of weight, however.  Even with all their power, the Hind still has weight issues when fully loaded and it hurts performance.  If you go filling a giant fuel tank in the center of the helicopter, the airframe and engines will feel it, especially at lower speeds when the wings don't help anymore.  Also, the Hind was more "tough" than armored in the center section.  12.7mm brought down many a Hind in Afghanistan and they can and will penetrate the fuselage in that area.  That will penetrate the tank if it's not armored...which adds more weight.  Just be careful.

Cheers,

Logan

[ChernayaAkula]

What a way to kick things off here on Whatifmodelers! This is gonna be a real looker! Anything with Hinds gets my vote!

[GTX]

Welcome aboard - looking forward to the result.  Another idea for the backstory to this one is that the ARA decide to press Hinds into service after the pair were brought into Tindal in the '90s (Sandline ones on their way to PNG).

Regards,

Greg

[rickshaw]

Welcome aboard - looking forward to the result.  Another idea for the backstory to this one is that the ARA decide to press Hinds into service after the pair were brought into Tindal in the '90s (Sandline ones on their way to PNG).

Regards,

Greg

The same thought popped into my head.   I understand they even assembled one of the Sandline ones and test flew it.   The comment I heard was "built like a tank and flew like one."

[John Howling Mouse]

Gutsy, very gutsy....looking forward to more.  Welcome aboard!