Suggestions?

[sideshowbob9]

Right, I'm going to turn this thread into a general brain picking one for my various projects so as to save space elsewhere.

Next up is a fixed-wing Mil Mi-10! I have a VEB 1/100 Mi-10 and some 1/72 Gannet wings leftover from my Guillemot project (high-wing jet Gannet as a cheap Buccaneer S.1 alternative). I'm imagining the finished product as something reminiscent of a Tu-91 'Boot'.

The question for you guys is: should I bring the turboshafts down from the roof to a chin postion or leave them on top (in which case there'll need to be a lot of internal shafting )? Either way the rotor gear fairing at the very top will have to go.

Also, I'm intending to keep the tail boom (for fuel) but may invert it (I think it will look better). However, I'm not sure whether to cut it immediately aft of the rotor fairing or at approximately the mid-point. Any ideas?

Here's a pic to help with visualising: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/98/Harke.png

Thanks for your time.

Edit: Something a little like this:



Or for a real oddball, this:



The idea for the latter stems from this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:QT-2PCs_in_STAAF,_RVN_Hanger_c1968.jpg
http://www.airfields-freeman.com/CA/CrowsLanding_CA_67_QT-2PC.jpg

[elmayerle]

If I wa going to do the first one, I'd bring the turboshaft engines down low on either side of the fuselage to reduce the amount of drivesahfts adn gearboxes required.  Actually, I kinda like the different nature of the second one, though I'd be tempted to do the canpy frame such that the extended shaft for the props was properly supported.

Have you considered inverting the tailcone, where it starts tapering, such that the existing rotor gear fairing could hold a gearbox for driving a counter-rotating set of pusher props?  I'd probably do another cut and inversion to turn the vertical fin back up, or at least have it extending both above and below the tailcone.

[sideshowbob9]

Actually, I kinda like the different nature of the second one, though I'd be tempted to do the canpy frame such that the extended shaft for the props was properly supported.

So do I. In reality, the shaft would indeed be in contact with and supported by the forward fuselage. The quick and dirty illustration was intended to emphasise it is a shaft.

I'm leaning toward option two as not only would it be easier to model, it may also create a more visually interesting model. In story, it would thus retain *some* commonality with the Mi-10 and show the lengths Soviet designers sometimes went to to achieve increased visibility & survivability (Il-20 I'm looking at you).

Have you considered inverting the tailcone, where it starts tapering, ......  I'd probably do another cut and inversion to turn the vertical fin back up .....

In my illustrations, I've done just that (compare with the original image here: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/98/Harke.png ). However, looking at the model, the boom does look overly long.

I have the tailcone of a "Wooster" 747-400 (approx. 1/200?) that's left over from yet another project**. Perhaps I could append that at the suitable diameter to make it look a little more "fixed-wing"?

** The central fuse. of the 744 fits the cockpit section of a 1/72 E-E Lightning almost perfectly, so I'm intending to make a fat Strike Lightning.

[sideshowbob9]

...the tailcone of a "Wooster" 747-400...

Something along the lines of this:



With that configuration, I believe a H-Tail might be preferable... and I have an Ar-240 to play with.....

[sideshowbob9]

Well your illustrations are certainly better than mine! 

I'm pretty much planning to do the Mi-10 as I've outlined, as a sort of Tu-91 competitor. I'm keeping the prop up high to avoid any major re-arrangement and to make for a quirky model.

Now having said that......

....gearbox-to-wing-props makes sense to me

... I completely agree with you. My local model store has a VEB Mil Mi-6 'Hook' and an Antonov An-24 'Coke'. Next time I'm up there, I'm planning to get them and marry the Mi-6 fuselage to the An-24 wings to make a slightly more sensible model. Whether I use gearbox-to-wing-props and keep the turboprops for something else or keep the turboprops on and make the Mi-6's engines straight-through booster turbojets, I haven't decided.

Either way, the An-24 fuselage will get some 1/144 B-29 wings to become Antonov's answer to the Tu-4 or Tu-70.

Thanks for your input.

[Weaver]

Re the wingless Mirages, how about using two of them to represent Dassault's combined attempts on the land and water speed records? Give one of them spatted wheels, and the other a hull plus outriggers.....

[PR19_Kit]

Either way, the An-24 fuselage will get some 1/144 B-29 wings to become Antonov's answer to the Tu-4 or Tu-70.

With mucho anhedral I hope? Did Antonov ever build an aircraft with dihedral?

[B777LR]

Either way, the An-24 fuselage will get some 1/144 B-29 wings to become Antonov's answer to the Tu-4 or Tu-70.

With mucho anhedral I hope? Did Antonov ever build an aircraft with dihedral?

The An-2 (It tends to get lost among all the large Antonovs)

Edit: Include the An-28 and An-38. They also made/make quite a few with flat wings.

[sideshowbob9]

Well I got a Mi-6 the other day and it is huge! Way bigger than I had intended. My plan for it at the mo is to bash it with leftover bits from the hideous Revell C-160 I have to make a Antonov/Mil fixed-wing transport of some kind. For now it's on the backburner.

Recent WIPs I've been working on are:

P-47N to be given an R-2160 & a big ventral radiator as a poor man's XP-69
F-8 to be USAF ADC with AIM-53s (R530s whiffed as air-air variants of the AGM-53 Condor)
Bicycle undercart/Yak-25 winged MiG-17 as a Yak-50
Ju-188 with Ki-46 wings instead of outer sections and 2nd pair of BMW 801s to be done up as a Ju-488 prototype

Re the wingless Mirages....

As of today, the Mirages are intended to become engine nacelles for a Belvedere>T-188ish kitbash. Practical? Hell no but I'm doing it anyway! 

....and An-38....

I've been toying with the idea of getting and cutting up two An-14s to create a single An-38. Question would be what to do with the left-over An-14 bits?

Trouble I have is not coming up with ideas but getting bogged down in the execution. 

[B777LR]

I've been toying with the idea of getting and cutting up two An-14s to create a single An-38. Question would be what to do with the left-over An-14 bits?

A really short Antonov. Or perhaps a helicopter gunship? Maybe Kamov style?

[sideshowbob9]

......and lifetime's PSP 

[sideshowbob9]

So the ideas that have popped into my head this week (pushing all previous plans even further back!) are:


Taking a SB2C, filling in the rear cockpit and giving it a R-3350 and Yak-7 wings to create a quasi-XP-62 (can't afford anigrand).
Taking the Yak-7 and giving it the SB2C wings to great a developed monoplane SOC Seagull 
Taking a SB2C and giving it a R-3350, cut down spine, bubble canopy and A-1 wings to create a quasi-BT2C.
Taking a P-40 and giving it a R-2800 from a F7F to create a quasi-XP-60E.
Monoplane F11C/BFC Goshawk.
Navalised P-36 (F13C since the real one was fugly).
Taking 4 R-2600 from various Helldivers and putting them on a HP Halifax (thinking NMF USAAF '45 - maybe an assembly ship).
Taking a Spitfire 22, giving it Attacker wings to create a Seafang ...and then giving it a Centaurus.
Taking a Wessex and turning it into a fixed-wing Gannet alternate (at least it would have a great view over the nose).


Yes, I seem to have a thing for Curtiss at the moment.


Any comments or suggestions on the above? "You're mad" is taken as a given.

[Radish]

Seem like good ideas to me....

[sideshowbob9]

This is a (very) quick and dirty conversion of a B-25 into a B-45 type jet bomber. I've got an Airfix B-25 on the way and this is roughly what I have planned.



Cut away the "raised spine", add a single tail, canopy and some jets where the radials used to be and the resemblence is striking.

What do you guys think?

Edit: While I'm at it, what shall I do with the DC-7 fuselage that's giving up it's tail for this project (and has already given up it's wings)?

[sideshowbob9]

Ok so the B-45 has stalled while I will myself to do the PSR.

I need some suggestions on a couple of other projects so I'm just going to fire away.

Got a Saab B.17 incoming and am planning on doing it Swedish Navy (Sweden get a Nairana class escort carrier post-war). Also planning on doing up a Bloch MB.152 as a navalised FFVS J.22 as they are pretty similar. Maybe if they were to get a Colossus class later in the same way as the Dutch, would navalised Lansens be a reasonable extrapolation? Maybe even a naval pact with the Dutch?

Got a couple of F9F Cougars + conversions. One will be a photo-recce bird, the other the trainer. The question is in who's colours should I put them in?

Along similar lines, I'm putting an RF-4E nose onto a F4D. Who would need a carrier based recce bird circa 1958?

I have a CAC Boomerang built that I have no idea what to do with.

Fiat G.55, Tupolev SB-2, FJ-4 Fury, EF-111A, EE Lightning, L-29 Delfin and A-4E all ditto.

Any ideas?