Seaknight & M16, red : primary seaplanes

[ericr]

[shadow=red,left][/shadow]So, the thing is, I like seaplanes : floatplanes, single-float and double-float or even more, and flying boats as well (single-hull, double-hull or more).
Actually I like them so much that I sometimes floatplanize, or even flying boatize aircraft that were never meant for that, but to me it looks like an improvement (like, to some others, fitting longer wings, it seems).

And I like to paint in primary colors : plain yellow or red or blue, sometimes two of them, or the three.

In the past I have already posted quite a few of them, titled by the aircraft type or name, but the effect of series gets lost in separate posts.

Therefore I thought I might as well start a thread on this.

To begin, here comes a Vought Kingfisher, at the funny scale of 1/200 : it came with its own catapult, which is very nice.

And to give it a bit of context, I looked for a support for the catapult : a boat not too large, just enough to carry it, in a spirit remembering the Aurora boat in the Tintin adventure where he flies a yellow (!) Ar196.
At the scale of 1/200, I found out about the ETV Waker (that had a life as a Greenpeace vessel too apparently), already gifted with a helicopter deck, and featuring a nice rear deck, with good room for the catapult :

[kerick]

Nice work. Good thinking to find the boat.

[Captain Canada]

Oh I love it ! Who makes the boat ? Thäs somat I'd defo like to build. Maybe even steal your idea 

[Hobbes]

Revell. It's a Dutch Coast Guard ship.
http://www.amazon.com/Revell-05240-200-Kustwacht-Waker/dp/B0013FCHCK

[ericr]

Oh I love it ! Who makes the boat ? Thäs somat I'd defo like to build. Maybe even steal your idea 

yes indeed it is Revell : there is apparently a variant of the kit which is a SMIT harbour tug, by revell and heller

at the same scale I also did something with a Marwede rescue boat (pictures soon ...)

and please do steal ! 
it is not stealing actually anyway, I like my ideas to inspire other, especially because they will do it differently,
and possibly with better skills 

[ericr]

And to give it a bit of context, I looked for a support for the catapult : a boat not too large, just enough to carry it, in a spirit remembering the Aurora boat in the Tintin adventure where he flies a yellow (!) Ar196.

here is a picture of the inspiration by the way

[ericr]

So I had this 1/200 Kingfisher and catapult kit, and it has two of each actually, and I thought, instead of making two Kingfishers, why not use this centrale float and pair of secondary floats for floatplanizing another aircraft?
The trick was to find a kit for an aircraft with the roght size for the float to fit : I finally decided on a 1/144 Po-2, which has the right length, and did exist as a central-float version known as Po-2M :



and I installed it on the same seaplane tender :



I also tried another 1/200 boat : the Marwede rescue ship, which also has a helicopter deck (actually not for landing, I read afterwards, only for manoeuvering, but well, this is whiff anymay  ) :



but the Po-2 looked a bit too large for that, so I prefer to assign it to the Waker :



whereas the Kingfisher looks quite right on the Marwede :





don't you think? 

[NARSES2]

Kingfisher looks good on it 

[ericr]

Kingfisher suits it.

the pic of both on the tender.

thanks all!

I just acquired a 1/200 helicopetr (not many around ... a Huey), so it should end up completing the team
especially if I find tiny enough floats for it 

[ericr]

and now for something a bit different :

here is a central-float version of the Ar196 :
I had been longing for this kits for quite a few years, and suddenly found it,
and built it in red.





The twin floats set is in the kit, so I have it as a spare "for something else"  as someone said recently

[zenrat]

Single float Arado looks like a real one.  What are the floats off?

Helicopters don't need hydrodynamically shaped floats with a step so all you need fot it are 2 tubes or rods of an appropriate size.
Or one.  Never seen a single centre float chopper...

[Dizzyfugu]

The single float Ar 196 was real - it was tested against the dual float version and lost because it was more draggy. Looks nice, though!

[ericr]

Single float Arado looks like a real one.  What are the floats off?

Helicopters don't need hydrodynamically shaped floats with a step so all you need fot it are 2 tubes or rods of an appropriate size.
Or one.  Never seen a single centre float chopper...

indeed it was a real one, as noted by Dizzyfugu, but maybe not monochrome red 
the what-if story could go like : after building the prototype a special primary coat of anticorrosive was applied, and the pictures were taken just before the camouflage paintig that followed ...

So the floats are off the kit itself indeed, that can be seen there :


I intend to use the spare floats for seaplanes, probably imaginary, and also probably two signle-float seaplane (to maximize fun  )

never seen a central float helicopter either  a inspiring idea? 

[zenrat]

Sea Kings have a very boat like shape to them.  Was there some emergency floating concept there?

[ericr]

Sea Kings have a very boat like shape to them.  Was there some emergency floating concept there?

it seems to have been intended indeed : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphibious_helicopter



so twin-floats helicopters do exist, as well as "flying-boats" with a hull :
a central float with two smaller auxiliary floats remains to be invented it seems :
nice challenge, not ?