English Electric Canberra F10

[Captain Canada]

Good start this will be interesting !

[kitbasher]

Gyron Juniors, then 😁

[Weaver]

I may only display the Firestreaks deployed from only one tip tank as a result. The Firestreaks will need the hatches extended rearwards around 5 mm, and that will make the whole assembly very fragile before gluing it all together I'm sure.

I hate to be teaching my grandmother to suck eggs here, but are you sure you've got the maths right there Kit?

Falcon length: 2.00m (AIM-4C/D)
Falcon wingspan: 0.51m
Firestreak length: 3.19m
Firestreak wingspan: 0.75m

The difference in length is 1.19m which works out to about 16.5mm in 1/72nd scale.

Also, note the Firestreak's greater wingspan. Are you sure there's enough room for them in the pod and that the doors are big enough? Perhaps the Firestreaks for this application would be a folding-wing version.

[PR19_Kit]

Gyron Juniors, then 😁

The RB164s were a two spool, contra-rotating engine and would out-perform a Gyron Junior at every level.

(Or they did in KitWorld, as RR never got around to actually designing them..........  )

I hate to be teaching my grandmother to suck eggs here, but are you sure you've got the maths right there Kit?

Falcon length: 2.00m (AIM-4C/D)
Falcon wingspan: 0.51m
Firestreak length: 3.19m
Firestreak wingspan: 0.75m

The difference in length is 1.19m which works out to about 16.5mm in 1/72nd scale.

Also, note the Firestreak's greater wingspan. Are you sure there's enough room for them in the pod and that the doors are big enough? Perhaps the Firestreaks for this application would be a folding-wing version.

Mea culpa there H, it was a total typo, I should have typed 1.5 mm which works OK in the plastic. And yes, it was the folding fin version. 

(Was there a real folding fin version? It would have been a good idea.)

Fitting the split bomb bay doors is a real PITA, they don't fit too well even when in one piece, and the problem is all in the rear half, which is the bit I want closed so it's got to fit. Looks like some serious PSR work there later on.

I've sanded all the raised panel lines off the M'box PR9 wing, ready for a little re-scribing. Quite where M'box got their info from I don't know, but it's NOTHING like a real PR9! 

[Weaver]

Mea culpa there H, it was a total typo, I should have typed 1.5 mm which works OK in the plastic. And yes, it was the folding fin version. 

(Was there a real folding fin version? It would have been a good idea.)

Um, nope, you should have typed 15mm...

There was no folding-fin Firestreak as far as I know. They were only ever mounted externally, so there was no real need for one.

[PR19_Kit]

Mea culpa there H, it was a total typo, I should have typed 1.5 mm which works OK in the plastic. And yes, it was the folding fin version. 

(Was there a real folding fin version? It would have been a good idea.)

Um, nope, you should have typed 15mm...

There was no folding-fin Firestreak as far as I know. They were only ever mounted externally, so there was no real need for one.

I'll get it right eventually, it must be the cold.

Luckily in KitWorld DH Propellers developed the folding fin version specially for the Canberra F10.

[Kit's 2nd law of Whiffing: 'The backstory can always be adjusted to suit the model.'  ]

[sandiego89]

Liking the direction of this- Can't go wrong with Genies- very cold war. 

[rickshaw]

Liking the direction of this- Can't go wrong with Genies- very cold war.

Same with Firestreaks.   It was only missile which was designed in reverse with the engine in the front, the guidance electronics in the rear and the power system at the back... 

[Weaver]

Mea culpa there H, it was a total typo, I should have typed 1.5 mm which works OK in the plastic. And yes, it was the folding fin version. 

(Was there a real folding fin version? It would have been a good idea.)

Um, nope, you should have typed 15mm...

There was no folding-fin Firestreak as far as I know. They were only ever mounted externally, so there was no real need for one.

I'll get it right eventually, it must be the cold.

Luckily in KitWorld DH Propellers developed the folding fin version specially for the Canberra F10.

[Kit's 2nd law of Whiffing: 'The backstory can always be adjusted to suit the model.'  ]

Wouldn't be hard to make a folding-fin Firestreak: plenty of other missiles have had them. Mind you, Firestreak being Firestreak, you might, for credibility, have to have them picking the least practical, most complicated system they could devise...

[Weaver]

Liking the direction of this- Can't go wrong with Genies- very cold war.

Same with Firestreaks.   It was only missile which was designed in reverse with the engine in the front, the guidance electronics in the rear and the power system at the back... 

Not quite. Firestreak's layout, front to back was:

Seeker
Front proximity fuse ring (sensor windows)
Guidance electronics
Control electronics
Fuse electronics
Rear proximity fuse ring (sensor windows)
Control Actuators
Motor and wings
Warhead (wrapped around blast tube)
Control fins
Air bottle (wrapped around blast tube)

Compressed air from the bottle at the back went forwards through pipes to the control actuators, which then moved long rods which went back down the body to the control fins. The reason for this was probably weight balance and the bulk of the systems. Firestreak's valve electronics needed cooling, so putting them around the blast tube probably wasn't an option, and it was probably thought better to have reliable rods running past the motor than fragile wiring, so the actuators were put in the forebody too. When you've got all that stuff in the front, the only place left to put the warhead then is in the back.

Red Top, with the advantage of experience and solid-state electronics that were both smaller, and actually needed heating rather than cooling, could put it's control electronics and actuators in the rear, which gave the more logical layout.

[Hobbes]

Liking the direction of this- Can't go wrong with Genies- very cold war.

Same with Firestreaks.   It was only missile which was designed in reverse with the engine in the front, the guidance electronics in the rear and the power system at the back... 

Are you thinking of Fireflash, maybe?

[rickshaw]

Mmm, not sure. IIRC it was Gunston who described as being designed arse-about.   

[Weaver]

Mmm, not sure. IIRC it was Gunston who described as being designed arse-about.   

Gunston is prone to hyperbole and exaggeration when he has an axe to grind. Having said that, he is kinda right about Firestreak, just not in the way you put it. It does indeed seem weird and inefficient to have air running all the way up the missile one way to operate rods that then run all the way back to operate fins that right next to the air bottle. It's as 'weird' as running air 20ft through a fuselage to a turbocharger, then 20ft forwards to a piston engine, then running the exhaust gasses 20ft back to the supercharger to drive it, but it worked pretty well for the P-47, didn't it? In both cases, there are period and technology-specific reasons for the choices that wouldn't apply if you could use later technology and/or 20/20 hindsight.

[PR19_Kit]

Wouldn't be hard to make a folding-fin Firestreak: plenty of other missiles have had them. Mind you, Firestreak being Firestreak, you might, for credibility, have to have them picking the least practical, most complicated system they could devise...

There's food for thought, perhaps mine will telescope, each wing being made of 5-6 sections, each slightly smaller than the other so the outer sections would slide into the inner ones?

With launch accelerations of around 150 g what could possibly go wrong? 

[PR19_Kit]

It occurs to me it's somewhat ironic that I'm thinking of making bits of the infra-red guided and SMALLEST missile on this fighter fold up, and at the same time the aircraft's toting a MONSTER radar guided device under each wing that's just hanging out there in the breeze!

I saw a real Red Dean at Cosford last weekend and it's MASSIVE! The thing's around 15 ft long and the top of the wings come chest high on me!