Bell AV-22A Mamba

[kitnut617]

Choosing a fuselage was probably the easiest part, in fact what I used was the genesis of the idea. I had for a number of years a wrecked A-10, it had come down from the ceiling a couple of times and after finding it on the floor one day I just collected all the parts (that I could find anyway) and stuck them in a box. I found that box during one of my rummaging through the stash looking for something else.

The fuselage was minus one of it's wings, the engine assemble had detached and the fins had broken off, along with all the small detail bits like u/c, pylons etc.

What I was looking at was a nice slim fuselage and it occurred to me that it would make a nice tandem seat something or other. The V-22 parts came a bit later after I had spent some time thinking about it.

The A-10 usually when it sits on it's wheels has the bottom of the fuselage parallel with the ground with the top of the fuselage from behind the canopy to the tail sloping downwards, Likewise the front of the fuselage from the canopy to the nose slopes down in the other direction.  What I noticed was, if I raised the tail end up so that the top of the fuselage lay parallel to the ground, this steepened the slope of the forward fuselage.
I though that it would give a very good 'stepped cockpit' of typical attack helicopter style of look.

So after looking through the spares box for a suitable canopy, I settled on an F-14 one which was minus it's windshield. I found that the A-10 windshield (which had miraculously survived the wrecking) frame face where it would match the regular A-10 canopy, was actually a good fit to the F-14 canopy. So then what I did next to fit the longer canopy to the A-10 fuselage was to cut the top of the forward fuselage off in the same plane as the canopy rail face until I found a point near the nose where the A-10 windshield fitted almost perfectly. After that -- it was off to the races so to speak.

In these pics I can show what I did.  This one was taken before another disaster happened -- I had to remove from the middle of the fuselage what was left of the A-10 wing's wing root that was moulded into the fuselage side, but during the fix-up process, the whole rear fuselage broke off.  And I had glued the wing on by then too, so I was in a bit of a quandary what to do.



But that proved to be easier too, the glue I used hadn't taken very well and the wing came off relatively easy.

While it was all apart again, I decided to fix the fuselage properly. I also added about an extra 1/2" (12mm) to it too. These photos show the end result.  Also you can see where I switched the tail plane from the bottom of the fuselage to the top side.

[kitnut617]

But I'm jumping the gun here, I had to do the cockpit area first before I did anything else.

The F-14 I have provided some more parts, the kit was one of a box of kits I bought in a LMS closing out sale after the owner had suddenly died, the kits all had parts missing as the owner had a habit of removing parts for his other customers when they had found something wrong with their kits. But all I could find missing of the F-14 was the windshield part plus the canopy had a massive mould flash right down the center of the canopy. Fortunately on the outside so I was able to polish it out. I found that I can buy a replacement canopy for it, a Rob Taurus one. I also found there's quite a few cockpit resin sets to have too, so I decided to use the tubs from the kit.

Trying to get the tubs in without totally separating the A-10 fuselage I came up with a solution. I had intended to remove all the A-10 cockpit, the GAU-8 gun and the front nose gear bay, which left quite a hole in the underside. Something else I decided on quite early in the thinking, was that in true attack helicopter style, it had to have a chin turret.  So what to use ?  Rummaging again through the stash I found just what I wanted, a P-61 turret (surplus too, because the Airfix kit is earmarked for a P-61E or Reporter conversion). So I took all the parts needed for the turret ---- fairing, gun mount, drum, and the internal mounting piece and the retaining pin.

Now I had to work out how I was going to install it. The F-14 combined cockpit tub I cut in half and put the front one to the rear and vise versa. After assembling all the turret bits though, I found there wasn't enough room under the front tub if I wanted the tub to be where I wanted it to be.  The solution was fairly straight forward (after giving it a lot of thought mind you), I just cut the floor off the front tub and glued the mounting piece back in it's place. This provided the right size hole for the turret drum to turn in and it also enabled the tub/turret to be place very nicely.

There is something about the P-61 turret that I should explain about. In it's normal use it sits on a flat surface where the guns only elevate upwards, so putting it on the bottom of the fuselage I had to make something so the gun would elevate into the horizontal position when the aircraft is flying straight ahead (remember I've made the bottom of the fuselage slope upwards to the rear)

So the hole left over from the removal of the gun and wheel bay was filled in with a piece of styrene card that would lay parallel with the ground, it had an appropriate hole cut into it for the turret drum to poke through.  And before I forget, the C-130 -- actually an AC-130A, provided another part --- a M61 Vulcan cannon. This replace the four .5's the gun mount has 

In these pics you can see how I went about it.



In this pic you can just make out the black turret mounting piece I glued to the bottom of the tub.



And here you can see I've sanded the new bottom of fuselage above the turret fairing so it is shaped like the rear of the turret fairing.

[kitnut617]

Here's a pic of the front fuselage with the canopy in place.



Mind you that has change now too. The build got to a point where I was thinking where the various add-ons were to be put. You can see in the above pic that the nose is pretty well cramped for space so I was thinking where am I going to put the refueling probe, the FLIR turret and the ground avoidance/weather radar. After more consultation with he who knows, I came up with an idea to have this radar 'built-in' and not as an after-thought.

So now it looks like this.  And this is the CF-100 bit ----  But I'm jumping the gun again ----





The refueling probe went here,





I've made it so I can pose it extended or retracted.



The FLIR turret went here, of course it is independent to the gun turret operation   

[kitnut617]

For the cockpit I used the V-22 seats and instrument panel and the shroud. In the rear cockpit, I cut the V-22 panel in half and then made the shroud to suit. For the front cockpit, I cut the small screen off the end of the other half of the panel and glued it below it. I then had to scratch build a shroud around it.





The pilot come from the A-10 kit, the gunner is an Airfix Harrier figure, but I change it's head. The original head looked like a 'pin-head' compared to the A-10 figure, but then I found another Harrier figure (GR.5/7) which had a head about the same size as the A-10 figure -- so I switched them around.  I'm thinking of making some helmet mounted HUD visors for them.

Here's the flare dispenser I was talking about further up. I might drill a few more holes in it later.

[Gondor]

You might want to reconsider the position of your refueling probe. Where it is it will need to extend a lot to be clear of the canopy which could get damaged by the refueling basket. Helicopters and the V-22 have the probe mounted on the lower forward fuselage with this in mind.

Looks great regardless 

Gondor

[kitnut617]

All been considered Gondor, but sticking it out the nose or at least to the side a bit of the nose, the pilot can't see it. Evan had suggested placing it on the centerline above the canopy, still not sure on that yet.

[nighthunter]

Simply beautiful

[Gondor]

All been considered Gondor, but sticking it out the nose or at least to the side a bit of the nose, the pilot can't see it. Evan had suggested placing it on the centerline above the canopy, still not sure on that yet.

The probe would be extendable in flight to a point that the pilot can see it, easily represented by using several nested tubes to reproduce the appearance or it could be more like the Tornado GR1/4 versions with the probe being pushed out sideways into the airstream from the fuselage side.

Gondor

[zenrat]

Fascinating stuff.
Please continue in this vein.

[kitnut617]

All been considered Gondor, but sticking it out the nose or at least to the side a bit of the nose, the pilot can't see it. Evan had suggested placing it on the centerline above the canopy, still not sure on that yet.

The probe would be extendable in flight to a point that the pilot can see it, easily represented by using several nested tubes to reproduce the appearance or it could be more like the Tornado GR1/4 versions with the probe being pushed out sideways into the airstream from the fuselage side.

Gondor

Alastair, I looked at dozens of photos of refueling probes on various aircraft to see what had been used on others.  The probe sticking out the front would have to be almost as long as the forward fuselage before the pilot even got a glimpse of it. Sticking it out the side was an option but then the mechanism was getting a bit close to the prop-rotor tips. Besides, where it could go so the pilot can see it, is an ammo drum for the M61 Vulcan cannon plus various black boxes.

For what it's worth, I settled on something like this photo and in use with the Israelis, (it's even the right colour  ) ;



It's a simple design which for that was an afterthought, whereas mine is designed in from the start. It actually measures to be about the same distance from the canopy. Mine actually sticks out almost to the front-seater's head (and is above the canopy) so the pilot only has to turn his head slightly, the F-16 pilot has to look almost over his shoulder ---

[NARSES2]

Wowee 

[kitnut617]

This is probably a better pic showing the probe in relation to the prop and canopy, I could move it a bit closer to the prop though. But I've been told by he who knows, the prop blades actually flap --- reading about the prop-rotor that has been designed into it, so I need to make sure nothing really gets in the way of the prop.



Also in this view, you can see I had to revise the wing stub orientation for a couple of reasons. First one is because in my attempt to get the sponsons closer to the fuselage, I forgot about what clearance I needed when the inner weapons bay doors open. Also the way I had the stub wings attached to the sponson, also impeded on how the doors opened.  So now for an initial head-on attack just the inner doors would open, but in subsequent attacks, the prop nacelle would be rotated a couple of degrees, then the outer doors can be opened for firing RP's too.

[kitnut617]

In the front end of the starboard sponson, I've got the GUA-8 gun from the A-10 installed. Considering that all the gun is as in this photo, the ammo drum can be located in the fuselage. The feed and extraction belts can be routed through the stub wing.



Pic of the starboard sponson with the GUA-8 sticking out the front and with a comparison with a GPU-5 or GEPOD30 (which is a six-barrel version of the GUA-8)

[kitnut617]

Here's a comparison between an V-22 and the AV-22.

[kitnut617]

Here's a couple of pics, showing how the sponsons orientate to the fuselage, top pic is without the wing in place. Also shows the front nose u/c gear





I had found that the V-22 and the A-10 had some similar features, they're about the same size dimensionally, the tail planes were similar and set about the same width which was another reason I went with the A-10 fuselage.

This pic shows the similarities of the fins. Although I'm using the A-10 horizontal surfaces, I went with the V-22 fins, but I altered them slightly by making the rudders a bit longer so the bottom edge is now down at the tail plane level. The A-10 tail plane already has chamfered ends to the elevators for rudder clearance so I didn't have to do anything there.