Convair B-58F thoughts

[jcf]

Standard ejection seats, as on the TB-58A, make the most sense.

As to making the entire "nose" detachable "aft of the cockpit", there is no singular cockpit,
and there's an avionics bay between the first two crew positions. The overall crewed area of
the aircraft occupies about a third of the total length and is overlapped by the wing. Getting
a clean separation would be challenging and making the entire forward fuselage detachable
would needlessly add weight.



As to fuel and weapons carriage, why not something along the lines of the conformal fuel/avionics/weapons
pod proposed for the F-4?



Inset the ALCMS into the lower edges of pod assembly, after they're launched the pack could then be dumped for
a clean configuration.

[Wardukw]

Well i did say it was out there Jon and looking at your excellent bit of reference my idea is wayyyy out there 
Thing is what is this plane going to do and only do ?.
Supersonic bomber or low altitude strike bomber?
A Mach2 low altitude aircraft would be useless as it would never use that speed..to fly fast and low and still be able to maneuver you wouldnt be anywhere near M2..you would be at a max of Mach 1.3.
Take a alook at Vietnam.the F4 Phantom..that plane was a Mac 2 fighter and a bit of research was done after the war to see how many fights were done at speeds over M 1.8..none .all fights were around 1.1 and 1.4...you cant maneuver much at all above those speeds and todays fighters show that..none are as fast as  a F 4 yet everything today can run circles around everything from then.
If this B 58  ..is to be for low level work slow it down..make it more maneuverable and ejections aint a problem.
It would be a massive high flying a couple of thousand feet of the ground at Mac 2 ..one mistake tho and they're sending you home in a match box .

[Pellson]

Well i did say it was out there Jon and looking at your excellent bit of reference my idea is wayyyy out there 
Thing is what is this plane going to do and only do ?.
Supersonic bomber or low altitude strike bomber?
A Mach2 low altitude aircraft would be useless as it would never use that speed..to fly fast and low and still be able to maneuver you wouldnt be anywhere near M2..you would be at a max of Mach 1.3.
Take a alook at Vietnam.the F4 Phantom..that plane was a Mac 2 fighter and a bit of research was done after the war to see how many fights were done at speeds over M 1.8..none .all fights were around 1.1 and 1.4...you cant maneuver much at all above those speeds and todays fighters show that..none are as fast as  a F 4 yet everything today can run circles around everything from then.
If this B 58  ..is to be for low level work slow it down..make it more maneuverable and ejections aint a problem.
It would be a massive high flying a couple of thousand feet of the ground at Mac 2 ..one mistake tho and they're sending you home in a match box .

As previously said, it's instead of a FB-111, so lo-lo-lo missions. Or hi-lo-hi, depending on threatlevel, but since we're talking SAC, we're pretty much off the scale as it comes to threats, yeah? 

Thanks also to Jon. Good thinking.
Re weapon/fuel carriage, I'm at least for now looking to stay as close to the kit standard as I can - because I'm lazy. So no, regardless of sexiness, I'm not venturing into scratchland this time. 

[Wardukw]

Ok screw ejection seats 
Weapons are more fun and i do love the thought of a B58 carrying a load of ALCMs
You can loose the centre tank to mount a couple of AGM 86s there but there goes your fuel..without it the B58 has bugger all range .
The AGM 86 is 20ft long so you gonna have to figure out that part..so im thinking beside the centre tank and two more mounted on the wings between the engines.
The plane will have to slow down alot to launch these tho..the top speed of a AGM 86 is only 550mph ..id hate to think what would happen if one was launched at supersonic speeds and in the nineties the US didnt have supersonic ALCM and the ones they were playing with the B58 couldnt even carry them dew to the massive size of the things.
If you updated your bird to the 2000s then you'll have alot more doors open to ya and it wouldnt take a lot of work to do it..keep the engines..its wiffy anyway..a few pods here and there..freakin love carnads  so put them on for sure.
Modern paint job and supersonic ALCMs your good to go.
Its one reason the ol B52 carries  swag of ALCMs ..up to 20 of them..its slow and a perfect platform to launch them..the B2 Spirit is slow too and the B1 is nowhere as fast as it used to be so that launches them aswell.
Ya know ive never seen a B58 in gray..could look epic bud 

[Snowtrooper]

My intention for the B-58 in the Stash is to put SRAM's from the Italeri B-2 kit on the fuselage pylons instead (the B-2 will then get the ALCM's from the Monogram B-1). Would fit the supersonic flight profile better and without tail cone, the size and weight of a SRAM are quite close to the B28 bombs the kit has (so should just about fit in the pylons). Although mine would be in the SIOP SAC scheme instead of the gray 90's scheme.

[Pellson]

My intention for the B-58 in the Stash is to put SRAM's from the Italeri B-2 kit on the fuselage pylons instead (the B-2 will then get the ALCM's from the Monogram B-1). Would fit the supersonic flight profile better and without tail cone, the size and weight of a SRAM are quite close to the B28 bombs the kit has (so should just about fit in the pylons). Although mine would be in the SIOP SAC scheme instead of the gray 90's scheme.

That's an interesting take on the problem! I do have a Testors/Italeri B-2 in the stash, and as I always build my models in flight, I won't be needing the SRAMs for the Reaper.

My B-58 is going to get the old SAC Euro One camo, i.e gunship grey and green drab. The Bones flew with that for a few years before going all grey, and so did the Stratofortresses. I'm not really fond of all grey camouflages..

[jcf]

https://up-ship.com/blog/?p=7646



"A NACA-Langley photo of a wind tunnel model of a B-58 variant, dated 1957. While generally based on a stock B-58,
at least three things are diferent:

1) The wingtips are turned sharply down. Presumably, the wingtips would be like those on  the B-70... hinged to
be horizontal at low speed, and angled down at high speed to benefit from compression lift.

2) A wider cockpit (on a possibly longer nose), presumably for side-by-side seating. Whether this means additional
crew in back is unknown.

3) A smaller external fuel tank, carried under a pylon under the left wing root, rather than on the centerline. It looks
like there might be another tank under the right wing root, but it's hidden behind the fuselage. This would open up
the centerline position for either a single very large weapon (a large rocket, perhaps), or another fuel tank/weapons
pod. If the latter, the design would seem to indicate much greater range than the standard B-58 could attain."

USAF 600 gallon drop-tanks on pylons in a similar config and the ALCMs* on the belly?

*The tested but not purchased air-launched version of the Tomahawk could be another "What-If?" option, in both the
full length and compact versions:
http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/m-109.html#_MRASM

[Pellson]

That wind tunnel model is described somewhere, and as you say, plans were for side by side seating of two pilots. The possibly movable wingtips were also described in the spec for the B-58B.
EDIT: The wind tunnel model is actually one of the studies for the B-58C model, but the cockpit is unaltered from the A-version.

Above said, I'll stick to the original kit design of the nose and wings for now. Main question for the time being is whether to write in the wrong length in the backstory or just leave it. It is pretty significant, but the downside is that if I acknowledge the length, then I'll have to either write something about the too short engines too - or cut them up for extension. Which is a bit cumbersome as two of the four are moulded on their pylons. Annoying..

[sandiego89]

I would just ignore the length of the source kit.  Only a true rivet counter would ever notice or care- and they can always be ignored....

[Wardukw]

Sandiego is right ...ive had the Monogram B58 many yrs ago and could i tell you if anything was a miss ? Nope..not at all and the really great thing about this channel..there is not rivet counters here.
This is wiffy world Snow ..damn near anything goes here and your B58s size is perfect for your needs.
Just wait and see what im going to do with a 1/144 Concorde.

[jcf]

Sandiego is right ...ive had the Monogram B58 many yrs ago and could i tell you if anything was a miss ? Nope..not at all and the really great thing about this channel..there is not rivet counters here.
This is wiffy world Snow ..damn near anything goes here and your B58s size is perfect for your needs.
Just wait and see what im going to do with a 1/144 Concorde.

The Monogram 1/48th kit, along with the 1/144 and the older "odd" scale kits, is correct in terms of length
the Italeri 1/72nd scale kit is the one where they hooped it by using the length with pitot boom for overall
length rather than to the tip of the radome proper. The result that the fuselage is over an inch too short and they
changed everything to match: wing leading edge angle, wing chord length, engine nacelle dimensions, weapons
pod length etc. etc. They based their kit on the bad Aviation News drawings.

In short, it's the perfect starting point for a whif two-seat interceptor or intruder version. 

Years back a modeller in Japan corrected the Italeri kit to be dimensionally accurate in 1/72nd scale.

In this drawing the Italeri B-58 is the lower profile.

[Wardukw]

Well ya learn something new every day Jon and i would have never guessed that the Monogram B58 was right.
This two seat lay out sounds very cool..like a B47 style i would guess and with the Italeri being quite a bit shorter this idea works rather well and theres no doubting it would look extremely different .
This delta winged misslie would be one of a kind 

[Beermonster58]

Interesing Jon! 😊👍.
So, essentially (and, not that it really bothers me) the Italeri kit is actually accurate but, just not in 1/72 scale?
To be honest though, it doesn't bother me and, given the sheer lack of attention given to the type, I certainly cannot see anyone else producing a new kit in the foreseeable future.

If we cannot get a new 1/72 B-47 after all this time, what hope for a B-58?☹️

[Old Wombat]

Interesing Jon! 😊👍.
So, essentially (and, not that it really bothers me) the Italeri kit is actually accurate but, just not in 1/72 scale?

That's not how I read it; The Italeri kit is actually only accurate for something that IS NOT a B-58, in any scale, because;
1. the fuselage is too short (by about 1" in scale, so about 6' IRL);
2. the wings have the wrong leading edge angle, as they are trying to compensate for the too short fuselage;
3. the engines are out of position & (judging from the images) slightly short, due to the misshapen wing;
4. for the fuselage length, the fuselage is too chubby; &
5 the tail is, likewise, misshaped due to the shortening of the fuselage.

However! They did get the 1/72 scale span & height correct for the B-58.

[Wardukw]

I have pics on my lappie of the Italeri being corrected and its a monster of a jobbie.
The fuselage i think was cut into 2 or 3 sections..the wings were widened..fuel tank as well lenghtened..this was for sure not a weekend fix for sure.
You have to be disparate as hell to want a accurate 72nd B58 to go to that extreme.