Cobalt Industries Python

[Wardukw]

Cobalt industries started life in the early 2000s building drones for the military and the public ..starting with the T7R9 drone ,,not what you would call a large machine by any means with a wing span of only 18ft but it was a start,,as time and the years progressed Cobalt moved to the building and design of aircraft ...by the year 2160 Cobalt had developed the Python.
The US military had a problem,,satellites  ...thousands of them in fact ...its is not exactly known but the estimated amount is somewhere in the area of 17000 with is being quite common for them to crash into each other when one has done it time and needs to be replaced or destroyed before it degrades to the point of loosing its ability to hold its orbit .
The idea one US Officer named Col Martin R Rogers ( head of aircraft development,,a flashy title for a guy whos comes up with ideas and then finds somebody to build it ) came up with was to shoot the satellites down instead of waiting for them to crash into something which they cant control.
The first idea was of course to launch missiles from earth to destroy the satellites in space ,,,this turned out to be far more expensive than first thought  dew to the altitudes that some of these satellites orbited around this planet .
The second idea was why not build a thing which was multi use and able to fly to an excess  of 85000 feet and launch a weapon from there ,,,some not so bright sparks suggested a laser mounted on a large plane to destroy the satellite ,,its was tried before in the 90s with a Boeing 747 and wasnt a success hence why its not around now,
The third and final idea was the smartest and easiest ..a single seat fighter ,,armed with Strangemark anti satellite missiles .
This aircraft which was to be named the Python ,,nobody seems to know where the name came from but it stuck ,,,was designed right from the start with it engines ..to massively powerful Reintech 1589 series two stage jet turbines ,,being a modernized version of the famous SR71 Blackbird these engines have the ability to run with full power in a very thin atmosphere and unlike the  SR71 these engines to not require two different fuels to run making these the first choice for this aircraft.
Being a very slim aircraft the has a near prefect aerodynamic profile this aircraft is a beautiful thing to behold,, but this was also a problem as being a fighter it needed the ability to well fight,,so with some new design features ,,like fitting it with canards and a new profile wing to make this plane more unstable in flight giving it the ability to as they say turn on a dime ..new computer systems were also installed but this is a must otherwise this aircraft would never leave the ground and if it did would be meeting the earth again very shortly afterwards .
The first flight was held on a nice clear morning in Sep 15th 2164 to the delight of  the pilot J E Colins ,,,the first flight lasted for a little over 45 minutes with the second,,third and fourth flights taking place over the next 3 days .
After the year and two months the aircraft was excepted for service with the USAF and shortly after that it was also excepted by 7 other nations with the same issues at the US were dealing with but also hostile forces aswell.
With a first order of 120 aircraft being delivered 9 months after the first orders another 300 were ordered in total to fulfill the needs of the other nations requirements.
The first kill made by the Python was 17 days after entering service with USAF and the second was made by the RAAF 1 day after that .
Its unknown at this point but all reports of the Python have been very favorable and it will be very interesting to see what the future holds .

Ok boys enough of that for now ..my brain hurts trying to come up with a story for this thing .
This thing started with a idea when McColm was asking about ideas for a B58 Hustler ,,,being a big fan of this thing i straight away had an idea for a something mutant.
The first problem was getting one ,,i used to have the Monogram B58 in 48th but the prices today are totally nuts and so are the prices for a 72nd one too but i was willing as this idea would not go away .
Then Scotaidh came to the party and then i had a old Testors 72nd scale B58 for my project ,,but this was not enough because i wanted to convert to 48th scale and then the hunt started to find a plane with the lines for what my nut was thinking about ,,,nothing was coming to mind and then one day i came across this vey cheap Academy F16 and it wasnt love at first site but its cheap and i might have a need for it for something ,.,,well long story short..i was looking and then looked at the 16 and then the trying of this and that and bingo baby,,i found the start,,next was landing  gear ,,i was thinking F15 but hell no,,not at those nutball prices but i did find again a very cheap plane ..a MIG29 ,,as it turns out ...another bingo baby moment ,and so on and so forth from here ,,now the pics
This is the first idea for the layout,,the jet tubes are PVC Hot water pipe.
DSCF3494 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
DSCF3495 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
Now things have been glued and the layout is set in stone ..well plastic 
DSCF3496 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
DSCF3500 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
DSCF3502 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
Now filling and a crap load of sanding has taken place ,,
DSCF3505 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
DSCF3506 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
DSCF3507 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr
The nose landing gear bay is the one cut from the remains of the Mig 29 and the pod it sits in is one of the fuel tanks of the B58
DSCF3509 by Phill Harrison, on Flickr

More to follow soon lads 

[Old Wombat]

Interesting!

[Wardukw]

Still a wee way to go yet matey..wait till ya see the thing with landing gear and the canopy on and all the other gubbins .

[perttime]

That is becoming a cool looking aircraft.
I have one concern, though: when you blow one satellite, in a somewhat known orbit, to pieces - how many small objects in unknown orbits do you get?

[Rick Lowe]

That is becoming a cool looking aircraft.
I have one concern, though: when you blow one satellite, in a somewhat known orbit, to pieces - how many small objects in unknown orbits do you get?

You go from one big kinetic object to a shotgun blast... 

Looking good on the build, Phil!

[McColm]

Thanks, I built this ages ago.




1/72 Airfix F-16 A/B, parts from a Airfix  F-117 and I think it was a 1/200 SR-71.

They look very similar 

[Wardukw]

Cherrs guys and McColm mate that does look very cool mate..right up my alley and dude i am amazed at the similarities our planes have  .
Perttime ..Rick nailed it..even today anti aircraft missiles dont actually hit a plane..they explode beside it like Rick said with a sort of shotgun blast..many yrs ago USAF fired a missile from a F15 and killed a satellite with it..ya know to take out russian satellites ..same deal here but in wiffy world and instead of one missile my bird carries four to six of them..for when things go to poop .

[McColm]

Thanks, I thought that you could use it to take some styling references from it for your build.

[NARSES2]

As I've said many times before I'm fascinated by people who can take, what to my eyes are a bunch of disparate parts, and make a natural looking whole 

[comrade harps]

That is becoming a cool looking aircraft.
I have one concern, though: when you blow one satellite, in a somewhat known orbit, to pieces - how many small objects in unknown orbits do you get?

Let me introduce you to the Kessler Syndrome of catastrophic cascading space debris.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kessler_syndrome

[PR19_Kit]

What to do with your Spares Box.................

.....and your hot water pipe. 

Looks VERY promising. 

[Wardukw]

Thanks Chris .McColm and Kit and Comrad e .that was quite a interesting read mate..like alot of things military i never said it was a good idea ...anybody whos a history buff knows theres been hundreds if not thousands of ideas that militaries around the world have come up with and one hell pf a lot of them have not been great or even good ideas..this might happen to be amongst that group and being a military idea theres the likely hood they wont care and it wouldnt surprise me if this whole thing was just a cover to destory your enemies satellites ..its easy enough to move your satellites out of the way before taking out a enemies one .
One thing i did notice reading that is if this was such a massive problem then why hasnt the international space station been hammered with debris..could only be a matter of time or luck .

[comrade harps]

The ISS has been damaged by space junk:
https://www.sciencealert.com/space-debris-has-damaged-the-international-space-station

l'm not having a go at your idea. Military minds concoct lots of really dodgy programs and systems. Think of this one as overkill MADS: mutually assured destruction of satellites.

[Wardukw]

Oh i love that Harps..MADS  ..it got me thinking about one thing tho ..this is ment to be like 140 plus yrs into the future ..so i reckon things might be different..well should be different..one idea i did come up with is a misslie which donest destroy the satellite..its grabs it..forcing it out of orbit..no debris amd it burns up in the atmosphere .
Or the satellites then are far different from today..much smaller..much better tech and more powerful..so they could be much more spread out than they are now..
Oh another verison i just thought off..instead of pushing it out of low earth orbit ..hows about pushing em out of high earth orbit..deeper into space.
140+ yrs into the future youd expect them to be able to do that sort of thing.

[comrade harps]

Satellite grabbing is a thing: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/44054/a-chinese-satellite-just-grappled-another-and-pulled-it-out-of-orbit