Shorts Ekranoplan 'the Welsh Harp Sea Monster ' revised version 2024

[McColm]

This is based on a spares and repair 1/72 Airfix Shorts Sunderland, it has had a few names and configurations but I think the Ekranoplan look sums the kitbash with a few extra bits added on.
The nose of the Sunderland has been cut off and now forms two clamshell watertight doors, the lower deck is the upper part of the weapons bay taken from a 1/72 Avro Shackleton. The pair of rear jet engines either side of the reduced vertical tail fin comes from the 1/72 Revell/Monogram Convair B-36 Peacemaker. The twin tail fins are also from an Avro Shackleton.
There are a few parts off the Italeri Sunderland that I had but used for another project and the lower wing comes from parts of the rear tail section of a Giantess Glider. The engines are from a Shackleton MR.3.
The rotor stack and rotor blades are from the Airfix Rotodyne with leftovers from the spares boxes.
In theory upto four Ford Anglia 00 gauge die-cast cars can be fitted into the cargo hold. The passengers would have been accommodated in the upper deck behind the flight crew making this a Air-Car-Ferry.
 I can see this being operated for the English Channel service to France, firstly competing with the ferrys and then the hovercraft service. The salt air would cripple the fleet due to corrosion on exposed areas but a secondary role as a water bomber or salvage heavy lift heliplane may have extended the life well into the 1990s.