Canute

Well, yeah, I stayed in after Nam and had some fun flying here, there and darn near everywhere. Not much call for fighter types. I did have a hip pocket link to a few big chemical companies (Dow, duPont, Mobil) thanks to interviews I had with them when I was in college. Problem for me was the 28 year break from college to AF retirement. Flying was fun, but the guys and gals I got to work with made up a big part of why I stayed in the AF.

Lou, do you know the difference between a fighter pilot war story and a fairy tale? The fairy tale starts out "Once upon a time....". War stories start out "this is no s**t... ". If you want war stories, I'll chime in where appropriate. I'm sure there are other vets, from any number of countries, with stories. Military Aviation is hours of boredom, interspersed with minutes of stark terror,

Looking forward to your commemorative build, Lou.

I remember using a couple of that size bottles, painting a Monogram P-47 and a Revell B-25 Tokyo Raider. I think we had a real hobby shop with those size bottles. Usually we had the little Testor's bottles.

Colors look good, Denis. Got a little fade in the OD. Nice. And you resurrected an ancient bottle of Pactra? Well done.

I think they overloaded the a/c with extra ammo on the bombers over Germany. More than the usual 9 yards of .50 cal per gun in a Mustang.

Wise move to use a light primer, Denis. Yellow (and red) are tough to paint onto dark colors. Too translucent. Yes, definitely an He-177. Some Wiki history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinkel_He_177

My condolences, too, Craig. Not many of the Greatest Generation left. I salute them all.👍 Yeah, the Phantom was known to be supersonic on the deck, despite the airspeed/mach meter saying not. A phenomenon of all the angles and sharp points. Those photos you see of F-4/14/15/16 and others with the visible shock cone are suitable proof. Never flew a Mudhen, but did snivel a hop or two in the F-15B. Thought I died and went to fighter pilot heaven. You are going to load this one up for bear, aren't you?

Greg, superb detailing on the island. Harley, that beat up carrier was the Franklin. Took a lot of punishment, but sailed back to NY for refurbishing. Although repaired, she never went back to sea in an active commissioned status. Wiki history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Franklin_(CV-13)

Actually, the He -177 was a 4 engine bomber, but it had 2 motors in each of the nacelles. Engine fires were a bugaboo, along with the landing gear collapsing under those nacelles. Like Chris said, all engines had to go into production of Reich Defense fighters. Thankfully, the Me262 being developed in mid war spent so much time messing around with making it into a dive bomber that they didn't have enough to form up full fighter wings. They had squadrons of 262s and protection squadrons of FW-190 and Ta 152s to cover them in their takeoff and landing phases. Look up or find a copy of "Warplanes of the Third Reich" by William Green. It's a very large tome. There is a lot of info on all this in Green's book. And black & white pictures.

I'm pretty sure the B-17 was it's own design, but the B-29, 307, B-50 and the C-97 shared a lot of parts. The double bubble fuselage and a lot of the wings and engines. I had to refuel behind KC-97s in Europe and they were pokey, even with the jet pods under the wings. Lou, you are correct about the Luftwaffe. Trained pilots on gliders, sent planes and crews to Spain in their civil war.

Every station stop was an opportunity for the crew to "oil around" the loco. Most US engines were swapped out about every 100 miles for added servicing. All the services needed for each loco was a big reason for the rush to dieselize after WW 2.

You got a lot of good information there. Early craftsman kits like these expected you to go down to your local brick and mortar hobby shop to pick up trucks and couplers. Those shops have disappeared. And if you are going to run this car in a train, find out if it's a scale layout or a Lionel O gauge layout. These make a big difference. Lionel uses bigger wheels and deeper flanges. They're really not compatible. Scalecoat is a solvent base sealer and paint. Just be careful if spraying; wear a chemical mask, available at big box hardware stores. Even if brushing, I'd still mask up, due to the odors. And consider doing it outside for peace on the home front. 😀 You may want to add additional interior bracing at the joints and along the roof. Sagging joints, especially in O scale, will look bad. The color of a galvanized roof raises a lot of discussion among model railroaders. I tend to use what is called SP lettering gray, it's a light gray color. Others use a dull silver; might be OK for a brand new car, but after running a while it fades. If you're weathering a car go dull gray on the roof. The Pan Pastels are excellent for weathering. This particular site is pitched to model railroaders and has some how-to videos. http://modelingcolors.com/index.html I'd find some color photos to give you some visual guidance on weathering. I use this site a lot. This is his section on Railbox cars. http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/rbox/rbox.htm Have fun. Be careful or you could fall down a new rabbit-hole in a new hobby.

Here's a link to Cybermodeler for info: https://www.cybermodeler.com/aircraft/rafale/rafale_all.shtml

Back in days of yore, one of my additional duties as a Phantom flyer was to pull Range Control Officer for a day, every so often. I'd spend the day at the range, controlling flights of fighters and helos. Strafing was always fun. The Marine helos came and parked/hovered at the foul line and blazed away with whatever they loaded up that day, usually 7.62 mm. Buzz saws at work. Most fighters has 20mm cannon, so that was OK. Bigger buzz saws. The A-10s couldn't shoot at the regular targets; rip 'em to shreds. We had a supply of good old M113 APCs for them to shoot at. Lots of fire, smoke and noise. And they'd turn the APCs into Swiss cheese.

Didja ever see a Herc do a combat assault landing. Almost looks like a fighter pitching out to land. They are only limited by the bank angles allowed, shallower than what a fighter would use. The newer C-130Js may be allowed steeper bank angles and higher G loading. Most big jets are limited to 2.5 G. Fighters are somewhere north of 8.5 G, although that's in combat maneuvering. Landing pattern G loads are in the range of what a Herc would pull.

What do you use to glue the bricks together? A ready to use product or do you make a mortar? Interesting line of kits. Might try a small one.

Your ordnance looks good. And so does the Viper. Well done.

Of the 2 guys in the cab yes. There's a guy in the caboose, called a Conductor, who's the real boss, but many an engineer will argue that. Gene, nice work all around. The General looks very good.

Craig, most iron bombs, whether live or inert shapes were a khaki green. Live ordnance would have a yellow band next to the front fuse, inert ordnance would have a blue band. Laser kits were khaki, too. Cluster bombs were similarly painted. AIM-9 Sidewinders have a metallic green forward section. White behind. And yellow or blue stripes near the fuse section. Sparrows and AMRAAMs were white, except the radome/front section was a white ceramic. 12 years as a Weapons Officer did leave some imprint.

The corporate suits at Testors/Rustoleum feel that solvent paints are passe. I liked the early Floquil, which was lacquer based. Great on any model except the plastic parts (unless you used Floquil Barrier). Good luck with your use of solvent based paint. I bit the bullet and switched to acrylics. My airbrushing technique needs some work, but I can brush paint without putting on a chemical mask. I still mask up airbrushing, due to the particulates.

Henke, it's one of the better reproductions of HMS Hood. See this site of the HMS Hood Association for more details: http://www.hmshood.com/hoodtoday/models/trumpeter/trumpeter350.htm The site is very thorough, as you would expect fro the Association. References pro and con, photo-etch, other reviews. It will keep you occupied for a while, absorbing all the info.

All too true. Your health first. We can wait.

Henke, nice work. As to rigging sequence: bottom to top, middle to outside.

Thanks for the suggestions, folks. Kurt, I don't think I'll be plating anything. I mostly want to get my PE clean and ready for blackening. I have an old Sheepscot Scale Products rail marine pile driver kit. The gantry for the pile driver has a lot of PE, which I intend to blacken.