Skull Leader

Thanks! I mostly shot some of the new skin (forward lower turret cradle, starboard side of the front fuselage, wing cap, belly pan, bomb bay doors). The longest term project I was part of was taking the belly pan and restoring it to the pre-radar configuration. We had to figure it out from photographs, as the set of blueprints Boeing provided us were all for the later mods that featured the radome. I was also part of the team that installed the wing. My very last project before my group finished was helping provide the first buff-job... she sure was shiny when we rolled her out aft

Doc restoration vet here. (2004-2014) Decals don't exist in any official format and likely won't due to licensing rights from Disney. They wouldn't even let us use the original "Doc" artwork that was on the nose when we pulled it out of the desert. There was one licensed image of Doc that they let us use and that's it. (for those not in the know, the artwork that was originally on the nose during '69972's operational life was very different). They did eventually convince disney to let them use the original art for some merch, but Disney was adamant that if we were going to continue

It was only a target tug for a very short time. It served in a radar squadron for most of it's operational life and made a number of endurance flights.

Nice! And also, since my statement about Sniper pods back in 2017, the JASDF has modified their stance somewhat and now Sniper XR pods are being carried by the F-2 fleet. (not sure when that changed exactly though)

If you're talking about BuNo 161621, likely not. It was a TARPS jet. F-14As and Bs that were TARPS airframes could still make use of the LANTIRN system, but only if the TARPS controls were yanked out (the two control panels occupied the same piece of real estate in the left hand side of the RIO's seat), which was a massive pain in the posterior. As such, PTID displays were likely reserved for the aircraft most likely to use the LANTIRN and do bombing. (not saying it isn't possible, just not very likely.)

VF-1 and VF-2 had both switched to overall gull gray by that point.

I'm friends with Dan "Turk" Pentecost, who was one of the pilots that participated in this little adventure. I've asked him on multiple occasions if he had any images of the HMS gear they installed in those jets and he didn't have anything that showed them (nor any photos that weren't already being circulated). The pods you see on Station 8A were nothing more than telemetry-gathering pods for the exercise. They wanted something that gathered more data than your bog-standard ACMI/TACTS pods. Attached below is probably the best you're going to get for the addition above the RIO's co

Not a clue!

Nuff said. need one for a B-17 build. I'd take either the Koster or Pro Modeler Cheyenne tail. Anyone have one they're willing to sell?

Nuff said. need one for a B-17 build. I'd take either the Koster or Pro Modeler Cheyenne tail. Anyone have one they're willing to sell?

Mystery solved: he worked on a B-17H!

Hmmm. What is the likelihood of a Navy wrench-monkey working on someone else's bird while stationed on saipan? Would the coast guard have kept rescue birds out there? What about the USAAC?

Thanks, Joe. Don't suppose you have an image somewhere that shows what the rest of the markings on a NMF Navy B-17G would look like?

So my (long departed) grandfather in law was in the navy in WWII and evidently worked on a B-17. The photo in my grandmother in laws album shows what is clearly a B-17G with the nose scanner radar instead of the chin turret... but has all other guns and turrets installed (at least the dorsal one, and it has cheek guns). The aircraft is NMF and not blue (which I thought was weird). So... is this a navy SB-17G? Some other bastardized configuration? My father in law wants a model of the aircraft, but I can't extrapolate a lot from this photo. Anyone able to help? I

Well, that answers that!