Tailspin Turtle

Click on resin, 1/48, and then scroll down to A/A42R-1 Refueling Pod set for S-3 and F/A-18 http://www.wolfpack-d.com/ Also see: https://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2015/06/things-under-wings-inflight-refueling.html It's basically a 400-gallon drop tank. See: https://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2011/07/douglas-low-drag-external-fuel-tanks.html

You could do it the other way round: two F-14s deployed on Enterprise in February 1982 were forced to land on Midway due to weather. The Midway air wing was assigned VF-151 and VF-161 F-4s; the Enterprise F-14s were VF-114 (111NH) and VF-213 (202NH). They were parked outboard on the port side of the angled deck; they were launched from the port-side bow catapult after the morning launch cleared the deck enough that they could be launched with the jet blast deflector down.

https://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2012/12/f-4s-wing.html

http://superheatmemorial.blogspot.com/2018/12/summary-differences-vought-f8uf-8.html

For what it's worth: http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2013/05/douglas-a3d-skywarrior-main-landing.html I don't know what the Trumpeter version looks like other than there should not be two separate wheel wells; instead, the "hole" in the fuselage for the main landing gear was separated by a thin shear web (panel) except for the part between the aft end of the bomb bay and the angled bulkhead at the front end of the wheel wells where the extension/retraction actuator was for each landing gear. It was open from one side of the fuselage to the other.

The cable reel and sonar "wet end" were fully enclosed in a "cabinet" during operations because otherwise there would be salt water sprayed around the cabin when the wet end was reeled up. I'm not sure I've seen pictures of the USN HSS-1 sonar with the cabinet panels removed but I'll take a look when I get home next week. In any event, that's a excellent representation of a generic dipping sonar mechanism.

It is a pretty good synopsis of Stevenson’s book. For my series of status reports on the post-cancellation saga, see https://thanlont.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-12-avenger-ii-program-fat-lady.html

Most of the stuff of interest to modelers, in fact material that is not in the monograph (it was published 30 years ago), is provided by my blogs. I’ve thought about fronting 1/72 and 1/48 conversions (and suggested it to a couple of aftermarket providers) but nothing has come of it. Yet.

Check Steve’s website to see what is out of print: http://www.ginterbooks.com/ Order any of those even on Amazon and you may get a low-quality POD. I asked Amazon not to do that for any of mine and they seemed to have complied (the F-111B is out of stock; they list one “collectible” for $132!)

It also depends on what drawing or museum example is being consulted: https://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2015/08/its-not-that-easy-to-get-it-right.html

My apologies: I was wrong, the bottom of the fuselage does begin to curve up a little before the radome according to pretty good Vought drawings.

Thanks for the suggestion. It does look a bit better but doesn’t address the fact that the bottom of the forward fuselage should not curve upward before it reaches the radome.

Al now has 129544 that was at the Museum of Flight in his hangar in Arizona. I don't know what Paul Allen's relationship with it was. Al also has hunks of 129622 and smaller pieces of other F7U-3s. The J46 may not have been particularly durable (durability, TBO being one measure, generally increases proportionally with the number of overhaul inspections but the J46 wasn't in service for very long) but so far I haven't seen anything to suggest that it was considered unreliable and in any event, the Cutlass has a spare if one has to be shutdown in flight. I'm sure he'd like to acquire more J46 p

That link is better than most but not the complete story and there a few errors. It did take too long to reach the fleet, in part due to short-sighted decisions by the Navy in addition to Westinghouse being late in the development of the J46. Note that the Cutlass was mostly assigned to attack squadrons; there was a photo reconnaissance version but it wasn’t assigned to deployable squadrons. The F7U was assigned to about as many Navy squadrons as the F4D but most with Skyrays made more than one deployment. No Cutlass squadron made more than one and some did not make any. As to why it wasn’t mo

Steve - Much of what you and almost all other aviation enthusiasts have read about the F7U-3 Cutlass is incorrect or at best, an exaggeration. For example, the accident rate, when examined in context, was not significantly worse than other U.S Navy carrier-based jets at the time and arguably better than the F8U’s. It was also not underpowered relative to early jets before the Navy added useful load and avionics, etc. to make it the first carrier-based fighter to be deployed with the big Sparrow missiles: that made it much heavier but by then the Cutlass was just a placeholder for the F3H Demon