Hajo L.

...ok, my work here is done... 😉 Engines have been fitted: HAJO

Did I mention "only a few parts"? To get to this it took only a couple of minutes: There are two reasons why the N/AW-10 looks strange. #1 of course is the two-seater cockpit, #2 are the bigger rudders. Apparently the prototype got bigger rudders to compensate for the changed front part of the aircraft (because of #1). Since I think this looks too much off, I cut away about 5mm of the upper part of the rudders. Dumb me forgot to take pictures before and after... So this is after. They are still bigger that the "normal" rudders, I will take a picture with one of my standard Thunderbolts later. HAJO

I *think* there have been some sort of idea or thoughts about procuring the A-10 for the Luftwaffe... Would have made sense back then! HAJO

Well, some models I saw (or even bought) from Mastercraft/Mistercraft were cheap rip-offs from Matchbox or other kits of questionable reputation. I once used their decals for one of my AH-1Gs - they were ok. HAJO

Mistercraft is - in my eyes - notorious for having nice boxart and often beautiful decals, but crappy kits... Have you checked scalemates.com for the history of this kit? HAJO

I just googled the LBE and I know these double-decker coaches! I remember seeing them during the 150-year-anniversary of the Deutsche Bahn, when a pair of them travelled round Lübeck! Back to the Thunderbolt... No, it will be in USAF-livery. The kit itself is something along an "easy-kit", which means, that there are only a few parts and many stuff is without much detail. So I had to add some instruments to the panel, since it came without any details. Having bought the kit second hand without any decals also didn´t help much, since the original plan was to have decals for the instrument panel... 😉 The back-seater has two big displays for his sensor suite. And of course I added some ballast to this part to keep the aircraft balanced. HAJO

I fully understand you and I agree. If you happen to look into the "This ain´t real"-GB, you´ll see my most current posting for a project where I explained my personal relation to the Cold War. I think this explanation also stems from the aftermath of having done the Pershing-diorama. Actually, it´s a very good opportunity to thank you folks from the US and Canada for defending our borders in Europe against the Warsaw Pact. You could have chosen to stay at home on the other side of the pond, and leave us Europeans alone with our problems. Thank you for staying with us! I think this unity we had back then in NATO was the main reason why I can build a diorama such as the one above today, and never had to see a "live-launch" of a Pershing back then! HAJO

As announced I will give some love to the N/AW-10A, the double-seater Thunderbolt II. For me the Cold War was always something that was geographically very close - I grew up in the eastern suburbs of the german town of Lübeck. Lübeck was once mentionend in Winston Churchills speech about the "Iron Curtain": To give you some idea: Here is Lübeck: I lived in the east of the city, here: To be precise, I lived where the arrow of "1" is aiming to. As young kids, me and my friends usually went to the surrounding fields, and very often we paid the railway track (blue line) a visit. There we would watch the trains that went across the inner-german border (red line), mostly loaded with coal, and sometimes we just stared eastwards. And at "2", we could see trucks and cars crossing the track, east german vehicles! For us young boys it felt like we would look right into the heart of the communist empire! So, growing up as a son of a german reserve officer, and sometimes hearing and seeing east german Mi-24s flying patrol on "their" side, while we had UH-1Ds and Alouette IIs flying on "our" side, I knew very well that if the Cold War would ever go hot, we´d be among the first to notice! One of the things we west germans would have to count on the tackle the "Red Steamroller" of various battle tanks would have been the A-10 Thunderbolt. Long story short: I will do a double-seater Thunderbolt, "as if" it became operational during the mid-80ies and forward deployed to Germany. The kit will be the Hobbyboss 1/72-model, I built one some years ago and remember it a very nice project. HAJO

Looking "from east": The view from "the west": Anyone who knows Herman Kahn? In his book "On Escalation" he described the theoretical steps of the different levels of conflict, from diplomatic exchange up to an all out nuclear war. As you can see here, we have obviously reached one of the highest levels of escalation, where no rules apply anymore - the crew does not care anymore for the sign that says "Prevent Forest Fires! Smoking and open lights forbidden!". Various power- and controllines are leading between the firing position, the truck and his generator and the missile erector: HAJO

I just finished a diorama I built for a friend and collegue of mine. He graduadet with a thesis about nuclear strategy and asked if I could do him some "nice stuff". I had recently seen the M1001 with Pershing II-kit by Modelcollect in 1/72 and agreed to build this. The construction of the m1001-truck and the erector was a pure pleasure, here are some impressions: The truck is a german built MAN, with lots of small details and even PE-parts: This is the erector: Also very nice to build, but you have to think first before you start, especially if you want the missile in the launch-position - the kit only offers the transport position. But that conversion is not very complicated. And done, with the missile in position (not finally painted, though): The MAN was wearing a MERDC-scheme during the early years of its usage in europe, so I painted it in this - as I think - very attractive camoflage. I used a lightened up green 65 by Revell, Khaki green 86 (Revell) and the small "hooks" are done with white (darkened a bit with brown) and matt black. Cool looking camo! One downside of the kit: It does NOT contain any realistic decals for the MAN-truck. So I had to come up with some spare markings of my own. Also missing: The prominent MAN-logo on the grill! As I mentionend, I wanted to do a diorama. This mainly because my friend wanted to park the truck, erector and missile in his office, and the best method to keep the model safe from touchy fingers and room cleaning personnel is to do a diorama and put a glas-hood over it. The first step was to do a basic layout: Adding a small foot of a hill and the command post for the firing crew: Plaster was used to have some basic ground structure and even a small forest trail: Color: Scatter materials, secured by lots of thinned white glue: Checking again: Adding trees for a typical german pine forest: And small bushes: The "doomsday-button"! Trio infernale: Taking up position: Adding a camo-net above the position for cover: And finally adding the erector with missile and cotton to simulate the blast:

Have you heard of the AP-2H? A conversion of the P-2 Neptune Sub-Chaser aircraft for use against ground targets during the Vietnam war. Only 4 were done, and the received quite a package! https://p2vneptune.com/v07c.shtml One of their features was a set of 8 (!) downward firing 40mm grenade-launchers, mounted into the weapons bay. Looked like this...: HAJO

Cool aircraft! HAJO

Here is a diagram HeavyArty-posted at FineScaleModellers: http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/16/t/75405.aspx?page=1 HAJO

Lovely details! I´m really looking forward to the sling-loaded container and the aircraft carrying it! HAJO

Looking really excellent! HAJO