F-35 weapons bay

[salomon]

Hi, I'm planning to build the excellent Tamiya's F-35A also the Italerie's F-35B. The japanese model is really awsome but I need to make some add for the Italerie's B version.

 

We have many F-35 A's weapons bays reference pictures on internet but so hard to find any for the "B" version, are there a lot of difference between the A and the B? Tamiya and the Italerie's kit don't have the same dimension of the weapons bay. Any help?

[Joe Hegedus]

Can’t help you with details of the B weapons bay, but there is a significant size difference between the bays of the B and those of the A and C versions, due to the presence of the lift fan for the B model to facilitate the STOVL capability.  The CV and CTOL versions can take 2000-lb JDAMS internally, whereas the B’s bay is too small for those weapons.

[Crash Test Dummy]

I don't think the lift fan has much impact.  The A has a fuel tank in this space.  The F-35B weapon bays are a little shorter mainly at the aft end but otherwise very similar dimensions elsewhere. The shape of the doors at the forward end are also different. To me it looks like the outboard door extends further forward in the B. The B has one fewer hinge than the A at the aft end. The B internal weapon stations are only rated for 1500lb vs 2500lb for the A. There are a variety of different adapters used to position different weapons in the correct location in the bay.

 

F-35B 

 

 

F-35A

 

[salomon]

Thank you, nice picts and we can see differences between those two versions.

[MattN]

Wow, that pic of the B undersides is a great weathering reference.