C-130 drawings

[Youngtiger1]

Hey Guys,
 

I need some advice from experts in our community. 

Are there any trustworthy C-130 drawings that show accurate panel lines and rivets? Am I correct in assuming all variants of C-130 have same panel lines? Excluding the specific modifications or attachments. Also, are there any decal option that has High Viz stencils available for purchase? All I see is low viz markings. TIA

 

Mike
 

 

[Dutch]

Q.1:  Are there any trustworthy C-130 drawings that show accurate panel lines and rivets?

A.1:  Yes!  World Air Power Journal and The Aviation News Service both offered plans / line drawings.  More difficult to find is the C-130 Hercules Modelers Guide Pt. 1 & 2 by Jay Sherlock (if you can find them).

 

Q.2:  Also, are there any decal option that has High Viz stencils available for purchase?

A.2:  Maybe. By Hi-Viz, do mean a silver/white Herk or a SEA Herk?  If you seek 1/48, 1/72, 1/144 or 1/200 scale hi vis walkways and stencils, DrawDecal of Florida has a modern AMC Gray C-130 stencil sheet available in multiple scales.  While the black walkway lines are the majority of the sheet, the insignia and stencils are all modern, so the yellow door outlines etc may have to come from a different sheet.  But look anyway, as his Japanese C-130H sheet offers the yellow outlines.  Caracal also offers CD72117 with all kinds of hi-viz markings.  DACO also offers a 1/72 Belgian Air Force example with tons of hi-vis stencils. If you are doing a hi-viz USMC KC-130F, then Flying Leathernecks has a sheet for you.

 

 

Edited November 21, 2023 by Dutch

[Sabrejet]

Q.1:  Are there any trustworthy C-130 drawings that show accurate panel lines and rivets?

A.1:  I'd be careful with the Aviation News plans. Some are OK; others in the series less so. Plans they may be, but don't assume that "plans" are accurate. 

 

If you're attempting to replicate panel lines and rivet patterns, a better bet would be to use a combination of T.O. fuselage station diagrams (these should not be scaled) and photo interpretation. C-130 T.O's show each frame/rib location (represented inches, so these measurements can be scaled) measured from a datum and skin joints will always correspond to these. Note that the C-130 wing employs planks, which are span-wise milled panels, attached to the ribs and to each other via a selection of taper-lok fasteners. As a result there aren't many longitudinal joins in the wing structure other than the main outer wing joint etc.

[andyf117]

I believe the 1/144 scale plans in the Verlinden Lock-On book were regarded as being pretty good.

[Youngtiger1]

Guys, thanks for your inputs.

 

Dutch, I had forgotten about Draw decals. Last I had read on these forums that the owner was having health problems and thinking about close his shop. However, your link shows otherwise. Might have to purchase that JASDF Blue scheme Hercules in 1/48. Since it has those yellow doors and propeller cautions lines. I have DC-130 that I am going to  build. Whitey51 build one few years back and I want to copy that dude as that was a cool looking Herk. In fact, he was very helpful with parts and information. 

 

Also, thanks for the tips on the books. I do have several Air Power Journals so I’ll look through my stash and see if I have the issue covering C-130. Never heard of the Jay Sherlock’s books. I will have to keep en eye on eBay for this. 
 

Saberjet, can you clarify the abervation of T.O.? Are you referring to Tech Operations manual? As for using the walk around photos I think you might be right. The best source compare to any drawings. 
 

Btw, great name. I saw my first air worthy Saber jet when I was at Edward AFB in 1999 and Michael Dorn aka Worf from Star Trek flew in his brand spanking new polished aluminum F-86 and parked it along other classic jets. It was an envy of many pilots that day. That was the same year I saw a B-1B pilot did full roll of that monster. I didn’t know B-1 could do such. I wished I had a video camera at that moment because the next day it didn’t happen.  

[Sabrejet]

1 hour ago, Youngtiger1 said:

Saberjet, can you clarify the abervation of T.O.? Are you referring to Tech Operations manual? As for using the walk around photos I think you might be right. The best source compare to any drawings. 
 

Btw, great name. I saw my first air worthy Saber jet when I was at Edward AFB in 1999 and Michael Dorn aka Worf from Star Trek flew in his brand spanking new polished aluminum F-86 and parked it along other classic jets. It was an envy of many pilots that day. That was the same year I saw a B-1B pilot did full roll of that monster. I didn’t know B-1 could do such. I wished I had a video camera at that moment because the next day it didn’t happen.  

 

T.O = Tech Order. Many are available on line but from memory the -2 Maint or -10 Repair TO's have station diagrams. I have a few copies if needed.

[Rob de Bie]

On 11/21/2023 at 8:23 AM, Youngtiger1 said:

Are there any trustworthy C-130 drawings that show accurate panel lines and rivets? Am I correct in assuming all variants of C-130 have same panel lines? Excluding the specific modifications or attachments.

 

I'm also after trustworthy C-130 drawings, but probably for another purpose. I want to build a simplified wire model of one, to do photo measurements. This is how far I got:

 

 

I mainly used dimensional data from Lockheed station drawings and Jane's, plus the drawings in Verlinden's C-130 booklet (red is my own wire model). I found one fairly large error so far: the tail planform was wrong. The artist assumed the root chord value was valid for the fuselage side, but it is measured on the a/c centerline. The drawing therefore shows a tail that's too large in chord and area. The error probably affects the beaver tail and possibly more. It just shows how difficult it all is.

 

 

Rob

[Youngtiger1]

Any of you guys have the British publications called Warpaint series No.5 C-130 Hercules book? It suggests there is a foldout with detail drawings. I wonder if it’s worth purchasing. 
 

Saberjet, thanks for the tip. I’ll try google and see what I can find. 

[andyf117]

7 hours ago, Youngtiger1 said:

Any of you guys have the British publications called Warpaint series No.5 C-130 Hercules book? It suggests there is a foldout with detail drawings. I wonder if it’s worth purchasing.

I do - the plans are marked as the Aviation News ones by Mike Keep and date from 1978, so they only cover 'early' versions...

....photos of the A2 fold-out sheet below to illustrate what they cover - as my copy still has it stapled in, the 'rear' is shown here in two halves:

Edited November 29, 2023 by andyf117

[habu2]

Back in the early '80s I was a CGI modeler for military flight simulators.  We had a contract for a CH-53 simulator that required training in-flight refueling.  I was tasked with building a KC-130 model including dynamic hose/drogues.  I had an E-sized mylar drawing with dimensions, panel lines and cross-sections - wish I still had it.  These are screen captures from what was state of the art CGI in the 80s.

 

 

 

[Dutch]

@habu2, You are a man of many talents! Very nice. I wish I had the time to devote to CAD or other 3D rendering software so I could design all kinds of model aircraft parts. 

[habu2]

CAD ?  CAD ??? We don't need no steenkin' CAD !!!

 

Back when I was a kid we walked five miles uphill in the snow - wait, wrong story.....

 

Back when I was a "database modeler" (1983-ish) we had to manually calculate the XYZ coordinates of every single vertex in the model. Triangles were easy-peasy but, if we wanted more than three vertices in a polygon, we had to calculate out to four significant digits to maintain planarity and avoid rendering artifacts when polygons were viewed on-edge.  Speaking of polygons. we had to define each polygon as a list of vertices, and the list order determined the visible side of the polygon.  Then we had to define lists of polygons into "objects", which also had to be carefully ordered since there was no priority scheme at that level.  Objects were then listed in "cells" with manually defined separating planes to determine priority between adjacent objects.  Models (airplanes, terrain, everything) usually had multiple levels of detail, with each level a separate model, and the models linked with appropriate transition ranges.  All this was linked into the overall database and compiled, usually an overnight task.  I initially worked on a PDP-8, and we eventually moved up to a VAX 11/780.  This was all pre-SGI (Silicon Graphics) era.  Oh, and all those vertices, polygons, objects, planes, cells and other attributes all had to be MANUALLY TYPED IN. No mouse, no "windows", just text editors on VT-52 & VT-100 monochrome monitors.

 

This C-130 model was something like 5,000 lines of code.  The prop disks were semi-transparent and the transparency varied slightly in an animation sequence to simulate spinning props.  Each section of refueling hose was on it's own dynamic coordinate system, and the host program calculated and moved the sections in real time (not pre-computed) according to their interaction with the refueling probe on the helo - done with invisible "collision volumes" also modeled nd linked into the visual model.  Initially we weren't able to apply texture patterns to the polys, that was an emerging technology at the time, the visual models were later modified with texture patterns as the capability became available. I remember slapping together an old AMT C-130 model (1/72) and literally drawing on it with a Sharpie to determine the layout of the polygonal sections.  Ahhh, those were the days...

 

This real time rendering was done on custom hardware in multiple full-height racks (the size of refrigerators) and, for literally millions of dollars, could render up to 1500 polygons in a scene at 30 Hz. Yeah, we were cookin' with gas....

 

I also found a couple of screen captures of a T-45 model I built for the Navy's T-45 sim: