General Melchett Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 Hi everyone, my latest offering comes in the form of an early proposal for a nuclear missile equipped variant of the ubiquitous VC10, one of several such interesting proposals submitted by the Vickers Corporation and BAC in the early sixties. A bit of background for those interested. The VC10 was seriously looked at for adaption to a variety of roles including ballistic missile carrier, maritime and electronic recon platform, AEW, and even the worlds largest interceptor!!!.To meet these roles Vickers and BAC proposed using multi role modular aircraft with interchangable noses and fuselages, totally unique at the time. These nuclear equipped aircraft were to have worked alongside then gradually have replaced the V-Bombers in time. This version the ALBM carrier was based on the Type 1106 variant ,(as used by RAF Transport Command) but had the standard 1100 airliner fuselage matched with the Super's 1150 wings, (to take the weight of the Skybolts and which had a more appropriate Mach rating) and uprated Conway Co.43 engines.The nose was heavily re profiled to encase the NBS and H2S systems and tanks were fitted to the extreme wing tips. Up to eight Skybolts could be carried pushing the total payload up to a massive 40,000lbs, this is the main reason that I added a new beefier undercarriage with a lower pressure footprint enabling it to be flown from more RAF airfields.There was also mention of fitting reheat to the Conways, RATO packs or even replacing them altogether with Bristol BS.81 turbofans of 36,000 lbs thrust each. An impressive way of looking at the strike potential would be to say that it would take 72 Vulcans and 32 Victors to carry a creditable deterrent whereas only 42 VC10's would have been needed to do the same job! Weapons to have been carried were 8, (or more usually 4) Douglas Skybolts, 4 Z.89's or 6 Bristol X.12's....a truely frightening war load!!! Reference was mainly supplied by Chris Gibson and his wonderful book, ''Vickers VC10, AEW, Pofflers and other unbuilt variants' and is a goldmine of information, (hopefully allowing other models to be built in time!), The model is basically a hybrid of parts namely Airfix fuselage and tail, Welsh models Super VC10 wings, Braz Super engines, Zvezda TU 160 Blackjack undercarriage and lots of good old fine Milliput and requisite elbow grease!. The fuselage was built as per the kit but with the windows filled and Milliput used to recontour the nose to make it more Nimrod like and match the 1/144th drawings I had made for the build. The wings were then added from the WM vac kit and wingtip pods added from the spares bin, new pe wings fences were added from the two six set then the excellent Braz Super|VC10 CO 43 engines were fitted,(vastly superior to the Airfix efforts!!), The Skybolts came from the old Crown B52 kit and pylons were scratchbuilt again according to plans, next the undercarriage from the Blackjack kit was cut down and adapted to fit before finishing off with a mix of decals using the Two Six Gulf Air set, Freightdogs Anti nuclear markings and stencils and bits from the spares bin again. Finished off in Tamiya white and Vallejo satin clear the model was given a light wash of Promodeller dirt and burnt umber oil paint thinned with white spirit.Finally Little Cars red and clear lenses were added again as per drawings and that completed a fun build of an aircraft that would have been truely impressive had it ever entered service. Mine has been finished as a Wittering based aircraft (139 'Jamaica' squadron circa 1965). The only thing left to be fitted are the pale blue serials ( I've run out!!) which will be XM720 from a cancelled second batch Victor... There's was a fair bit of conjecture as to what name it it have been given, (the name Poffler was used but as usual this was thought to be a typically obscure project code name to throw any would be spies off the scent!), and after a bit of searching it appears that the names Vengeance or Vigilant would have been quite likely as they continued the 'V' theme of the other V-Bombers in service. Several drawings of the time showed it in camo scheme but as the Skybolt was designed to be launched at around 40,000 feet I thought the anti flash white more in keeping with the role. Anyhow after all that, hope you like it, (a similarly equipped Trident is in the pipeline too for those interested ).... Cheers all, Andy Here along side my earlier BAC Rapier B1, (nuclear equipped Concorde proposal.....next Trident?)... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
HOLMES Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 General Melchett.. WHOA!!! YOWZER !!! SHE IS A BEAUTY!! Both of your models are EXQUISITE to look at ,thanks for posting them ' HOLMES Quote Link to post Share on other sites
The Rat Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 Absolutely gorgeous General! But... As someone who thinks that the VC10 is one of the most beautiful aircraft ever designed, I wish the design hadn't required them to tinker with the nose profile, it just kills the looks. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
dragan_mig31 Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 OMG this is one of the best bombers I have ever seen.Lovely finish. :worship: Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Bigasshammm Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 WOW Having never even heard of this I was like what? Informative and stunning. Nice job. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Sean Bratton Posted October 27, 2010 Share Posted October 27, 2010 Beautiful build, Andy. And a great job on the paint, too! As someone who thinks that the VC10 is one of the most beautiful aircraft ever designed, I wish the design hadn't required them to tinker with the nose profile, it just kills the looks. That was my first thought as well. Cheers, Sean Quote Link to post Share on other sites
General Melchett Posted October 27, 2010 Author Share Posted October 27, 2010 Many thanks for the kind comments folks, they really are appreciated!, yep I tend to agree with you on the nose...it does rather detract from the beauty of this aircraft but would have been neccessary to house the bulky NBS and H2S bombing and radar systems of the time..(today you could get away with it!). Having said that this design is by far and away one of the more attractive of the several touted, (and which I hope to model later).The modular version looked extremely strange with what can only be described as a Short Sperrin type front end and very bulbous tail cone...(not to mention 18 large missiles hanging from the wings but more of that one later Thanks again everyone I'm glad you like it and if any of you are coming to SMW Telford be sure to come across to the 'project cancelled' sig table where I'll be with Chris Gibson (author of the books) and Joe Cherrie (TSR2 and 'what-if if-only' expert), it would be great to have a chat about this and other projects I have planned...... Andy Quote Link to post Share on other sites
DamienB Posted November 3, 2010 Share Posted November 3, 2010 Andy, that's an absolute beauty. Superb. Must get hold of Chris' book! Found this earlier this year while digging through TSR2 stuff at Brooklands: Same nose, but different carriage style and no wingtip pods. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
sharkey Posted November 4, 2010 Share Posted November 4, 2010 Great model. The jet itself looks like a private jet that can drop bombs ^^ Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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