WIP Mega THREAD!

[+daddyairplanes]

oh yeah,

should probably mention i'm playing with loadouts

Iron Hand guys, prep to be disappointed. the Air Guard didnt really do the Weasel thin in SLUFs, and so those are now omitted. It was the Navy E's that were wired for Shrike and HARM...

but assymetrical loadout can make life.... interesting

 

[+daddyairplanes]

pleasant suprise when i went to download the trainer today

still gotta fix that skin tho, and wait for a guy in Abilene to get back to me on numbers and serials

[+daddyairplanes]

@yakarov79, you ever do a new LANA pod when you were working on naval A-7s?

there's only so much a repaint can do for that very basic A7FLIR model.....

[+yakarov79]

5 hours ago, daddyairplanes said:

you ever do a new LANA pod when you were working on naval A-7s?

I was planning to do something about it the moment I will get into Air Force SLUFFs....well it did not happen yet.

more seriously...I did not research the topic yet.  once I asked for some pictorial walkaround but seems like my guy did not have time or chance to do it yet...

[+daddyairplanes]

yeah i hear you on the waiting part, and it is a rarer find on the internets

got a hook up in pm tho, so Im good for now.   huge thanks to Svetlin for sharing and Nyghtfall for already creating a really detailed AAR-45 skin that works on the old TMF model

 

(goes back and eats words on "only so much a repaint can do".....)

Edited May 28, 2023 by daddyairplanes

[+yakarov79]

Yup. I know where is one and i had a plan to go there in summer...but plans for summer changed(again) and I just ended in Italy instead...again.

[+daddyairplanes]

sometimes you just gotta make it yourself chapter 376

original    new version

 

keystone cop swiped from the current ARW patch, available in non fuzzy but small png via Wiki

also featured in chapter 212 of "what the hell was i thinking back then" 

[+EricJ]

I don't like working that hard on decals for birds. If it's large enough and I can work with it I'll use it. If it gets too complicated I may pass it up. I wanted to do a VAQ-142 line bird for the Growlers but was having issues with the reference and PNG image of the tail art. So I decided to wait and see if something better came along.

[+daddyairplanes]

these days its not all that hard really, espescially when im being picky. i've messed with enough of these (USAF patches) that i know roughly what the best approximate fonts are, how to place em fairly quick etc. now ten years ago when i made that first patch by cutting it out in PS.........

more frustrating was that the Pennsylvania Air Guard was really screwy with their SLUFs. I made that patch just to realize that it was probably just for their Nellis deployment in 83. further, out of 4 possible camos, they stayed in traditional SEA until 84, only their two seater and one D model going to wraparouond camo. At least that i could verify by photo

beyond that only three got painted the two tone gray at the end.

frustrating, but in the end only meant i did three skins for them instead of four.

[Svetlin]

On 5/27/2023 at 9:56 PM, daddyairplanes said:

ini cleanups,

or why did TK comment that out so the pylons stayed on no matter what.....

Probably because it is close to impossible to find a picture of the Corsair II with fully clean wings. I have come across pictures with 2 pylons removed, one on each wing, but not all at the same time. Here are a couple of pictures I consider to be popular with the middle pylons removed: 

Note, that in the second picture, the innermost pylon is still there despite being empty. May be a drop tank was hanging there and was dropped before the picture was taken, who knows...

I would say that considering the lack of pictures of Corsairs II without pylons, TK decided to represent the aircraft with pylons on at all times.

[+daddyairplanes]

oh i agree on the no clean wings search results

but the ANG birds didnt have the outer one added too often. so i made my adjustments to allow them to be blank.....

 

ok checkin internets after typing, they didnt carry payloads often on the outermost stations. but all the ANG birds typically have all pylons on even if only one or no stations are used

ok DA, why you gotta go screwing with ini's .........

[+yakarov79]

Last two pictures of Navy  sluff are taken 1990/91 during DS. At the time Sluff was ready for retirement...and VA had not enough pylons at the moment, so pylons from stations 2,3,6 and 7 were didided for two aircraft. Except HARM birds.

Second pic- empty station 6 may indicate that mission was carried without it and flight was refueled on route.

In real unlike in game pylons are not something that you plug and play on a whim..it takes time to wire systems and pylons..and during combat deployment not always there is a time for it. Often aircafts wired for HARMs stayed HARM bird for whole deployment while other birds were bomb trucks with TERs. Also from certain point ..if you have TER fixed to pylon and mission requires smaller payload - you just hang one mk82 on TER...it saves time too.

[+daddyairplanes]

quite true on time to upload/download and wire up pylons

in the case of the Guard units, they had a very small staff on all the time, and few flying hours during the normal week.  so likely easier to leave em all on.

i actually looked around at the pics i collected and another run at Google to say Svetlin was just talking about the Navy birds. I discovered that Guard birds typically had all pylons no matter what. a few pics even have just a travel pod or just a 119 jammer but the other 5 pylons on and empty!

in fact, it was more likely in the Guard for the Winder rails to not be loaded than the wing pylons

[PeacePuma]

On 31/5/2023 at 4:50 PM, daddyairplanes said:

sometimes you just gotta make it yourself chapter 376

original    new version

 

keystone cop swiped from the current ARW patch, available in non fuzzy but small png via Wiki

also featured in chapter 212 of "what the hell was i thinking back then" 

I was passing by and I saw this patch I decided to improve it I hope it works for you.

[+daddyairplanes]

i know TK made some tgas for Colorado. frankly mine look better

he didnt make any for Michigan tho....

[+daddyairplanes]

make sure to support teh local team....

[+daddyairplanes]

more from the nose art gallery....

[+daddyairplanes]

10000 pts to whoever can ID the unit (will do serials tomorrow)

 

[Nightshade/PR]

If my memory still holds true, 76TFS, England AFB, Alexandria, Louisiana? I seem to remember the checkerboard strip along the tail.

Edited June 11, 2023 by Nightshade/PR
Spelling Correction

[Blade]

7 hours ago, daddyairplanes said:

10000 pts to whoever can ID the unit (will do serials tomorrow)

 166th TFS, Ohio ANG, mid '70s (later the stripe became solid blue)

Click for image

[+daddyairplanes]

winner! (makes note to change checkers to green and cuss out lack of color photos of 112th birds)

[+daddyairplanes]

14 hours ago, Nightshade/PR said:

If my memory still holds true, 76TFS, England AFB, Alexandria, Louisiana? I seem to remember the checkerboard strip along the tail.

76th TFS

 

75th TFS

(with the checker you remember)

 

and to round out 74th TFS

 

you are right about the base though. they kept similar schemes through the A-10 years. 76th deactivated until a couple years back, the 74th stayed same until they traded Vipers back for Hogs, and the 75th has only gained a "75th" title in the checkers, otherwise staying the same through the years

[Nightshade/PR]

Bless You Good Sir.

Your words & images are PROOF that my Alzheimer's is NOT in full bloom just yet!!!! 

[+daddyairplanes]

some nose arts (much more to come)

[Viggen]

Always found it interesting how many camos and variations of them that the USAF A-7s wore. Very fond of the two tone grey.