The Utter Aviation Randomness of Sentinel Chicken

[Litvyak]

Stunning work, all of them, but I LOVE that Greenlandair 727! I love trijets, and that scheme looks just right on it, too.

[Talos]

Those look awesome, SC! I can't think of anyone who's done an SP profile before, so when I saw the TWA one on your monitor there it took me a second to do a double-take. The Pan-Am one looks great too. You have the best reason for doing a profile with it, because you want it yourself!

[Sentinel Chicken]

Here's another real world print finished earlier in the spring:

Republic Airlines DC-9 Series 14 | N948L | MSN 47049 | LN 42 | Ship 139 | December 1982

The formation of Republic Airlines came about from the merger of Minneapolis-based North Central Airlines and Atlanta-based Southern Airways- it was one of those unique mergers in the industry where the two airlines were completely complimentary to each other- from what I recall, their route networks didn't have a single route duplication at the time of the merger and formation of Republic and their networks had only seven US cities in common. The airline's livery was based on North Central's and kept the distinctive "Herman the Mallard" tail logo with the new airline's headquarters in Minneapolis. Only one year later in 1980, the airline spread westward with its acquisition of Hughes Airwest and the addition of Hughes Airwest meant that Republic served more US destinations than any other airline at the time, even the big legacy carriers. This was trumpeted by Republic's 1981 ad campaign centered around the slogan "Nobody Serves Our Republic Like Republic". By the time Republic took delivery of the first production MD-82 on 5 August 1982, it was the largest Douglas DC-9 operator in the world.

This particular print depicts N948L, a Baby Nine in the classic Republic colors that came over from the Hughes Airwest acquisition. The history of this particular airframe covers a good number of airlines- it first flew on 21 June 1966 and was destined for Phoenix-based Bonanza Air Lines as it's first pure jet equipment. But for a year around 1967 before it flew for Bonanza it was leased by Douglas as N6140A to another local service carrier, Allegheny Airlines- at the time, Allegheny had settled on the DC-9 Series 30 as its jet equipment (after a flirtation with the Boeing 727) and the lease offered Allegheny experience with the DC-9 before the first Series 30s arrived with the airline.

It was the only Baby Nine to fly in Allegheny's colors before it was returned to Douglas and delivered to Bonanza where it became N948L. On 1 July 1968 (only about a year after N948L was flying for Bonanza), Bonanza, San Francisco-based Pacific Air Lines, and Seattle-based West Coast Airlines all merged in what's probably the only three way merger in the history of the US airline industry to form Air West. Just two years later, Howard Hughes, long since divested of his holdings with TWA, was itching to get back into the airline industry and purchased Air West, the airline becoming Hughes Airwest, famous for the bright yellow livery and the futuristic logo type of the airline titles.

(Interestingly, Hughes later wanted to buy Texas International on his way to building a coast-to-coast airline- he lost a three way bidding war between Herb Kelleher of Southwest who was trying to knock TI out of contention in Texas and Frank Lorenzo, who would win the war for TI and started quite in infamous career in the airline industry!)

When Republic bought Hughes Airwest in 1980, twelve of the airline's Baby Nines came across, of which N948L was one. The airline had actually operated a total of 21 Baby Nines, but some had been sold off to other airlines before the Republic acquisition. Republic itself would be acquired by it's hometown rival, Northwest Airlines in 1986. Republic had a very large DC-9 fleet at the time- approximately 42 Baby Nines alone, of which 34 crossed over to wear Northwest colors.

And fly them Northwest did! Northwest even embarked on an upgrade program to keep their Baby Nines active and up-to-date. The Series 10s were finally withdrawn from service in 2003, this particular aircraft, which was still registered as N948L, was withdrawn from use in November 2001 and was finally broken up at Greenwood Leflore Airport in Mississippi in June 2003.

As future releases, I also plan to do prints of N948L in Bonanza colors as well as Northwest's colors. Stay tuned!

Some detail views from this print:

And an overview of the entire print:

[Sentinel Chicken]

Howzabout some what if airline 747SPs? Just finishing these up......

[Scooterman]

Sign me up for one of those Pan Am SPs, JP.  Please!

[elmayerle]

-chuckle- If you're going to do 747Sps, how about one in SP (Southern Pacific) markings?  Perhaps matched by one in Santa Fe markings as an evolution of the markings on their DC-4s when they tried to get into the airfreight business just after WW II.  If you want to get really gaudy, use the markings of the Coast Daylight as inspiration.

[Litvyak]

-chuckle- If you're going to do 747Sps, how about one in SP (Southern Pacific) markings?  Perhaps matched by one in Santa Fe markings as an evolution of the markings on their DC-4s when they tried to get into the airfreight business just after WW II.  If you want to get really gaudy, use the markings of the Coast Daylight as inspiration.

That's a brilliant idea! Either in full on Daylight scheme, or if you want to tone it down a little bit, do the black widow scheme...

[The Big Gimper]

While poking around in the virtual world, I re-discovered the lost world of Sentinel Chicken.

Some nice Dornier Do-31's on this page and Hawker P.1216's here.

[apophenia]

The whif Greenlandair B727 got me wondering if anyone knows the RW B727 combi operator who flies off of fjord ice in northern Greenland? Photos all show a rather generic scheme but it's neither Transair nor Icelandair's livery.

[Sentinel Chicken]

Logan was kind enough to poke my near-body with a stick to see if in fact I was dead.

Rumors of my demise are somewhat premature. Let's just say I was out fighting the forces of evil n' sh*t.

Some real world work that's been taking up my time lately:

[Sentinel Chicken]

I think I had posted these on the other forum but it appears my Spey Mirage IVKs need to take roost here as well. These are from 2006.




One of the more interesting aircraft for me has always been the Dassault Mirage IV, long the mainstay of France's airborne nuclear deterrent. Basically a 50% scale up of the Mirage III/V series of fighters and given twin engines, it was one of the few delta wing jet bombers to enter service (the other as far as I know off hand being the Convair B-58 Hustler).

When the British government cancelled the very promising BAC TSR.2 strike aircraft in 1965, Dassault offered an "Anglicized" version of the Mirage IV which would have had British avionics planned for the TSR.2 as well as Rolls-Royce Spey engines instead of the SNECMA Atar engines. License production was even offered to the British- however, political realities what they were in those days and the French not ranking high on the esteem list with NATO following Charles de Gaulle's unilateral withdrawal of the French armed forces from NATO in 1966, it was a stillborn idea- the British wanted the F-111, that went nowhere with the delays and cost escalation in the F-111 program, so they ended up with a land based version of the Blackburn Buccaneer and it wasn't until the arrival of the Panavia Tornado in the early 1980s that the RAF finally had an outstanding tactical attack bomber.

At any rate, suppose the Brits cancelled the TSR.2 earlier and took up Dassault's offer for a British Mirage IV?

1. Fuselage stretch in the region of the intakes to counterbalance the heavier weight of the Spey engines.

2. Increased depth of the aft fuselage by bulging the upper countours to accomodate the Spey engines.

3. Increased intake size to accomodate the higher air mass flow of the Spey engines.

I'm not exactly sure where the SLAR would have been fitted, but it seems that the nav/attack radar would have been in the belly radome.

For this one, I've decided to stick with the anti-flash white even though I believe by this point (1967) the switch to low-level camouflage was taking place as well as the first IVKs, if built, wouldn't have been delivered until 1969. But it's a WHAT IF!!!

I decided to go with a slightly recessed weapons/fuel pod centerline, a sort of smaller version of what the Hustler used. I figure there'd be some fuel in there as well as one or two WE177 bombs. Use up the fuel, drop the bombs, and ditch the pod and haul ass home.

Next up, a more realistic camouflaged version........stay tuned!

[Sentinel Chicken]

Here's how the IVK would have most likely looked like at service entry in 1969, wearing the gray/green camouflage on the uppersurfaces with light gray undersurfaces. I think I got the markings on this one right, echoing No. 14 Squadron's blue diamond markings that were worn on their Hawker Hunters before they transitioned to the Canberra.

[Sentinel Chicken]

Here's another 1969 bird- this one in the markings of No. 16 Squadron which at the time was winding up use of Canberras with RAF Germany in the interdiction role. Markings are more along the lines with the vertical black/yellow band throught the roundel that were used on the Canberras. I had started out with the black/yellow arrowhead as was used on No. 16's Buccaneers, but that seemed to more appropriate for something in the 1970s. Tail marking also echoes the squadron badge of No. 16 Squadron. For this one I added some 1000 lb GP iron bombs on my interpretation of where some additional pylons would have been- the IVK would have had four hardpoints on each wing and in addition to the two already there, two more would have likely been under the wing roots in tandem.

[Sentinel Chicken]

More RAF Mirage IVKs (or Spey Mirages as some references call the proposed aircraft)!



^In 1972 the RAF revised the camouflage scheme and markings of its ground attack fleet (primarily the Buccaneers I believe) from gloss paint and red/white/blue roundels to matt paint and Type B roundels (no white) for lower visibility during operations. The above illustration reflects that change in markings- the colors of the camouflage remained very similiar (if not the same), but the markings reflect the new Type B roundels. Markings are for No. 3 Squadron- currently a Harrier operator, but I thought appropriate for the IVK variant as at the time, No. 3 Sqn was a Canberra interdiction squadron assigned to RAF Germany.

Weapons loadout shows BL.755 cluster bombs, which entered RAF service around 1972 and replaced air-to-ground rocket pods (SNEBs, I believe) in the area attack role.



^No. 213 Squadron was another Canberra interdiction squadron assigned to RAF Germany- only the squadron was disbanded having ended its days as a Canberra operator. I extrapolated what No. 213's markings would have looked like- the black/yellow roundel bands came from its days in the 1950s as a Vampire operator and the wasp on the tail came from when it operated the Canberra bomber.

Weapons load out consists of the AJ-168 television-guided Martel missiles with the distinctive spindle-shaped TV Martel data link pod on the left outboard station. It was around 1973 that the TV Martel first entered service.



^Last one for now, this one reflects the temporary Arctic camouflage that RAF Germany's Buccaneers would wear when deployed to Norway for exercises. During the 1977-1978 period the Soviet Union began to increase its naval operations in the seas around Norway and the North Cape area and NATO responded by holding regular maritme attack exercises in Norway. The basic camouflage substituted a temporary white paint over the dark gray.

Markings are the later version of No. 16 Squadron- compare with the other No. 16 Mirage I posted above- the yellow-outlined black arrowhead on the forward fuselage and the squadron emblems on the tail and intake similar to what No. 16 did with their Buccaneers.

Weapons loadout has four AS-37 Martel anti-radar missiles (a further development of the AJ-168 Martel) and an AN/ALQ-101 ECM pod on the left outboard station. Since the anti-radar Martel variant didn't need the data link pod, it's not present on this load out. From what I recall, this version of the Martel had interchangeable seekers that would be preselected on the ground based on expected threats and target characteristics.

RAF martime attack tactics would have had six aircraft, some with AS-37s and some armed with AJ-168s. If a ship turned on its radar to defend against the attack, then the radar homing Martels would find their mark. But if the ship turned off its radars, then it would have been easier for the TV Martel-armed aircraft to press home their attack.

Enjoy this set of illustrations!

[GTX_Admin]

Great to see you are still alive.

[Sentinel Chicken]

Great to see you are still alive.

Day job has been a bit of a b*tch. Cold and flu season is good for business but bad on my free time.

[Cliffy B]

Glad to see you back as well man!  LOVE those RAF Mirages, especially the arctic camo verison 

[Sentinel Chicken]

The whif Greenlandair B727 got me wondering if anyone knows the RW B727 combi operator who flies off of fjord ice in northern Greenland? Photos all show a rather generic scheme but it's neither Transair nor Icelandair's livery.

Links to any pictures?

[GTX_Admin]

While poking around in the virtual world, I re-discovered the lost world of Sentinel Chicken.

Some nice Dornier Do-31's on this page and Hawker P.1216's here.

I always loved the Do-31s and the S-3s.

[Logan Hartke]

Logan was kind enough to poke my near-body with a stick to see if in fact I was dead.

Rumors of my demise are somewhat premature. Let's just say I was out fighting the forces of evil n' sh*t.

Nice to see you back, J.P.!  Hopefully you'll get some time to do some more Whif profiles later on.

Cheers,

Logan

[GTX_Admin]

SC, you are so lucky you already have an Avatar...else you may have gotten this:

[apophenia]

Links to any pictures?

Here's a lousy image (from a pdf) of that B727 on the ice. And today found the background story.

In 1993, Platinova (a Nuuk-based mining company) was exploring for zinc and lead on Greenland's northern tip ('Ironbark' on the Citronen Fjord). They hired First Air to ferry in equipment to the Citronen Fjord (and to the Frederick E Hyde Fjord slightly further to the north). A bulldozer was flown into Thule AB and then on to the gravel strip at Station Nord. From there, it was driven 300 miles north-west across the sea ice. The driver then ploughed a 7,000 foot landing strip on the ice surface of the fjord. The strip was later lengthed to 11,000 feet which allowed First Air's B727-100C to operate from it.

B727-100C in First Air livery of that time:
http://img.planespotters.net/photo/287000/original/C-GFRB-First-Air-Boeing-727-100_PlanespottersNet_287213.jpg

[Sentinel Chicken]

Not so much a what if but a real world project just recently finished. These are WIP shots:

[GTX_Admin]

Good to see you posting again mate.

[Scooterman]

Second that!