I like flying saucer designs, so when Takom came out with their 1/350
Haunebu I, II, III kit, I had to have it. I no longer build NAZI crap but since these saucers are all fantasy, I made them allied post war designs based on discovered alien artifacts.
There are three saucers in the kit - small, medium and American sized.
Backstory:
In 1947, while surveying locations in Alaska for an early warning radar system, the US Army found the damaged wreck of a uncrewed alien spacecraft, embedded in a hillside and covered by snow and gravel. While most of the vehicle had been crushed by debris, a rocky overhang protected what was later determined to be the drive unit. Early radiocarbon dating of plant material found around the vehicle indicated that it had been embedded in the hillside for close to 7000 years.
While removing the remains of the vehicle, the cylindrical gravity shielding drive unit - which was mostly undamaged - was seen to levitate slightly when a generator was placed nearby. With the hope of using this alien technology, the Defense Department created Project AESOP - Advanced Extraterrestrial Spacecraft OPerations.
Full reconstruction of the original vehicle was not possible - the shattered crystaline substrates that seemed to control the vehicle could not be reproduced (later studies of the fragments in the late 2040s showed them to be some type of quantum computer), but a partially successful reverse engineering of the drive unit allowed the construction of a small test vehicle in 1950.
Since the science and engineering behind gravity shielding weren't fully understood in the early 1950s, the vehicle had to be circular in shape to allow the reconstructed drive unit's field to lift it from the ground. While strictly an atmospheric design, the saucer showed excellent acceleration and maneuverability. Control in yaw and pitch were done by three dishes pointing inwards under the drive unit. By varying the power, frequency and direction of the microwave emitters at their focus, the drive unit's field could be shaped and modified to allow directional control. It was also discovered that even with the directional controls active - as long as the drive unit was on - the vehicle was nearly invisible on radar.
This is the original design from 1950:
Flight tests showed that the rounded crew compartment was interfering with the shape and efficiency of the field generated by the drive unit. A truncated crew compartment was added in 1951, and flying from the Muroc/ Edwards Air Force Base, extensive flight tests were completed over the California deserts:
In 1952,
George Adamski claimed to have photographed this saucer in flight from Desert Center, California. The US government saw this as an excellent opportunity to hide the project - in plain sight - so they created the UIO (Useful Idiot Office) for Project AESOP to support and promote UFO conspiracies - they dumber and more outrageous, the better. This cover allowed the design and testing of larger units.
I haven't quite finished this model - I want to knock back some of the grainy paint texture and clean up some of the weathering. The underside looks awful:
The three disks are from a car kit that just happened to fit. I didn't like the three turrets included in the kit, but I may replace these. I used a PE hatch for the crew.
Here's the crew compartment with one crew member:
