Better pictures, and the fuller back-story:
By mid-1941 German U-boat pens had sprung up in Hamburg, Heligoland, and occupied France. These pens made almost impossible targets, but there was one man in Britain who was a specialist in "impossible targets." His name was Barnes Wallis and he was given the task of designing a weapon capable of destroying the U-boat pens. Wallis knew that a shaped-charge weapon was the best answer, but the leading technology in shaped-charge weapons was all German. Fortunately, Wallis was provided with top secret information gained at great expense from Germany regarding shaped-charge research, and using this, Wallis designed a warhead he believed would be capable of penetrating and shattering the thick reinforced concrete bunkers that had shown themselves impervious to conventional bombs. Wallis problem now became one of delivering his massive warhead accurately. Wallis crafted a scheme whereby war-weary bombers could be fitted with the shaped-charge warhead in place of the cockpit - the unmanned bomber would have a director aircraft mounted on its back that could separate from the bomber after setting it on a course to impact the target. Obsolescent fighters were considered ideal in order to leave first-line fighters free for escort and other duties. It was considered reasonable that a second-line fighter could be able to protect itself on the return journey. Ultimately, the first prototypes used Blenheim Mk I bombers withdrawn from OTUs, coupled with Hurricane fighters. This combination proved most effective and ultimately all the conversion used some variation of this combo. The combination was considered by the Air Ministry to be a new type and was given the name Wallis Wembley in honor of its creator, but in service, they were generally referred to as Piggy-back Blenheims. The combination shown here used a Blenheim NF.I withdrawn from 42 OTU and a Hurricane IIC. The lower component was expended against the U-Boat pen at Hamburg, and the upper component Hurricane returned safely, but was not used again.
The Kits: The Airfix Blenheim NF I kit was used (the cockpit having been donated to my Bristol Bergen project). The upper component was the HobbyBoss Easy Assembly Hurricane IIC. The warhead was an aftermarket kit from Aires. The warhead fit almost perfectly, except the warhead was too wide to fit between the propellers, which meant I had to extend it forward. This added a fair amount of work. Nevertheless, I am happy with the results. Hope you like it too. Here are some more (better) pics taken by my son:
Wembly11 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly10 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly9 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly8 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly7 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly6 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly4 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly3 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly2 by
cacree, on Flickr
Wembly by
cacree, on Flickr