Author Topic: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"  (Read 15422 times)

Offline Robomog

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JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« on: February 18, 2018, 04:03:35 AM »
Hi All

I was going to sit this one out, but I had one of these eureaka moments and here I am. It's my first kitbash in competition but I'm not holding my breath here, i'm still learning. So a bit of alt history :-

The Germans had managed to succeed in  the battle of the bulge due to over running a petrol dump and having enough impetus  to reach Antwerp. German counter attacks on the Eastern Front had pushed back the Russians giving Germany that vital breathing space to develop and refine its jet aircraft and manufacture tank and other military hardware. The Meteors were still busy with the V1’s and the Airacomet was still too under powered to be a competitive  aircraft. The Vampire, F84 and other jets were still yet to come on line. Which left a problem of intercepting high flying Arado 234 reconnaissance jets which were feeding accurate troop positions to German high command and nullifying the cracking of German secret codes.
A stopgap aircraft had to be found that was fast enough to catch the high flying Arado jets.
During one push the army overran a German airfield and although all the aircraft were gone they discovered a number of discarded Jumo jet engines some of which had not been damaged or destroyed as they had evacuated  in a hurry. These engines were to become the basis for the stopgap interceptor.
There were plenty of Spitfires and Mustangs available. Originally it was intended to remove the existing engine and mount the new jet engine under the nose but designers soon realised that this would roast the undercarriage. Borrowing the Me262 concept a wing mount of two jet engines was carried out around the bomb shackle and gun area of the Mustang wing the wing structure was also reinforced to allow for the additional weight.
This left the nose clear for armament.
Two aircraft were converted, one with six fifty calibre machine guns, the other with two machine guns slighty offset to aĺlow for the installation of a thirty seven millimeter cannon. This had a limited capacity of only six rounds but it was thought that the extended range of the weapon would give it an edge in a chase situation.
And thus the Jetstang JXP-51 was borne or ‘Frankenstein’s Mustang’ as it was called by the mechanics.
It was not the most perfect combination, in flight it was adequate and fast, the armament worked well, but in its original tail-dragger form the ground clearance on the jet engines was very tight and had a tendency to blast chunks out of the concrete runway. To counter this a raised retractable tailwheel was installed rather like a reversed nose wheel to raise the tail and level the engines, this resolved the problem, however the amount of available flap had been considerably reduced due to the placement of the engines and as a result landings became a bit hot needing a lot of braking to avoid overshooting the runway.
To compensate the tailwheel was given a selectable landing position which brought the aircraft back to a lower, almost tail-dragger stance again, that allowed the pilot to flare the landing and create more breaking drag.
Having an aircraft capable of interception is one thing, getting into the best firing position is another, even with the improved speed and rate of climb. It was over two weeks before they had any success,  the machine gun  armed Jetstang managed to approach from behind and below and power climbed up under the enemy aircraft blasting it with its 50 cals before stalling away.
The cannon armed Jetstang had its chance two days later, this time it was already at height when the Arado  was reported by conventional mustangs flying below him. Sure enough he spotted the intruder ahead and slightly below him, but the enemy saw the Jetstang coming and gave the engines full power it was all the Jetstang pilot could do to close the gap, at extreme range he fired the 37mm cannon and with the fourth round was rewarded by a bright flash on one of the wings of the Arado, this rapidly folded up and the aircraft spiralled towards the ground spreading parts as it went.
After this the reconnaissance Arado’s became more infrequent and harder to track down. It was as if the existance of the Jetstang seemed to keep them away. The Jetstang’s had a couple more successes against high flying conventional bombers that had been pressed into service as reconnaissance aircraft, desperate to glean battlefield information.
The success of the type was not to last, when returning from another fruitless mission one of the Jetstang’s had a heavier than usual landing and as it was taxiing up to the hardstanding the ground crew noticed the left wing had increased  its dihedral by a considerable number of degrees. Closer inspection showed that despite the extra reinforcement in the wings the weight of the engine had finally taken its toll on the aircrafts structure and it had failed, the bumpy landing had been the final straw. The other Jetstang was grounded immediately and examination showed that this aircraft was also about to fail.
It was deemed that both aircraft were beyond reasonable repair. The engines were removed to be used on other projects and the aircraft stripped of all useful spares for the normal Mustangs. Both aircraft ended their lives sitting on oil drums on the edge of the airfield and we’re finally scrapped a few years later.
The Jetstang only occupied a short space in history but it fulfilled it’s task as a stopgap until better aircraft became operatonal .

Build details will follow shortly

Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline Tophe

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #1 on: February 18, 2018, 03:16:10 PM »
Interesting Mog. Will the wings look like P-51's (straight) or Me-262's (swept back)?

EDIT: (after checking) In April 2013 (not April 1st), I created such twin-jet-Mustangs, but I did not build them:


« Last Edit: February 18, 2018, 03:57:11 PM by Tophe »

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #2 on: February 18, 2018, 06:04:29 PM »
Hi Tophe, great minds think alike, i forgot you are the all variations of the Mustang goto person.

The wings will be straight. This project is a stopgap lashup so as little change to the structure as possible to save time.

I will be uploading some pictures shortly

Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline Robomog

  • ...had a very bad experience with [an] orange...
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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #3 on: February 19, 2018, 04:51:47 AM »
And so it begins, not too much detail as I started late and lost a week coughing my lungs out.

 I was sorting through some spare parts and found a couple of badly painted Jumo Engines from a Frog, or Revell Me 262 that I had kept and simply thought they would look pretty good on a Mustang.

20180204_165504 by Robomog, on Flickr

Here is the doner kit

20180204_165631 by Robomog, on Flickr

And a quick dry fit to see if its feasible, its not worlds best fit but I think some of the problems could stem from the butchery that was to follow.


20180204_170455 by Robomog, on Flickr

The Jets are attached and the unwanted oil cooler removed the wings are being checked for fit


20180207_200822 by Robomog, on Flickr

And now for some serious PSR.....


20180210_153722 by Robomog, on Flickr

The wings are on, more PSR......


20180210_202731 by Robomog, on Flickr

A new nose from a Hellcat drop tank to give more space for armament,  more bloody PSR ! .............


20180216_172053 by Robomog, on Flickr

20180216_172348 by Robomog, on Flickr


The Tail planes are on and the gun ports cut,  a little light sanding YaY !!.........


20180217_172344 by Robomog, on Flickr

The story so far with a coat of rattle can white, this has shown up some faults so still some work to do........


Thanks for looking

Mog
>^-.-^<





 
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline Brian da Basher

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #4 on: February 19, 2018, 05:06:53 AM »
Outstanding work on those engines, Mog!

They look like they were molded to fit those wings.

Brian da Basher

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #5 on: February 19, 2018, 06:00:25 AM »
Thanks Brian,  I was really fortunate,  the engines still had some of the original wing attached so it was a simple matter of carefully taking the thickness down with a drum sander. Length wise it was damn near spot on.

The gods of polystyrene smiled on me !

Mog
>^-.-^<

Mostly Harmless...............

Offline AXOR

  • Our returned Monkey Box man
Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #6 on: February 19, 2018, 06:35:11 AM »
This will be interesting to watch,everything looks good and promising at this stage. :smiley:
Alex

Offline finsrin

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #7 on: February 19, 2018, 06:58:55 AM »
Great concept. :smiley:
Engines and nose are zactly right.  Appreciating the pictures.

Offline Tophe

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #8 on: February 19, 2018, 01:26:58 PM »
Wonderful :-* Congratulations! So nice an addition to the Mustang family... :smiley:

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #9 on: February 20, 2018, 02:06:58 AM »
Looking good.
All hail the God of Frustration!!!

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Offline elmayerle

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #10 on: February 20, 2018, 03:00:26 AM »
Looking great so far!!  I look forward to seeing the finished product.

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #11 on: February 20, 2018, 05:28:49 AM »
Thanks for the comment guys, I have had a change of work location so updates are going to be a bit less frequent than I would like, but they will appear eventually  ;D

Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline The Wave

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #12 on: February 20, 2018, 10:27:07 AM »
Nice work so far! :smiley:

Offline pigflyer

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #13 on: February 21, 2018, 05:54:51 AM »
Love it.  Very entertaining story and nice kite.  Great work Mog, great work.
If I don't plan it, it can't go wrong!

If it's great, I did it. If it's naff, I found it.

Offline KiwiZac

  • The Modeller Formerly Known As K5054NZ
Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #14 on: February 23, 2018, 04:39:09 AM »
Very cool, I like what you've done so far! A very clever solution to the nose issue.
Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG"
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #15 on: February 23, 2018, 06:10:31 AM »
Thanks again for the comments, very much appreciated

I will post some more progress  photos shortly

Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline andonio64

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #16 on: February 24, 2018, 12:39:19 AM »
I agree with our colleagues, the jet engines are definitely the part! And the nose is fantastic, it has really a vintage future look.

Antonio

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #17 on: February 27, 2018, 05:07:43 AM »
Thanks Antonio !

Well, got some time in over the weekend, as I was using silver I decided to spray it on, as back in the day I had real trouble brushing metallic colours and found airbrushing gave a superior finish. So down to the shops to get some rattle can silver but no luck, our local Hobbycraft is useless.

OK no problem, my old airbrush is in the loft somewhere but I found a basic hobby spray gun in the garage, so with some well watered down the paint that would do the business..........

No it didn't.

 Despite having a really thin mix the paint blobbed on to the model like a sticky pebble dash finish, had to quickly wash it off  with water before it dried.

So with some trepidation I went for a brush finish and three coats later IMHO it looks great !

20180219_162239 by Robomog, on Flickr

Shown here with the anti dazzle black


20180222_202153 by Robomog, on Flickr

and another photo


20180222_202451 by Robomog, on Flickr

And here's a picture of the ground clearance in tail dragger  configuration as I said above its not lot !

Thanks for looking

Mog
>^-.-^<
« Last Edit: February 27, 2018, 05:45:22 AM by Robomog »
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline kitnut617

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #18 on: February 27, 2018, 05:53:56 AM »
You could give it a longer tail wheel like the Germans did on some of their fighters (Bf 109 for instance). Not sure of the reason why they did though.

Offline Robomog

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #19 on: February 27, 2018, 06:46:49 AM »
Hi kitnut

It will be getting a raised tail wheel as described in the alt history.

Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

Offline elmayerle

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #20 on: February 27, 2018, 07:51:37 AM »
You could give it a longer tail wheel like the Germans did on some of their fighters (Bf 109 for instance). Not sure of the reason why they did though.
IIRC, so that the large bomb carried on the centerline would clear the ground.

It will be interesting to see how this beauty gets its raised tail wheel.

Offline Tophe

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #21 on: February 27, 2018, 11:21:10 AM »
IMHO it looks great !
I am not sure I understand all (IMHO = If Memory Holds Out?), but I confirm that your model looks great, magnificent! :-*

Offline Old Wombat

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #22 on: February 27, 2018, 06:16:38 PM »
IMHO = "In My Honest Opinion" or "In My Humble Opinion"
"This is the Captain. We have a little problem with our engine sequence, so we may experience some slight turbulence and, ah, explode."

Offline Robomog

  • ...had a very bad experience with [an] orange...
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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #23 on: February 27, 2018, 10:47:35 PM »
Thanks OW, it's the second one, always humble......


Mog
>^-.-^<
Mostly Harmless...............

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Re: JXP-51 Jetstang "Frankenstein’s Mustang"
« Reply #24 on: February 28, 2018, 02:03:48 AM »
Looking good
All hail the God of Frustration!!!

You can't outrun Death forever.
But you can make the Bastard work for it.