I have a hunch that this kit will be just like the F19 Stealth fighter kits you could get in the early 80’s!
Not looking like the real thing at all…
:diablo:
Dear Diablo,
Back in the 1980s a very influential publication in Washington DC, USA, Armed Force Journal International, covered defense committee hearings and had article on those dull hearings. Most newspapers ignored those hearings. At one Senate committee hearing an Ast-Secretary of Defense was being grilled about the fact that a model company knew what the new stealth fighter F-19 looked like and held the model up. The Ast-Secretary of Defense (he was in charge of advance technologies I believe) stated to the Senator “Senator, That looks like nothing I have ever seen.” The Senator of course believed he was just being evasive. Not realizing he was tell the exact truth!
Finally, about 7 months before the first pictures of the F-117A were released I was on assignment at the Association for the US Army (AUSA) convention which is the biggest arms convention in the USA at that time. I knew another reporter by the name of Nick Nicholas and he stated he had the inside scoop from someone who had seen the stealth fighter and showed me a drawing. It looked like a turtle with wings with a lot of flat sides like a diamond. I told him, “It won’t fly Nick and a radar would pick it up in an instant!” I did not realize that that drawing with the flat sides was actually the concept and from a far distance probably looked that way.
Jack E. Hammond
BTW> The above is from memory of over 25 years of a now 60 year old man.
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Folks,
The best all around practical and cost effective option for medium size patrol warships combating anti-piracy and other low level naval threats is that GDM-A 35mm twin turret that Oerlikon has been offering for years that while can have a man in the turret aiming it can also be remotely operated — a lot of navies in the 1970s and 1980s bought them for small warships patrolling near coast lines or where a lot of islands were present realizing they need a man-in-loop weapon. It allows for about any situation at the right price. For engaging those small high speed boats that pirates use it can either fire HE with quick fuzes that explode as soon as they hit any surface including water or the AHEAD round with range information given either by a portable laser range finder on the bridge or the bridges radar to program the rounds just before firing.
Other options are either two large and expensive, or the range at which they are effective can bring them within the pirates own weapons (ie a 14.5 or 12.7 machine gun has a good a range as a 25mm cannons effective accurate range). Also, .50 cal to 30mm cal weapons rely on a direct hit where a 35mm round with either a quick fuze HE or an AHEAD “shot gun” round does not so aiming offsets due to sea states are not as critical.
Finally, the Oerlikon 35mm cannon and rounds are in wide spread production making cost lower and spares easier to acquire. And the 35mm turret I mention bolts to the deck and does not require any cutting of the deck for a below magazine — ie all it needs is a power hook up.
Jack E. Hammond
BTW> No longer in production, but the old manually aimed and loaded 3 inch DP cannon that was mounted on escorts firing modern quick fuze rounds or proximity rounds (they explode right on the surface and proved devastating in the Korean War against NK PT boats) would be a very effective weapon. But as I said, they are no longer in production.
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Interesting on how high the stern is………
Dear Members,
In the 1980s I always wondered why the USN did not have cruisers like the VITTORIO VENITO with the cruisers doing the air defense and helicopter ASW role for the larger conventional carriers. I discovered years later that while it looks like a great arrangement that is used by those two Italian cruisers, most of what I read stated it does not work to well on large warships (with a large deck on the stern and hanger space). One, the back part of the warship is where it is pitching up and down a lot and two it seems that the forward part creates winds and other type of air forces that cause landings to be a problem. The main reason that the Spruance class and Ticos have that landing deck located more near the middle of the ship.
The Russians took this type of design for a non amphibious helicopter carrier with the MOSKVA and they built only two, realizing the problem of the design and switching to the KIEV class. According to some Jane’s publications it was a bear to operate its helicopters unless the warship was going at a very slow speed due to the wind conditions its’ high super structure created across the flight deck in the rear.
Jack E. Hammond
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