Beautiful aircraft.
Also always nice to see a restoration for which care is taken for the correct colors and the accurate markings of the peculiar aircraft depicted, so rare !

Where is this Spit based ?

Blimey, when I heard the Fairey Battle was going to get strung up around a staircase in a new building I thought it was a mis-heard rumour gone wrong. Looks like it may have been right…

A rare aircraft, when preserved in a museum, should always stay on its wheels (to be able to be rolled outside the building for some occasions) and be kept so easily accessable for serious researchers (for instance, for making professional walkarounds).

Basically, a rare aircraft hanging out of reach is almost a lost aircraft.

And why not, at least once, a Buchon not in these fake colors, but in its original and very pleasant Spanish finish ?

P.S. It would be nice if a Spanish team would buy back a Buchon, probably the only solution to see a Buchon in its real glory.

I just read on this French defence blog…

http://secretdefense.blogs.liberation.fr/defense/2010/01/premier-vol-du-raptorski-en-russie.html#comments

… that the IRST radome on the prototype is just provisional for testing the final one and that “it will disappear” on the production variant (which will be produced by the same company making the ventral Mig-35 sensors).

So do you think that the final IRST of the PAK-FA will be retractable, to keep smooth “stealth” lines ?

Please, say me yes, an aircraft is always prettier with no asymetric elements on it 😀

“It’s a humbug,” said independent military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer. “It’s just a prototype lacking new engines and a new radar. It takes new materials to build a fifth-generation fighter, and Russia lacks them.”

As I never heard of this Pavel Felgenhauer, I quickly googled him to find the typical neocon influence agent, serving mainly USA and US allies interests.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavel_Felgenhauer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jamestown_Foundation

I saw last week one of these US tv shows about air-air combat made with 3d aerial sequences. This episod was done about future air-air combat options. It featured in the circumstances examples of dogfights between USAF F-22’s against formations of Russian Su-30 and French Rafales (I was very surprised of it). This means, for the US aviation experts and USAF pilots who took part to this TV documentary, that strategical situations showing combat between US forces and European nations is not a totally impossible option for the future.
If I were a European fighter pilot defending my country against US aircraft, would I like to go to combat in an US aircraft armed with systems my country cannot fully control ?
Of course, no.

Almost all nations that are buying the F35 are already reliant on the US to some degree…
+++++++++++++++++++++++++

Yes, this is right and this is not good.
It is time to end, at last, WWII.

If you consider that the main target of the F-35 is to destroy, perhaps definetely the European capacity of producing jet fighters and consequently to keep for a very long time the NATO countries under American sovereignty, the cost of this program, from the US point of view, is perhaps not so high.