New models 1/144 and 1/72

  Me and Nat went out to Lakeside the other day, first time in ages and we had Wagamamas... yum yum.  Anyhow I always go into Modelzone to check out what they have and usually I try to sneak out with a model that Nat hasn't noticed that I have picked up :P  Well we went in there and I was on the look out for a new E-2C Hawkeye as mine has fubar'd up.  I might be able to recover it but I am not in the mood for it right now.  Well I spotted this instead, Nat told me to get it as it's not a "little fart arse thing"... anyhow below is what I got.

  I love the look of this plane, looks mean and it's a European theater plane too, which wins point for me as I saw the Battle of Britain's Memorial Flight C-47 Dakota fly over the other day.  Such a beautiful plane, anyhow it was in the colours of the D-Day landings and I was kinda inspired by it

  I also got these 3 in the post from Ebay, I did order an EA-18G Growler too but I am waiting for that to turn up.  Anyhow I was looking through the kits and I had brain storm concerning the two models below.

  Now these two both had nothing but Air-to-Air missiles in it, I wanted to do something different.  Then when I was researching the Tornado GR4 (Below)...

 It comes with 4 Storm Shadows, as you can see on the box art, there is two Storm Shadows on the wing plyons.  As far as I am aware that would hardly ever get used, its very rare to see a Tornado without the fuel tanks on that station.  I have only ever seen a Tornado without a fuel tank when it was on QRA or parked up.  But I know the Storm Shadow can be put there so technically it's not wrong, just odd.  Anyhow, while researching where they went I saw that the Storm Shadow is used on the Dassault Rafale and the Typhoon FGR4, and I had an idea once I saw the GBU-10/GBU-12's in the kit.  I am gonna turn my Typhoon into an FGR4 and the Tomcat will be turned into a Bombcat.  As far as I can see there wont be that much to do to either models.  The Bombcat put it's bombs where the AIM-54 Pheonix goes (the wiki picture demonstrates this perfectly) and there is some Mk.84 "dumb" bombs in the kit too.  The Typhoon FGR4 is easier, I just gotta find the right pylons to put the bombs on, now I can either have 6 GBU's on the wings, 4 GBU's and 2 Storm Shadows or a mixture with the "Supersonic" Fuel tanks.  I liked the look of the fuel tanks so I am going to go with that.  Now one part that was missing was the LITENING or TIALD pods for the Bombcat, I'll have to find out which it used but that problem was solved by the next kit...

 
  What do you see on the inner-most plyon?  A LITENING pod... well I think it's a LITENING pod, I gotta check that up, but still as I only bought this kit for the decals and the weapons.  I think I am sorted here.  I got the spare Sidewinders too.  Now part 3 of this weapon mix up.  I've got these pictures of an F-18 that I think looks cool...

 Or

  Now, the top one from what I can see has 8 ARMAAMs (AIM-120) possibly 10 with 2 in the body recess with two Sparrow AIM-7's and two Sidewinder AIM-9's.  And the bottom one has 6 AIM-120's with 2 Sidewinders.  Now I dont think these are viable load outs because as usual carrier aircraft usually have extra tanks on.  But it looks cool, so I am going to use the missiles I have left over from the Tomcat and the Typhoon and use them on the F-18.  Cool idea no?  I also got this model turn up...

  I have always had respect for the pilots of this aircraft and the amount of bombs this thing could carry was ridiculous.  I'll make one as the A-6E but I might try to make the other one into a Prowler, I'm sure that Retro-wings do a conversion will look into it.

  For people who like to read I purchased this...

 I was a little disappointed with this book, I thought it was going to be a book about the actual "fights" of the war day-by-day kinda thing but it describes what planes where involved and the paint they had on them instead with a little of the history behind it.  I likes this one tho, there is a few Pumas in it and I have an 1/144 Puma awaiting some loving care, I might get some ideas from this.

  More ideas as and when they come to me...

  PEACE!

  Dazz