1/72 B-52D with Big Belly Mod, Operation Arc Light

IIRC there were 4 on each side by the front main gear, the same on each side by the rear mains and 3 or 4 inside, behind to bomb bays.  Was only there about 3 months.  Best part of being there was the 9th SRW was next door with the SR's.

Was a trip working on them out on the nuke alert pad..........AP crawling up your tail feathers to watch you like a hawk watching a mouse.

When I got to Udorn they asked if I was shop or flight line---said shop, had enough of the fl, they said we will give you a tour of the ramp areas, etc, since you will probably see some fl here too.  Parked in front of a revetment and said well, here's one of our birds.  Looked out the door of the bread van, looking right down the nose canon of an F4E.  Looked side to side slowly, looked back to the driver and then at the bird....Driver asked what was wrong, I said I thought B52's were bigger than that.  Yep, you're a shop troop.  Spent the next 9 months in the ALQ71 shop babysitting 60 of them til I got tired of it and went outside.

Came back to Shaw and still on the RF's to finish out.  Was going back to Mather but my re-enlist got canceled.  PO'ed the wrong guy.  Had a VRB of 6 then too.  E4, had career 7 and management 7 and a line number for staff that would have come up in about a year, and was red X qualified (they gave up the inboard pylons since they only carried the pods on the RF's and they pulled the charges out of the pylon bolts).

Pawel

Russ - beautiful scratchbuilding! Nice figure, too! Keep 'em babies comin', and have a nice day!

Paweł

Thanks, Pawel!

Bish

WOW Striker, that's some piece of work. I think you better stop now before you get carried away.

goldhammer

From one ECM tech to another, super, beautiful work.

Worked on "G"'s at Beale in 73 before going to Phantoms in Thailand. Love / hate relationship with them...Loved the bird,  hated those oil leaking, heavy, slick ALT's in the side bays. Especially when the bird was not fully loaded with fuel and the bays were 7 feet off the ground (not high enough for a stand, but too high to be really comfortable for 3 guys trying to load o box in the rack).  More than one tried to dig holes in the ramp.  Wish I had a couple of the maggie donut magnets though.

Thanks for the good words, Gold. Great to meet a fellow ECM tech. We only had C's, D's and F's at Clinton-Sherman back in 67-68. I hear you about those ALT's. You could get ALTritus handling those things . I think the transmitter alone weighed 150 lbs with coolant. Were the racks still located inside the 47 section on the G's? (we used to call them ovens - for good reason). Yeah, one of those magnetron magnets would be cool, but you'd have to keep anything metallic well away from them.

I worked on C-model Phantoms at Bergstrom AFB, Texas and D's through G's at Nellis AFB, Nevada.

Cheers, and thanks for stopping by.

Duke Maddog

Truly amazing work! I love it!

Thank you, Duke!

Son Of Medicine Man

Wow Russ!  That looks awesome!  Great scratch building there!  It just looks fantastic!     

Ken

Thanks, Ken! I appreciate the good words, bud.

Russ

mississippivol

Wow! That's excellent

Thanks, Mississippi, and thanks for looking 

Russ - beautiful scratchbuilding! Nice figure, too! Keep 'em babies comin', and have a nice day!

Paweł

WOW Striker, that's some piece of work. I think you better stop now before you get carried away.

From one ECM tech to another, super, beautiful work.

Worked on "G"'s at Beale in 73 before going to Phantoms in Thailand. Love / hate relationship with them...Loved the bird,  hated those oil leaking, heavy, slick ALT's in the side bays. Especially when the bird was not fully loaded with fuel and the bays were 7 feet off the ground (not high enough for a stand, but too high to be really comfortable for 3 guys trying to load o box in the rack).  More than one tried to dig holes in the ramp.  Wish I had a couple of the maggie donut magnets though.

Truly amazing work! I love it!

Striker8241

I decided to build one more maintenance stand - a B-2 stand - which I plan to use on my nuclear arming diorama - which I hope to do someday. While I've enjoyed building these stands, I believe the B-2 has cured me of any desire to build more . Anyway, here are some pictures. Many thanks for looking!

The picture below shows how it will be used in the future diorama.

 

Wow Russ!  That looks awesome!  Great scratch building there!  It just looks fantastic!     

Ken

Wow! That's excellent

I decided to build one more maintenance stand - a B-2 stand - which I plan to use on my nuclear arming diorama - which I hope to do someday. While I've enjoyed building these stands, I believe the B-2 has cured me of any desire to build more . Anyway, here are some pictures. Many thanks for looking!

The picture below shows how it might be used in the future diorama.

Big roger on that, Ken!

BTW, has your email addy changed? I sent you an email a few days ago but got no answer. Then I remembered your saying something about getting away from COMCAST - do you have a new email? Could you send me a message?

Thanks,

Russ

Striker8241

Hi, All,

While mulling over building the remaining transporters and empty clips, it suddenly dawned on me that I've probably overestimated the number of transporters that would have been at the aircraft during the bomb clip loading process. I originally thought there would be six but I'm revising the total number to four now, since six would just be too inefficient. I believe there were only the three loaded clips and one empty transporter initially brought to the plane.

I suspect they probably downloaded the first empty clip to the single empty trailer, then installed a full clip in its place in the bomb bay. Then downloaded the second empty clip to the now empty transporter, uploaded the next full clip, downloaded the last empty clip followed by uploading the last full clip.

I was stationed at Okinawa and we didn't have the pre-loading facility for the clips so I never got to see the actual process but the pictures I've found seem to confirm this, particularly the one below.

 

So that means I only need to build two more transporters instead of four (yay!)

Cheers,

Russ

 

Glad you caught that before you built them!   

Ken

Hi, All,

While mulling over building the remaining transporters and empty clips, it suddenly dawned on me that I've probably overestimated the number of transporters that would have been at the aircraft during the bomb clip loading process. I originally thought there would be six but I'm revising the total number to four now, since six would just be too inefficient. I believe there were only the three loaded transporters and one empty transporter initially brought to the plane, as alluded to in the photo below.

I suspect they probably downloaded the first empty clip to the single empty trailer, then installed a full clip in its place in the bomb bay. Then downloaded the second empty clip to the now empty transporter, uploaded the next full clip, downloaded the last empty clip followed by uploading the last full clip.

I was stationed at Okinawa and we didn't have the pre-loading facility for the clips so I never got to see the actual process but the pictures I've found seem to confirm this.

 So that means I only need to build two more transporters instead of four (yay!)

Cheers,

Russ

Bockscar

Wow Russ,

All those tiny releases,

do the solenoids actually work? ;-)

They sure look sweet, so many itchy trigger fingers,

so little time!

I'm not quite myself yet, look more like special effects for

a virus outbreak movie......

I can't believe we haven't had a summer up here yet, and July

is already over!

Those clips look great,

Dom

Thanks for the good words, Dom! Sorry to hear you're still having reactions to that medicine. I hope that clears up really soon. Thank God it's not anything more serious. 

Take care and get well soon!

Russ

Thanks for the good words, Jim! Glad to know you're still around. I was beginning to wonder if you were ok. I hear you about work - best thing I ever did retiring. I don't miss it a bit! (actually, I do miss my days in the Air Force...).

Cheers, and here's hoping you win that lottery!

Russ

Wow Russ,

All those tiny releases,

do the solenoids actually work? ;-)

They sure look sweet, so many itchy trigger fingers,

so little time!

I'm not quite myself yet, look more like special effects for

a virus outbreak movie......

I can't believe we haven't had a summer up here yet, and July

is already over!

Those clips look great,

Dom

Must be nice to have time for BUFF Building!  Work has been a hassle.  I need to go ahead and win the Lottery and get over this work thing.

Looking good Russ!  

Son Of Medicine Man

Striker8241

Hi, All,

It's been a while since I've had much time for modeling. However, I did manage to complete the first of three planned empty bomb clips.  They're pretty tedious to make so I'm not eager to build the other two right away . I found some clearer pictures online so I redid the points where the chains are attached to the sides of the transporter. I also weathered the transporter and the clip a bit.

Cheers and thanks for looking!

Russ

 

 

 

Great work once again Russ!  Very nice detail!     

Ken

Thanks, Ken!

Russ

Bish

That looks really nice, I can just imagine how much effort this was.

You will finish this one day.

Thanks, Bish. I'll keep plugging away .

Striker8241

Hi, All,

It's been a while since I've had much time for modeling. However, I did manage to complete the first of three planned empty bomb clips.  They're pretty tedious to make so I'm not eager to build the other two right away . I found some clearer pictures online so I redid the points where the chains are attached to the sides of the transporter. I also weathered the transporter and the clip a bit.

Cheers and thanks for looking!

Russ

 

 

 

Great work once again Russ!  Very nice detail!     

Ken

That looks really nice, I can just imagine how much effort this was.

You will finish this one day.

Hi, All,

It's been a while since I've had much time for modeling. However, I did manage to complete the first of three planned empty bomb clips.  They're pretty tedious to make so I'm not eager to build the other two right away . I found some clearer pictures online so I redid the points where the chains are attached to the sides of the transporter. I also weathered the transporter and the clip a bit.

Cheers and thanks for looking!

Russ

Bish

More great work there Russ. I have been following this, even if I haven't posted to often. Just so much amazing work and so much to keep track of.

Thanks for the good words, Bish! Glad you're still looking in .

Russ

Cool, Duke!

Russ

More great work there Russ. I have been following this, even if I haven't posted to often. Just so much amazing work and so much to keep track of.

Well, I have two of these BUFFs in 1/72 scale. Both are hanging from my ceiling currently, but I still want to get all these as well. I'll be sending an E-mail fairly soon.