Post by Flite-Metal on Jun 28, 2024 4:54:03 GMT -6
The intention of this thead is to focus on Scale...not wanna be, but competitive level Scale Jets and Prop. Initial subject is the rebirth of the A6 Intruders as seen in the film "Flight Of The Intruder". This thread and my Boeing B-47 thread were an extensive show & tell in that other place... This is way mo' better! Don...God Bless! You made an excellent choice of editible format with video capability enabling us to share the wealth visually...worth more than a 1000 words.
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Obviously the original movie A6 was damaged. The special effects company for the movie is a Houston company. They were contracted to provide large (1:5.5) flying scale A6 Intruder models for the film "Flite Of The Intruder", a John Millis film based on the Stephen Coonts' novel.
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Houstonian Barry Rayborn was approached by the owner of the effects production company while he flew one of his turbine powered jets during an R/C presentation at the "Wings Over Houston" Airshow at Ellington Field. Barry was asked if fhe would like the remains of the last movie A6 damaged in a recent hurricane. Barry jumped at an opportunity to rebuild this famous movie prop.
............................................From This:
Obviously the original movie A6 was damaged. The special effects company for the movie is a Houston company. They were contracted to provide large (1:5.5) flying scale A6 Intruder models for the film "Flite Of The Intruder", a John Millis film based on the Stephen Coonts' novel.
......After getting the salt water damaged A6 home the full extent of disasterous condition became evident with warped internal wood components, wingskins, horiz stab, and vertical fin. Barry is a Flite-Metal customer I visit from time to time as he nears completion of a subject. I arrived to find Barry covering a P-80 with Flite-Meteal for Top Gun. Barry turned to ask if I would like to see his new toy...down in his garage...a Ferrari Spider ...SURE!
Barry led me downstairs through the side garageentrance. As I entered the doorway I glanced to my left and became immediately fixated on the 1:5.5 A6 which I recognized as the lead in the movie "Flight Of The Intruder". I began to slow down and stopped to stare while Barry stood waiting to showoff his new toy. Barry was not aware I had researched and obtained 1:6 Grumman A6 plots of nose to tail, and tip to tip on 3 inch centers from Bob Kress, VP of Grumman in New York with an intention to construct a recip ducted fan A6. The recip was deemed to be way below the "at the time" 1.623:1 power to weight ratio of recip ducted fan power. My dream of a 1:6 A6 faded quickly. This was eight or nine years previous. Turbines were out of $ sight at the time.
Two days later the surviving A6 parts were in my shop destine for a reconstruct eval. I set about gathering every resource I could get my paws on. At that time there was not a lot of technical resource online to support what was required. I set about to learn as much as I could about the person(s) who did the dirty work in creating this A6. Fortunately the work was "carved" in the DFW region of North Texas.
Having developed a reop plan with a material component list in hand I set out to find what was rumored to be other 1:5.5 A6's pulled from the original molds cast in North Texas for the "Flight Of The Intruder" film.
Barry led me downstairs through the side garageentrance. As I entered the doorway I glanced to my left and became immediately fixated on the 1:5.5 A6 which I recognized as the lead in the movie "Flight Of The Intruder". I began to slow down and stopped to stare while Barry stood waiting to showoff his new toy. Barry was not aware I had researched and obtained 1:6 Grumman A6 plots of nose to tail, and tip to tip on 3 inch centers from Bob Kress, VP of Grumman in New York with an intention to construct a recip ducted fan A6. The recip was deemed to be way below the "at the time" 1.623:1 power to weight ratio of recip ducted fan power. My dream of a 1:6 A6 faded quickly. This was eight or nine years previous. Turbines were out of $ sight at the time.
Two days later the surviving A6 parts were in my shop destine for a reconstruct eval. I set about gathering every resource I could get my paws on. At that time there was not a lot of technical resource online to support what was required. I set about to learn as much as I could about the person(s) who did the dirty work in creating this A6. Fortunately the work was "carved" in the DFW region of North Texas.
Having developed a reop plan with a material component list in hand I set out to find what was rumored to be other 1:5.5 A6's pulled from the original molds cast in North Texas for the "Flight Of The Intruder" film.
Don,
