Knight26

Is Tony Stark subbing in as the aqua-trooper?

From a game or RC simulator, even more obvious in other clips.

I want to go to that warehouse. 

OMFG that collection is amazing

I would still call it a win, depending on price, as I have never been able to find an actual Mac-7 VF-19F/S 1:65 that wasn't a kitbashed bootleg with VF-19 Kai parts.

On 12/8/2022 at 3:26 PM, captain america said:

Be prepared for the possibility that it will have no control surfaces. 😎

*twiddles thumbs and whistles*  Not saying I know people on the program who have said things, but...  Not saying that I don't.

3 hours ago, kalvasflam said:

Ok, let's back up a second, P-8 is equipped with Harpoons, last time I checked, that's an offensive weapon system. 

And yep, the whole idea is that the 747 would make a good bomb truck on approach, because why do you need stealth when you can just paint a United coloring scheme or a Lufthansa one on top of it.  Put some tick figures in the window, and doctor the electronic signature, who would know the difference.  But in reality, that is not really needed, because if you have 1000 mile range on the ALCM (and I think there was at least a couple of variants that had even longer range), you'd just stand off and lob missiles from far away.  Interceptors just aren't going to be flying out that far.  I would say use the B-52s, except the problem there is that, those are even older air frames.

Besides, if you're not down with the 747, we can always use the 777 or the 787.  I heard the 787 is supposed to be very eco friendly with its lower fuel burn, but the 777 does have the advantage of larger cargo capacity.  And more of them are in service as airlines.  I know it's very cynical, but the people who gets to argue about this sort of stuff are usually the ones who won the war in the first place.

The B-1R concept sounded a little bit out there, I remember that it involved adding AESA radars and AMRAAMs, and my first thought was... what????   B-1B to be fair is already a bomb truck, I wonder what more it would take to make it able to carry more weapons.  I wouldn't be surprised if its bomb bays can already carry most of the munitions in inventory.

Yes, the P-8 carries Harpoons, but the primary role is that of a subhunter, and the operational flight profile would not be easily mistaken for that of an airliner, espeically since it primarily operates off the coast or in close proximity to battlegroups.  An ALCM carrying 747/777/787 would, and utilizing them in such an offensive posture, paints a target on every other airliner out there, even if you are launching at 1000mile plus range.  That is, again, due to the operational flight profile of the P-8 that is not the case there.

The B-21 might seem underwhelming but we do not know much about it at this point, and it has been optimized for its new operational profile and 6th gen systems integration.  Time will tell just what it can/will do.

 

6 hours ago, kalvasflam said:

It's also a bit redundant at this point, think about when and why stealth was conceived.  In this day and age, you are better off with just a bomb truck, like what they were doing with the Rapid Dragon, except, even that concept is a waste of time, just get a dozen 747, convert them with rotary bay and strap some missiles on them.  The concept was around in the early 80s, and it's perfectly viable, and you can go one better by automating the cockpit so that its a UCAV missile truck.  Just stealth up the missiles a bit, and make sure it has an extended range.  Even the original ALCM had 1000 miles plus range. 

Penetrating air defenses sounds good until you realize that stealth isn't quite as good any more against more modern air defenses, and as pointed out, with hypersonic missiles, you hardly need that penetration any more unless you have to have a man in the loop making last minute targeting decisions.

 

 

The problem with turning a 747 into a bomb/cruise missile truck is that you have now turned every airliner out there into a potential threat in an enemies eyes.  That was one of the reasons why the concept was ultimately killed.  Boeing and the Navy even had long discussions about that with the P-8, which is a sub hunting 737.  In that case however, since it is considered a "defensive" aircraft the decision was made to move forward, and its operational profile does not look like an airliner.  The Cruise Missile Carrying 747 would have been a purely offensive aircraft and its operational envelope would have made it disappear into typical air traffic, which was the point, but doing so paints a giant target on every airliner out there.

1 minute ago, iharthaters24 said:

are all of them 1:18 and from bbi/21 century?

There's a makers mark on the bottom of each that will make it clear.

57 minutes ago, iharthaters24 said:

Are these valuable? I have no reason to keep them so i would like to find a home if they are/arent for someone who knows how to take care of these.

Value varies depending on completeness, condition and what people want at the time.  

Those are the old BBI/21st Century 1:18 scale Hornet, Viper and Cobra.  Very cool find.

Looks awesome, can't wait to see it in robot more and how they implement the bridge move.

I'm not really seeing much difference other than color, but, as stated, that could just be the lighting.  
The fighter mode proportions still look off to me, especially the forward fuselage and the engine nacelles.  But let's face it, M+ has a fair amount of anime magic in the designs.

A sad day indeed, my thoughts are with the families.

Oh man, he was the ultimate batman (voice), this is a sad day for any batman fan.

Michelle Yo is always a win.

Have you gotten hands on these yet @Shawn? 

I think I'll give it a watch

1 hour ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Not to mention that both the "real" Macross and any recreations for in-universe docu-dramas were literally making the ship appear bigger on the inside through the strategic use of holograms.  Holographic false skies concealed the fact that compartment ceilings were practically scraping the rooftops in most places, giving the illusion that there was only the one layer of city when in fact it was stacked 3-4 layers deep in places.

 

Exactly.  When it comes to interior habitable volume the bigger issue will always be storage and mechanical space volume.  Even then, as we have pointed out, actual living spaces would likely be crammed in wherever they can be found with multiple people living in the same small "apartment."  Those few "large" homes we see in the city section seem reserved for business owners and the higher-ups in the city.  

I think the reason why so many people have a hard time picturing the actual volume/living requirements is due to western civilian living conditions bias.  Anyone who has spent time in crowded cities, or aboard a warship understands how big a small space can actually be when used appropriately.  Of course in Western Sci-Fi we often see the opposite issue, massive ships with tiny crews, look at any of the Enterprises from Star Trek.

6 hours ago, SebastianP said:

The problem is we see how people live in the city and it's not "stacked like sardines in efficiency apartments." There's just way too much *space* inside the ship. I mean, just look at the training area where Hikaru did his basic training early on in the show? There's an actual military base with a barracks and everythign. That's got to take up a huge chunk of not just deck space, but volume. Same with the park and amphitheater where the Miss Macross competition takes place. Then there's the roads, and the business district, and the fact that the buildings in the city don't go all the way to the top of the compartments they're in, so there's space above that's effectively wasted. 

The size of the features we see inside the ship add up, and the tally doesn't really match...

Which is why I think that the size of the population and the facilities within the ship are holdovers from before they decided "won't it be cool if the Macross punches something with an ocean-going vessel?" 

Your math makes my brain hurt, you can't divide the ship into 3 meter decks and claim you can get the same density per square kilometer of deck space as a city full of skyscrapers gets per geographic area.

Being very generous, the Macross has an overall population density of around 150,000 per square kilometer of surface footprint, and that's counting the space in between each arm and leg. Without that, we're probably looking at 200k. While there are places in the real world with 150k per square kilometer, looking at the wikipedia articles for them I'm *guessing* that has to do with people having twelve kids and living in shoebox deathtraps with streets so narrow that if a fire ever occurred, the fire engines would have to wait outside the district lines because they won't fit.

The first "affluent" area listed on Wikipedia's list of city districts by population density among the ones I checked at least is Yorkville, Manhattan. Where the residents live in 40 story skyscrapers, and have a population density of 60k according to the 2010 census. 

Hence why my final example is Male in the Maldives, the majority of buildings in the 6km^2 island city are sub 10 stories, with the largest being 15 stories, and having a population of over 133k people, and it is not exactly a poor city.  That area also encompasses all the parklands, marinas, and other schooling and entertainment venues.  And as @Seto Kaiba pointed out we largely see only one family living in their home (Likely because of their business), and officer quarters.  Most of the rest of the city, outside of the entertainment, shopping, and morale venues, are what appear to be apartment blocks, by and large.  The "cityscape" aspect of the ship would largely be maintained to try and keep the civilian population's morale up with their actual living spaces being far more cramped for the average citizens.

There is also SK's own words on the matter.  In an interview back in the early 2000s (IIRC) right around the time the PS2 game was released, he literally said that we have yet to see the true story of Macross.  He compared each production to being like a WW2 movie or TV show, which gets a lot of the facts right but falls down on the details in certain points.  When we see it from that perspective, then the original SDF-Macross could be seen as a low to mid-budget TV series that has to use existing sets wherever possible, maybe even aboard the actual SDF-1, where possible, but they are limited to where they can shoot, hence having to use a fair number of "Sets" that are outside of the ship that they do their best to mask.  Then, as @Seto Kaiba pointed out, DYRL was likely "filmed" aboard a later gen Macross class, which reduced the number of civlians onboard and had more lavish facilities as a result.  THe original series might also have as well for all we know.

@Seto Kaibais right about the scale of things.  A modern nuclear aircraft carrier has a crew complement of 5000+.  Given that the D&P are each approximately 50% large (500m compared to 350m) one could easily estimate their crew sizes to be equal increased to 7500+, each.  The Macross is supposed to have a military compliment of 20k, with 15k on the carriers, that leaves only 5000 aboard the SDF-1 herself.  That is a huge amount of space for that crew.  Now, taking into account the relatively small internal volume of the SDF-1's engines and other mechanical systems, stuffing 58k civilians onboard would be possible, just not ideal.  The city is stretching things, but city-like amenities could be incorporated into the cavernous legs, with the majority of the civilian population then relocated into low security areas of the ship, or conscripted into the crew.  

ANother way to look at it.  Tokyo has a population density of 6000+ people per square kilometer (and it isn't even in the top 100 for population density).  Assuming a rough usable deck print of 1000mx400m, that is .4km^2, per deck.  The SDF-1 is then 312m tall, of which maybe 100m would be full size decks.  Assuming 3m deck spacing average, that gives approximately 33 decks, so a total deck area of 13.2km^2.  Not including the partial length/width decks, that gives space enough for 79,200 people.  Which matches up nicely with the original numbers of 20k crew and 58k civilians.  Even with the lost deck spacing between individual components, there are still additional deck levels to make up the difference.

Taking all that into account, aside from the few large spaces like concert venues, resteraunts and entertainment spaces, most people would probably live in either communal spaces or micro-apartments spread throughout the ship.  The "city" would be where they go when not at home to try and keep a sense of normality and raise moral.  Yes, that does not line up exaclty with what is seen in the animation, but it could still work out feasibly.

Or for a real world example:  Male' city in the Maldives, a tiny island city is only 6km^2 and has a population in excess of 133k people with the tallest building topping out at 15 stories, and most coming in under 10 stories.

Maybe it's because pretty much all my VF-19s were knockoffs (I think), but that VF-19 might be legit, as I have never seen the 1/65 VF-19F/S with the shorter wings and san-canards. 

Ultimately the failure of the YF-23 comes down to the following factors, in no particular order:

Too Radical a Design:  The YF-22 was the more conservative design approach, it looked like a stealthed up F-15, which the USAF brass preferred.

Weapons Deployment and Versatility:  The YF-23's trapeze missile launcher was a gamble, but would have allowed it to carry more AMRAAMS in the main weapons bay.  Additionally, the forward sidewinder bay (singular) would have simplified the design with only having two bays.  However, there were worries that the trapeze might jam, trapping weapons inside.  Also, the AMRAAM bay would not have been able to carry much, if any other ground attack weapons.  See below.

Mission types:  The YF-23 was designed as stealthy interceptor, fast and carrying anti-air weapons.  It's weapons bays would not have been able to accommodate anything more than Small Diameter Bombs (SDBs) which were barely even a program yet at that point.  THis would require it to carry all other weapons externally, defeating the stealthiness.

Alternations to the Requirements:  Contrary to what many believe, the design requirements did not include thrust vectoring or super maneuverability.  They did however require Thrust Reversers in the initial iteration.  As a result the first YF-23 prototype actually had thrust reversers, Lockheed gambled that that requirement would get pulled and never designed it into the YF-22, instead opting for the thrust vectoring.  By the time that the requirement was pulled it was too late to change the YF-23's design, and one set of engines, with reversers, were already on hand.  So while prototype two did not fit the reversers, and it also had the more powerful engines, making it lighter and MUCH FASTER.  Production F-23s would have deleted the thrust reversers with later variants having the option for TVC.

Showiness:  While the ATF competition did require working weapon's bays, it did not require anyone to fire a weapon.  Lockheed knew that showing a missile launch would do wonders to help them, so made sure to have one of their prototypes able to fire off a sidewinder.  Northrup wanted to show off their stealth capabilities, which were superior.

Contracts:  Lockheed had only the C-130 production contracts at the time, they had yet to purchase General Dynamics and the F-16.  The F-117 was out there but had ended production.  Northrup on the other hand still had the B-2, which was facing delays and cost overruns, and their half of the F/A-18 production, two major programs.  Politically Lockheed needed the contract more.

Corporate culture:  NG has a very odd corporate culture.  Where most companies tend to be run top-down, with every site adhering to company standards, each NG site/program tends to act more like a franchise doing things their own way.  This actually creates quite a bit of confusion inside the company and some instability.  Having worked with at least 5 different NG programs and sites, I have seen this, with none of them writing their reports/proposals in a common format, or displaying their data in the same format.

Cost:  The YF-23 would have been a costlier design overall, but had it's production design more "locked in" than Lockheed did.  Lockheed did fib about how quickly their could turn around a production design, and their production design wasn't full "locked in" until later.

Overall, most agree that the YF-23 would have made a superior interceptor, but that was it.  The more radical and advanced design, it would have been locked into that single role much moreso than the F-22 without adding additional design variants. (see NATF).  But in the end the F-22 won out for many reasons one the biggest honestly being the NG contracts, corporate culture, and the politics of giving a new fighter to Lockheed.

6 hours ago, Chronocidal said:

From what I've heard from people who were involved with the YF-23, everyone knew the 23 was the better plane, but all the decisions got derailed due to some combination of politics, and personal or corporate vendettas.  Someone really didn't want Northrop to get the contract.

It's a bit more complicated than that.  When I was at EAFB I worked with several of the program Flight Test Engineers and one of the pilots.  I even got to watch some video I'd never seen anywhere else.  

The paint job is amazing, let me start with that.  I love it.  The colors look good to me for the most part, accurate to what the items would likely be, power modules, capacitors, metallic relays of copper and gold, etc...  Even the brightly anodized parts make some sense in order to keep them from getting mixed up.  The cabling however would mostly be white with clear ID tags on them.  The colored wires would be inside the white shielding.