Pilot's Log

At the latest "Build Day" at Paul Francis' shop a few weeks ago, one of the usual gang told me that there is a trend of home-brewed movie host shows over the Internet. He said, "There's no money in it, of course," but since when has that stopped anybody who yearns to be a TV star?

The other day, I got a circular from Oldies.com with their latest offerings of antique movies on DVD and I was flabbergasted with how many old aviation movies--some I never heard of before!--that are available. Titles like Atlantic Flight, Mercy Plane, Lost In The Stratosphere, Navy Born and The Flying Fool...and suddenly I was thinking, "There has to be enough content here between this and old aviation promo and training films to make up a TV series!"

Maybe I'm not exactly the kind of guy you'd want to see hosting a TV show. Thing is, I wouldn't do it ALONE. I'd get a "crew" together, just like they did with Mystery Science Theater 3000 and they still do with Wolfman Mac's Thriller Drive-In and Off-Beat Cinema, just to name a few. Yes, this pipe dream has me on a set, which I'd call the "Doofer Room", with posters on the walls and aviation props and old airliner seats and who knows what else bric-a-brac-wise. I'd have a set of costumes, from the basic airline Captain to bush pilot to military fatigues to space gear. Maybe, on occasion (if I could swing it), I'd shoot an episode at one of the airports in the area, or at the Museum of Aviation in Sevierville.

The chances of me actually doing something like this is miniscule. I wonder if somebody beat me to it, tho'.

And I may as well blab it because I don't think I have any hope of patenting it--and because I think the sooner it's put together by somebody--anybody!--the better.

I was watching the news coverage of the aftermath of the NAS Oceana F-18 crash and how the newsies were saying it could take weeks to arrive at a cause of the accident. I remembered that most military jets didn't have flight recorder systems as such, simply because they didn't have space for them. And then I realized that the aircrew already were plugged into the plane whenever it was in operation. The helmet headset. Run a data feed from the aircraft's computer to a memory module in the headset and then there would be a flight datalog even if the crew ejects from the plane. The module wouldn't have to be big...probably smaller than an iPod.

I don't think this made the news.

Is Writer's Block...dead?

( Jimmy Franklin's ZAR Act From The 1980s )

PS: ( The Music )

Flightglobal's Top Ten Lists on deployed military aircraft...

COMBAT AIRCRAFT
1) F-16 Fighting Falcon
2) F/A-18 Hornet
3) F-15 Eagle
4) MiG-21/J-7
5) MiG-29
6) Su-27/Su-30/J-11
7) Su-24
8) Su-25
9) F-5 Tiger
10) F-4 Phantom

MILITARY TRANSPORTS
1) Lockheed Hercules
2) Boeing 707
3) Antonov An-24/An-26
4) Beech King Air
5) C-17 Globemaster
6) Illyushin Il-76/Il-78
7) Antonov An-32
8) Transall C-160
9) CASA CN-235
10) Antonov An-12

MILITARY ROTORCRAFT
1) Sikorsky Blackhawk
2) Mil Mi-8/Mi-17/Mi-171/Mi-172
3) Mil Mi-24/Mi-25/Mi-35
4) Bell Iroquois
5) AH-64 Apache
6) Boeing Chinook
7) Bell Jet Ranger/Kiowa
8) Bell/Agusta 212/412
9) AH-1 Cobra
10) Aerospatiale SA341/SA342

At Toy Paradise (www.toypara.com), a seller of collectable trifles from Japan, they have 16 different prepainted versions of the Kawasaki T-4 jet in 1/144th scale. From eight different "blind box" sets.

The addition to my Amazon Wishlist for today is a set of LITKO flight bases for Wings of Glory (nee Wings of War) miniature aircraft. And so I am trying to set a limit on which miniatures to acquire and how many. This is a real balancing act, as it's great to have a good diversity of subjects, in good numbers, but not so great to have too much of something either because it's a waste of effort and resources.

Back in March I did a likeable plan--a Doomsday Roster--to see what I could justify and what I couldn't. Wings of Glory uses 1/200 scale miniature pieces. There isn't exactly one-stop shopping for these; Ares (ex Nexus) sells some of these but there are still a great many that are possible choices in the game that aren't available from them yet. Other manufacturers have some, but not all. Still, I looked over Wishlists of years past and came up with the following plan:

TWELVE EACH of: P-51 Mustang (various versions), Yakovlev YAK-1/YAK-3/YAK-9, P-47 Thunderbolt (various versions), Lavochkin Lagg-3/La-5/La-7, F4U Corsair, F6F Hellcat, F8F Bearcat, Spitfire IX (to use as Seafire).
EIGHT EACH of: P-40 Warhawk (various versions), P-36 Hawk 75, P-38 Lightning, Hawker Typhoon, Hawker Tempest, Boulton Paul Defiant, Spitfire (early version), Hawker Hurricane, A-20 Havoc, P-61 Black Widow, DeHavilland Mosquito, Brewster Buffalo, F4F Wildcat, Gloster Gladiator.
SIX EACH of: P-39 Airacobra, P-63 Kingcobra, Polikarpov I-15, Polikarpov I-16, Messerschmitt Bf110, Messerschmitt Me410, Junkers Ju87 Stuka, A6M Zerosen.
FOUR EACH of: Nakajima Ki-43, Fiat CR42, FockeWulf Fw190A, FockeWulf Fw190D, Dornier Do335, Junkers Ju88, Messerchmitt Bf109, Macchi MC202, Kawasaki Ki-61, Reggiane Re2000, Reggiane Re2001, Kawanishi N1K2-J.

Again, this is one of those "if I somehow come into a boatload of money to blow" pipe dreams. I probably won't even get a small fraction of these. But I've at least got a plan in my mind and on paper.