Y and Z

Modeling Subjects Helicopters
1

for those interested these photo’s are from Bell

UH-1Y

AH-1Z

2

The evolution of the Huey and Cobra is just amazing.

Thanks for the pics John.

3

Yeah I agree… Most old aircraft start to look out dated… But regardless of that fact, The Huey and the Cobra always seem to look fresh and “today”…

The Cobra for instance is still in my opinion the ultimate in attack helicopters… That design was 30 years ahead of itself!.. 30 years later, and its still awsome!.. The Apache already looks old school in my opinion…

Chris in Japan

4

I think I’ll hold onto my AH-1T kit and wait for Cobra Company to come out with the Z mods, then I can have a Z next to my Whiskey Cobra on the shelf.

Thanks for the photos.

5

You guys are welcome, I too will wait for Cobra Company. And a couple more

6

Chris,
[:p] Old school?

The Zulu Cobra does look completely bad@$$ though! There’s a really good shot of the new exhaust system in this quarter’s issue of International Airpower Review.

7

Speaking of completely bad …that new exhaust is butt ugly. It is being retrofitted to the AH-1Ws as well - starting out here Iraq. Speaking of exhaust - most of the birds here have the covers aft of the engine cowling removed. Your 1/48 Italeri AH-1W kit can be built as is again. Meanwhile people will be cutting the 1/35 kit to get that look. Probably the same people who errorinously said that the Italeri kit was “pre-production.”

8

Supercobra,

Question is, does it work well? I’m thinking about picking up that resin Z conversion for giggles.

9

The new turned exhausts are an abomination as far as looks go…kind of ruins the profile of the whole aircraft if you ask me. But if it works and sends a couple MANPADS off-target, then I’m all for it [tup]. The best part of the upgrade for both aircraft is that they will have something close to 80% of their repairable components as interchangeable between the models.
Jon, I’ve seen a few pics online of a guy who made his own resin Zulu update, but didn’t know it was in production. All I can say is…that’s got to be a LOT of surgery! Hope we don’t cause a resin shortage, heh.

10

SuperCobra… you currently deployed in the “sandbox”?

11

Dragonfire,
Yes - I’m baaack!
I think the turn was just as much to reduce heat stress on the tailboom as IR signature. I hasven’t seen data but the Marines are pretty frugal so it must be worth it. Also must in the program office love the bird so I can’t see the disfiguring it for no reason.

I got one of the first one of those Z resin updates he put on eBay - didn’t know how long he would do it for so I bid too much - he is still doing it huh. I haven’t got around to using it yet but not it does require a lot of surgery and the resin pieces themselves need a lot of cleaning up.

12

Let me clarify a couple of things:

  1. I am not illiterate - I just got spoiled be spell check so I get lazy when i don’t have it.
  2. Reducing heat stress (skin weakening through annealing) was the reason for the turned exhaust. Reduced IR signature may be a welcome by-product but Zs and Ws are getting internal baffles within the exhaust stack to reduce the signature. This is important to modellers as you can see the baffles sitting in the exhaust. Ws forward deployed have already been modified.
13

SuperCobra,

Send me an email. I’m heading in your direction this week and will be where the MAW and MALS is bedded down.

Semper Fi!