Phoenix

By Guy Caulfield

This model was built because I had nothing better to do for a solid, excrutiatingly boring, weekend. The idea is based on the idea of "flight of the Phoenix" in this case, it is a crashlanded starship crew that need to planet hop to be picked up by another ship. They build a ship out of one of the main lift engines, with a booster pack (not shown, I haven't built it yet) that gives them orbital escape and then a month of interplanetary range. As can be seen on the model, they have an old engine start firing system, one of which comes from the onboard generator, and the other as a flare which is on the rocket cone. All of the ship was "thrown together" in the story, from the remains of their ship, including the drop tanks and the jet engines in the nose section with ducted lift manoeverability for the 'eventual' arrival. As I remember, the crew was a mixed bunch of the courageous, naive and a coward. In my story line, they were all thouroughly hard core spacemen who knew that the only way to survive was to take a pile of scrap up through the atmosphere into interplanetary space, with only their working knowledge of the ship that they had served on, and the knowledge of aerodynamics and re-entry dynamics. In my story, they survive.   Like in the two films. The model itself is made from a triangular salad dressing glass bottle of American origin, cardboard, straws, a medication 'bulb', some sprue; the motor is made from a piece of garden furniture.   The whole thing is covered with aluminium sticky tape that I found, ubiquitous superglue, and some paint that I had left over.   It got quite a bit of attention on facebook, which pleased me no-end, as that weekend was awful. In my defense, as a scratchbuilder, I spend a lot of time agonising over the aerodynamics and feasability of my models, which is why I added the tubular wing supports at the wing roots.   And although this model doesn't have it, as I built it to be the post re-entry version, there should be a nose shield which is blown off during re-entry to allow the jet engines to spin up, which then give airflow stability, and aero-braking once the craft is in the atmosphere.

In my defense, as a scratchbuilder, I spend a lot of time agonising over the aerodynamics and feasability of my models, which is why I added the tubular wing supports at the wing roots.   And although this model doesn't have it, as I built it to be the post re-entry version, there should be a nose shield which is blown off during re-entry to allow the jet engines to spin up, which then give airflow stability, and aero-braking once the craft is in the atmosphere.   I really think that the front section of the fuselage would generate quite a lot of lift, which is why the survivors decided to build the wings so far back. The Main thrust engine is heavy, and as such, although this craft made it to the end, it was always considered to a "controlled crash landing"   undercarraige of any description, was considered too complicated, and pointless.   If I ever find another salad dressing bottle I'd like to make the diorama of its landing, and or its rail launch.   Image: Bottom Image: Bottom Front Right Image: Right Image: Rear Image: Top

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