Small Scale Military Headquarters

Would like to put some bombs on my Starfighter without modifying the wings to add hardpoints (amazing, I'm not going after one of my planes with a saw and drill). Found this photo in a forum discussing F-104 armaments.

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/attach ... tid=139593

I think that would be perfect, being able to just modify the existing Sidewinder rack, but to me that looks like an ECM pod. Can someone clarify, or give some suggestions what type of bomb, if any, I can mount on the rack?

Also, here's the forum I found some great F-104 photos in. I'm sure I'm missing one, but couldn't see any other photos of a bomb on this rack.

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showth ... ge=1&pp=30

if you're talking about the Silver Starfighter, i think the neatest thing would be to put a nuclear bomb on it.....that is pretty much what F-104's in the sixties were intended to be used for, tactical nuclear strike.

In fact the squadron, represented by the S1 F-104, was stationed in the Florida Keys and loaded with tactical nukes and ready to fly off to Cuba should the Cuban missile crisis have flared up any more than it did.....ie if the Soviets hadn't turned their ships around.

As far as the first picture goes, that wouldnt' be an ECM pod i dont think...too big and the Starfighters weren't used for EW. Could be a dummy nuke for training. Many of the tactical nukes were more or less drop tank shaped. I did some research once but have forgotten much of what i learned.

If you have a Smoke II then the obvious choice would be to put a napalm canister under each wing. They did a lot of close support napalm strikes during the early stages of the war. Most looked like somewhat smaller versions of the wingtip drop tanks and could either be finned, for precision strikes or unfinned (so they'd tumble) for area strikes (like against troop concentrations).

I think there was an earlier thread about napalm and shrikes that might be available sometime. I realize that's pretty vaque, but so was the original announcment. Anything we can hang off these guys would be good. I'd also go for a "shape" for the silver F-104. I wonder if any of the misc tanks that have come with some of these a/c might be convertable.

Hey Morian Minor: a couple of months ago I posted a message in the Reference Room section of this forum about the F-104 being used as a ground attack machine (don't laugh) in Viet Nam. A recent issue of Flight Journal (check my post) had an article about how in the '65/'66 time-frame, Starfighters flew out of Da Nang to provide close air support to U.S. troops pinned down by N.V.A. They dropped 500lb bombs (one per wing) or Napalm onto enemy troop concentrations, and were quite accurate (or so the article says). Our grunts liked the F-104 because it could arrive on the scene in a hurry, getting there "fustest with the mostest".

http://www.916-starfighter.de/SEA100.htm

The first f-104 pilot to complete 100 missions in vietnam. I also posted some info about in the Smoke II availabilty thread about vietnam starfighters. They were used A LOT in the strike role despite their light payload ability and lack of all weather capability.

They flew nearly 8000 combat sorties all totaled.

A napalm strike craft would give me an excuse to pick one up from BadCat .

Thanks for the leads, guys. I'm thinking a MK-28 tactical nuke is needed for this bird. I think Aferg is right, that's what's on the plane in the one image. At least length wise, it seems right (about 96"L). But, it seems to be off to the side. What I've found on the MK-28 is it was carried on the centerline.

Once again, my toys giving me an excuse to hunt on the web.

yeah i noticed it was off center too. Maybe if it's a practice bomb they would be much lighter and they carried two? Complete guess.