I'm waiting for parts for my locomotive to show up in the mail, so here's something that has been sitting on a shelf since I built it a few weeks ago, waiting for its stickers.
This is a comprehensive rebuild of my older F-5E Tiger, with an improved shape and a new camouflage scheme. It also represents a newer aircraft: specifically, one of the former Swiss Air Force Tigers that the US Navy introduced as adversary aircraft and upgraded to the so-called F-5N standard.
Tags: Lego aircraft F-5 Tiger F-5N Northrop Navy NAS Fallon VFC-13 agressor US Navy 2013 1/36 Military Model Fighter aircraft
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Until recently, this aircraft served with VFC-13 Fighting Saints, a long-serving adversary unit based at Naval Air Station Fallon, NV. Many moons ago, my F-5 Tiger model had a similar colour scheme, also representing one of the unit's aircraft.
Tags: Lego aircraft F-5 Tiger F-5N Northrop Navy NAS Fallon VFC-13 agressor US Navy 2013 1/36 Military Model Fighter aircraft
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Even though the design of the Tiger dates back to the 1960s, I think it still looks pretty snazzy today. Very typical of fighters of its era, though, is the coke-bottle fuselage, which narrows above the wings and then gets wider again. This was done because of the so-called Whitcomb area rule. This stipulates that to reduce drag when an aircraft flies close to the speed of sound, its cross-sectional area should gradually vary along the length of the aircraft. Because the wings add to the cross-section, the cross-section of the fuselage should be smaller there. Modern fighters have area-ruled fuselages, but it is usually done in a much more subtle way than back when the Tiger was designed.
Tags: Lego aircraft F-5 Tiger F-5N Northrop Navy NAS Fallon VFC-13 agressor US Navy 2013 1/36 Military Model Fighter aircraft
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Some of the changes besides the colour scheme are a narrower cockpit section, a wing with a slightly smaller span and a revised shape of the wing-leading edge extensions, to better represent the F-5N.
Tags: Lego aircraft F-5 Tiger F-5N Northrop Navy NAS Fallon VFC-13 agressor US Navy 2013 1/36 Military Model Fighter aircraft
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The US Navy's and US Marines' Tigers wear a variety of colour schemes, but this three-tone brown is fairly common.
Tags: Lego aircraft F-5 Tiger F-5N Northrop Navy NAS Fallon VFC-13 agressor US Navy 2013 1/36 Military Model Fighter aircraft
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