David Hingtgen

How so? Top Gun had A's, not A+'s. Anyways---pics of F-8 rocket launchers are rare, you pretty much need a lot of F-8 books to have a few pics. Basically there's a large panel on the belly just in front of the gear, hinged at the rear. The front end lowers, and you get a rocket launcher revealed. The speed brake is a smaller part of that panel, hinged at the front. It was taken out for the D to make room for a larger fuel tank. It was also fairly worthless to start with, as pylon-mounted rockets were bigger and better, and there was a big risk if any rockets didn't launch right--since the rocket launcher is RIGHT below the main fuel tank, and the rocket exhaust is angled into the fuel tank area when the launcher's deployed... Checking around, it seems the speed brake auto-deployed partially for trim purposes, when the rocket pack was lowered. So you do get a "zig-zag" of panels.

Go to Botcon.com for pics of Classics Dirge. He's just a Dirge-colored Ramjet, no mold changes, so I feel a lot better about not getting him. But of course, Thundercracker my fave should be perfect, mold-wise...

TIE Fighter is still the best PC game I've ever played, and the best "space sim" game I've ever played. Being in the SW universe just makes it even better.

KOTOR is one of the few comics I read now, and the best SW EU I've seen a long time. (I ignore most of it--it's all downhill from Heir to the Empire) Of course, I am a huge fan of the KOTOR games. But still---KOTOR is more "old school" SW than just about anything else nowadays.

Corsairs simply rock, 'nuff said. They sound the coolest by far, no question. (Yes, that goes out to all the Mustang fans). One of my all-time fave airshow experiences is simply eating pizza while sitting on the grass next to a Corsair.

F-14A+ Kai. Not F-14D Kai. Having the original cockpit is the main thing that makes it an A+ instead of a D.

The F-8A through F-8C have rockets built into their speedbrake panel---not sure they could use both at the same time, it's double-hinged and almost zig-zags when both are open on the ground.

Neat! Lots of tiles, lots of slopes and wedges too. I see some Star Wars parts, and new style Technic/Bionicle hinges etc. Do you happen to have LEGO set 4953, Fast Flyers? The wings are quite similar in design. http://creator.lego.com/en-US/products/4953.aspx

The above post could also be read: "I am in the early stages of playing with my XVF-7 sample so don't expect reviews for a while"

Umm, erm...

It was always perfectly clear to me from Yoda staggering and clutching his heart that he felt "the distubance in the force" from all the Jedi dying and was thus ready for treachery from his troopers.

http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=231

A real Gripen C mainly adds in-flight refuelling capability.

Chindenathus said what I was going to. Basically---a properly installed LED will last forever. My PS2's red LED has been going for years on end. But most cheap LED installations like in keychains and toys, have no resistor/circuitry----they'll work, but only 1/1000 as long as they should. That gives then tens, maybe hundreds of hours of operation, instead of the thousands or hundreds of thousands of hours they would if they had a proper resistor. Going resistor-less means you can do it cheaper, and in a smaller space. But it won't last long, and it especially doesn't like to be on for longer than a few seconds, as it'll REALLY burn out then with no resistor.

Big Boeing bombers have traditionally done well with having only a stub of the fin remaining---you can find very similar B-17 pics. Strange that the JAL 747 did so much worse, but I think it had its controls frozen as well, which doomed it.

Nothing's been done for many years, and there can't be THAT much demand for its services. There's not much the An-225 can do, that the An-124 can't. Anyways, I recently heard An-225 #2 is just a static test frame, and can't be made flyable. Pic of the day: Never let someone tell you turbulence is just an annoyance. It has ripped apart large jets in mid-air, and severely damaged even more.

For how "up to the minute" civil aviation usually is, this has been a surprisingly "rumor-filled" event. It actually seems it might have been fixed, before the first threads indicating it had been damaged showed up.

With the complexity of the transformations, I think Deluxe is too small for almost any movie character. Especially Bonecrusher----imagine him Leader-sized.

Wouldn't silver or gold paint have looked a lot nicer?

I wasn't complaining about the missiles, I was complaining about the launcher being integrated into the arm, and being oversized. Look at Classics Hot Rod. He doesn't have a gigantic Frankestein arm, he's fine. The launcher is his GUN, and it's not half as big as Cybertron Thundercracker's arm. Leave the gimmicks/weapons to the weapons, not the limbs. Targetmasters were a good gimmick, because the robots didn't suffer at all. They were even retrofitted to existing toys. But Armada---nearly every toy was gimped by having to incorporate gears and springs inside big boxes to make mechanisms work.

Seems the rumors are true, the An-225 is likely irrepably damaged in the UAE. World's largest plane for those who don't know. Nose gear collapsed while attempting to kneel while loading, and the forward fuselage basically bent down and crashed to the ground. There's a 2nd An-225 half-built, and I'm hoping they can salvage a lot of the 1st's parts to finish it. But the wings would be the main issue---they cost a lot, and the 2nd one doesn't have any---but it'd be almost impossible to get the off of the 1st, and then transport them. It's unlikely overall, there's just not enough money/point to do it. And using the 2nd one to repair the first is just as unlikely---the airport the accident happened at is considered too ill-equipped to be able to perform major repairs.

Survey for collectors from Hasbro----fill out the form, tell them what you think. http://www.hasbro.com/common/surveys/hasbr...ocollectors.htm I restricted my rant to "oversized firing missile gimmicks that ruin the sculpt of TF's". I used Cybertron Thundercracker as my example.

Anyone else get an AT-ST vibe from that drawing? Never thought of it before, but that particular drawing make me think of it.

Now that all the ground-pounding is out of this thread, here's my new wallpaper: http://airliners.net/open.file/1195977/L/ And a view from directly behind: http://airliners.net/open.file/1197864/L/ I don't know why, but a lot of the best pics of US planes come from Australia--maybe they just try harder to impress when they're down there or something.

Due to the way the forum works, it arranges posts by time, so they're all in order relative to themselves---but they're also "in front of" the first post in this thread. So everything after this should be in order, and I think I snagged all the relevant posts. Debate away!