I just found this ten-minute video by Dark Skies on the Convair Model 49 proposal. A design submitted in the 1960s for the US Army Advanced Aerial Fire Support System programme. This called for a heavily armed attack helicopter for use in Vietnam. The Lockheed AH-56 Cheyenne was eventually built for this, but cancelled in the early 1970s at the prototype stage.
The Model 49 was not a helicopter, and was never built, but Convair did produce models of the proposed design. It basically had a barrel-shaped body, with a tilting cockpit section on top. Bizarre thing, rather like the better known French Coleoptere of the 1950s. Pure Gerry Anderson.
Convair Model 49 - Floating Fire Support Gunship - YouTube
If you search under Convair Model 49 there is a surprising amount of information on this craft, along with photos of the Convair models.
Fantastic Plastic did a 1/72nd resin kit of this oddity. It is listed on Scalemates, and there is a review of the kit on Modelling Madness.
Convair 49, Fantastic Plastic (2009) (scalemates.com)
Fantastic Plastic 1/72 Convair Model 49, by Scott Van Aken (modelingmadness.com
Paul Adams from New Zealand
The Model 49 was not a helicopter, and was never built, but Convair did produce models of the proposed design. It basically had a barrel-shaped body, with a tilting cockpit section on top. Bizarre thing, rather like the better known French Coleoptere of the 1950s. Pure Gerry Anderson.
Convair Model 49 - Floating Fire Support Gunship - YouTube
If you search under Convair Model 49 there is a surprising amount of information on this craft, along with photos of the Convair models.
Fantastic Plastic did a 1/72nd resin kit of this oddity. It is listed on Scalemates, and there is a review of the kit on Modelling Madness.
Convair 49, Fantastic Plastic (2009) (scalemates.com)
Fantastic Plastic 1/72 Convair Model 49, by Scott Van Aken (modelingmadness.com
Paul Adams from New Zealand
Fantastic Plastic does such an amazing job of resurrecting in model form so many obscure concept aircraft and spaceship designs. Sadly, resin kits are beyond my meager modeling capacities, and since these are small-run kits, the prices are a bit out of my budget. But I applaud Allen Ury’s ongoing efforts to preserve these “lost” vehicles.
ReplyDeleteYes, its an amazing resource , Fantastic Plastic, a credit to the internet.
DeleteLots of coolness here
ReplyDeletehttps://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/luigi-colanis-improbable-designs.15260/page-2#post-568232