# Martin XB-51



## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

This is Anagrand's 1/72 resin kit of Martin's XB-51 very loooong medium bomber proposal of circa 1949. Two prototypes were built and flown, but the government ultimate rejected the idea in favor of license-building British Canberra bombers. Here's what the 51 might have looked like if it had gone into production and been used as a night intruder in Viet Nam.










More pics:
Martin XB-51
Yes, that last pic includes an F-107 in 'Nam camo .


----------



## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

That looks great. The XB-51 is one of my favorite planes. It also features heavily in the William Holden movie, Toward the Unknown. For some odd reason the words "Martin XB-51" on the nose of the actual plane were repainted to say "Gilbert XF-120" for the movie.

My ex wife worked with a lady whose father was a test pilot on the XB-51 and I got copies of a lot of personal photos of the real plane, detail stuff, old air force material etc. when I built her a big vac kit of the plane for her to give him as a present.


----------



## Steve H (Feb 8, 2009)

This is why I love the whole 'Cold War' period of aircraft development. 

Look at that beast. It could easily have been a 'Luftwaffe '46' aircraft, or a guest mecha from a Gerry Anderson show. 

I've always wondered what it would have looked like if SAC had seen the value of the B-36, its ability to fly for DAYS (well, two days), and how it might have been re-purposed as an early AWACS or ELINT platform. 

Anyway, enough of my insanity. That's a very clean build. Well done!


----------



## scotpens (Sep 6, 2003)

Steve H said:


> . . . Look at that beast. It could easily have been a 'Luftwaffe '46' aircraft, or a guest mecha from a Gerry Anderson show.


Well, it's certainly odd-looking enough! That's a hell of a weird place to put the engine nacelles. I assume the center engine had an S-shaped intake duct like the Boeing 727 and Lockheed L-1011?

Oh, and that's a beautiful clean build as always, John! :thumbsup:


----------



## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

Steve H said:


> This is why I love the whole 'Cold War' period of aircraft development.


Right? It was, like, "Hey, let's try _this_!"


----------



## Steve H (Feb 8, 2009)

John P said:


> Right? It was, like, "Hey, let's try _this_!"


The aircraft companies weren't afraid to bend tin and see if the thing would fly. 

Didn't Lockheed have the U-2 prototype flying in like 6 months and production less than a year later? I know it was built from a lot of 'oh hand' stuff but still. 

Mind, one of the big problems that became more and more annoying is how the Pentagon would change the requirements for what they wanted in mid development. 

Of course NOW we have the insanity of companies taking DECADES to get a plane into production. Damn things are out of date before they even enter active service. 

And then there's taking a plane and putting it to uses it wasn't really designed for. It's a testament to the manufacturers ability that they often excelled at these tasks. 

Take the F-105. (going off memory here, correct me if I mis-state  ) This plane was designed to be a high speed penetration bomber. Zoom in, drop the nuke, get outta town ASAP. It was part of the concept of how WWIII was going to start, most likely with Soviet Tanks roaring in to hit the Fulda gap and invade West Germany. 

So the F-105 was a giant sleek bird, needing only drop tanks. It's funny how HUGE that thing is, you don't think about it until you look how small that cockpit is. Anyway, they took that plane and hung and bunch of bombs from it for missions in Vietnam and it did that job well. But man, it just looked like taking an Indy racer and putting a dump truck bin on it.

I won't go into a rant about how ridiculous it is to think the F-35 can do the same job as the A-10...


----------



## Xenodyssey (Aug 27, 2008)

Lovely rendition of it. Looks good in the SEA camo. As a design it looks very Gerry Andersonish, and those belly nacelles would have had a real FOD problem taking off and landing.


----------



## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

We were talking about FOD on facebook, but someone pointed out that those engines are no closer to the ground than many other planes' engines, and there are no wheels in _front _of them to kick up FOD.


----------

