Camionetta Desertica SPA-Viberti AS.42

Here are some images of Italeri's 1/35 scale Camionetta Desertica SPA-Viberti AS.42.

From Wikipedia"
                                                                                                                                "Camionetta Desertica SPA-Viberti AS.42, this vehicle, specifically designed to operate in the desert, was a four wheels drive car entered in service with Saharan units in November 1942. It was built on the same chassis of the AB.40/41 armoured car but it was not armoured. It was powered with a 100HP gasoline engine and reached a maximum speed of 85 Km/h. This easily recognizable vehicle, had racks on the sides to carry 24 jerrycans (most fuel) and a spare tire on the front hood. It could carry a crew of six and different kind of weapons like the 20mm Breda cannon, the 47/32 Anti-tank cannon, the 20mm Anti-tank Soloturn rifle and up to three Breda mod. 37 machineguns. The AS.42 was 1,49 meter high, 5,20 meters long and 1,80 meters wide.

Bruckenleger IVb Bridge Layer.

Here are some images of Trumpeter Models 1/35 scale Bruckenleger IVb Bridge Layer.

Firespray-31-Class Patrol And Attack Craft, Slave 1

Here are some images of MPC's 1/84 scale Firespray-31-class patrol and attack craft, Slave 1.

From Wookieepedia"
The Firespray-31-class patrol and attack craft, or Firespray-class starship, or Firespray-class interceptor, was a patrol and transport starship designed by Kuat Systems Engineering initially for use by the Republic Correctional Authority. The most well known of the starships was Jango and Boba Fett's ship, the Slave I. 
As a prisoner transport, the ship featured numerous holding cells and devices made for the most exotic of creatures. A trademark of the ship was that it landed horizontally with the drive engines facing the surface and the cockpit facing upward. To transition to normal flight mode, the ship rotated so that the cockpit faced forward while the drive engines faced rearward.
The stock ship was well armed and armored for its size, with on-board storage space and room for several passengers and/or cargo. Roughly as fast as Koensayr's Y-wing starfighter/bomber, the ship had more than enough speed and maneuverability to intercept smugglers and other renegades. 

 Kuat Systems Engineering produced several prototypes shortly before the Battle of Naboo. However, all but one were destroyed when Jango Fett staged a prison break on Oovo IV. Jango kept the sole remaining Firespray, renaming it Slave I. Kuat Systems Engineering, suffering from the financial loss of the prototypes, eventually mothballed the project and concentrated instead on starship upgrades.
Many years later, K.S.E. found themselves on a more secure financial footing, and again desired to enter the starship market. The company then re-introduced the Firespray-class, hoping to build upon the reputation of the remaining prototype and its legendary pilot, Boba Fett.
The new Firesprays were, like the original prototypes, designated as patrol and attack ships and perfectly suited for law enforcement and interdiction missions. With Kuat Systems Engineering keen to expand the market for the ship, they had started to promote how easily the ship could be customized and upgraded to fulfill a myriad of roles.
At least ten were used by the Mandalorian Protectors during the Yuuzhan Vong War^[source?]. By 137 ABY, these ships were legendary, but regarded as myth. During this time, Deliah Blue found and rebuilt one that was in such an advanced state of disrepair as to be falling apart. 

Slave I was a modified prototype Firespray-31-class patrol and attack craft used by famed bounty hunters Jango Fett and his cloned "son", Boba Fett. It was greatly modified with advanced weapons systems by both Fetts during their respective use.
Originating from Oovo IV, the ship was stolen by Jango Fett, replacing his previous ship, Jaster's Legacy. After Jango's death on Geonosis in 22 BBY, the ship was inherited by Boba Fett and used on several missions during and after the Clone Wars. It was subsequently replaced by the Slave II, Slave III, and Slave IV.

Space Station V

Here are some more images of my scratch built model of Space Station Five from 2001 A Space Odyssey.  The materials I used for this model were a 4'x8' sheet of 1mm styrene plastic, 1/2 inch PVC electrical pipe (this is what determined its size), the windows are from a coil book binder punch and various types of sheet and strip styrene for structure and detail.
At the time when I built this model there were (or at least I don’t think there were) really any reliable blueprints of this model kicking around. So what did I do? Answer put the movie into the player, fast forward to the pertinent points in the movie and start taking measurements which is exactly what I did. Now some eagle eyed individuals will no doubt point out some mistakes on my model when compared to the original (which by the way was tossed into a farmer’s field in the early seventies and then was never seen again, what a crying shame). All I can say to those eagle eyed viewers is Hey! I took the measurements off a friggen TV set for crying out load gimmi a break!
From Wikipedia "
Space Station V is a fictional space station seen in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Operational, it is a large, international, rotating wheel space station used as a transfer point from Low Earth orbit to the moon and other planets. It also functions as an orbital hotel, mostly operated by Hilton Hotels. Rotation of the station provides artificial gravity for people aboard the station. The station contains two docking bays for docking spacecraft and is placed on its rotational axis at the opposite sides of the construction. By the time of events depicted in the film, it is still under construction, with the incomplete second wheel.
The rotating wheel depicted in the movie traces its lineage back to wheeled space station designs by Wernher von Braun and Herman Potočnik, the latter describing such a space station design in his book The Problem of Space Travel - The Rocket Motor (1928). The studio model was reported to be eight feet wide (Bizony) or six feet wide (Agel), and stuffed with tiny lights behind the windows. Due to its large size and spidery structure, the model always seemed in danger of breaking apart. Kubrick had most of the models and props used in 2001 destroyed or discarded, or stored away and inaccessible, so that they wouldn't be used in any movies not under his control. In the early 1970s, when the MGM studio in Borehamwood, England where the film was made was demolished, the model for Space Station V was dumped in a field about 20 miles from Borehamwood. It was destroyed by vandals a few days later.

Lockheed Sea Shadow IX-529

Here are some images of Revell's 1/144 scale Lockheed Sea Shadow IX-529, built for a client.

From Wikipedia'
Sea Shadow (IX-529) was an experimental stealth ship built by Lockheed for the United States Navy to determine how a low radar profile might be achieved and to test high stability hull configurations which have been used in oceanographic ships.
Sea Shadow was built in 1984 to examine the application of stealth technology on naval vessels. She was used in secret until a public debut in 1993. In addition, the ship was designed to test the use of automation to enable the reduction of crew size. The ship was created by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the U.S. Navy and Lockheed. Sea Shadow was developed at Lockheed's Redwood City, California, facility, inside the Hughes Mining Barge (HMB-1), which functioned as a floating drydock during construction and testing.


Sea Shadow had a SWATH hull design. Below the water were submerged twin hulls, each with a propeller, aft stabilizer, and inboard hydrofoil. The portion of the ship above water was connected to the hulls via the two angled struts. The SWATH design helped the ship remain stable even in very rough water of up to sea state 6 (wave height of 18 feet (5.5 m) or "very rough" sea). The shape of the superstructure was sometimes compared to the casemate of the ironclad ram CSS Virginia of the American Civil War. Sea Shadow was built in Redwood City, California.
The T-AGOS 19-and-23-class oceanographic ships have inherited the stabilizer and canard method to help perform their stability-sensitive surveillance missions.
Sea Shadow had only 12 bunks aboard, one small microwave oven, a refrigerator and table. She was never intended to be mission capable and was never commissioned, although she is listed in the Naval Vessel Register.
Sea Shadow was revealed to the public in 1993, and was housed at the San Diego Naval Station until September 2006, when she was relocated with the Hughes Mining Barge to the Suisun Bay Reserve Fleet in Benicia, California. Until 2006, Sea Shadow and the HMB-1 were maintained and operated by Lockheed Martin for the U. S. Navy. The vessels were available for donation to a maritime museum.
In 2006, the U.S Navy began to try to sell Sea Shadow to the highest bidder; after the initial offering met with a lack of interest, it was listed for dismantling sale on gsaauctions.gov. The U.S. Government required that the buyer not sail the ship and is required to scrap the ship. The ship was finally sold in 2012. Sea Shadow was totally dismantled in 2012 by Bay Ship.

Kazon Shuttle

Here are some more images of Monogram's Kazon Shuttle/Torpedo from Star Trek Voyager. 
This kit was released back in 1998 during Voyager's peak, and even then I don't think this kit was very popular.
I think because  most people couldn't picture in their minds exactly as to where it came from.
Sure we new it was Star Trek Voyager but what episodes?
Only the truly die hard fan knew where it was from, but for general mass appeal it wasn't well... that appealing or well known.
This is why I suspect that this kit will probably never be re released. Perhaps in 40 years like the Romulan Bird of Prey was. But I could be wrong.

From Memory Alpha"                      
A Kazon shuttle was a type of auxiliary craft utilized by the Kazon during the 2370s. These vessels were smaller in size than a Kazon raider, and could be manned by a crew of as many as three.
With the assistance of Seska, Maje Culluh of the Kazon-Nistrim had the bow of a Kazon shuttle specially modified for use in what was later a successful raid on USS Voyager in 2372.
The Kazon then lured Voyager to an ionized hydrogen cloud with an automated message beacon that transmitted a Starfleet frequency. When Voyager attempted to tractor in the beacon, they were attacked by Cullah's raider. The raider focused its attack onto on section of Voyager's shields, which created a hole that the shuttle, which had been hiding in the hydrogen cloud, passed through so as to puncture a hole in Voyager's hull.
Once aboard, the three Kazon aboard proceeded to the transporter room, where they were able to successfully steal a transporter module and return to their mother ship.
As a result of the attack, the Kazon shuttle remained lodged partway into Voyager's hull, making it impossible to the ship to create a stable warp field. Removal of the shuttle was accomplished by rerouting additional power to the containment field, and then towing the lodged shuttle out with one of Voyager's shuttles.
Neelix, who had several dealings with the Kazon during the years prior to that incident stated that he had "never seen the Kazon do anything like this before." Tuvok explained the situation, stating "until now, the Kazon have never had an adviser with Cardassian, Maquis and Starfleet tactical experience." (VOY: "Maneuvers")
Lieutenant Tom Paris used a shuttle to escape from a Kazon vessel after discovering the identity of the spy working for the Kazon-Nistrim. (VOY: "Investigations")

Rockwell Space Transportation System Vehicle (Space Shuttle)

Here are some more images of  Tamiya's 1/100 scale Rockwell Space Transportation System Vehicle (Space Shuttle).

From Wikipedia'
The Space Shuttle was a crewed, partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft operated by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Its official program name was Space Transportation System, taken from a 1969 plan for a system of reusable spacecraft of which it was the only item funded for development. The first of four orbital test flights occurred in 1981, leading to operational flights beginning in 1982. They were used on a total of 135 missions from 1981 to 2011, launched from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. Operational missions launched numerous satellites, interplanetary probes, and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST); conducted science experiments in orbit; and participated in construction and servicing of the International Space Station.
Shuttle components included the Orbiter Vehicle (OV), a pair of recoverable solid rocket boosters (SRBs), and the expendable external tank (ET) containing liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. The Shuttle was launched vertically like a conventional rocket, with the two SRBs operating in parallel with the OV's three main engines, which were fueled from the ET. The SRBs were jettisoned before the vehicle reached orbit, and the ET was jettisoned just before orbit insertion using the orbiter's two Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engines. At the conclusion of the mission, the orbiter fired its OMS to drop out of orbit and re-enter the atmosphere. The orbiter glided to a runway landing on Rogers Dry Lake at Edwards Air Force Base in California or at the Shuttle Landing Facility at the KSC. After the landings at Edwards, the orbiter was flown back to KSC on the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, a specially modified Boeing 747.
The first orbiter, Enterprise, was built purely for Approach and Landing Tests and had no capability to fly into orbit. Four fully operational orbiters were initially built: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, and Atlantis. Of these, Challenger and Columbia were destroyed in mission accidents in 1986 and 2003, respectively, in which a total of fourteen astronauts were killed. A fifth operational orbiter, Endeavour, was built in 1991 to replace Challenger. The Space Shuttle was retired from service upon the conclusion of Atlantis' final flight on July 21, 2011.
Until another US manned spacecraft is ready, crews will travel to and from the International Space Station (ISS) exclusively aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
A planned successor to STS was the "Shuttle II", during the 1980s and 1990s, and later the Constellation program during the 2004–2010 period. CSTS was a proposal to continue to operate STS commercially, after NASA. In September 2011, NASA announced the selection of the design for the new Space Launch System that is planned to launch the Orion spacecraft and other hardware to missions beyond low earth-orbit.
The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program began in 2006 with the purpose of creating commercially operated unmanned cargo vehicles to service the ISS. The SpaceX Dragon became operational in 2012, and the Orbital Sciences' Cygnus, is expected to be launched in September 2013. The Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program was initiated in 2010 with the purpose of creating commercially operated manned spacecraft capable of delivering at least four crew members to the ISS, to stay docked for 180 days, and then return them back to Earth. These spacecraft are expected to become operational in the mid-2010s.


Space Shuttles have been features of fiction and nonfiction, from movies for kids to documentaries. Early examples include the 1979 James Bond film, Moonraker, the 1982 Activision videogame Space Shuttle: A Journey into Space (1982) and G. Harry Stine's 1981 novel Shuttle Down. In the 1986 film SpaceCamp, Atlantis accidentally launched into space with a group of U.S. Space Camp participants as its crew. The 1998 film Armageddon portrayed a combined crew of offshore oil rig workers and US military staff who pilot two modified Shuttles to avert the destruction of Earth by an asteroid. Retired American test pilots visited a Russian satellite in the 2000 Clint Eastwood adventure film Space Cowboys. In the 2003 film The Core, the Endeavour's landing is disrupted by the earth's magnetic core, and its crew is selected to pilot the vehicle designed to restart the core. The 2004 Bollywood movie Swades, where a Space Shuttle was used to launch a special rainfall monitoring satellite, was filmed at Kennedy Space Center in the year following the Columbia disaster that had taken the life of Indian-American astronaut KC Chawla. On television, the 1996 drama The Cape portrayed the lives of a group of NASA astronauts as they prepared for and flew Shuttle missions. Odyssey 5 was a short lived sci-fi series that featured the crew of a Space Shuttle as the last survivors of a disaster that destroyed Earth. The 2013 film Gravity features the fictional space shuttle Explorer, whose crew are killed or left stranded after it is destroyed by a shower of high speed orbital debris.

A United States Space Shuttle stamp

The Space Shuttle has also been the subject of toys and models; for example, a large Lego Space Shuttle model was constructed by visitors at Kennedy Space Center, and smaller models have been sold commercially as a standard "LegoLand" set. A 1984 pinball machine "Space Shuttle" was produced by Williams and features a plastic Space Shuttle model among other artwork of astronauts on the play field.

US postage commemorations

Main article: U.S. space exploration history on U.S. stamps#Space Shuttle Issues

The U.S. Postal Service has released several postage issues that depict the Space Shuttle. The first such stamps were issued in 1981, and are on display at the National Postal Museum.

Eagle HLT (Heavy Lift Transport)

Here are some images of my kitbash of the Eagle HLT (Heavy Lift Transport) inspired from the Space 1999 universe. Built from two MPC 1/72 scale MPC Eagle 1 Transport kits and parts from my spares box.

With two and a half times the lifting capacity as the Eagle Transports the Eagle HLT was instrumental in the construction of Moonbase Alpha.

Hawker Sea Fury FB 11

Here are some images of Fisher Model and Pattern's 1/32 scale Hawker Sea Fury FB 11.

From Wikipedia"
The Hawker Sea Fury was a British fighter aircraft designed and manufactured by Hawker. It was the last propeller-driven fighter to serve with the Royal Navy, and also one of the fastest production single piston-engined aircraft ever built. Developed during the Second World War, the Sea Fury entered service two years after the war ended. The Sea Fury proved to be a popular aircraft with a number of overseas militaries, and was used during the Korean War in the early 1950s.
The Sea Fury's development was formally initiated in 1943 in response to a wartime requirement of the RAF, thus the aircraft was initially named Fury. As the Second World War drew to a close, the RAF cancelled their order for the aircraft; however, the Royal Navy saw the type as a suitable carrier aircraft to replace a range of increasingly obsolete or poorly suited aircraft being operated by the Fleet Air Arm. Development of the Sea Fury proceeded, and the type began entering operational service in 1947.
The Sea Fury has many design similarities to Hawker's preceding Tempest fighter, but the Sea Fury was a considerably lighter aircraft; both the Sea Fury's wings and fuselage originate from the Tempest but were significantly modified and redesigned. Production Sea Furies were fitted with the powerful Bristol Centaurus engine, and armed with four wing-mounted Hispano V cannons. While originally developed as a pure aerial fighter aircraft, the definitive Sea Fury FB 11 was a fighter-bomber, the design having been found suitable for this mission as well.
The Sea Fury attracted a number of international orders as both a carrier and land-based aircraft; it was operated by a number of countries, including Australia, Burma, Canada, Cuba, Egypt, West Germany, Iraq, and Pakistan. The type acquitted itself well in the Korean War, fighting effectively even against the MiG-15 jet fighter. Although the Sea Fury was retired by the majority of its military operators in the late 1950s in favour of jet-propelled aircraft, a considerable number of aircraft saw subsequent use in the civil sector, and several remain airworthy in the 21st century both as heritage and racing aircraft.
The Hawker Fury was an evolutionary successor to the successful Hawker Typhoon and Tempest fighters and fighter-bombers of World War II. The Fury's design process was initiated in September 1942 by Sydney Camm, one of Hawker's foremost aircraft designers, to meet the Royal Air Force’s requirement for a lightweight Tempest Mk.II replacement; the Tempest, while a successful aircraft, had been viewed as being heavy and oversized for typical fighter duties. Developed as the "Tempest Light Fighter", the semi-elliptical wing of the Tempest was incorporated, but was shortened in span by attaching the two wings at the aircraft centreline, eliminating the centre-section. The fuselage itself was broadly similar in form to that of the Tempest, but was a fully monocoque structure, while the cockpit level was higher, affording the pilot better all round visibility.
The project was formalized in January 1943 when the Air Ministry issued Specification F.2/42 around the "Tempest Light Fighter". This was followed up by Specification F.2/43, issued in May 1943, which required a high rate of climb of not less than 4,500 ft/min (23 m/s) from ground level to 20,000 feet (6,096 m), good fighting manoeuvrability and a maximum speed of at least 450 mph (724 km/h) at 22,000 feet (6,705 m). The armament was to be four 20mm Hispano V cannon with a total capacity of 600 rounds, plus the capability of carrying two bombs each up to 1,000 pounds (454 kg). In April 1943, Hawker had also received Specification N.7/43 from the Admiralty, who sought a navalised version of the developing aircraft; in response, Sidney Camm proposed the consolidation of both service's requirements under Specification F.2/43, with the alterations required for naval operations issued on a supplemental basis. Around 1944, the aircraft project finally received its name; the Royal Air Force's version becoming known as the Fury and the Fleet Air Army's version as the Sea Fury.
A total of six prototypes were ordered; two were to be powered by Rolls-Royce Griffon engines, two with Centaurus XXIIs, one with a Centaurus XII and one as a test structure. Hawker used the internal designations P.1019 and P.1020 respectively for the Griffon and Centaurus versions, while P.1018 was also used for a Fury prototype which was to use a Napier Sabre IV. The first Fury to fly, on 1 September 1944, was NX798 with a Centaurus XII with rigid engine mounts, powering a Rotol four-blade propeller. Second on 27 November 1944 was LA610, which had a Griffon 85 and Rotol six-blade contra-rotating propeller. By now development of the Fury and Sea Fury was closely interlinked so that the next prototype to fly was a Sea Fury, SR661, described under "Naval Conversion." NX802 (25 July 1945) was the last Fury prototype, powered by a Centaurus XV. LA610 was eventually fitted with a Napier Sabre VII, which was capable of developing 3,400–4,000 hp (2,535–2,983 kW); this aircraft become possibly the fastest piston-engined Hawker aircraft after reaching a speed of around 485 mph (780 km/h).


With the end of the Second World War in Europe in sight, the RAF began cancelling many aircraft orders. Thus, the RAF's order for the Fury was cancelled before any production examples were built because the RAF already had excessive numbers of late Mark Spitfires and Tempests and viewed the Fury as an additional overlap with these aircraft. Although the RAF had pulled out of the program, development of the type continued as the Sea Fury; many of the Navy's carrier fighters were either lend-lease aircraft and thus to be returned, or in the case of the Supermarine Seafire, had considerable weaknesses as naval aircraft, such as narrow undercarriages. The Admiralty opted to procure the Sea Fury as the successor to these aircraft instead of purchasing the lend-lease aircraft outright.
While the RAF contract had been cancelled, the Fury prototypes were completed and used for work in developing the Sea Fury as well as for the export market. The first Sea Fury prototype, SR661, first flew at Langley, Berkshire, on 21 February 1945, powered by a Centaurus XII engine. This prototype had a "stinger"-type tailhook for arrested carrier landings, but lacked folding wings for storage. SR666, the second prototype, which flew on 12 October 1945, was powered by a Centaurus XV that turned a new, five-bladed Rotol propeller and did feature folding wings. Specification N.7/43 was modified to N.22/43, now representing an order for 200 aircraft. Of these, 100 were to be built at Boulton-Paul's Wolverhampton factory.
In 1945, the original order to specification N.22/43 was reduced to 100 aircraft; as such the manufacturing agreement with Boulton-Paul was ended and all work on the Sea Fury transferred to Hawker Aircraft's facilities at Kingston. This included the construction of what was intended to be a Boulton-Paul built Sea Fury prototype, VB857, which was transported to Kingston in January 1945; this aircraft, built to the same standard as SR666, first flew on 31 January 1946. Immediately upon completion of the first three airframes, the flight testing program began at Kingston. It was soon discovered that the early Centaurus engine suffered frequent crankshaft failure due to a poorly designed lubrication system, which led to incidents of the engine seizing while in mid-flight. The problem was resolved when Bristol's improved Centaurus 18 engine replaced the earlier engine variant.
 The Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) became a prolific customer of the Sea Fury, and many of its aircraft were diverted from existing Royal Navy contracts. On 23 June 1948, the first aircraft was accepted at RCAF Rockcliff. The type was quickly put to use replacing Canada's existing inventory of Seafires, taking on the primary role of fleet air defence operating from the aircraft carrier HMCS Magnificent. Two Canadian squadrons operated the Sea Fury, Nos. 803 and 883 Squadrons, which were later renumbered as 870 and 871. Pilot training on the Sea Fury was normally conducted at the RCN's HMCS Shearwater. Landing difficulties with the Sea Fury were experienced following the RCN's decision to convert to the US Navy's deck landing procedures, which were prone to overstressing and damaging the airframes as the Sea Fury had been designed for a tail-down landing attitude. The Sea Fury would be operated between 1948 and 1956 by the RCN, at which point they were replaced by the jet-powered McDonnell F2H Banshee. The aircraft themselves were put into storage, and some were subsequently purchased by civilians.