Myasischev M-50 "Nuclear powered soviet bomber of doom!"

RocketmanTan

Well-Known Member
One of the funniest political hoaxes I've seen is the M-50 nuclear powered bomber hoax. On December 1, 1958, Aviation Weekly published an article featuring pictures of a supposed "Nuclear Powered Bomber." Obviously intended to scare the living crap out of the American People as well as make good profits, the article forever immortalized the M-50 Bounder in the Aviation Hoax hall of fame (What, there are like only five or so in this category?).
Aaaaanywho...I've decided to do a model of this badass aircraft in two versions. The first will be the accurate, diesel-powered M-50, while the second version will be a humorous take on the hoax, with cold war propaganda sprayed all over the sheets! I'll keep y'all posted as the week progresses.

--Bryan "Opposite over adjacent" Tan
 

RocketmanTan

Well-Known Member
Test build time!

Well, the prototype model pattern is finished, and I'll start posting test build photos once I'm done. I sure hope it turns out like I planned, and I sure hope you good folks like it, too!
 

RocketmanTan

Well-Known Member
Test build pics

Below are pics of the finished model (still using my webcam, so the quality's still crap...)
 

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Captain Rhino

New Member
Yes, but consider the double hoax that followed:

1. The Americans sensing a need to respond the supposed supersonic challenge of the M-50 Bounder, announce plans to build their own long range supersonic bomber, the B-70Valkirie. Its mission is to penetrate increasingly capable Soviet air defenses at high altitude.

2. The Soviets respond by beginning to develop a counter measure, their high altitude high speed point defense interceptor, the MiG-25.

3. The Americans build and successfully flight test two XB-70 prototypes. After one is lost in a fatal midair collision with its F-104 chase plane, they decide the mission is best performed with nuclear tipped ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. The B-70 program is cancelled.

4. The Soviets, not wanting to lose their sunk costs in their MiG-25 program, continue and finally field interceptor and reconnaissance versions of the aircraft.

5. Projecting their own multirole design philosophy onto the MiG-25, American military aircraft designers assume that it too must be a multirole aircraft. They respond by designing two aircraft that will dominate theaters of war for the remainder of the 20th century: the supersonic seabased multirole fighter, the F-14 Tom Cat, and the supersonic landbased multirole fighter, the F-15 Eagle.

6. The West does not learn of the MiG-25's very limited maneuverability and range until Victor Belenko defects with his aircraft to Japan in 1975. Once thoroughly evaluated by Western intelligence, they realize that the MiG-25, while capable, was not the multirole threat it was presumed to be. (That would come later when the Soviets fielded the Su-27 family of multirole aircraft.)

Keep up the good work. (Like the math humor in your nickname.)
 

RocketmanTan

Well-Known Member
Yes, but consider the double hoax that followed:

1. The Americans sensing a need to respond the supposed supersonic challenge of the M-50 Bounder, announce plans to build their own long range supersonic bomber, the B-70Valkirie. Its mission is to penetrate increasingly capable Soviet air defenses at high altitude.

2. The Soviets respond by beginning to develop a counter measure, their high altitude high speed point defense interceptor, the MiG-25.

3. The Americans build and successfully flight test two XB-70 prototypes. After one is lost in a fatal midair collision with its F-104 chase plane, they decide the mission is best performed with nuclear tipped ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. The B-70 program is cancelled.

4. The Soviets, not wanting to lose their sunk costs in their MiG-25 program, continue and finally field interceptor and reconnaissance versions of the aircraft.

5. Projecting their own multirole design philosophy onto the MiG-25, American military aircraft designers assume that it too must be a multirole aircraft. They respond by designing two aircraft that will dominate theaters of war for the remainder of the 20th century: the supersonic seabased multirole fighter, the F-14 Tom Cat, and the supersonic landbased multirole fighter, the F-15 Eagle.

6. The West does not learn of the MiG-25's very limited maneuverability and range until Victor Belenko defects with his aircraft to Japan in 1975. Once thoroughly evaluated by Western intelligence, they realize that the MiG-25, while capable, was not the multirole threat it was presumed to be. (That would come later when the Soviets fielded the Su-27 family of multirole aircraft.)

Keep up the good work. (Like the math humor in your nickname.)
Wow!:eek: That's very interesting and somewhat funny at the same timesign1. Thanks for your support, and thanks for noticing my math joke:thumb:.
 

sjsquirrel

Member
Too cool.

Hey Rocketman, this looks way too cool.

I'd never heard this story, so thanks to Captain Rhino for filling in some history, and thanks to you for doing up the model. It looks to be a fairly simple build so I'm puttin' it on my build right away list. That'll help motivate me to get to one of my XB70 kits, and then I'll need to do up that F15 kit I have, and buy an F14 to round out the display.

Talk about motivational material......sign1

Cheers,

Steve
 

Captain Rhino

New Member
M-50 Bounder in 1/33 scale

Hope I won't get into trouble for pointing out relevant content on another website, but over at the German paper modeling website Kartonbau.de there is a long running thread titled "Kranich M-50 Bounder, vergrößert auf 1:33," which describes a conversion of the old East German (DDR) model of the M-50 Bounder from 1/33 scale to a more manageable 1/50 scale.

Here's the URL :

http://www.kartonbau.de/wbb2/thread.php?threadid=12004

The original model is a collector's item (US$150.00). Based on the photo's of the original model at Kartonbau.de, I don't think it would be worth the money.

However, here is a resource you will be able to use:

http://www.airwar.ru/other/draw/m50aiv.html

These drawings are from a Russian hobby magazine and were in 1/72 scale when printed. Once scanned, who knows? Anyway, their primary use for you will be the fantastic detail you will be able it incorporate into your model.
 

twinslet

New Member
Another facinating part of the XB-70 saga has to do with the perceived threat mitigation for the Valkyrie. When the Soviets finally develop an effective Mach 4 ground to air missle, the need is perceived for a Mach 3 escort fighter. The DOD guys do it right; they design a weapon for the job, then a vehicle to deliver the weapon. Thus a new supersonic fighter is developed (I think it's the F107, but not sure and I'm way to lazy to go do the research). The fighter is scrapped when the Valkyrie program falls apart but, now they've develoed the weapon and its too good to waste. The Navy develops its much needed next gen air superiority fighter around the delivery of the wonder weapon - now known as the Phoenix missle. The missle is indeed a wonder weapon with a kill range of 70 miles, but is rarely used in that capacity because in most engagments, you must have visual confirmation. There is a pretty good stockpile of Phoenix missles when Desert Storm rolls around and, to "use up" the stockpile, Phoenix's are used as an air to ground weapon on small non-hardened targets. So much for a quarter of a million dollar wonder weapon!

- Tom
 

RocketmanTan

Well-Known Member
Hope I won't get into trouble for pointing out relevant content on another website, but over at the German paper modeling website Kartonbau.de there is a long running thread titled "Kranich M-50 Bounder, vergrößert auf 1:33," which describes a conversion of the old East German (DDR) model of the M-50 Bounder from 1/33 scale to a more manageable 1/50 scale.

Here's the URL :

http://www.kartonbau.de/wbb2/thread.php?threadid=12004

The original model is a collector's item (US$150.00). Based on the photo's of the original model at Kartonbau.de, I don't think it would be worth the money.

However, here is a resource you will be able to use:

http://www.airwar.ru/other/draw/m50aiv.html

These drawings are from a Russian hobby magazine and were in 1/72 scale when printed. Once scanned, who knows? Anyway, their primary use for you will be the fantastic detail you will be able it incorporate into your model.

Wow :eek: the german model is massive!! Thanks for the links, dude :thumb:

I've finished the regular copy of the model, and I'll submit it to the downloads section soon. I'll start the retro version in a bit.
 

woppy73

New Member
Well - the german model will be finished. At least thats what its owner told me. We just have to wait :mrgreen:.

kind regards,
Wolfgang
 

Airborne82

New Member
Wow, thank you for the history lesson. I always like learning new things about aviation history, such a fascinating field.
 

sjsquirrel

Member
Build pics

Hey Bryan, and all who may be interested,

I finally got around to building this and thought I'd share a few pics. I wasn't content to leave empty tubes for the engines, so I hacked up some inserts to dress them up a little.

The first picture below shows all the pieces and some partial assemblies.
The second pic shows the turbine blades for the front of the engines.
The third shows the insert installed in the engine with an empty one for comparison.
The fourth pic shows the insert in the rear of the engine. It's just a smaller diameter tube inside the large tube. Not realistic, but it adds some "depth" to the model.
Finally, an underside view of the plane with all the engines in place. I made the "exhaust" tubes on the engines under the wing a little longer. The first one I did I decided it was too short, so I mad two like that for the wing tip engines, then made longer ones for the the next two.

I can only do six images in a post so I'll post a few final pics next.

Hope you like it,

Steve
 

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sjsquirrel

Member
Finished build pics

And here are some pics of the finished plane.

It's a very sleek looking model, and believe it or not I gave it a little test and it flew fairly well. With a tiny bit of tweaking and testing you could set this one up for rubber-band launching and I bet it would fly like stink.

Enjoy,

Steve
 

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