Introduction

The English Electric Lightning has long been a favourite aircraft of mine even though it retired from service before i was old enough to fly... I have been very lucky to see 2 seperate aircraft do fast taxis at Bruntingthorpe (unfortunately now a big carpark). The Lightning was touted with a variety of proposals to convert it into a carrier bourne aircraft, the most common design for this was based on a twin seat aircraft, removed the nose intake inleui of some tornado style side intakes, extended the fin forward and added some small swing wing sections, all of which i feel detracted from the fundamental lightning image. I decided to do another "what if" build as if this aircraft actually entered into further development / production but using some alternative adaptations to the original airframe.

Please note this is not a scale replica of anything and is 99% a new build by me. The following adjustments where made to the basic F6 lightning aircraft:

Widened the fuselage by 600mm ish (you can barely notice..)
Moved main undercarriage into the widened fuselage sides
Raised the main wing height
Gave the wing the ability to increase AOA (crusader-esc)
Folding wingtips for carrier storage
Folding rudder (vigilante-esc) for carrier storage
Weapons underslung on the wing (much increased payload over F6)
Pitot moved onto wings (2no. now for redundancy etc.)

Features

Custom cockpit (based on EE lightning but with RJ tweaks where necessary for carrier operation etc.)

Openable cockpit

Custom landing gear

Custom weapons

Angle of attack adjustable wing

Carrier capable
Intake condensation effect

Reheat on 100% throttle

FAST and agile aircraft model

Controls

AG1 = Turns engines on - reheat when on 100% throttle
AG2 = Opens cockpit

AG3 = Angle of attack for wing
AG4 = Arrestor hook
AG5 = Drop external fuel tanks

AG6 = Air-brakes

AG7 = Fold wings and fin

VTOL dn = flaps

takeoff procedure (carrier or landbased)

Adjust as necesary for runway length etc. Press AG 1, press AG3, lower flaps 50%, increase throttle to 100%, apply some pitch to keep it level and rudder as neccessary. Once the aircraft exceeds 120kts gently pull up, retract U/C flaps and revert wing to normal ASAP

Landing procedure (carrier)

Landing is just takeoff in reverse with 100% flaps and AG4 for arrestor hook. Note it has some weight behind it so momentum takes some getting over to loose all that speed. Approach speed around 150-170kts, dont land too fast or too slow for obvious reasons, clear bombs and drop tanks as necessary.

Screenshots

Lightnings always go vertical right?

Carrier Landing Approach - no bother

Wheels going away, oh look the nose gear is slow like the real lightning

Destroyer, what destroyer?

Careful how low you go... The destroyer bumped into the belly tank and ripped half the model away.

Notes

Thanks to "V" for their Funkyplant formula which i used to make the light effect for the condensation in the intake on full throttle and stationary ish.
Thanks to Tang0five for the sanity checks.