IAR 80 (new project) - September 28, 2023
Hello everyone. It's me Antony, back with another blog in 2023. We are now on September 28 - past the half of 2023. Now that I'm working and my 7th semester has started, my time for Blogs decreased to some occasions. At least it is good to be back at work.
I'm still waiting for any news related to the new civil service exam of this year - with some to the education and health departments; and the subscriptions to be open in case I plan to apply for another public job. Like I said before, I may give it a shot, but it will be the same thing as before - Reserve my days and my spare-time for study. If I fail, it would be another civil service performed, with my money being spent for nothing.
For the calling process to work as a teacher, I definitely gave up due to the lack/low number of vacancies for mathematics teachers. My mom said for December they might re-open the subscriptions. However, I'm not sure I plan to do that in case I'm going to wait for too long until they reach to my position and then I announce my interest for that vacancy.
Enough of that, let's go for the important. For today, I'm going to bring new project I started recently. As always, I'll never get tired of starting new projects while I have a load of them to conclude. The new aircraft I started is the IAR 80 - Romania's main air fighter built during World War 2. Originally I had plans of starting the IAR 80 before my other planes (I don't remember which one: the A6M Zero, P-47 Republic, Ilyushin IL-2 and Heinkel He 111) after a boom of views from Romania (365 views in total in this Blogspot, 356 in Antony B. Arnoni - Literary Works and 356 in TonyGamingProjects). Since I'm familiar with the IAR 80, I decided to make it as a tribute to the Aeronautica Regală Română (Romanian Royal Aeronautics) and the brave pilots that fought harsh conditions in WW2. As always, I like to share the story of planes, vehicles, ships, weapons and more.
In 1930, before the development of the IAR 80, Romania was producing the Polish PZL P.11 by license after several competitions lost in favor for the Polish fighters. However the Industria Aeronautică Română (IAR) studied to apply the best features from the PZL P.11 to their aircraft designs, removing the gull inverted wings to adopt a low-wing design while keeping the main engine: the French Gnome-Rhode 14K Mistral Major. The results were the new IAR 80, with the first prototype built in 1937 and having its flight test in April 1939. The IAR 80 was agile, quite maneuverable and nimble compared to modern fighters of its time, despite the Bf 109 of the E series having the advantage of speed and dive attack. The Romanian air fighter was armed with two 7.92 mm (0.312 in) FN-Browning machine guns mounted in the inner portion of the wing - all exported from Belgium, but the exports were frozen after Germany conquering Belgium during the initial days of WW2; only to be resumed when Romania joined the Axis after the arrival of Ion Antonescu's fascist regime to power. As the war progressed, the Romanians realized the IAR 80 and its engine were at its limits - requesting the Germans for better engines and planes like the BMW 801 and Junkers Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers, with a majority of the requests refused due to the crescent need for planes and spare parts to the Eastern Front in 1941. At least one prototype was built with a Junkers Jumo 211 but tests presented excessive vibrations, making the prototype unstable. In response to the lack of a dive bomber, the IAR designed the IAR 81 with arms to attach a 50 kg bomb and some units received the 20 mm Mauser MG 151/20 autocannons to take down modern planes. The Romanian aircraft remained the best fighter capable of facing Soviet obsolete planes like Polikarpov I-15, I-16, MiG-3, LaGG-3 and Yakovlev Yak-1 to some extent. With the Americans launching bombardment campaigns at Romanian's refineries and oil depots in 1943, most of the pilots withdrew from the Eastern Front for home defense. The initial waves that attacked Ploiești and other cities consisted of Consolidated B-24 Liberators of the USAAF. The American campaign was costly as most of the bombers were destroyed by anti-air defenses and fighters (mostly by German Bf 109, Bf 110 and Romanian IAR 80). In 1944, the next attacks consisted of Lockheed P-38 Lightnings fighter-bombers escorted by other P-38s over Ploiești - also resulted in the lost of a considerable number of P-38 Lightnings as the IAR 80 and the IAR 81 took the American fighters by surprise thanks to its agility at low altitudes. This led to a major change in the American bombardment campaign over Romania. As the war raged on, Romanian pilots and aces started to diminish quickly and the IAR 80 was replaced by the German Bf 109G-6 for home defense duties, until a coup d'etat led by Michael I of Romania (with the help of partisans and the Red Army - who invaded Romania as Germany was forced to assume defensive stance) disposed of Antonescu's dictatorship regime in 23 August 1944. The remaining IAR 80 planes remained in service until 1949 where they were relegated as training planes - designated as IAR 80DC; as the Soviet La-9s and Il-10s were put into service in the new Romanian Air Force. In late 1952, the training planes were replaced by Yak-11s and Yak-18s.
Let me show you the images of the IAR 80:
Similar to the Kawasaki Ki-61 Hien, the IAR 80 was made from a simple and clean model - without any extra components and details like the engine exhaustion outlets, the landing gear, the cockpit, the antenna and the armaments. The minor adjustments were the nose to house the Gnome-Rhode Mistral radial engine. Also, it's using a temporary material based on the G.55 Centauro, Ki-61 and the Avro Lancaster: two color nodes attached by a ColorRamp and a Noise Texture.
The Propeller blades were imported from the Ki-43 / Ki-61 / A6M Zero with some modifications for a temporary material. The rudder is using a temporary material to represent their national flag, although a little weird due to the edges linking one vertex to another. In the colored version this small issue will be fixed.
The Romanian aircraft received the roundels from the Romanian Royal Aeronautics on its wings and fuselage. In addition, I made the Pitot Tube with several subdivisions for adding different materials, the canopy, the antenna located in the front of the canopy, the aerial attachments, the Browning MGs on the wings, the navigation lights on the wings, the engine exhaustion outlet and the tail skid. Unlike most planes, the IAR 80, along the I-16 (some units) and the Polish PZL P.11 used skids over wheels. I have no proper idea what are the advantages of skids over wheels, despite I know that some planes were equipped with skis for taking off or landing in snow-covered airbases. Still, it's looking good.
Well, that's it for now my friends. I hope you like this Blog. I don't have updates from my original works to share you. In case I have some spare time to enjoy, I'll be working on other things aside from Blender projects and my personal things. Until the time comes, you will be surprised to see them. See you next time.
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