Relying on Museum Examples for Detail Accuracy: Part 2

Today's example is the gorgeous "F7U-3M" at the National Naval Aviation Museum at Pensacola.

This picture is from the walkaround section of Britmodeller curated by Julien and in this case credited to Bootneck Mike. For more, see http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234949143-vought-f7u-cutlass/

I hadn't noticed it until F7U expert Al Casby of Project Cutlass pointed it out to me, but the external tanks are almost certainly bogus. External tanks are not often seen on the F7U-3 (even though it was short on endurance) but if present, they would have been either the standard Douglas-design AERO 150-gallon tanks, the very similar Fletcher 150-gallon tank, or the bespoke belly-mounted tank. These tanks have no fins and their afterbody has a distinctive upward sweep.

 Don Hinton Photo Cropped

 I suspect that they are either the 200-gallon tank that was carried by F-86s.

Or even more likely, given the flange on the left side of the NNAM tank, the one for the F-100s (see http://www.supersabre.com/200GallonTank.htm).

Note that this F7U was delivered to the Pensacola museum with these tanks installed so they weren't a goof by the workshop at the National Naval Aviation Museum.

These are what the F7U-3 tanks should look like:

Note that the pod under the belly was also a fuel tank that could be jettisoned. (A very similar pod could be carried in its place that contained 2.75-inch folding fin rockets.)

For other detail issues with this airplane from an accuracy standpoint, see http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2015/08/its-not-that-easy-to-get-it-right.html