Switch to full style
This is the place where the majority of the warbird (aircraft that have survived military service) discussions will take place. Specialized forums may be added in the new future
Post a reply

Aces: Iron Eagle III warbirds

Sat Aug 01, 2009 6:32 pm

I saw this the other night after finding it on the
bottom shelf at the video store. What a multitude
of warbirds and some great aerial scenes as well!!

Anyone have any ID's on the many aircraft in this film?

I have Spitfire NH904 and P-38 N38BP, what about
the C-123K, Zero and the "P-51-Me.109"?

Many background warbirds as well. Filmed at
Tucson Intl. in 1991.

Sat Aug 01, 2009 6:36 pm

The 123 is the ex Thunderbird Aviation 123. It was also used in Outbreak and Operation Dumbo drop. it is still sitting at Deervalley airport in Phoenix.

Sat Aug 01, 2009 6:59 pm

Hey Matt, is the owner of the 123 going to do anything with it or is it going to continue to sit. It hasn't flown for quite a while has it?

Sat Aug 01, 2009 7:11 pm

I have no idea what is going on with it, a number of months ago I saw it with the cowls open. I don't even know who owns it. Since it has been sitting on the north ramp it had a Gulfstream blown into it during a dust storm.

Sat Aug 01, 2009 8:10 pm

The P-51 is the Planes of Fame airplane.

Sat Aug 01, 2009 11:17 pm

It's been years since I saw it, but when I was at Planes of Fame East (Bob Pond's Minnesota collection) in the early 90's I was told that several of the museum's a/c were used in the film. Don't recall which ones.

Sun Aug 02, 2009 12:47 pm

The Zero was Gene Fisher's at the time and an ex-Tora bird that he had modified with (I believe) Aerostar landing gear. I thing the aircraft is now in the Northwest somewhere.
Jerry

???

Sun Aug 02, 2009 12:49 pm

Brian Reynolods has it in Olympia.

Sun Aug 02, 2009 11:32 pm

If this was the one with the guy standing up in the Spitfire to shoot the rocket launcher, that was Bob Pond's Spitfire and POF's P-51A as the Me-109. That movie was craptastic! In one of the Iron Eagle movies Steve Hinton taxied around some hangars for 3 hours in a T-33 while they were shooting.

Mon Aug 03, 2009 1:30 am

Here is a shot that Charlie Hilliard gave me a few years back.

Dated the summer of 1991.

Formerly 'Our' much loved red Spitfire G-FIRE of Spencer Flack.

Somebody please put it out of its misery and paint it in a representative livery. :)

PeterA

Image

Mon Aug 03, 2009 9:42 am

BEST MOVIE EVER!!!

So I'm going through flight school in Corpus Christi, and Hacker comes down for a week to visit me. Iron Eagles III is playing at the dollar theater, so what the hell, we decide to go to an afternoon show. There's maybe 5 other people in the whole theater, and Hacker and I literally start cat-calling and laughing out loud after about 5 minutes. The people around us were mortified, but darn...I have never had so much fun at a movie.

And Hacker learned something very valuable that day. He learned that all he had to do was carry around a roll of Reynolds Wrap, and that if he had a radar guided missile on his tail, he could just open the canopy and unroll the thing in the slipstream. SAVED HIS ASS over Iraq a few years back. I believe there is even a painting that Wade Meyers did of this incident......(sorry, Wade...just kidding).

Mon Aug 03, 2009 10:32 am

Hey Speedy we did the same thing for the opening of "Pearl Harbor" in San Antonio. Only difference was it was SRO. Should have seen the people when we started whooping and hollering for the Japanese planes when they came on (we had one of our Kates in the filming). By the B-25 scenes we were yelling BULL SH(cough) and I think most of the crowd felt the same way by then.

Mon Aug 03, 2009 10:26 pm

ISTR that the bad guy flew a nasty-looking little black jet. This one, perchance? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zG9LlHcX8lg

Tue Aug 04, 2009 6:08 am

It was the ARES Mudfighter, yes.

I've always thought that was a pretty cool little jet. Questionable in it's ability to actually be a viable close air support asset, but a very neat idea none the less.

The problem is that gun gas ingestion is simply not that serious of an issue to design an entire aircraft around it....so a great solution for an unimportant problem.

The more significant problem can be seen in the youtube video. Check out the airplane on the strafe run. As soon as the gun fires, the airplane starts moving around. That is a pretty serious issue -- when the gun is your "precision" surgical instrument, you can't have the airplane moving all over the sky when it shoots. Small aircraft movements translate to gigantic aimpoint shifts on the ground.

Tue Aug 04, 2009 9:38 am

some cool aircraft shots.., but i was so embarassed for the 'actors' in this movie!

More PO'd that I spent money on it.., but still embarassed for the poor actors!
Post a reply