Cobra Bullhead
Submersible Air Defence Vehicle

Given, Cobra's penchant for sinister undersea headquarters, they obviously need some way to defend those bases from attack. I came across a cheap Corps plane that I figured could work as a combination submarine and interceptor-fighter jet. The bulbous canopy combined with the aquatic nature of the vehicle made me think of bullhead fish, so that's where the name comes from. It looks like it has two forms of propulsion on the rear of the vehicle, so I figure the large central one is the underwater propulsion while the two on the side are the jet engines used in the air. The idea is that these planes can burst from the water for a short flight time, just enough to try to knock out an attacking aircraft.

Plane and black missiles – The Corps Rapid Assault Attack Fighter
Red torpedoes – Dreadnok Cycle

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Splash Viper
Air/Sea Defence Pilot

The Splash Viper is the pilot of the Cobra Bullhead, a submersible air defence vehicle that can act both as a submarine and an interceptor jet. Although they're designed to knock out attacking aircraft, being Cobra they're going to spend much more time being shot down themselves. As such, I figured the pilots should have a nice bright uniform so that they can be found by recovery crews. The second version of Lampreys are bright orange, and I added the lower half of Windmill for a similar colour. I painted some details, especially on the legs since Windmill had pretty sad paint apps.

Head, arms, torso – Lamprey v2
Waist, legs - Windmill

Pistol – Sea Slug

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Skystriker XP-14F(B)
Interceptor-Fighter

The F-14 Tomcat is a Navy jet. No other US service branch ever operated it, in large part because it was designed specifically for use on an aircraft carrier. Now technically, the Skystriker is not an F-14, it's an XP-14F, which could be some Air Force variant of the airframe since it's clearly based on the same jet. But since the Joes have the USS Flagg, and since the Tomcat's airframe is so clearly built for aircraft carrier operations, it's a Navy plane in my Joeverse.

The Skystriker is actually a very good scale model of the Tomcat, in 1/32 scale. The only thing that's really out of scale is the interior of the cockpit, which allows two 1/18 scale figures to sit in it. Or rather, the original fit two figures. Since modern-era figures are substantially larger than ARAH Joes, when the modern Skystriker was released it only had room for one pilot. Since Tomcats are always two-seaters, and since I was using ARAH-style figures, I know I had to make it a two-seater again. So I took the seat assembly from a Rattler and shopped it up to make it fit. I kept the upper part of the modern Skystriker seat, both because it has the nice ejection seat detailing, and because if you remove it entirely the nose of the plane will not stay in place.

The Skystriker being a Navy plane did create a dilemma. Since Ace is a USAF pilot according to his filecard, I was going to have to either give the Skystriker a new pilot, or make a change to Ace's background. Since Ace not flying the Skystriker would be tantamount to heresy, he's now a Navy man in my universe. And since all Tomcats require a RIO (Radar Intercept Officer) to fly in the back seat, I created Scope.

Other than the seats, the only other non-Skystriker part I used are the Sidewinder missiles. I had a small Lanard plane that came with missiles that are nearly identical to the Sidewinders that came with the Dragonfly, except black in colour and the holes aren't quite as wide. They needed a small amount of modification to fit on the Skystriker. The Sidewinders that come with the Skystriker have extra flangey bits in the middle which don't appear on real Sidewinders, so I prefer to use the Dragonfly version (or a close approximation) when possible.

Airframe, Sparrow missiles, Phoenix missiles – Skystriker (modern version)
Sidewinder missiles – Lanard the Corps! (modified)
Cockpit interior – Rattler (modified)

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Ace
Fighter Pilot

The F-14 Tomcat is a Navy jet. No other US service branch ever operated it, in large part because it was designed specifically for use on an aircraft carrier. Now technically, the Skystriker is not an F-14, it's an XP-14F, which could be some Air Force variant of the airframe since it's clearly based on the same jet. But since the Joes have the USS Flagg, and since the Tomcat's airframe is so clearly built for aircraft carrier operations, it's a Navy plane in my Joeverse. Which means that Ace is a Navy pilot, since having someone other than Ace being the Skystriker pilot would not be acceptable.

This version of Ace is the pilot of the modern Skystriker released in 2009. It's just a paint upgrade of Ace v2, which is an excellent example of a great figure sculpt whose paint apps leave so much to be desired. There's lots of nice detail on the figure that you don't notice unless you go looking for it, since it's not painted.

All parts and accessories – Ace v3

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Scope
Flight Officer

For my modern Skystriker custom I needed a modern Radar Intercept Officer (RIO), the flight officer in charge of the radar and weapons systems (among other things) on an F-14 Tomcat, which of course is the basis for the XF-14P Skystriker To maintain continuity, I made an updated version of Scope, the RIO created to fly with Ace as the pilot in the vintage Skystriker. They have similar flight suits to emphasize that they're a partnership.

Head – Barrel Roll
Arms, torso, waist, legs – Ace v4

Helmet – Ace v4

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Okay, these are all fantastic and the use of that The Corps! jet as a Cobra answer to the SHARC is brilliant. I can't think of a single critique to make. The paints look factory and the planes are beautiful. I'm honestly jealous of how finished your figures look.

awesome showing! it's like a large group project all you! i'm an A10 fan so that one I love. they are all super clean and artfully done!

AERIAL AWESOMENESS!

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Yes, what they said!

You are keeping ARAH customs alive, and doing it with style.

Using the Snow Job chest/back for the early Ace? Brilliant, in that way that seems obvious but I never would have thought of it.

The paint on the Russian jet is astounding, too.

Bravo! Good looking crafts!

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there are, from time to time, some ARAH custom threads that make me long for the good old days. Where the figures were clean, they all fit well into the vehicles, and the vehicles were at the center of good old fashioned play time.

this is one of those times.

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What a great thread with fantastic goodness.
Well done.

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Fantastic bunch of customs!
The Firebird would've made a great addition to the Oktober Guard GP! That's my favorite plane.

I did actually have it ready just in time, but then got busy with something else (some boring real-life thing having nothing to do with customs, dammit) and I missed the deadline.

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