KINETIC K48113 F-84F Thunderstreak USAF 1:48

The Republic F-84F was about as much an F-84 as an F-86 Sabre was an FJ-1 Fury.  Yes, it saw its birth on the same design table, and the same designer - Alexander Kartveli - was present at its birth, and it was born at the same place, Republic Aviation. But past that the only thing it had in common with its Thunderjet forbear was an appetite for runways on takeoff.

      Following the success of the swept-wing F-86 Sabre in 1947, the Air Force revised the General Operational Requirement originally issued in September 1944 that had resulted in the development of the F-84 Thunderjet. The revision called for significant increases in operational performance over that contained in the original document. The result of this would be one of the greatest corporate boondoggles in the history of the American aviation industry, in which corporate political influence and the perceived need to create a new weapon for an unanticipated war would result in an airplane finally delivered to first line units just in time to be sent to second-line service.

      The F-84F officially began life with a letter proposal in November 1949 in which Republic Aviation suggested it could satisfy the revised GOR by modifying the straight wing F-84 with  swept wing and tail.  Republic modified the proposal within a month, with an offer to build additional ordnance capability into the new aircraft. While the drawings called the new airplane the  F-96, Republic stated that the proposed low-cost new aircraft would merely be a modification of the F-84E then entering the USAF inventory, with 55 percent of the F-84E tooling utilized for the new aircraft. The Republic proposal was initially endorsed in December 1949 and Republic was allocated one F-84E for use in developing a prototype of the swept-wing aircraft. The Air Force, insisted the F-96 be redesignated, officially becoming the F-84F on September 8, 1950. This was an entirely political move on the part of the Air Force, to convince the Congress that this was not a new aircraft program, but merely a continuation of one previously authorized and funded.  The name "Thunderstreak," the result of a contest among Republic employees, was given the new airplane.