Image 7: Top/side, looking back toward the engine assembly. While not an authoritative reference for paint/markings, especially since only the command pod may actually have been filmed, it does provide excellent detail references for the modeler. The images below are of a 44" Eagle reproduction built by Martin Bower, with several pieces obtained from Phil Rae and D. Space:1999 lore goes on to say there were Passenger, Recon, VIP, and Rescue pods, but all of these are (for modeling purposes) just the standard Transporter pod - sometimes painted with different markings, such as red stripes for the Rescue pod. The most common flavor of Eagle pod was the Transporter. Image 5: A crisp look at a 44" transporter Eagle with the Command Module removed. Image 4: Back view, looking straight into the engine bells. The landing pads are tilted backward due to gravity (the picture's rotated 90 degrees). There were minor detail variations between all the models. Wherever possible we have noted which model a set of pictures depicts. The main pod varieties included transporter (passenger, rescue, and recon), docking/science, winch, and cargo.Ī number of studio models existed for the Eagles, in various sizes - 44" and 22" being the most common. Its center section could be swapped out with mission-specific pods. The Eagle was designed to be modular so it could undertake a great variety of roles. While the Eagle's unstreamlined design made its travelling to and entering a different planet's atmosphere each week seem implausible, the craft is an elegant design in the context of its intended role: a utility vehicle for lunar operations. Certainly the most notable and enduring of these is Moonbase Alpha's workhorse, the Eagle, which was created by Brian Johnson. Running for two seasons, from '75 to '77, the show introduced us to a tremendous variety of interesting spacecraft, modeled primarily by Martin Bower.
Gerry Anderson's Space: 1999 was the the tube's first major planet-hopping adventure series since Star Trek.
The seventies were a relatively dark period for TV SF. By Rob Caswell and Mark Dickson, with additional info and photos supplied by Chris Trice and Darren Peters.