BTL-B Y-wing starfighter

From Wookieepedia, the Star Wars wiki.

The BTL-B Y-wing starfighter flew combat missions for the Galactic Republic during the Clone Wars.

Contents 1 Characteristics 2 History 3 Behind the scenes 4 Appearances 5 Sources 6 Notes and references

[edit] Characteristics

Unlike the BTL-S3 Y-wing and its successor designs, the BTL-B model had a full covering of both the primary fuselage and engines. A bubble-turret provided clear view for the gunner, with a 360-degree field of fire.^[2]

They possessed a hyperdrive system allowing them to jump into hyperspace without the reliance on a carrier or hyperspace ring. To aid them in their operations, they also made use of an astromech droid.

[edit] History

The BTL-B Y-wing was acquired somewhat underhandedly, and without the entire approval of the Jedi Council, by Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker and his Padawan apprentice, Ahsoka Tano, who collected a squadron of the newly-made starfighters from a Koensayr testing facility in orbit around Bormus.

Upon receiving the fighters, Anakin formed Shadow Squadron of the Republic's most skilled Clone Pilots, and began using the ships immediately to hunt General Grievous' flagship Malevolence, the secret weapon of the Confederacy of Independent Systems.^[8][9]

Koensayr testing facilities could barely keep up for the demand on the fighter, and in addition to the ships that were acquired by Skywalker, two squadrons of BTL-B's were issued to Hunter Squadron, who participated in the Battle of Gwori, led by Jedi Generals Plo Koon and Saesee Tiin^[10]

BTL-Bs were subsequently issued to Blue and Red, and were repainted with their respective squadron's colors. Gold Squadron also was issued Y-wings.^[3]

[edit] Behind the scenes

Designer Russell Chong spearheaded the ship's development. "The Y-wing was a really fun project, bringing it back fully faired," he says.

When Joe Johnston refined the Colin Cantwell and Ralph McQuarrie Rebel Alliance Y-wing designs for construction into a visual effects model for Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, he posited that the starship was once a sleek vessel that was chopped and stripped like a hot rod by Rebel Alliance technicians. The BTL-B is apparently the stock version of the "stripped-down" Rebel ships.

According to Chong, "We back-engineered the Y-wing and turned it back into a bomber. I took images of the actual Y-wing model from the files at Lucasfilm and I designed our new version over it. We revitalized the bubble turret that Colin Cantwell and Ralph McQuarrie had developed. All the body panels are very much the same as the original Y-wing. I did my best to give it the same styling and the same look as the original Y-wing."

The early Cantwell concept models built of the Rebel Y-wing featured an immense bubble turret dome for a gunner to sit in. The limitations of bluescreen technology at the time made such a dome impractical. Concerning the original turret design, Chong states, "I didn't want to use the actual bubble turret with the single laser canon in the original Ralph McQuarrie illustration because it was too bulky and interrupted the sleek lines of the ship so I opted for a more aerodynamic design similar to the WWII B-17 and B-25 top turret."

The role-playing supplement, The Clone Wars Campaign Guide, identifies a starfighter of the same design as the BTL-S1 Y-wing starfighter.^[5] This is likely an error on the part of the writers of the book, being that the iteration that the Rebel Alliance had access to was the BTL-S3. The writers likely made the assumption that the first of the line of Y-wings developed by Koensayr was an S1 model. It possible, however, that the very next series of Y-wings after the BTL-B was the BTL-S1, and has yet to be introduced into the Clone Wars television series.

[edit] Appearances

• Star Wars The Clone Wars Volume 1: Shipyards of Doom (First appearance)
• Star Wars The Clone Wars Volume 3: The Wind Raiders of Taloraan
• The Clone Wars: Procedure
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars – "Shadow of Malevolence"
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars – "Storm Over Ryloth"
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars – "Innocents of Ryloth" (Appears in flashback(s))
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars – "Liberty on Ryloth"
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Lightsaber Duels

[edit] Sources

•  Y-wing starfighter in the Databank
• Pablo Hidalgo comments on TFN
• Official Site preview
• Y-wing model from WhizKids PocketModel gallery
• Torpedo model from WhizKids PocketModel gallery
• Discussing the origins behind the Clone Wars Y-Wing design
• Star Wars PocketModel TCG: Clone Wars
• Star Wars PocketModel TCG: Clone Wars Tactics
• Star Wars: The Clone Wars: The Visual Guide
• The Clone Wars Campaign Guide

[edit] Notes and references