Warbird Information Exchange

Gary, does that mean you will come "help" with our CAF project when you drop by. We always need extra hands it seams.

Glad to hear about the new job. Have fun with the spare time you think you will be getting now.

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A-7D, the Short Little Ugly "Flyer" and A-10A Warthog, weren't called an ATTACK plane for nothing. Remember for a little relief on the ground, call your local Air Force to "Go Ugly Early"!

Well, I'll be (eventually) be inspecting all CAF aircraft, so I'm sure I'll come up there to check out your project. As far as helping with it, I'm going to do what I can to assist all of the Units and Squadrons to get the airplanes assigned to them in airworthy condition (if they aren't already) and then keep them that way. I will be turning some wrenches, but I'll mostly be a consultant of sorts and will help everyone get the expertise and assistance they need for each particular project. Sometimes I'll be able to personally assist with an issue, other times there'll be someone else who'll be better at a given issue. Every Unit has different hurdles to overcome. Some hurdles are higher than others, but I'm confident that if everyone is willing to work with me, we'll be able to be proud of every single CAF airplane out there.

Gary

Congratulations, Gary! Best of luck in your new position.

Any modifications in the works for the B-24 this winter?

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

None that are planned. Well, maybe a few minor little things, but I'm not going to be the one doing them, so stay tuned and we'll watch together.


Gary

Congrats on your new position! Filling your shoes as the B29/24 crew chief maybe the hardest job you face! You have been and will continue to be a tremendous asset to the Squadron and the CAF. I am very pleased you are staying with us!
Dave

What with Gary beginning the process of transitioning to his new position I decided to post some updates whenever Elly and I are able to come down to work on '927. It won't be the same as having him do it, and if I bore everyone to tears just let me know.
Daniel Collier was here for several days and beefed up the side-entry door and in his "spare time" started to work on opening up the tail in the area where it was dinged coming home from Nellis. It looks like we were really luckier than I'd hoped with regard to the damage. The three stringers involved were not torn up as I'd feared, the clips that fastened them to the frame failed instead. You can see the broken angle on the stringer with the two empty holes in it.

Another interesting aspect of working on this old girl is all the "makeup" that's been applied over the years. The buttonhead rivets have so many coats of paint on them that they almost look like flush rivets, so I used a high-speed to buff the paint off the tops of each rivet so I could drill in the exact center of the heads.

Then it was a simple matter to drill out the rivets and remove the first skin section. You can see the displaced stringers in this shot somewhat easier than the first picture:

We plan on removing the remaining damaged skin this morning before heading home into the wonderful winter weather, and I'll show you the final open-up when we get home.

Scott

Scott,
Many thanks for keeping up the great Gary Austin Tradition of posting pictures while explaining what work you are doing and why. I appreciate the ongoing metal work seminar.

John,

I'll post some more "in progress" pics of this little project when I get access to a computer I can download to. Right now, we have no water or power at our home in northeast Oklahoma (since 05:30 Sunday morning) and won't likely have either for a week or so, along with a lot of other Midwesterners. Ice does baaaaad things to trees and powerlines ! I'm not able to do much on this computer but post replies.
It is kind of cool to be back in "frontier days" reading and cooking by firelight!

Scott

Scott,
Sorry to hear about the weather damages. In New England, we have been there and had that done to us before - no fun. The worst problem I have at the moment ain't so bad by comparison - a long hilly driveway you can skate on and no thawing in sight.
So, do you have a wood-burning computer?
Or, how exactly do you stay "on-line" when the lines are literally down??

John,

My temporary computer set-up is kind of "classified information" but it doesn't burn wood . As far as the WX problems, my wife and I are native Nebraskans so this isn't extremely unusual to us. We grew up on farms and have experienced days at a time without electricity, so we just read by the kerosene lantern. My concern is people not used to this kind of situation getting carbon monoxide poisoning trying to stay warm.

Scott

As promised, here are a couple of shots of the final open up. Not much to do but make up some skins and repair the stringers.


Now it's back to winter!

This was taken on Monday afternoon. We still have no electricity, the water is flowing though. I broke down and bought a frickin' generator this morning .

Scott

Found this picture of the tunnel gun on Flickr


http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawk914/11 ... ool-usaaf/


Greg

Greg,

Welcome to posting on WIX! The guy manning that gun sure has a "limited field of fire", doesn't he? I think the airplane is an early "D" judging from the style of window cutouts on the right of the photo. Some aircraft had two rectangular windows with rounded corners, and some had the square-cornered style with four windows per side. No telling with the Liberator .

Scott

We decided to spend a little of the Christmas season with our "third family" down in Midland. I've been working on the repairs and decided I'd post a few pictures of the progress (or lack thereof ) that I've made. I was able to save the stringers from oblivion by using patience, hammers, and other "special tools" to massage them.

THis is the first new skin section being fitted after cutting it to shape and rolling it to conform to the fuselage:


Here is a shot of both skins clecoed into position while the drilling commences:


And this is a shot of the interior with everything temporarily fitted:


We plan on spending a few hours tomorrow finishing the drilling process, deburring, and maybe getting some primer on the parts so that they can be installed permanently. Then we'll head to the homestead and see what Santa left under the tree. I suspect I'll just have coal in my stocking--I wasn't a very productive elf the past few days.

Merry Christmas from Skeeter and Shadow!