Warbird Information Exchange

I've got an idea from this site:

http://www.japanprobe.com/2009/08/29/bu ... ishi-zero/

Why not do this with a full size warbird, have 100 different people make a different part to a rare plane, and build a complete warbird! Get blueprints, and pick a part for everybody!

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One of the hard lessons learned by the auto industry during WWII is that the tolerances for making aircraft were much higher than autos and so their assembly line strategies had to change a bit. I think that this need for carefully respect tolerances, problems with plans (which sometimes are incomplete), geographical distance which would hamper the ability to test fit different parts would pose serious logistical problems. But hey, why not? I'm just saying it would be a challenge... After all, isn't kind of that what is causing Boeing problems right now?

just some thoughts

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rreis

If you want pictures, see rreis@flickr

Kind of whats causing Boeing problems right now!!??!! that's sort of like admitting that the Titanic may have filled up with water at some point.
If you are adept enough while looking at photos of B-17's you can tell a Boeing built from a Vega or Douglas built because everyone, as rreis states, puts their own spin on things because of the 'at home' fabrication techniques everyone uses but applies differently.
Even in house has it's peculiarities, from PA001 thru the last 'classic' 737 300, the aft fuselage diameter @ sta 727 where the aft and fwd fuselage sections are joined, was approximately .035 bigger in diameter than the frame or the forward fuselage and consequently was 'massaged' into place as the sections were joined. This came about because Boeing never really intended for the football to sell that well, figuring in the beginning that the DC-9 and BAC 1-11 were already in service and they would build 250-300 total aircraft, call it a failure, and take a big tax write off on R&D and tooling costs.
After sales took off, there wasn't time to retool so away they went and lots and lots of engineering 'goofs' weren't addressed until the -400/500/600 and the consequental redesign for the 700-800-900 with a brand new wing and many many refinements. The new gen 37's are as different from the 100-300's as the 49 Ford is from a new Rousch Mustang.

The B-29 had at least two different centersections with different wing spans depending on whether or not the wing center section bolted together in the middle of the bomb bay torque box ala BELL or was one piece from mid span across the mid fuselage section as Boeing built them.

One of the problems with the 262 replicas involved pretty much chucking out everything that had been done in Texas and starting over making corrections along the way.

_________________
Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

Kind of whats causing Boeing problems right now!!??!! that's sort of like admitting that the Titanic may have filled up with water at some point.
If you are adept enough while looking at photos of B-17's you can tell a Boeing built from a Vega or Douglas built because everyone, as rreis states, puts their own spin on things because of the 'at home' fabrication techniques everyone uses but applies differently.
Even in house has it's peculiarities, from PA001 thru the last 'classic' 737 300, the aft fuselage diameter @ sta 727 where the aft and fwd fuselage sections are joined, was approximately .035 bigger in diameter than the frame or the forward fuselage and consequently was 'massaged' into place as the sections were joined. This came about because Boeing never really intended for the football to sell that well, figuring in the beginning that the DC-9 and BAC 1-11 were already in service and they would build 250-300 total aircraft, call it a failure, and take a big tax write off on R&D and tooling costs.
After sales took off, there wasn't time to retool so away they went and lots and lots of engineering 'goofs' weren't addressed until the -400/500/600 and the consequental redesign for the 700-800-900 with a brand new wing and many many refinements. The new gen 37's are as different from the 100-300's as the 49 Ford is from a new Rousch Mustang.

The B-29 had at least two different centersections with different wing spans depending on whether or not the wing center section bolted together in the middle of the bomb bay torque box ala BELL or was one piece from mid span across the mid fuselage section as Boeing built them.

One of the problems with the 262 replicas involved pretty much chucking out everything that had been done in Texas and starting over making corrections along the way.

_________________
Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

Kind of whats causing Boeing problems right now!!??!! that's sort of like admitting that the Titanic may have filled up with water at some point.
If you are adept enough while looking at photos of B-17's you can tell a Boeing built from a Vega or Douglas built because everyone, as rreis states, puts their own spin on things because of the 'at home' fabrication techniques everyone uses but applies differently.
Even in house has it's peculiarities, from PA001 thru the last 'classic' 737 300, the aft fuselage diameter @ sta 727 where the aft and fwd fuselage sections are joined, was approximately .035 bigger in diameter than the frame or the forward fuselage and consequently was 'massaged' into place as the sections were joined. This came about because Boeing never really intended for the football to sell that well, figuring in the beginning that the DC-9 and BAC 1-11 were already in service and they would build 250-300 total aircraft, call it a failure, and take a big tax write off on R&D and tooling costs.
After sales took off, there wasn't time to retool so away they went and lots and lots of engineering 'goofs' weren't addressed until the -400/500/600 and the consequental redesign for the 700-800-900 with a brand new wing and many many refinements. The new gen 37's are as different from the 100-300's as the 49 Ford is from a new Rousch Mustang.

The B-29 had at least two different centersections with different wing spans depending on whether or not the wing center section bolted together in the middle of the bomb bay torque box ala BELL or was one piece from mid span across the mid fuselage section as Boeing built them.

One of the problems with the 262 replicas involved pretty much chucking out everything that had been done in Texas and starting over making corrections along the way.

_________________
Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

DANGED "SUBMIT" BUTTON!!!!

_________________
Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

Caffeine Jolt-O-Rama?


PJ
PV-2 Harpoon "Hot Stuff"
www.amhf.org

A2C,

People are already doing what you suggest. The problem is locating everyone who has a template or making an individual part for the plane you are interested in.

Look at all the P-40 parts comming form Australia, the P-51's from Germany, Ect.......

The pilot who died in the reproduction P-51 at Osh a couple of years ago had all the fixtures to build P-51's.

I have a friend who wanted to build P-51's, so I wrote a P-51 parts interchange manual (took two years) for him. I still have some cleanup of mistakes written into the original manuals in WW II to correct before I am ready to publish the manual. The manual has the part number, part description, interchange, and blueprint number.

I have also written a PT-19/23/26 parts interchange manual to help restore my aircraft (I have 2 aircraft). I still need to add the blueprint info to this manual before I publish it.

I am currently working on editing an L-5 parts interchange manual, and hope to be able to publish it soon. This manual was also written to help me restore my aircraft (I have 3 L-5 projects).

I think my next interchange project will be the BT-13/15 aircraft (I have two rebuild projects).

Laterrrrrr
Avn-Tech

Avn, are you speaking of people making their parts, from scratch (this is, from blueprints)? Like a center section in Germany, wings in the US, tail-section in japan, etc ?

Inspector, I think you took my words a bit farther than my intent. Boeing, as Airbus, is building airplanes spread around the world. I said it was a challenge, not an impossibility. The proof is all those older models they are able to keep building in a distributed fashion.

Maybe I read it wrong but I thought A2C meant something like "take a rare airplane and distribute it's fabrication". Taking it to the extreme (for instance, few parts existing) this could be quite a challenge. But I also think if all keep inside the tolerance envelope and referred to the same plans, coupled with a good networked coordination (like, the parts plans should be modeled in the same program, with the files available through the web, so everyone could access them and check their virtual fit. They would also incorporate a versioning system, like when producing software, so changes could be tracked and everyone would be keep in sync). I think it's a very interesting problem.

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rreis

If you want pictures, see rreis@flickr

rreis,

Flugworks is building P-51 parts (Germany), someone in Australia is currently building P-40 parts. I am sure there are others out there with fixtures and molds for making other parts also.

Yes I am talking about from blueprints, or reverse engineering. All the blueprints for aircraft are not avialable. Most blueprint sets (Smithsonian) are from military arcives. The military did not produce blueprints for parts that werre not expected to be field repaired. So some parts would have to be reverse engineered to make blueprints.

I currently have the blueprints for C-45, B-26, F-86A/E/F, F-86D/K, F4B/P-12/P-26/P-29, Lockheed contractor set (partial P-38, P-80, T-33), JRF-4/-5/-6. I also have the Flugworks P-51 and P-40 Sets.

Peter Eubank in Australia is selling sets of blueprints that have been digitized by Flugwork (Germany). A search of Ebay for airmailbyairmail will show a listing of his blueprint sets.

Laterrrrrr
Avn-Tech

Inspector, how much involvement did you have with the 262 project ?

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"You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass..."
Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto

Thanks for the answer AVN. My question is, all these companies have something to compare against (real P51 parts, real P40...) or are they building it just from plans? I mean, what if you would start only from plans, distributed worldwide, each maker doing his own bit, some sort of sync must be achieved... and off course it could be done, I just think it's an interesting organizational problem, easier to solve today than a decade ago.

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rreis

If you want pictures, see rreis@flickr

Parts for P51's were being manufactured in Romania (at a former Sukhoi factory?): Spinners, exhaust stacks & some other parts. At least until someone screwed the pooch & that entire deal collapsed.

Also:
Airframe Assemblies in the UK make a HUGE range of warbird sheetmetal parts.

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Those who possess real knowledge are rare.

Those who can set that knowledge into motion in the physical world are rarer still.

The few who possess real knowledge and can set it into motion of their own hands are the rarest of all.

Probably the biggest problem is the 100 different manufacturers......

First, there probably aren't 50 people in the world who could do it.

Next, most of them are busy and booked solid for their foreseable lifetimes...

Then when something doesn't fit, you run into a lot of finger pointing (B-737 above, the 2 pieces are different sized)...

Then we get to money. I've found that people with money seem to like to keep it and when they spend it, they are pretty darn tight with it (unless its daddy's money and they are second generation spenders) and they want results.

You can pay one shop to build something from "scratch" (Ezell with the Red Bull P-38 or Bill and Scott Yoak and QUICKSILVER)... But to coordinate a LOT of shops, its going to be a problem.

Mark H

PS: I do know and understand that both the P-51 and P-38 were done with subassemblies from other craftsmen, but to spread it out farther than the dozen or so outside contractors they used probably wouldn't work.

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Fly safe or you get to meet me .......

rreiss,
One of the classes I teach to Boeing 787 folks is shimming and shop measurement. Engineers set three criterias for dimensioning a part, minimum, nominal, and maximum and when the parts are all brought together any gapping is adjusted with shimming as the max allowable 'pull up' is .005 gap at least on Boeing jets.
Consequently, every contractor shoots to make all their contracted parts to minimum dimensions as the material saved can be used (not implying the excess is pounded together to make more, just that the manufacturing is planned to use the minimum each time and the excess is raw stock towards the end of the contract) so the supplier can make a few to several 'free' parts that they can bill for but donot have to purchase more material to create. In some cases this causes huge headaches and emergent manufacturing to correct the compounded problems of too many minimal (but still 100% correct parts) not fitting together as the designers and engineers planned.

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Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-