CAF - Midland Boneyard Photos

[Rob Mears]

I had the privilege of spending my Saturday with Gary Austin, Carl Scholl, and Eric Van Hoff out amongst the "field of treasures" behind the main CAF hangar in Midland. Over the last year or so, Gary has been sorting out what at one time was little more than a massive dumping ground for the CAF's spare parts. During the move from Harlingen, the immense amount of spares held in CAF inventory were basically dropped off by the truckload in the field beyond the tarmac, with no rhyme or reason as to how they were sorted. Over the last year, Gary has expended a great amount of effort leading the rearrangement and ordering of the stuff so that it can be better identified, and thus easily sourced by the various CAF Squadrons needing parts.

Carl Scholl was able to lend his expertise and help identify some of the more obscure items that, until that time, had remained unidentified. Below are a number of photos of the digging expedition.


















Racks full of various exhaust manifolds...




B-29 airframe parts...




B-24 cowl ring...








T-33 and other landing gear assemblies...




Hellcat ailerons (two of many)...




Unidentified turret...




Loads of propeller blades (B-25, P-47, etc)...




F4U Corsair exhaust manifolds...




F4U Corsair intercooler ducting...




Lockheed Lodestar cowl rings...

[Jesse C.]

Wow, looks like you guys are really knocking it out!

I just love wandering around part piles. Its the only time you get to see parts you would not even knew existed!

[mustangdriver]

I would kill for one of those cowling panels for the game room.

[Tim Landers]

I'd like to have one of those prop blades.

[henry]

thanks for posting the pics, i had wondered what it looked like since reading gary's first mentions.

imagine having that stuff to play with as a kid...

mustangdriver, you would realy need a hub, blades and the front half of an engine to go with the cowling bowl (and them some additional stregnthening in your house).

[Former Member]

Thanks for posting the pics Rob...I could spend hours wandering through a place like that! I scrutinized the photos but didn't see any ball turret goodies though.

John

[mustangdriver]

Yeah, but it would be worth it.

[1969read]

The B 24 people in Melbourne Australia were after cowl rings a while back for there project Jason

[retroaviation]

If there is anyone who wishes to purchase parts from the CAF, just e-mail or PM me. All parts, however, that are used on current CAF airplanes get offered to those Units and Squadrons who operate them first. If they decide they don't wish to purchase them, then I am authorized to sell them to the open market. Half the money goes to CAF HQ and half goes to the B-29/B-24 Squadron (since we're doing all the work).

And sorry John...no ball turret stuff.

Gary

[peter]

Gary any clues as to that turrets ID?

[B29Gunner]

Gary any clues as to that turrets ID?

It's B-29

[Pooner]

Regarding that turret remains.... don't forget about the B-50, too, amigo! Lots of those former -29 turrets ended up on the Five-Zero. Saw that and thought right away about an application for your project....

[retroaviation]

Well, it could possibly also fit a B-50 I reckon, as I don't know much about them. However the turret is definitely the remains of a B-29, two gun turret.

Gary

[peter]

I bet it was a welcome break for you to get outside and away from the B24 for a bit. Looks like you enjoyed it and found some B24 stuff to boot!