Museum of Flight's B-17

[Pat Carry]

It seems like just yesterday it was outside on display for a limited time there at the museum when in fact it was last summer. Are there plans to have it on display outside this summer as well?

[The Inspector]

No concrete knowledge, but I speculate it'll be after Summer finally settles in around here, right now the Seattle area is running about double the amount of normal June rainfall about 2.85 inches against a usual 1.35 inches, and last Saturday the entire area got a real F rog choker.
We natives are very adept at lighting 4th of July fireworks from under an open umbrella

[spookythecat]

It seems like just yesterday it was outside on display for a limited time there at the museum when in fact it was last summer. Are there plans to have it on display outside this summer as well?

That limited time has been happening since it was brought out. I guess there's no place to put it indoors. The B-29 is sitting out (in it's white plastic wrap) as well as the DC-2.

[p51]

I was at a large media event there a while back and talked with several of the marketing people. They explained that there are NO plans at this time to display the 17, 29 or any of the other outside airplanes across Marginal Way from the main museum under cover.
One told me it'd probably be years before the bombers would be under cover and if they ever are, it won't be in an enclosed building as there are no long-term plans to do that, even several years out. Needless to say, I was hugely bummed to hear that, especially since we were sitting in a building built for a space shuttle that is never going to show up.

[mustangdriver]

We had the main museum currator on our show and he said that there are plans to build a building and that they hoped to break ground rather soon. This would house the larger aircraft. But once again, it is going to be a long while before they come inside. I would hate to see the B-17 get to where it needed another restoration.

[hang the expense]

Thats what happens when you park the heavy iron.What a waste of aircraft.

[The Inspector]

The original plan, several decades and administration teams ago,was to remove the DC-3 from inside the Great Gallery and replace it with the/a B-17 (at the time no one knew that Swage would buy a B-17 or that the MoF would wind up with it) the building is stressed to support as much larger and heavier aircraft so teh B-17 wouldn't be an issue. The entire Southend wall is a huge hinged door more than big enough to get a B-17 inside with only the removal of the right wing from #4 outwards.
I expect that Boeing may eventually give up the Development Center across Marginal Way since it's easier and cheaper to design an airplane with CATEA rather than sheets of Veneer and plywood, and the last major use i'm aware of was when the building had an enormous autoclave inside for B-2 wing parts.

[APG85]

Unfortunately, the acquisition of a flown Shuttle would have generated enough revenue within a couple of years to build another addition to the museum to house the larger aircraft. Another missed opportunity...

[The Inspector]

Not Mof's issue-The MoF had a building DONE-FINISHED- READY TO GO Before the last shuttle flight, it was the panel @ NASA who submarined that, now we get the shuttle trainer. Part of that might extend to the NASM having too much input since they were very deeply upset, wounded, crippled, snubbed when the MoF wound up with all the Wright Bros. (which was the choice of the Wright family) papers and the NASM assumed they should have been the annointed recipient of that cache.

[APG85]

Didn't mean to say it was the MOF's fault they didn't get a Shuttle. Politics got the best of them in that one...

[p51]

We had the main museum currator on our show and he said that there are plans to build a building and that they hoped to break ground rather soon. This would house the larger aircraft. But once again, it is going to be a long while before they come inside.

All i know is the main people who try to get the money for the museum and handle said money in regard to how it's spent told me there is no plan to get the bombers under cover currently underway either now or at any point in the foreseeable future. And that was quite recently, at the media event where they talked about mining asteroids...

The original plan, several decades and administration teams ago,was to remove the DC-3 from inside the Great Gallery and replace it with the/a B-17 (at the time no one knew that Swage would buy a B-17 or that the MoF would wind up with it) the building is stressed to support as much larger and heavier aircraft so teh B-17 wouldn't be an issue. The entire Southend wall is a huge hinged door more than big enough to get a B-17 inside with only the removal of the right wing from #4 outwards.

I'd totally fogotten about that, the marketing guys also told me that had been the plan at one point. It'd slipped my mind until I just read that. We had a long talk and it was quite clear to me that preservation of warplanes does not draw the big donor bucks they're looking for.

[gary1954]

NASM assumed they should have been the annointed recipient of that cache.
Amen Brother The all knowing All Seeing Cluster that it is

[APG85]

I'm sure the day will come when those planes will get a building. They've invested to much to let them rot outside. The B-29 has gone through decades of restoration and now sits shrink-wrapped. They also went through large hurdles to get their hands on a Constellation and have it re-painted and brought to the Museum. Maybe when the economy gets better...someday...maybe... The Shuttle would have been the magic key in all of this. If you did through the history of the Udvar-Hazy Center and how it came to be, you can trace it back to the Shuttle Enterprise. A good infusion of money helped as well...

[StangStung]

I'd totally fogotten about that, the marketing guys also told me that had been the plan at one point. It'd slipped my mind until I just read that. We had a long talk and it was quite clear to me that preservation of warplanes does not draw the big donor bucks they're looking for.

I'm curious. Aside from a Shuttle, did they opine about what does bring in the big donor bucks they're looking for?

[p51]

I'm curious. Aside from a Shuttle, did they opine about what does bring in the big donor bucks they're looking for?

Yeah, they thought it was anything that would lead to well-heeled donors, and they thought that would be better focused to spacerelated stuff. One of the primary space tourists who paid his way with the Russians gave a lot of money to the MoF for that shuttle building. They considered that, and people deep into the aerospace industry at the upper echelons to be where the bucks would come from. One said, "As much as I hate to say it, the veterans don't bring in the money we need."