Where's Flak Bait?

[DaveM2]

I can't spot the Lippisch, maybe it is being confused with the Horten?

No confusion here. Look harder.

Landing gear is peeking out under the Ar234 tail feathers. The horizontal bits are tucked between the Blitz and the Do 335. Evidently the vertical is still in the works.

Doh- should have gone to Specsavers (not sure if you have them-eye glasses company)

[Steve Nelson]

Interesting to see the paint loss at the cockpit/fuselage break.
Shows you what 40 years of handling by visitors will do.
I'm surprised they didn't protect the area.

I'm also surprised to see the paint loss on the top of the fuselage (both ahead of and behind the cockpit.) I'll have to check my photos, but it seems like when I saw her in 2008 when she was still downtown the paint in those areas was pristine. I wonder if those areas had been touched up at some point, and the restoration staff has removed the later paint.

SN

[Pat Carry]

I hear Flak Bait's restoration has been delayed because of the renovations to the NASM's building on the mall. I hope I live long enough to see it restored some day.

[333farmboy]

I know this isnt the correct place to post this but I'm needing help to identify a aluminum tank that was produced by the Glenn L Martin company and says b-26 b on the tag. Thanks.

[tulsaboy]

I posted some pictures here a while ago in 2009 when I visited and the airplane's forward fuselage was on display downtown. There was a significant amount of damage and paint loss at that time, with parts of the break being down to bare aluminum. This is the link. I'm trying to figure out how to make the photos work again.

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=31788&hilit=flak+bait

kevin

[Steve Nelson]

This is what the top of the fuselage looked like in 2008. The paint is perfect, but I noticed at the time that it was noticeably lighter than the paint on the sides. I wonder if it was some water-based touch-up that has been removed since she was moved to Udvar-Hazy.





And here you can see what nearly four decades of being molested by the grubby hands of thoughtless tourists have done to the original paint..and as you can see, the abuse was still going on (I pixelated the faces as they may be minors.) The museum eventually put up some plexiglass barricades, but not until after significant damage was done..that bare spot is where countless tourists put their hands so they could lean over and look into the nose compartment. I was thrilled when I heard that they were finally moving her out of the downtown museum.





SN