Warbird Information Exchange

The more outré and grotesque an incident is the more carefully it deserves to be examined, and the very point which appears to complicate a case is, when duly considered and scientifically handled, the one which is most likely to elucidate it.
From "The Hound of the Baskervilles"

If a museum is buying an aircraft, you could certainly understand the curatorial staff wanting to know that the majority of the parts were original from that aircraft as far as possible. One could also understand a non-transport curator not understanding the concept of consumable parts and lifed items; but if you aren't buying it, and you've not established with the owner why you are asking first, then it's none of your business.

This makes a lot of sense in a parallel arena, as an explanation. However, it's hardly appropriate, or useful, in Eric's Skyrader case. Certainly data from an 'untouched' machine will provide chronological data for production, serial number hook-ups and so forth; but that level of research is again in need of an introduction - and to get excited about items in a warbird that's a good few years under its belt shows a detachment from reality...

I was going to say that clearly can't apply to, say, part serial numbers, specifically cited in this case. However, I have to say I recall at a model club I once belonged to there was a chap who produced a fifteen page document elucidating all the different tyre sizes (nothing else - just the size) of all W.W.II Luftwaffe aircraft. Despite the fact that the differences in many cases was a hundredths of a millimetre, when regarded in 1/72 or 1/48th, he regarded this as valuable work that he'd spent years undertaking.

He was that famous kind of modeller who is never seen with a completed model, but was always able to pontificate and criticise at length. Some get caught up in 'research' to well beyond the insanity event horizon - and accelerating, and are no more 'modellers' than they are rocket-scientists.


Maybe he should have been asked if he was in distress, as in the maritime signal of flying your flag upside down.

While I'm more than happy to subscribe to "it's your aeroplane you can paint it as you will", having a national insignia upside down is also disrespectful of that nation's heraldry. While most people don't know anything about flag etiquette, it's not hard to get it right. We are all clear that burning a flag is a deliberate insult - carelessness over any national identifier like that is also (much more mildly) rude. That marking doesn't belong to you, it belongs to the nation, and people. Which is the other reason many military schemes require official permission to appear on privately-owned aircraft.


Absolutely. The common social lubrication of good manners sometimes gets forgotten by an unwashed few, to the detriment of many.

Fascinating, I've certainly had my horizons expanded!

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James K

"Switch on the underwater landing lights"
Emilio Largo, Thunderball.

www.VintageAeroWriter.com

Forgotten Field wrote:




Can't we just go back to the good ole days when, if you had something nasty to say you just directed it at Bill Greenwood?

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Eric

"I spent most of my money on alcohol, women and skyraiders....and the rest of it I just wasted."

I still can't fathom that people would even consider something like an engine component "original" to a specific airframe.

This is essentially the same core argument that I have with people who consider all-up restorations in which lots of metal gets replaced a travesty and ruining the 'historical accuracy' (or some such) of the aircraft.

Major rebuilds of active military aircraft happen VERY regularly. Even better...anyone ever heard of a "Cann Bird"? Every military aircraft maintenance unit I've ever seen has a designated maintenance spare aircraft whose sole purpose is to provide parts on short-notice to the rest of the local fleet when the local supply system doesn't have that part on hand. That aircraft sits over in the corner stripped of parts until supply gets them on hand...then after the jet has done it's two weeks of duty as the cann bird, supply-system parts are put back on the jet and it flies again. Another jet from the line is selected to become the cann bird for the next couple weeks.

Are you kidding me? I fly a 2000-model-year F-15E that, at less than 7 years old, probably has had individual components like engines, gearboxes, wingtips, antennas, flaps, stabs, etc, removed, changed, replaced, cannibalized, or swapped with other jets probably 20 or more times in its short lifespan. It's the newest jet on the line, and there's no way an "aviation archaeologist" could possibly go out there TODAY and document what parts are original and what are not.

If you can't do this with a 7-year-old warbird, why the he11 does anyone think they might be able to do it with a 50-year-old one, much less one that has all ready been retired from military service??

The guy concerned with the correct fuel pump or carb serial number needs to have a reality check. Warbirds are not like classic cars -- you're never going to have an "all original" warplane. It can't happen, unless one rolled off the assembly line and was put into a time capsule. Any airplane that has seen any kind of use is going to be a mish-mash of parts and components.

Don't under estimate the value of the minutia.

Quite a few of the worlds Spitfire/Seafire fleet of approximately 220 airframes have only been positively identified but using a database and sequential trends built up of known construction numbers, component numbers of engines and propellers, log cards, movement cards, insurance documentation etc.

Only last month a Spitfire was at last identified after surfacing 22 years ago in Burma. Since departing UK shores with the returning Czech Squadrons in 1945, it was sold clandestinely to the Israelis, but transited in false Yugoslavian markings. When sold on by the Israelis it again travelled clandestinely across Arab airspace in Burmese markings.

Devoid of all data plates on the airframe, only some obscure digit stampings located on revealed structure when de-revitted, linked with log cards still in the IDFAF archive, finally clinched it.

One very happy warbird owner...now if this had been a Skyraider with a Toko-Ri provenance.

PeterA

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anorak_%28slang%29

Note the illustrative image...US military cold weather apparel.

With respect, Randy, perhaps because you aren't listening to the answer?

On July 20th you and I discussed the very same matter, in this thread.



So, moving on, things have value 1) because of what they cost, 2) because they're fun to use or 3) because they teach us about history. Generally you can pick two outa three.

To go further to specific parts - up to roughly, the 1950s, wartime military aircraft would, often only last a very limited period in use, it's only in the 'modern' or a peacetime era that military a/c last decades. There are W.W.II aircraft and wrecks in museums which have all the parts as fitted in the factory, nothing changed. In terms of the historical record, those items say a lot more, as Peter's illustrated above, than an aircraft which has a number of parts replaced in service, not bad, or post-service parts replaced, much less satisfactory. (A good example is Lady Be Good - a first mission loss - we can then say that anything still with that aircraft or recovered from a souvenir cache and reinstalled is exactly correct, and that kind of minutiae does tell us things we didn't know about B-24 history, supply, construction etc.)

There's nothing wrong with keeping an aircraft airworthy, post service, and an aircraft, such as your F-15 example equally has an important story to tell. But let's say you win a medal of honor, and your F-15 is 'preserved'. Great; the engine, airframe combination and parts are sent to the Smithsonian (nothing but the best for our Randy) but the USAF decide to swap out the engine, seats, avionics secret black boxes, nose-cone, instruments wing, and all tailplanes for various reasons. Technically, it's the same aircraft that you flew today; but we all know it's not - compared to if it was rolled back to the USA with nothing touched. Which version is more historically important?

Or let's say it's damaged in transit (Brad drops it out of the back of a C-17.) So Randy's museum decided to mock up the missing and damaged bits to make it look right, by cutting them out of wood and tinfoil, and making a bang seat out of an orange crate and bits, because the USAF says those bits can't be retained. Gets it on show, but it's significantly far from it's original, 'authentic' state.

Cheers!

_________________
James K

"Switch on the underwater landing lights"
Emilio Largo, Thunderball.

www.VintageAeroWriter.com

Point taken....for a very extreme case of how a very specific aircraft was configured on one specific day that an important event occurred. The airplane's preservation is about that specific event, and not the aircraft in general. That I understand.

If we're talking about the Spirit of St Louis, or Enola Gay, or some other singularly remarkable aircraft that became remarkable because of something that happened on one specific day or mission, I buy it.

But for any other operational military aircraft, the configuration, parts, paintjob, or the like could be different from day to day. Looking at a specific serial number on a specific component, with the thought that it might be "original", is simply ridiculous -- from a museum, collector, operator, or any other standpoint.

I'd love to be able to post here a photo I took yesterday of my wingman's jet...which is currently wearing a speedbrake, flap, and rudder which are painted the F-15C "light gray" color (as compared to the standard F-15E "dark gray" color). They're all replacement parts...F-15C replacement parts, to be exact (as noted by the paintjob)...but serving in combat on an F-15E. That's just what happened to pop out of the crate when the logistics guys dropped off the spare part. I'd love to see, in 50 years, a "serial-number chaser" telling a civilian owner of that jet that his oddly-painted parts are "not original"....or even better, that the dark gray painted parts ARE original!

I'd also post a shot of our cann bird, sitting there missing parts like the instrument panel, rudder, inlet ramp, etc, and let anyone anywhere guess where the "historically correct" parts from that airframe are located.

James, the basis of our difference is this: I don't think that anything magical happens the day the airplane stops serving in the military and becomes owned/operated/maintained by a civilian. I don't think there's anything uniquely special about military service which allows an airplane to be overhauled, rebuilt, maintained, and yet still be 'original'....yet if the same thing happens with a civilian owner, it is suddenly 'not original'. That basic fact does not compute for me.

Perhaps it's because I fly military airplanes on a daily basis that there is not a mystique there. I absolutely love and admire the machines I have the pleasure to fly and be around, but the reality is that they're just airplanes. It will still be the same airplane sitting in the Arizona desert in storage, or sitting on top of a pole, or lovingly cared for by a civilian owner (I can only hope that someday this latter scenario is the disposition for the currently-serving warbirds).

I consider myself an astute student of military aviation and history. I also consider myself very detail oriented when it comes to specific aircraft. Even at that, I still cannot understand how anyone can make any claim of a part being "original" or "authentic" given how the military aviation game is run (outside of the singular example you give).

All of the previous points aside, I just like to fly this stuff. As long as it's airworthy, safe,and correct, I care little about the part #s.

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Eric

"I spent most of my money on alcohol, women and skyraiders....and the rest of it I just wasted."

I did not mean questions like that. I am not sure why anyone would ask a question like that!

I ment questions like color of paint, the aircraft serial number, squadron markings. These would be the modeler questions.

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Shop the Airplane Bunker At
www.warbirdbunker.com

Eric,
Ahh, yes you are correct, but flying has its historical vicissitudes as well. You must fly the aircraft in a historical fashion, be wearing the correct underwear for the Skyraider pilot you portray, and feel totally unworthy while you are doing so`. Several times on the way to Oshkosh, I was horrified that I had a GPS in my hand and tried to throw it out the window because real L-5 pilots never had a GPS. My co-pilot, who restored the L-5, counseled me against that. Because I was weak, I am so unworthy...

There was this moment when we were flying down the coast from Benton Harbor Michigan, on the way to Gary and then up Chicago inbound to KOSH. Most beautiful flight I've been on yet. I gave one of the 14th Liaison Squadron pilot's his first ride in an L-5 since July 1945. He said three times, "This sure does bring back memories." I did give my talk in the EAA museum in my WWII flight suit. Does that excuse the use of the GPS?

By the way, I'm coming up on 187 hours total. 32 more hours, and I'll have more L-5 time than 150/172 time. I should get it this year. Who cares about part numbers?

_________________
REMEMBER THE SERGEANT PILOTS!

My mother said, always wear clean underwear and never argue with a guy with a gun. She din't mention missiles.


Absolutely. In fact, guarenteed to be different, day to day. Keeps a lot of people, me included, busy trying to track that changing situation.


Not ridiculous at all. It's just a sliding scale of originality. In the specific case of nationally accredited museum. Warbird operators aren't fulfilling that job.

A (national level, military) museum wants the aircraft as 'original' as possible - that is straight from service, with those mixed grey parts with front-line use, as you describe.

They'll settle for replacement (inert, perhaps) parts from the stores to take it back to military configuration; they aren't original to that type at the time, but they are the next best thing.

If the can't get those they'll fabricate replacement parts - properly, tagged to show that they are new, and not part of the original machine.

If they get the aircraft after it's been operated in civil hands, either for work or fun, they'll want to take out the mods to take it back to the military configuration - sometimes easy, sometimes difficult, but removing a part of that aircraft's history to get back to the history that's important to them.


Nothing 'magic' but certainly fundamental. It's no longer a military operated aircraft, it's doing a different job, under different rules and entering a new phase of it's history. (In the civil job, it's certainly rare the munitions are live, those gun bays become luggage racks or hold inert ammo; which I'd conclude you'd be disappointed to tote at the moment.) Eric's Skyrader is a civilian aircraft operated for pleasure and demonstration - your F-15 is a military tool, owned and operated by the US military for the US people - even on a 'who pays' basis, let alone purpose it's different. You, or the machine retires from the military, different rules, expectations and so forth.

If Pensacola get a Martin Mars from FT Inc, they would rip out the firefighting gear, maybe take the engines back to the earlier version, paint it dark blue - it would then represent it's Naval history, despite the fact that its civilian life outweighs that by a factor of decades. They are declaring its (minor) military career is more important than it's significant civil career. However, there's no argument that the reconstruction to military configuration would be 'inauthentic' for the FT era, while the FT scheme and fit isn't authentic for the Navy career. Both are real and 'original' but they are different things. Of course standard engine items fitted by FT engineers would be doing the same job as those fitted by the earlier Navy crew; and that's detail of interest only to an owning curator and the type's historian. But FT adding up-rated engines takes the aircraft from it's authentic Navy guise to something, yes, unoriginal to it's Navy career.

Originality isn't an absolute, but a matter of degree.


No 'mystique' for me either, despite some of the romantic notions that float around here, and I'd agree you are a great student of aviation history. I'm arguing a nitpicky curatorial point - most of the time for most of us, an utter irrelevance. But if you want to show someone the real thing in a museum, it's likely you'll want to be able to trust them about it's originality.

A curatorial approach is a different thing. If you want to know what's 'original' and 'authentic' and what's an 'accurate recreation' or another part supplied later by Orville on the 1903 Wright Flyer, you can - because it's a internationally important heritage aircraft for us all, and it's been properly documented. It's a long way from the December 17, 1903 aircraft, but we know what's what about it, as we should.

Finally, as soon as an ex-military aircraft flies in civilian hands there are compromises from originality; that just a fact, and it's not a bad thing. As Forgotten Field's pointed out, some of those are like GPS navigation, and so forth. Most of the time those differences don't matter, but if the real history is the whole complete story, then you have a reason to explore those deviations.

There's been a general trend towards greater authenticity in Warbirds, and that's generally a great thing. You can have your Sea Fury with a Texan flag to, and that's a cool one also. If someone wants to fly their aircraft and have fun, that's a great thing, and not to get wound up about originality. But just sometimes, and for special cases, knowing what's what's worth it.

I was disappointed when this thread vanished. Like, I hope others here, it's been an interesting experience now it's back!

Oh, Randy, I live in South Island New Zealand, 'X' marks the spot, don't blow up the sheep in error.

Regards,

_________________
James K

"Switch on the underwater landing lights"
Emilio Largo, Thunderball.

www.VintageAeroWriter.com

Anorak: British derivation - see Wikipedia.

If British 'trainspotters/train number collectors' clothing of choice had been the Nomex flight suit rather than the US surplus Anorak, you would be in real trouble.

PeterA

Cheers, great discussion.

That's what I love about this place.

So James, when Randy retires and someone wants to put him in a museum we HAVE to leave him in that stinky old flight suit ?



James, your point is exactly mine regarding the misinformation found in many museums. Too many times I have seen museum placards espousing incorrect info as gospel. I have even tried to tactfully point out to at least one curator about the specific history of an aircraft in their collection and not only was the information rebuffed, the photographic evidence showing the aircraft BuNo was ignored !

In the EAA museum under the L-5 where I gave the talk about the 14th Liaison Squadron, there was a plaque which read that an artillery Piper Cub flew a surgeon into Bastogne during the Battle of the Bulge. I informed museum staff that it was an L-1 from the 14th Liaison Squadron and was warned not to make mention of it during the talk.

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REMEMBER THE SERGEANT PILOTS!

Peter A Wrote:




Good point, except that a Toko-Ri Skyraider would still only be worth the equivalent of a Battle of Britain Spitfire's hub cap, unless of course, Provenance, actually sells it, and then it would be worth a gazillion $$$, just like a Mustang.

By the way, when this all started I didn't know what an "Anorak" was, I told the story to several of my warbird pilot friends, and they all said "Oh, that's just some F'ing Anorak", I always just said of course, and then I had to look it up on Wikepedia.

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Eric

"I spent most of my money on alcohol, women and skyraiders....and the rest of it I just wasted."