Warbird Information Exchange

Stange B17 topic from Fly-Past

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=37055

It seems that there is some debate on the Fly-Past forum on whether this B-17 has two engines or three. The shadow looks like it has three engines to me.

Trying to take off in a B-17 on less than four engines was attempted elsewhere. In "Sceaming Eagle" - Maj. Gen Dale O. Smith's memoirs of when he was the C.O. of the 384th Bomb Group, he describes how they flew his command ship "Screaming Eagle" back from a base in Belgium on three engines after it had been forced down due to battle damage. The plane upon take off immediately headed into the direction of the dead engine. Right when it seemed a collision was imminent, the plane broke ground and took off.

It looks to me like it has only two engines, just a guess from looking at the shadow.
If the airplane was facing north and the sun was at about 3pm or so, the shadow between the right engine and the fuselage would be spaced farther apart.

But Why? Is this to ferry it home from somewhere?

I love the pics of the "Liberty Belle" back in its testbed days with P&W
The turboprop running and the other 4 engines shut off.

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"Hindsight is usually 20% off!"

Here's the response I gave on Flypast...

I'm going to concur that in my opinion this B-17 has only got 2 engines. My bet is a hanger queen that was converted into a squadron hack. The only reason you would remove the outboard nacelle and fair it over was if you were going to fly. Removing all the turrets add to this theory, with the idea that they probably stripped every last ounce of weight off the old girl.

So, you remove the outboard two engines, but fair the leading edge to reduce drag. You then remove every gun and turret and armor plate, which no doubt saves many thousands of pounds, not to mention that you're not going to add bombs and bullets. Also, the B-17 probably has a rather large fuel factor, so you could probably cut that way back, as we don't really care about range. I've just looked up that a B-17 could carry approx. 2700 gallons of Avgas. That's over 16,000 lbs. of fuel. Add 5000 lbs of bombs and the B-17 would fly at a gross weight of close to 52,000 lbs.

Let's start with an empty B-17, at about 33,000 lbs. We loose the two engines, props and hardware, armor plate, chin turret, top turret, and ball turrets, approx. 13 50 cal. machine guns and other loose fixtures and you probably save at least 11,000 lbs.

So, our two engined B-17 now weights 22,000 lbs. Let's add 300 gallons a side and put some oil in the engines (always a good idea) to take us to just under 26,000 lbs. That's less than the gross weight of a B-25.

Half the weight, with half the horsepower. Yea, make sure the CG is within limits and I'll bet she'll fly.

Half the weight should actually fly rather well on half the horsepower. Lots of extra vertical stab as well with the two outboard engines missing. Might want to remove the wing tips for less wing area/less drag. Stall speed should be lower as well, but not as fast at the top end. That's my guess!

Maybe with a couple of 3350's and about 20' off of each wing she'd do well at Reno!

if you check the shadows, there's part of the engine shadow on the fuselage. now because of the height of the fuselage I dare say that most likely if there's 2 engines on the other wing only a very small part of it would have been casting a shadow if any. I say at least 3 engines or possibly a retouched photo like the ones of the single engined B17 that were on here ages ago.

Also as the other Dan Johnson pointed out over at FP, there appears to be two sets of prop blades on the right side.

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Dan Johnson

Judging by the apparent angle of the shadow, it only looks like two engines to me. What appears to be a third engine's shadow combined with the fuselage shadow is really a shadow of the area of the fuselage where the "roof" of pilots cockpit stands higher that than the fuselage in front of the pilot's window. Also, at this angle, I think we would be able to see part of the nacelle or prop of a third (presumably outboard) engine, even if we can't see the wing.

A two engine plane also just makes more sense than a three engine plane (give or take a Stinson or Trimotor, of course ).

Mark

What BG is that?? Triangle K - probably a vet from that BG would have an answer for you - maybe start with Scott Burris' site to track the BG association down.

Might even get a neat story or two!

Tom P.
www.wendoverairbase.com

Perhaps that nacelle was faired over to do a three engine ferry flight to a depot for repair? If it had an off-airfield landing, this could explain it. This was done on a Lockheed Connie, and there are some rather well-known photos of it, where they did a similar repair for a ferry flight, as the nacelle was damaged. Removing the turrets would give you a few extra knots and less weight (and the lower ones may have been destroyed if it had landed gear up in a field...), but it sure seems to be a lot to go through for a ferry flight. Three engine ferry flights with B-17s are not all that uncommon. The Collings' 9-0-9 lost an engine at Windsor, Ontario a few years back, and we watched them depart on three engines. The fourth was feathered, and after removing one of the spark plugs, rope was pushed into the cylender to freeze that pistion in place to prevent the engine pulling through in flight. Jim

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Mustangs Rule!

I throw my hat in with the three engine school of thought. If you look at the amount of gap between the visible engine's shadow and the fuselage, it isn't very much, that would mean that if the other wing's engine(s) were there, the inboard engine would be basically merged with the fuselage (due the the height difference between the fuselage and the engine), and the outboard engine should show a gap between engines. So, I think it shows a 3-engined aircraft. I think that's what you would find if you played around with lighting on a model as well.

Ryan

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Aerial Photographer with Red Wing Aerial Photography currently based at KRBD and tailwheel CFI.
Websites: Texas Tailwheel Flight Training, DoolittleRaid.com and Lbirds.com.

The horse is prepared against the day of battle: but safety is of the LORD. - Prov. 21:31 - Train, Practice, Trust.

It looks to me like they removed the whole engine and nacelle for repair. I presume the nacelle was damaged by something, and the are replacing the whole thing. Hence the unpainted area where it was. I don't think it was faired over.



Chris

I hate to be contrary, but, if you look at the port engine's shadow, you'll see it has none. Which leads to the assumption that the sun is not directly over the aircraft, but off the port wing. That would acount for the starboard engine casting a shadow further away from the fusilage AND allow for the cockpit hump to cast a shadow on the starboard side. Also from that angle you should be able to see #4 beyond #3. BUT I COULD BE WRONG!

I think I agree with Don...If the Fuse is the "12 o'clock Datum line", then
I put the sun over the Port-side wing, at about 2 o'clock. This makes
the shadows work out for me....

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He bowls overhand...He is the most interesting man in the world.
"In Peace Japan Breeds War", Eckstein, Harper and Bros., 3rd ed. 1943(1927, 1928,1942)
"Leave it to ol' Slim. I got ideas...and they're all vile, baby." South Dakota Slim
"Ahh..."The Deuce", 28,000 pounds of motherly love." quote from some Mojave Grunt
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...and I don't see a prop or a shadow of a prop for the starboard engine.

_________________
He bowls overhand...He is the most interesting man in the world.
"In Peace Japan Breeds War", Eckstein, Harper and Bros., 3rd ed. 1943(1927, 1928,1942)
"Leave it to ol' Slim. I got ideas...and they're all vile, baby." South Dakota Slim
"Ahh..."The Deuce", 28,000 pounds of motherly love." quote from some Mojave Grunt
DBF