TEXAS RAIDERS- First Flight in Seven Years- Oct. 14, 2009

[SPANNERmkV]

Al and other regular readers,
Sorry I have been so hit and miss with my postings.
Sometimes I have been overwhelmed with day to day running the Wing and sometimes I held back until I had pictures.

If all goes well we hope to start #3 Engine tomorrow Sat. 2/14/2009.
The weather is not predicted to be the best, but we will do what we can.
Additionally we hope to hang the "real" rudder tomorrow and take care of some other projects in our copious spare time!

David Carr- MO extraordinaire is cracking the whip to keep us on schedule to fire up #1 NEXT WEEKEND.
Ambitious, but achievable...

It is always a good thing to implore the aid and protection of the Deity when embarking on any grand undertaking.

Send your thoughts and prayers our way.

SPANNER

[ww2John]

Spanner,
NO apologies required.
Thanks for all you do to "Keep 'em Flying".

[Alan Brooks]

AWWWWWW, just keep on cracking the whip.... It only hurts for a little while..... "No Pain, No Gain!"......... Just make sure that all of the little thing-a-ma-jiggs connect to all of the little thing-a-ma-jiggies........ Great job guys and girls....... With that new waist gunner working all of the time, along with the Fortress Fixer Girl, .... no wonder you guys are having such a great turnout for workdays! I absolutely cannot wait for you guys to get your work completed and get some air under your wings....... Superb job to all! Alan Brooks

[bomberflight]

I agree with Alans sentiments exactly

[DCarr]

We have ignition on #3!

More details and video to follow shortly...
-DC

[daveymac82c]

Congrats DCarr!!!!

That's great news! I can't wait to see the video.

Cheers,

David

[N3Njeff]

CRAP did I miss the boat. Seen the part about the washer on the throttle linkage but TOTALLY missed that #4 has RAN!!!!! OUTSTANDING!!!!!!!! Don, where do I send my $$$$!!!!!

[N3Njeff]

Don, do you guys have hats and T-shirts yet??????

[N3Njeff]

CAF- Gulf Coast Wing
18042 CR 127
Pearland, TX 77581
Attn: Mark Allen

That still current????

[DCarr]

That address is good.

Every bit helps!
-David Carr

[SPANNERmkV]

Al, and the rest of the WIX Universe...
The WING is having a Design a new TEXAS RAIDERS T-shirt contest.
I hadn't really thought about it but there is no real reason it can't be expanded beyond the CAF Wing members.
When I get more details I will post them.
The one thing that we would like to have incorporated is the NEW CAF wings somewhere on the shirt.
Our new PX Officer- Vicki Thomas has sourced getting T-shirts printed and is also working on hats.

I am just firing up the MAC for doing the video upload work for TA DA... firing up Engine #3.
It belched oil and smoke, spun for a good long while and then RAN!
Twice!
The second time was curtailed when our external oil cooler filter started blorking Texas Tea (Oil that is) out of the seams. We think it popped an O-ring on the high RPM run, with the extra oil presuure.
No undue amount of metal was noted in the screens. A lot of carbon credits were used up as you will soon see on the video.

Then the rains came!!!

Additionally, we hung the rudder. In fact we hung it twice.
And at the rate we are going it appears as if it is SO MUCH FUN, we are going to take it back down and hang it a third time.
Our motto (among many)... Don't Stop 'til you get it right!

My Brother from Virginia (actually the one born in Grand Island, NE as previously noted) loves the way us Texans take our women to war.
So Waist Gunner and Fortress Fixer are carrying on a fine tradition.
I even got Yoga MaMa to come pull herself up through the front hatch not too long ago.

This morning's project was to paint the two long horizontal throttle and mixture control rods for Engine #1.
"Video at 6" as they say in the bidness!

SPANNER

[retroaviation]

Don, get in touch with WIXer, Django, on the shirt idea. He's been known to produce a decent lookin' logo or two.

Gary

[SPANNERmkV]

B17 and Curtis-Wright fans...
I hope this works as a hotlink

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2aMdNhwV0pE

We had pre-oiled the engine so it smoked more than a Cheech and Chong movie on initial start-up.
It settled down and "Them that knows" say it is within the bounds of normal round engine with 800 hours output.

I may put the second start with the high RPM run if I get requests and time.

SPANNER

[N3Njeff]

Al, and the rest of the WIX Universe...
The WING is having a Design a new TEXAS RAIDERS T-shirt contest.
I hadn't really thought about it but there is no real reason it can't be expanded beyond the CAF Wing members.
When I get more details I will post them.
The one thing that we would like to have incorporated is the NEW CAF wings somewhere on the shirt.
Our new PX Officer- Vicki Thomas has sourced getting T-shirts printed and is also working on hats.

I am just firing up the MAC for doing the video upload work for TA DA... firing up Engine #3.
It belched oil and smoke, spun for a good long while and then RAN!
Twice!
The second time was curtailed when our external oil cooler filter started blorking Texas Tea (Oil that is) out of the seams. We think it popped an O-ring on the high RPM run, with the extra oil presuure.
No undue amount of metal was noted in the screens. A lot of carbon credits were used up as you will soon see on the video.

Then the rains came!!!

Additionally, we hung the rudder. In fact we hung it twice.
And at the rate we are going it appears as if it is SO MUCH FUN, we are going to take it back down and hang it a third time.
Our motto (among many)... Don't Stop 'til you get it right!

My Brother from Virginia (actually the one born in Grand Island, NE as previously noted) loves the way us Texans take our women to war.
So Waist Gunner and Fortress Fixer are carrying on a fine tradition.
I even got Yoga MaMa to come pull herself up through the front hatch not too long ago.

This morning's project was to paint the two long horizontal throttle and mixture control rods for Engine #1.
"Video at 6" as they say in the bidness!

SPANNER

Got any old t-shirts left over from the old days?????

[bluethunder28]

Sound great and looks good!

PS. With the tees, don't forget there are big boys that would like shirts too!