Collings Foundation S-58

mrhenniger · **Posted:** Tue Apr 26, 2005 1:38 pm

Does the Collings Foundation have a Sikorsky S-58 in their collection? I took a quick look at their website and didn't see it listed, but I have another source that says they do.

Mike

Ryan Keough · **Posted:** Tue Apr 26, 2005 3:05 pm

The Collings Foundation does not have a S-58 in our collection. There was a privately owned H-34 that was displayed at many Houston area events with the CF West collection around the 2000-2002 time period, but that aircraft has since been transferred out of the Houston area to our knowledge.

Ryan Keough

krlang · **Posted:** Wed Apr 27, 2005 5:06 pm

If the wings travel faster than the fuselage it must be a helicopter, Therefore unsafe!

I love that quote!

RareBear · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 7:16 am

Helicopters don't really fly - they just beat the air into submission.

Walt

Haggerstone · **Joined:** Mon Nov 08, 2004 9:44 am **Posts:** 7

RareBear wrote:

Helicopters don't really fly - they just beat the air into submission.

Walt

Or they are so ugly the ground repels them

JBoyle · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 11:03 am

RareBear wrote:

Helicopters don't really fly - they just beat the air into submission.

Walt

You sound like a lot of jet jocks...before a helicopter saved their rear-ends!!!

Ollie · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 4:42 pm

Amen!

N3Njeff · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 5:47 pm

anyone know where this helicopter went to?????? There was a great article in Air & Space in 01, I saved the issue. I wanted to see this UH-34 when I went to houston for avionics training but could not find it. I wanted to meet the owner and shake his hand for a quote he made and a code that I honor!!

In the article it talks about them wearing uniforms and dressing the part for the aircraft and his reply was.

"one of the rules of the aircraft is when you fly you crew it, you wear the uniform. Not becauseI think its fun but because I want to honor the people who flew them. I will not fly this aircraft in shorts or jeans or tennis shoes"

airnutz · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 8:15 pm

I have been looking for those guys, too. As I understand, the Choctaw
was severly damaged in a taxiing-accident where the main rotor struck
a hanger.

You helicopter guys know what is supposed to follow in such incidents. The
rotorblade star, shafts and transmission have to be completely
disassembled, inspected, magnafluxed etc. Not to mention purchasing new
blades and bits...verrrry expensive. As I've been told, it's easier and
more economical to start off with another Choctaw.

The damaged '34 was sold or traded to a museum to become a static display. I hear the guys are still around, but I have not found them yet.
When I find out more I'll let you folks know.

By the way..it was a fantastic machine to see and hear fly. The old
direct-drive Wright radial clattered and howled as if it was about to
come apart any moment...as I've mentioned before here. But it was
a magnificent machine in appearance and shear "stage prescence"!!
I hope those guys are restoring another one.

N3Njeff · **Posted:** Thu Apr 28, 2005 9:00 pm

You are absolutly right. When I was living in fla, I worked at N. Perry Airport for a banner towing company. I was setting up a banner when I heard a round engine, I expected to find a stearman or t-6 but when I turned around and see this monstrosity making such a beautiful sound. It was such a sight. I dont know if it was that one, but air crane service out of miami had it, and one of them got hit when andrew came ashore. A airframe eventually became a sign for "Maydays". A restraunt/bar on the airport.

Jimbob · **Posted:** Fri Apr 29, 2005 2:22 pm

I’m the guy who restored the UH-34 Sikorsky. Three years ago I taxied the UH-34 Sikorsky a little close to a hanger in Mississippi while on the way to a USMC air show, and shed parts for about 500 meters. I've never been in a helicopter while it was coming apart and I can tell you it is a very strange feeling, sort of like experiencing an earthquake while concluding sex. At any rate, I donated the remaining parts to the guys restoring the HMM-361 UH-34 so that some good would come of the remnants. You can follow the progress of the HMM-361 restoration at http://www.34restoration.org/

Rick Harris of the Collings Foundation and I worked together to persuade Congress to pass a ride to the defense appropriations bill about 4 years ago granting the Collings Foundation ownership of a flying TA-4 Skyhawk. Before I was helicopter queer, I was an electronics technician in VMA-211, a USMC A-4 Skyhawk squadron in Chu Lai, RVN. I dreamed about someday flying the Skyhawk. That dream came true after I brokered a deal with Israel and a company called Advanced Training Systems Inc, (ATSI) a well thought out and operated A-4 training operation located in Phoenix. Jon McBride, an astronaut and former Navy jet jockey who went through Navy flight school in the mid 60s with my twin brother, now heads ATSI. For the story on ATSI and the A-4s they now operate, see the July 2004 cover story "Skyhawks Forever" in Air and Space magazine. For photos of the TA-4 Skyhawk we now have on the ramp at Ellington Airport in Houston see http://www.collingsfoundation.org/tx_ta-4skyhawk.htm

My first love of course is still helicopters. I explain to all those who fail to understand how much more skilled a really good helicopter pilot is over a good fixed wing pilot, that the difference between flying a helicopter and flying a fixed wing aircraft, is about the same as the difference between oral sex and talking about sex. Even before I restored the UH-34 Sikorsky, Charlie Maddocks, my former Crew Chief from VMO-2 (67-68) who was stationed with me at Marble Mountain, RVN, located one of our actual combat aircraft, a UH-1e BuNo 153,762. A former US Army guy named Ross Capawana had purchased it. Ross has made his fortune in Nevada and after years of our whining, asking and cajoling, he agreed to donate the aircraft to the Collings Foundation. Several years later, after tens of thousands of dollars of restoration, BuNo 153,762 is now on the ramp at Ellington, back in USMC VMO-6 colors, ready to fly in air shows around the country. It's a little spooky seeing the actual aircraft I flew as a door gunner and crew chief, ready for it's next mission. It has aged less over the years than most of us, but it, and we, are ready once again to serve our country.

The Collings Foundation is the premier aircraft restoration and operational organization in the country, and I have to tell you as an outsider, they have done more than we could ever give them credit for in bringing these aircrafts back to flight status. By way of example, I purchased an A-4 from a museum in Argentina and spent many hundreds of thousands of dollars before I discovered that it would be virtually cost prohibitive for anyone to restore that aircraft for flight. It now serves as an enormously effective burn barrel for hundred dollar bills. I loved doing the UH-34 project, but spent more than $250,000 in after tax dollars to restore it to flight. I watched as tens of thousands of Americans viewed the aircraft at air shows across this country, but no matter how emotionally satisfying it was for me to restore it, it wasn't the smartest financial investment. By way of example, the Collings foundation has the TA-4 Skyhawk, the F-4 Phantom and the UH-1e operational, for less out of pocket money than I spent on my Argentina project. For that success, and the thousands of hours of volunteer time their folks spent on these projects, they deserve a huge round of applause. They will always have my respect. Jim Moriarty jim@moriarty.com

mrhenniger · **Posted:** Fri Apr 29, 2005 2:30 pm

Welcome to WIX Jim! Thanks for the insight. I hope you post again with more great stuff.

Mike

Jack Cook · **Posted:** Fri Apr 29, 2005 5:10 pm

Jim,
enjoyed your post and sure wish I could have seen the old H-34. My cousin Tom did 2 tours in Viet Nam flying helos. The first flying H-34s with HMM-362 from 11-66/11-67 being shot down 4 times! His second tour was flying CH-46s with HMM-162 (he only got shot down once that tour).
He always called them Sea Bats or Sea Horses not Choctaws. I've got a shot of one his downed and recovered 34s somewhere. I'll track it down and post it.

Cking · **Posted:** Sat Apr 30, 2005 1:47 am

You fixed wing chaps don't understand about helicopters UNTILL you work on them!.
I worked on helicopters for three years. Eaven now TWENTY years later after working on just about all of Mr Boeing's wonderful creations, I still think of myself as a helicopter man!
Also choppers are big, ugly and noisy!!!!

Rgds Cking

airnutz · **Posted:** Sat Apr 30, 2005 1:47 am

Your right Jack, your cousin Tom would call them Seabats(Navy), or
Seahorse(Marines) because Choctaw is the USAF/Army name. I didn't
intend to pissoff the Gruntz with my error in terminology....just my
ignorant upbringing, I guess. I came by it honestly...and it WAS part of
my job description for a few years. Old habits die hard!

JIM !! Glad to see you here!!! What an excellent accomplishment you
achieved !! I was gutted several months back when I was told of the
sad demise of your UH-34. There for awhile I revelled in yer birds
prescence in the real world...almost matter-of-factly. I live on the west
shore of Galveston Bay and you folks would run up the shoreline..you
couldn't have been much higher than 500 feet. That clattering-growl!!!!
I hadn't heard that sound since being a kid at Hensley Field in the mid-
60's. In the meantime some locals in San Leon said you guys were
"doing some stuff" across Dickenson Bay inlet over on the "empty open
brushy". They were bikers, so I didn't get much aeronautical explanation
as to what ya'll were doing..but when I said it's BIG, GREEN, and "sounds
like this"....they described your bird!! I assume you were practicing or
testing??

Please, post some photos with us???!!! She Was A Beauty!!!

I've been digging in junk all day and I'm thrashed..but have a few
questions tomorrow. Thanks for your post!
Jim

ps
Jim, as luck would have it the Flying Tigers site you posted was the
last one I had to post E-mail to in looking for the whereabouts of your
'34..the hunters lament, some times you find the bear..sometimes the
bear finds you!!

This is one of the sites I started at..lotsa 'Nam UH-34 pics...many color
www.popasmoke.com/visions/index.php?pag ... ategory=99

also some restored photos of UH-34 YL-37 Group up in Oklahoma..I
inquired about you there..but never got a word back.
Cheers...Whooopeee!

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