Warbird Information Exchange

The GM plant in Tarrytown now:

I'm a big fan of the TBF/TBM Avenger having been involved in the (first) restoration of RNZAF TBF-1 Avenger in 1979/80. Thanks mark for sharing those photos they are quite fascinating. We are having a chat here : http://rnzaf.proboards.com/thread/20568 ... ger-nz2527
about the latest restoration of NZ2527 and the mystery of her wings. Basically from what I gather the first 6 Avengers were described as TBF-1 but actually were "upgraded" to TBF-1C standard, which is why they have the nose gun and wing guns. The remaining 42 were built as TBF-1C and had wing guns but no nose gun.
Now onto the mystery. There are photos of NZ2527 not long before being retired in the late 1950s and you can see she has the wing gun positions.
However today she has wings that have never had wing guns installed! Which would make them TBF-1 wings. It's a mystery how she got them and perhaps we got spare wings when we got the Avengers (seems a little odd) or someone picked them up during the war from our US friends for some reason? By the way NZ2527 didn't get to where the shooting was, operating in Fiji and then postwar back here in NZ.

Entirely possible, it took a 'cuppa coffee' meeting between FHC (ex Champlin) and NASM to figure out, after 983 years that each had the others TA-152 wing panels since the aileron pushrods in the fuselages didn't line up with the ones in the wings of each airframe, so even when there are only two, and each is well known to everyone, it is possible to overlook the obvious.
After a panel swap, smiles all around

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Don't make me go get my flying monkeys-

Yes I recall reading about that, glad they could swap them back again!

I thought the wing swap was with the 190Ds; NMUSAF's which is really NASM-owned and Champlin when it was still with Champlin.

August

Within reason, Ta-152 = Fw190D+ . Evolutionary changes, and a re-designation to laud Kurt Tank the designer. The dispersed production scheme meant that the fuselages were all built as A models then modified.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.