C-119 Bockscar tour!

[steve dickey]

This big bird belongs to my neighbor who lives up the road from me in Pima Az, I have been wanting to go visit and finally got around to it today. The Bockscar was trucked in from Davis Monthan and put in place in 1990. Anybody familiar with FANG Airlines? Would that be Florida Air Guard?? FANG was seen above the entrance door as the picture shows and on the tail and above the air guard symbol, see close up.


















I found these canvas bags interesting!







FANG Airlines, intriguing!

Date on aileron.

[Chris Brame]

Roomy shed, wannabe pilots' toy and yard art rolled into one - bet a lot of WIXers would like to have such a setup! Too bad about the landing gear; hopefully replacements can be found.

A question: Per Baugher, the serial 53-8074 shows this to be the sixth of a small batch of 87 C-119Gs built by Kaiser-Frazer rather than Fairchild. The Wikipedia listing shows only 71 built by K-F starting with 51-8098. Anyone know which is correct?

[GARY HILTON]

Holy Cow! I thought somebody was going to do the airshow tour with the C-119! Be cool to team her up with "AW"....just another wicked thought....

[JohnB]

At the mention of "Bockscar" I was thinking B-29....oh well.

Still the 119 is neat, I'd love to have it in my back pasture. Great place to store the tractor.

[Richard W.]

We could cut it in half, make a monoplane, lay on the wing and fly out of there!

[peter]

Looks in pretty rough shape.. shame about the false gear..

[Zachary]

Would have killed to have something like this in my parents' backyard when I was a kid. The ultimate clubhouse!

[JohnB]

We could cut it in half, make a monoplane, lay on the wing and fly out of there!

What are you, some sort of toy plane designer?

[Richard W.]

We could cut it in half, make a monoplane, lay on the wing and fly out of there!

What are you, some sort of toy plane designer?

Lol.

[Chris Brame]

"A toy plane is something you wind up... and it rolls along the floor."

Seriously, a replica of the Phoenix made from C-119 bits might make a cool display - I took a stab at it in miniature long ago but I need to redo the gear legs; didn't have the video to refer to back in 1977.

[p51]

Makes you wonder how well anchored this is, as the winds can get up there in that part of the country. Where I live we can get some powerful windstorms every few years (we got several over the winter of 2006-7), I'd be scared to have something like this on the back 40 of my property for constant fear that it'd flip over in the Fall or Winter.

Would have killed to have something like this in my parents' backyard when I was a kid. The ultimate clubhouse!

Darned right. I'd have never left home if my parents had something like that in their back yard!

[Ken]

Although I never checked the specs, I was told the C-130 cargo compartment was designed to match the dimensions of a railroad boxcar, as in the early 50's, the Army thought of all of their cargo movements in those increments. I wonder if the C-119 Flying Boxcar is the same? Btw, the Herk has very similar litter strap stowage bags in the ceiling for when we needed to rig for patients.

Ken

[Matt Gunsch]

the C-119 cargo deck is about the same height as a duece and a half bed, and there is a lot of room back there.

[Richard W.]

"A toy plane is something you wind up... and it rolls along the floor."

Seriously, a replica of the Phoenix made from C-119 bits might make a cool display - I took a stab at it in miniature long ago but I need to redo the gear legs; didn't have the video to refer to back in 1977.

Your Phoenix model rocks. Very nice.

[steve dickey]

Makes you wonder how well anchored this is, as the winds can get up there in that part of the country. Where I live we can get some powerful windstorms every few years (we got several over the winter of 2006-7), I'd be scared to have something like this on the back 40 of my property for constant fear that it'd flip over in the Fall or Winter.

Would have killed to have something like this in my parents' backyard when I was a kid. The ultimate clubhouse!

Darned right. I'd have never left home if my parents had something like that in their back yard!

Funny I asked about the wind too, but if you look closely there are cables coming off the tail booms into the ground. The "landing gear" did not come with the airplane, it was sitting on its belly when he got it.
The base of the "landing gear" are anchored in 4ft thick concrete and in the 20 plus years its been sitting it hasn't moved an inch . As far as the shape its in, yeah its rough but I didn't see any corrosion at all unless you count rusty parts .
Any 119 experts out there can tell me about the split ailerons? Pix 2 & 4 I'm interested in how that set up works. Thanks.