WWII airfield buildings drawings???

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Sun May 09, 2021 11:55 pm

So I'm working on a project and need some dimensions and drawings for WWII airfield buildings - hangars, control towers, housing, you name it. Any good sources? Best if drawings and dimensions for scale are included!

shrike · **Posted:** Mon May 10, 2021 7:36 am

RyanShort1 wrote:

So I'm working on a project and need some dimensions and drawings for WWII airfield buildings - hangars, control towers, housing, you name it. Any good sources? Best if drawings and dimensions for scale are included!

FM 5-280 has most of that with complete dimensions and methods

Noha307 · **Posted:** Mon May 10, 2021 3:53 pm

Might also be worth contacting the Military Aviation Museum since they moved one from England. The Mid-Atlantic Air Museum also has some floor plan renderings for a control tower they are building. Lastly, you might try sending wendovertom a PM since Wendover has a bunch of untouched buildings. He might be willing to provide some pictures.

shrike wrote:

FM 5-280 has most of that with complete dimensions and methods

What's the date and title on that field manual? It might be easier to find - possibly online - with that information.

bdk · **Joined:** Sun May 02, 2004 1:16 am **Posts:** 11330

TM 5-280 Construction in the Theater of Operations (December 1944)

This is more current:

BASE CAMP DEVELOPMENT IN THE THEATER OF OPERATIONS https://www.publications.usace.army.mil ... 05-3-1.pdf

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Mon May 10, 2021 4:34 pm

Noha307 wrote:

Might also be worth contacting the Military Aviation Museum since they moved one from England. The Mid-Atlantic Air Museum also has some floor plan renderings for a control tower they are building. Lastly, you might try sending wendovertom a PM since Wendover has a bunch of untouched buildings. He might be willing to provide some pictures.

shrike wrote:

FM 5-280 has most of that with complete dimensions and methods

What's the date and title on that field manual? It might be easier to find - possibly online - with that information.

Yeah, I'm familiar with this one:

http://maam.org/images/tower_plans.png

Noha307 · **Posted:** Mon May 10, 2021 4:50 pm

bdk wrote:

TM 5-280 Construction in the Theater of Operations (December 1944)

No luck finding that one so far, but I did come across two other documents that might be useful. Both have at least some blueprints:

Engineers of the Southwest Pacific, 1941-1945 (see Volume 4)
World War II Temporary Military Buildings: A Brief History of the Architecture and Planning of Cantonments and Training Stations in the United States

Cvairwerks · **Posted:** Mon May 10, 2021 11:32 pm

BTW, there are two wildly differing manuals with that number... One is the construction, the other is about mine warfare equipment.

Found a couple of copies of the construction one for sale, but people want crazy money for them. There is one site that has copies of individual pages and topic sets for sale at decent prices.

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 8:39 am

Cvairwerks wrote:

BTW, there are two wildly differing manuals with that number... One is the construction, the other is about mine warfare equipment.

Found a couple of copies of the construction one for sale, but people want crazy money for them. There is one site that has copies of individual pages and topic sets for sale at decent prices.

Yeah, looks like the spread is $200-400!!! :shock:

What site?

Forgotten Field · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 10:16 am

Ryan,
The field manual for Theater of Operations (TO) Construction is Field Manual FM 5-280. There will be information in that manual with images. But there was a set of building drawings and bills of material which were complimentary to that manual and were (I believe) published as an Engineer Technical Bulletin (TB). If you are trying to build buildings, those drawings still exist. But they are woefully out of modern code compliance. They can be used for construction, but would need an engineering review and upgrade to meet code. Also, most of those buildings were designed with sawn nominal lumber, so you would need to convert a good bit of that from planking to plywood or the building would cost you incredible amounts of money to construct.

Hope this helps.

Best Regards,
Engineering Section, Forgotten Field

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 11:17 am

Forgotten Field wrote:

Ryan,
The field manual for Theater of Operations (TO) Construction is Field Manual FM 5-280. There will be information in that manual with images. But there was a set of building drawings and bills of material which were complimentary to that manual and were (I believe) published as an Engineer Technical Bulletin (TB). If you are trying to build buildings, those drawings still exist. But they are woefully out of modern code compliance. They can be used for construction, but would need an engineering review and upgrade to meet code. Also, most of those buildings were designed with sawn nominal lumber, so you would need to convert a good bit of that from planking to plywood or the building would cost you incredible amounts of money to construct.

Hope this helps.

Best Regards,
Engineering Section, Forgotten Field

Ha! It would be fun to build one on the ranch, but I'm actually looking to use the dimensions for some accurate scale models.

Cvairwerks · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 11:30 am

Here you go Ryan:

http://www.military-info.com/Aphoto/TM%205-280.htm

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 11:41 am

Cvairwerks wrote:

Here you go Ryan:

http://www.military-info.com/Aphoto/TM%205-280.htm

Seems a reasonable source, thanks!

wendovertom · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 3:27 pm

FWIW - the Wendover Airfield Museum is in possession of a large number of original construction drawings for a number of airfield buildings (want to build a morgue?). They are big, but I could have our curator see what he could do as far getting some good photos of them for you.

Tom P.

RyanShort1 · **Posted:** Tue May 11, 2021 9:22 pm

wendovertom wrote:

FWIW - the Wendover Airfield Museum is in possession of a large number of original construction drawings for a number of airfield buildings (want to build a morgue?). They are big, but I could have our curator see what he could do as far getting some good photos of them for you.

Tom P.

I would be very interested.

p51 · **Posted:** Fri May 14, 2021 11:21 am

RyanShort1 wrote:

Cvairwerks wrote:

BTW, there are two wildly differing manuals with that number... One is the construction, the other is about mine warfare equipment.
Found a couple of copies of the construction one for sale, but people want crazy money for them. There is one site that has copies of individual pages and topic sets for sale at decent prices.

Yeah, looks like the spread is $200-400!!! :shock:

TM collecting is a hobby unto itself. I know several people who collect all the TMs for specific subjects and I'm not at all shocked at how much these are going for (one guy sends me weekly emails asking when (not if) I'll sell him a rare (non-aviation-related) one I have, which I no longer even reply to as I've told him in the past I'm never selling it.
Like many of you, I'd love to have a copy of FM 5-280, but I've never seen one for a price I'd be willing to pay.

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WWII airfield buildings drawings???

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