B-29 Caricature Drawing From Back In The Day: Watcha Think?

 The post from a few days ago about the B-29 FIFI's first flight in 4 years, which is scheduled for tomorrow, got me remembering this drawing that I did back in 1988. Back about that time, I started a little t-shirt company making caricatures of iconic aircraft like the Piper Cub, the DC-3, and the P-51. I didn't have hardly any money at the time (Ha! Very little seems to change in my life!) so I only ran ads in Trade-A-Plane for the shirts since it was a cheap place to get some good exposure. Well, I had some success, but nothing like I had hoped for. But I did have a guy request that I do a B-29.

 Now back in those days, we actually took a pencil and drug it across a piece of paper to generate a graphic. It was a bit of a bizarre concept, but if you stuck with it long enuf, you'd actually emerge with something to look at... never mind the sore hand and tired eyes. For whatever reason, this B-29 never made it onto a shirt. I don't think it was exactly what the guy was looking for, and I'll admit that while it's technically pretty accurate, it lacks that special little magic that my other caricatures seemed to possess. It is however a pretty cool treat for me to see it again after all these years.

 I'm kinda wondering if you people out there on the other end of the internet like it. If I get some fashion of positive response, I might see if I can figure out a way to show you the other, better airplanes that I drew. I can't seem to find the original drawings at the moment, but if I dig deep enough in the dungeon I bet I can. So, watcha think?

CAF B-29 'FIFI' Scheduled To Fly Again June 29, 2010

Installing 1 of 4 modified Wright R-3350's on the B-29 FIFI    photos: cafB29B24.org

 After 4 years on the ground plus a lot of hard work and financial support, the world's only flyable Boeing B-29 Superfortress, owned and operated by the Commemorative Air Force, is scheduled for a test flight on Tuesday, June 29, 2010. FIFI will be back in the air once again! The flight is expected to take place at 8:00 am at the CAF Airpower Museum in Midland, Texas. Visitors are welcome to come watch, and the museum will be opening at 7am to give interested spectators a front row seat to see pre-flight prep and the flight itself. Admission to the museum is $10 for adults, $9 for ages 13-17 and over 65, and $7 for age 5-12.

 FIFI first began showing up at airshows in 1975 after an extensive search and restoration project by what was known then as the Confederate Air Force. I clearly remember it was a really big deal when she first arrived at Oshkosh, and I have years of memories of this grand aircraft from WWII participating in the Warbird airshows there. My recent ride in the B-17 'Yankee Lady' has really made the historical importance of these aircraft, and the people who did battle in WWII, become so much more real to me.

 The work required to put FIFI back in the air centered around the need to update the huge Wright R-3350 engines. The version originally used in the airplane has always been problematic, and when metal shavings were found in the oil, it was clear that major changes would have to be made. The re-engine project built up a variation of the engine from two different versions and required modifications to the engine mounts and cowlings. Hopefully these modifications will not only get FIFI back in the air, but will make it easier to keep her there for many years to come.

 Much of the re-engine project funding was jump-started by support from Jim Cavanaugh of the Cavanaugh Flight Museum (CFM). Both the B-29 and the Consolidated B-24 Liberator operated by the CAF will be based out of the CFM in Addison, Texas for 6 months of the year, and then be on tour with CAF crews around the country the other 6 months.

 Lastly, I haven't seen any confirmed reports yet, but hopefully FIFI will be included in the large collection of aircraft scheduled to be at Oshkosh from the CAF. The EAA's "Salute to Veterans" along with 75th anniversary of both the DC-3 (C-47) and the B-17 are drawing a lot of significant historical aircraft to the best place on earth: Oshkosh : )

CoolPix - Modern Military: Incredible View Of The V-22 Osprey

(click pic for hi-res)

 The Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey has had a long and difficult journey to get where it is today. But as this hi-res CoolPix shows, an aircraft as unique as this, with the capabilities that it has, is really a pretty stunning sight in the air, especially from this view!

 For now, this pic should stir your thoughts and emotions on the Osprey... and you can expect more detailed info to come before long as it would seem this incredibly unique flying machine will need a week of AirPigz posts dedicated to it before long. Until then, roll those rotors forward and push this tiltrotor up to about 280 mph. YeeHaw!

Why Hasn’t Somebody Built A 3/4 Scale OV-10? Hmmm?

 Unless you’re some kind of weirdo, you probably like the 1960’s era North American OV-10 Bronco almost as much as I do. It’s kinda insect-like while being a bit of a brute, and when you consider that awesome visibility from the front seat, it would have to be ear-to-ear grin inducing. So, I’m wondering; why hasn’t someone snagged a couple really tired, and cheap, Garrett TPE331 turboprops off an old Turbo Commander or Mitsubishi MU-2 and built a really sweet 3/4 scale, 2-place OV-10?

 Seems like a guy could build a stunning replica for a couple or maybe three hundred thousand bucks. OK, true, he wouldn’t be a guy with a regular bank account, but there’s a lot of people out there with more money than that wrapped up in homebuilt Lancair IV. And if you’re interested in stirring up a little attention when you arrive at an airport, I’m thinking a 3/4 scale 2 seat turbine powered OV-10 is gonna be pretty hard to beat!

 I can also see it being almost practical. You can figure about 1,000 high-time horsepower pulling around a nice sized airframe with a pretty roomy cockpit. Let’s say it has a fabulous rate of climb and a 250mph max cruise speed. You could easily keep the power back then and run with a 200mph economy cruise. And then you’ve got that awesome hinged cap at the back end of the fuselage that opens up so you can put all your camping gear, an extra 55 gallons of Jet A, and food for a week inside when you’re heading out to central Alaska... and then, the camping gear and a dead moose for the trip back. I figure about 1,500 pounds of cargo nicely positioned right where you want it, on the CG. Nice. Better not get too big a moose though. Lastly, enough fuel in the wing to run for a good solid 6 hours.

 So, there you have it. I’ve done my part by giving you the idea, cuz that’s all I can afford on this project. Now, someone NEEDS to build this dreamy 3/4 scale OV-10!

 Can I have a ride? Puleeeze! Must. Have. Ride.

 : )

CoolPix - Vintage Military: B-36 Tank Track Landing Gear... Really?

(click pic for hi-res)

Probably the most unusual looking CoolPix so far.

 Looking a lot like something out of a really bad 1950’s sci-fi movie, this tank style ‘track’ landing gear was actually tried on the massive Convair B-36 Peacemaker around 1950. Originally the B-36 was configured with a huge, single main wheel and tire on each main gear leg as the pic below shows. These were the largest tires ever built at the time with a diameter of 9 ft 2 in! The single tire idea was soon changed to a 4-wheel bogie configuration because the single tire concentrated the over 400,000 pound gross weight into too small of an area. Very few runways could support the weight.  It also increased the risk of loss of control of the aircraft in the event of a tire failure.

 This tank track idea is both interesting and bizarre. It certainly makes sense to try to increase the contact patch of the gear, but seeing it installed here feels a bit disturbing. Wikipedia says the system was heavy and made a lot of noise, but I’m intrigued enuf to continue to look for more info on how it performed. The pic above seems to show the tracks sunk down into the ground quite a bit, but there’s no way to know how soft that terrain was. I did see a page from a 1950 magazine article for sale on eBay that shows the airplane in flight with these wild things hanging off the gear legs.

 A couple interesting items about those huge single tires originally used on the B-36. I remember going to the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio when I was 8 years old (1969) and seeing one of the gear legs with the massive tire attached. I haven’t been to the museum for several years (gonna fix that before long), but I’m guessing it’s still on display. It’s pretty amazing to see for sure. And, just 35 miles east of me in Fort Wayne, Indiana, an automotive maintenance business called Fox & Fox has one of the wheel and tire assemblies on display in front of the store… how weird is that?! (click Fox & Fox to see their store front)

 The original B-36 single-tire main landing gear: that's some big tires!

2010 Indy Air Show Pic Stream #4 - Super Sunday Airshow!

 The media and practice day at the Indy Air Show on Friday June 11th went great, but heavy rains that fell in a short amount of time very early Saturday morning caused the car-parking fields to flood.  The inability to safely park cars along with some additional weather issues caused the Saturday airshow to be cancelled.

 The hard working volunteer crews at IAS developed a plan to use the second runway and taxiway for car parking on Sunday.  This involved building a road along with loads of other logistical changes that all took place thru the day on Saturday.  By Sunday morning the weather had improved and the Mt. Comfort Airport was ready for an airshow!

 I've picked some of the better pix that I took of Sunday's airshow, and while they are shown in order, they don't represent anywhere near all of the acts that performed.  I wasn't able to catch everything, and my telephoto lens isn't strong enough to do well with the smaller akro airplanes.  You shouldn't have any trouble telling tho that the Indy Air Show is a big-time event.    

 Fortunately it hadn't rained any on Sunday morning, but the day started with the clouds just barely high enuf to get the airshow started.  As a result, the opening flag jump was not able to use the mega flag as planned, and instead this 'little' one had to be used... that is if you consider a flag several times bigger than a parachute to be 'little'!  After the struggles of Saturday, this airshow-opening flag jump was a really beautiful sight no matter what the flag size : )

  Here's Kent Pietsch in his little Interstate Cadet doing his comedy routine.  Like we talked about in my podcast with Kent a few weeks back, he drops the right aileron off the airplane early in the flight and then flies aerobatics with just the left aileron.  It's all very well done, and very entertaining.  It works especially well since the announcer stand has Kent patched thru and a funny convo takes place as he goes wacko in the sky.

 A big black Waco with smoke pouring out the exhaust would have to be Kyle Franklin!  Between the smoke, the huge radial engine sound, and the way Kyle pushes the airplane around the sky, it's modern akro with a heavy dose of early barnstorming.  The airplane looks really cool here with the sun reflecting off the lower surfaces.

 I guess Matt Younkin wanted to be sure he could make more smoke than his brother-in-law Kyle Franklin by having two big round engines!  The Twin Beech airshow is always a crowd favorite.

 Wow, that's a lot of smoke!  I did a podcast interview with both Kyle Franklin and Matt Younkin several months back and got some great insight into what it's like for them flying these big ole airplanes.  These guys are doing some of the best work on the airshow circuit.

  More Kent Pietsch... this time doing act #2: landing the Cadet on the moving platform.  I watched him do this several times at the event, and I gotta say he's really really good at it!  I've also got a post coming in the future with some behind-the-scenes pix I took of him doing this that are extremely awesome, I think you'll like 'em a lot.

 This was pretty cool... after successfully landing on the RV, They drove it right in front of the crowd on the taxiway with Kent outside the airplane and the engine still running on the Cadet.  It made a nifty way to show it off to the crowd, especially since the airplane is up high where everyone can see it.  Shortly after, they pulled back on to the runway and he made a takeoff from the RV so the airplane would be on the ground again for his deadstick routine a little later.

  I think this picture of Amanda Franklin on top of Kyle's Waco is amazing... partly because of all the smoke, but mostly because Amanda looks so comfortable and 'into it' even as the airplane begins to slide backward!  They do a fantastic wingwalking act, and it's just extra sweet that they are husband and wife.

 The 'Pirated Skies' fly-by!  How cool is that?!

 As I mentioned in a post a few days ago, Kyle and Amanda take the wings and tail off of the big black Waco and put it in a trailer to get to the next airshow.  I had the cool opportunity yesterday to get pix after the show of the entire disassembly procedure.  Watch for a detailed post coming about that before long.

  This gorgeous B-17 Flying Fortress (Yankee Lady) was rebuilt and is operated and maintained by the Yankee Air Museum in Michigan.

  Yankee Lady is very special to me because I got to go for an incredible ride on Friday evening over downtown Indianapolis.  I got some amazing pictures during the ride, check out at this link: B-17 'Yankee Lady' Ride!

  The F-18 Super Hornet taxiing by on the way to the end of the runway for a hardcore aerial demonstration.  I like to feel the ground shake!

 This was the first time I've ever caught the shockwave vapor in a pic.  Not too bad for the first time : )

 And then a couple minutes later I got this one!  If I had a better lens, this would have been my best pic ever.  It's still pretty cool because the light was hitting it all just right to create a bit of a rainbow effect, and a sparkle off the windshield.  It's really interesting looking at the way the moisture forms on the top of the wing as well.  Super Hornet!

  These three P-51's are the Horsemen Aerobatic Team.  Authentic WWII Mustangs flying close formation aerobatics to a musical score done by James Horner, the composer who did the music for films like Avatar, Titanic, Braveheart, Apollo 13 and more.  I posted the video with the story and the music here: Video: Horsemen Aerobatic Team - Why We Love The P-51 Mustang.

 They had just strated up and were heading out to take off and loiter as the A-10 flew its demo.

 The A-10 followed them out shortly after and then went right into his demo.  The pilot is Major Johnnie "Dusty' Green from the Air Combat Command's A-10 East Demo Team based at Moody AFB in Georgia.  I talked with Major Green shortly before his demo about doing a podcast interview, and it looks like we'll get that done in the next week or two!  I'm really looking forward to learning more about the Warthog from the pilot's perspective.

  Here's the A-10 in the midst of a high speed roll maneuver.  The A-10 has a unique split-aileron design that allows them to function in several different ways.  You can tell just a bit in this pic that they aren't positioned as they would be in a normal aircraft.  It'll be interesting to talk with Major Green to learn more about how these unusual control surfaces work.

  There really isn't much that needs to be said about being able to see three perfect P-51 Mustangs in tight aerobatic formation.  The sight, the sound, and the history that it represents is astonishing.  If you ever have the chance to see the Horsemen fly, do it.

 Two of the Horsemen then joined up on the A-10 to do an Air Force Heritage Flight to wrap up the 2010 Indy Air Show.  It was a beautiful way to end a beautiful day.

 Even tho the event had some serious challenges due to the weather on Saturday, it was a great success on Sunday, and best of all it raised money to support children's charities in central Indiana.  I met a lot of wonderful and interesting people this weekend and I'm already looking forward to 2011 IAS : )

2010 Indy Air Show Pic Stream #3 - B-17 'Yankee Lady' Ride!

 This near-perfect B-17 sitting on the ramp at the Indy Air Show is 'Yankee Lady' from the Yankee Air Museum in Belleville, Michigan, just outside of Ypsilanti.  In addition to being on display, this WWII bomber was scheduled to do a fly-over of Victory Field, the home of the Indianapolis Indians minor-league baseball team on Friday evening June 11th.  I found out on Thursday that I was given the golden opportunity to be one of the people INSIDE the airplane for the fly-over!

 This picture is from earlier in the day on Friday, the opening media and practice day of the Indy Air Show.  After the scheduled airshow flying ended for the day, the weather got windy and it looked liked some storms might pass thru.  It was a little uncertain for being able to make the fly-over flight.  Fortunately, better skies arrived well ahead of the approximate 6:30pm departure time.  I was really glad to see that : )

 
 The crew had all of the riders collected and gathered around the airplane as we waited to board.  Since it was plenty warm outside, and would have been very hot inside sitting on the ramp, they had us stay outside, close to the airplane.  It made for another good chance to get more pix.  I've never looked at a B-17 like I did in that next few minutes.  Knowing I'd soon be riding inside changed my perspective... the history and meaning of an airplane like this became more real than it ever has before.

  The pilots were getting things squared away in the cockpit... first for the airplane in general, and second for the details of this specific flight which had us also sharing the sky over the stadium with 3 of the aerobatic airplanes from the airshow.  They were gonna fly a circle of smoke around the park and then they'd clear out and we'd make a pass right overhead.

 I like using my still camera on a monopod to get a very different perspective on airplanes.  I simply use the self timer to release the shutter, and the pix come out really nice!  It's a very poor-man's way to add a lot of punch to the photos.

 This pic shows how the monopod can be put to use.  You get a great view of the nose turret which I thought was kinda cool to see from this angle.  I had no idea that about 30 minutes later I would be sitting right on the other side of that plexi as the guy they decided to put in the only spot on the airplane that's actually in front of the cockpit.  Honestly, I'm still having a hard time believing that I a rode in a B-17, and even more that I was sitting in the nose!

 Here's the view out one of the left side windows in the bombardier area where I was seated.  BTW, I kept shaking my head at this point wondering if this was really happening!  I also had a small video camera with me but unfortunately I don't think there's gonna be much usable from it.  More on that later when I put together a second and much more detailed post about riding in Yankee Lady.

  Here we are in the air, heading over the edge of Indianapolis on our way to downtown.  This is a good time to say: if this had just been a simple ride around the pattern in a B-17, it would have been awesome.  But this ride was so much more than that!  Not only was I riding up front where I could see EVERYTHING, but we were flying about 1,500 feet above the ground heading right for downtown Indianapolis... again I'm wondering if this is all a dream : )

 While I was the only one sitting in the nose for take off and landing, we were allowed to move all around once in the air.  That gave others the chance to see out the front, but it also gave me a chance to move all over finding good places to point a camera thru.  There were several.

 This picture is from the large blister over the gunner station right behind the cockpit.  You have to climb up a bit to see out of it, so you get a little different view of looking 'down' onto the wing from here.  You can also tell that we have some bank angle here.  We made quite a few turns as the fly-over timing was worked out, and a couple of those turns were pretty tight ones too.  We spent about 10 minutes flying just outside of downtown as the akro guys were over the baseball field.  During this time I was able to move around to several different locations for fresh camera perspectives.

 Here we're looking over the arm and shoulder of flight engineer Norm Elleckson at pilot Dave Cobaugh and co-pilot Ray Hunter.  The cockpit layout is a little unusual for several reasons, but I'm gonna save those details for an extended post on this ride in the near future.  I will say that they did a fabulous job of flying the airplane and the whole crew made us all feel right at home.  They all represented the Yankee Air Museum really well.  Thank you men.

 This pic isn't the sharpest view of the pilot and co-pilot, but we had overcast skies, I was shooting thru a small plexi blister on the top of the fuselage, and they were in a somewhat dark cockpit.  Having said all that, this is essentially my favorite picture from the whole trip.  It's in seeing this picture that my strongest thoughts about the men who fought in WWII are brought to life.  To be looking right into the faces of men guiding a crew off to do battle is a very powerful experience for me.  While it's easy for us today to look at an airplane like this and think it's 'cool', it's far more important to understand the fear, pain, death and courage that was experienced by the people who did battle.

Here's another amazing view to see.  There's a plexi hatch about half way back the airplane, right in front of where the vertical fin starts.  They had decided that the chance of rain was small so they removed the hatch to give us some better cabin airflow.  The hole the hatch covers is pretty large, so it has some bars that run across it to keep you from climbing out, falling out, or doing anything else undesirable.  It made an incredible place to stick your head out of and look around.  It was especially stunning to be looking right down the vertical fin at the world moving away from us.  It was even more stunning to have that world be downtown Indianapolis as this pic shows : )

 And here's a fabulous view of downtown where you can see Victory Field in the lower left and Lucas Oil Stadium, where the Colts play, on the right.  This picture was also taken thru the hatch opening.  How cool (and crazy) is it that I'm riding in a B-17 looking at downtown Indy with my head stuck out a hole on the top of the airplane?  Wow.  

 After we had completed the fly-over, we headed straight back to the Mt. Comfort Airport.  I was back up in the nose as we made a pass over the airshow grounds.  We were also flying formation at this time with two of John Klatt's airplanes and Billy Werth in his Pitts... the akro guys who had been over the ballpark with us.  I'll have more info and pix of all that in the extended post yet to come.

 I'll also have a lot more details to share about the entire experience.  It was all such a huge blessing to me, and I'd like to thank Roger Bishop and all of the Indy Air Show staff and volunteers for the opportunity.  And of course, the Yankee Air Museum and the dedicated crew of people that keep this important part of American history flying.  You're all the best!

2010 Indy Air Show Pic Stream #2 - Media & Practice Day

 Kyle Franklin flies this big beautiful Waco in airshows all over the country, but interestingly, he and his wing-walking wife Amanda take the airplane apart and pull it down the road in a big trailer between most shows.  It sounds like a lot of work, but it actually simplifies the process of getting the airplane where you need it.  As you would expect tho, after it's all back together, it's time to double and triple check that everything is where it should be.  

 This pic shows Kyle as he was working his way around the back of the airplane earlier today when he was about 30 minutes away from flying in the practice show.  He was making one last check to verify the airworthiness of the highly-modified UPF-7.  I talked to him about the process, and he shared that it really has the advantage of essentially having him 'annual' the airplane every time he puts it back together.  He's actually far more in tune with the airplane's structure because he's touching everything a lot before it goes back in the air.  Pretty interesting stuff.

 Here he's giving the wings, struts and flying wires a good tug to ensure they are properly installed and adjusted.  Shortly after this pic he was making some sweet radial music and billowing out lots of smoke to fill the sky!

 Red Bull Air Race pilot Michael Goulian in the ASB.TV Extra 330 a few moments before he fired up and headed out for his performance.  He had a nice mix of unusual maneuvers in his show that had the Extra doing some fun tumbling and rotating, and his RBAR experience makes him very precise on all the lines.

  The Horsemen all started their engines at the same time which of course was just off-the-scale-cool hearing their big Merlin engines all come to life at the same time.  They taxied out right after this pic was taken but the A-10 demo was up next.  Once the Warthog was done having some fun showing off its unique capabilities, the Horsemen put on a beautiful display of formation aerobatics in three authentic WWII Mustangs.  We like to call this a 'good day' : )

2010 Indy Air Show Pic Stream #1 - Coming Together

 I've been blessed with a great opportunity to cover the Indy Air Show from the inside, and I can already tell it's gonna be a great time.  Friday is the media and practice day, and it's open to the public for a very small price.  Saturday and Sunday are the big days for the event and there's gonna be a lot happening.

 I made the 3 hour trip south on Thursday to the Mt. Comfort Airport and got out on the ramp to get a few pix of airplanes in the evening.  The P-51's above are from the Horsemen Aerobatic Team, and boy do they ever look nice!  I've never seen them perform before so I'm really looking forward to hearing three Merlin's making music in tight formation!

 A pair of F-18's were on the ramp still unloading some of their goodies from the trip to Indiana.  These guys will be very effectively turning kerosene into noise... lots of noise!  Should be very satisfying : )

 The recent 'A-10 Warthog Week' I put together has me primed to really soak up the show coming up by the Air Combat Command East Demo Team.  I was happy to see their two A-10's already on the ramp bearing their teeth!

 Friday morning arrived after just 4 hours of sleep!  I was actually back at the airport at about 5:30am and was able to watch the sun come up.  The skies were somewhat overcast, so it wasn't as dramatic as it could have been, but it was still wonderful.  These three Jet Rangers made a nice sight as the day was coming to life.

  Another pic of the Horsemen P-51's, this time in the hangar where they spent the night.  Never get tired of seeing really big props!

 As the morning progressed, more showplanes where being pulled out and prepped for a day of media rides and practice performances.  This is Billy Werth's Pitts (grayout.com) with one of the Red Eagles in the background.  I likes me some hot biplanes!

 I'm scheduled to get a ride on a B-17 this evening over downtown Indianapolis, so you can imagine I'm pretty excited about that!  I'm planning to get some pix and maybe some video of that experience and hopefully I'll have something to post from it by tomorrow morning.  If things go well, I'll have another overall post up later today.  

 Check out the full list of Indy Air Show performers so you can either know who you're missing or who you'll see if you get here!

Video: Horsemen Aerobatic Team - Why We Love The P-51 Mustang

 I'm pretty excited to be heading down to Indianapolis later today for the start of the Indy Air Show tomorrow.  On Saturday and Sunday, the Horsemen Aerobatic Team will be flying 3 authentic WWII P-51's in the airshow, and this video shows why they (and all of us) love the P-51 Mustang so much.

 Wow.  What an airplane!