General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region Forums"Doc" is almost ready to fly!
A restored B-29, "Doc" could be flying by this summer!
(Great videos at the link)
http://www.kansas.com/news/business/aviation/article78958292.html
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)A HERETIC I AM
(24,382 posts)bvar22
(39,909 posts)I love the old birds from that era.
They are the last of the prop driven generation before the jets took over.
The vintage warbirds from WW2 are some of the most beautiful and graceful planes ever built.
I'm not a big fan of the B-29, but I celebrate anytime any of these old birds are saved.
The B-29 is very complex, and the complexity caused many problems in the early days when maintenance was a shed on some small Pacific Island.
I can't imagine the dedication, hours, and sweat it must have taken to put "Doc" back together.
The article said it was found on a Bomb Range in California!!!!
I wonder what kind of condition it was in.
The cowlings look like it flew through a heavy hail storm, or maybe that was just ice thrown from the props.
Anyway, it is beautiful, and I love the polished aluminum.
I watched a 2 hour documentary about a group who attempted to rescue a B-29 from the Greenland Ice Cap by replacing the engines and tires (in the snow and ice with NO cover), and trying to fly it out.
It did not end well. The APU caught on fire during taxi to a makeshift runway and burned the plane to the ground. They were very lucky it didn't catch fire 10 minutes later.
Again, thanks for the post. It is a losing battle trying to keep these old birds flying condition. More are lost to crashes than are rescued each year, and as the last members of the Greatest Generation die off, there are fewer and fewer that have the ability or the desire to put in that kind of effort.
A HERETIC I AM
(24,382 posts)If you are interested in the history of this aircraft type, but to have yet to read very much on them, there are some interesting reads you can find with a simple search that describe the many, MANY difficulties the Wright R-3350 Duplex Cyclone engine encountered, quite a few of them resulting in the deaths of aircrew.
The following is from the Wikipedia B-29 article;
Pilots, including the present day pilots of the Commemorative Air Forces Fifi, the last remaining flying B-29, describe flight after takeoff as being an urgent struggle for airspeed (generally, flight after takeoff should consist of striving for altitude). Radial engines need airflow to keep them cool, and failure to get up to speed as soon as possible could result in an engine failure and risk of fire. One useful technique was to check the magnetos while already on takeoff roll rather than during a conventional static engine-runup before takeoff.[23]
I think it is fair to say that with the exception of jet fighter development at the time, the B-29 was the most sophisticated aircraft being produced in it's day, and I find it frankly amazing that they produced as many as they did (3970 aircraft) in such a short amount of time (3 years - '43 to '46).