One piece of info so far unreported …..
With a relatively warm day ( compared to last week ! ) and a goodly number of visitors with the schools on holiday ~
Wing Co. Joes was open today 🙂
Thought you might be interested in this article about B-17 owners and operators from the Smithsonian Air and Space magazine.
If you scroll thru the images that accompany the article you’ll stumble on this one …..
I was asked if I had any images to submit by Don Price of the CAF Gulf Coast Wing ~ to go with his interview for this article.
I sent three ~ and they used one of my favorites from the 2010 tour stop.
Taken with a Canon G11 “point & shoot” perched on top of a mono pod with a remote release and held as high as
I could get it whilst standing at the back of the queue for ground tours on a hot Saturday afternoon.
As Kevin Costner might have said ….. If you tour with it ~ they will come 🙂
44-83563 ~ N9563Z went back to the USA after filming the War Lover in England and is now known as “Fuddy Duddy”.
Today it’s owned and operated by the Lyon Air Museum but back in 2005 it was being loaned to the EAA whilst their
own B-17 was undergoing repairs.
It’s pictured here at Appleton Airport on July 28th ~ exactly 70 years to the day after the Model 299 made it’s
first flight from Boeing Field.
Next time you visit the American Air Museum at Duxford ~ pause for a moment inside the entrance and look at the major
sponsors plaque on the left. One of the names is ….. Major General William Lyon 🙂
DCW wrote …..
This is going to be an eye-catching exhibit, I hope a prominent corner will be found in AirSpace for it:
There is an apparently vacant spot in AirSpace just inside the main exhibition area as you walk in
And it would appear to be the perfect size for the Vampire ~ if you can forgive this crude attempt at “imagineering”
how it might look ……
It just might be the one spot where the vivid dayglo orange and silver paint scheme would sit well with the silver Hastings
and white Sunderland colour schemes.
Aside from the WOW ! factor as vistors walk in and see the striking finish on the Vampire ~ it happens again when you
then see the RR Trent engine behind rubbing shoulders with it 🙂
Duxford this morning !
If you want to browse more of my FB image collection …… 🙂
If the piece is being sold as a reproduction ~ all well and good.
I’ve seen modern renditions of nose art on large skin panels for sale in the USA.
This could be one of those …..
If I were looking to buy such a piece as an original panel ~ I would want to look at the structure on the back of the skin and in this case …… take a close look at the apparent combat related “bullet holes” near the nose art.
Here’s a picture of the Collings Foundations B-24J ~ taken at Willow Run in 2005.
The rivet detail does not look to be the same in my humble opinion.
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