Time to start the trivia...

[Britbrat]

#10 -- the P-61's wingspan is greater than that of the F-15

[Wayne]

5) also the Wright 1820-C9HE, and the PT86......

[Wayne]

2) also known as a Galland hood on 109g-6,10 and 14's and maybe others. it featured clear vision side panels..

[exrafbod]

#3: My guess would have been that it was the rounded tip propellers that lent the nickname to thus equipped Lancs to be referred to by their crews as "paddle steamers".
Maybe it was even the elaborate socket-wrench toolkits that came with each US built Packard Merlin (service crews loved them and they were highly "sought after").

In any case the correct answer was already supplied but this is interesting Lanc trivia anyway.

[jetmex]

OK, so Wayne gets #2 and #5. Patrick is on the right track with #10, but still not quite. He also got #8, but I have to check some dates to see if he got the right airplane. There's another one I was thinking about....

Kevin added some really neat Lancaster trivia, which is, after all, what this forum is all about. ;D

[Galvin]

I see you have all chewed pretty hard on this but I'd like to add a few facts that may have been missed.

1.) The 747 can carry a spare engine in a pod underwing bringing the total to 5. But all 747s also have a turbine engine powered APU mounted in the tail to provide air and electricity when the main engines aren't operating so the total is in fact 6.

2.) The "Erla Haube" refers only to the clear vision hood developed by the Messerschmitt subcontractor Erla for the later 109s. It could be retrofitted to just about any mark and replaced the moveable and fixed rear portions of the canopy with a single more unrestricted vision unit.
The term "Galland Hood" is a misnomer and is not correct in referring to any bubble canopy equipped Bf-109s or FW-190s. The term "Galland Panzer" is the source of this confusion and was a pilot armor upgrade for the 109 consisting of improved armor protection for the pilot including, most notably, replacing the center of the pilot's back and head armor with an armor glass panel to allow rear view. An overhead extension of the upper portion of the armor plate covering the top of the pilot's head was also part of this improved armor fit.

5.) The U.S. built DC-3s started off with the single-row Wright 1820 Cyclones of various horsepowers and later added the P&W 1830 two-row radials. Later conversions have used the P&W Canada PT-6, notably the PT-6-45A for the three-engined Conroy conversion and the PT-6-67R for the Basler conversion. There have also been conversions done on them in South Africa but I don't know just what engines were used. I have seen at least one conversion using the Rolls Royce Dart.
The Russian license bulit Lusinov Li-2 (PS-84) used the M-62 and later the ASH-82 radials. The Japanese built Showa L2D used either the Mitsubishi Kinsei 43, 51, 53, or 62 depending on the version.

9.) The Twin Beech Model 18 is not the only airplane to ever have a spar strap added on but it is the most well known. I worked for Volpar briefly in the 60s modifying the Beech 18 into Volpar Turbo-liners. The standard Twin Beech had a spar carry-through structure made from welded steel tubing. This whole unit was heat treated for greater strength and thefore not repairable by welding if cracks should appear in the tubes, which they often did. The inspection of the spar for cracks was reputed to have been caused by the inflight loss of wings through catastrophic failure of the carry-through but I have not seen any reports confirming this. At one point in the sixties it was mandatory per AD to X-ray the entire carry-through every 100 hours(!!??). The spar strap mod was developed to relieve the operators of Beech 18s of having to do this. Many of these aircraft were parked and or scrapped as a result until the mod came out.

8.) The last flying boat in U.S. service had to be the U.S. Navy Martin P5M Marlins that I saw operating off the seaplane ramp on the south side of Lindbergh field in San Diego as late as 1967. Some went to Viet Nam so they may have even seen later service. They were definitely pure flying boats because I used to pity the poor enlisted guys who had to go into the water after the beaching gear in all kinds of weather.

9.) Someone got all the 'cats save one. The XF10F was Grummans first unsuccessful experiment in swing-wing fighter design and was officially called the "Jaguar". It even had a Jaguar logo on it similar to the leaping panther on the prototype F9F. (See the Northeast Graphics decal sheet for British aircraft. I believe that leaping Jaguar logo on it was actually lifted from the one on the F10F. ) They finally got the swing wing thing right on the F-14.
The unnamed Grumman fighters (or ag biplanes for that matter) included the original FF-1/FF-2/SF-2 fighters as well as the F2F and F3F series of fighters. All of these were known unofficially as "Flying Beer Barrels". The export versions of the FF-1s that made it to Spain were called "Delphins" by their pilots.

The only other officially named fighter Grumman produced was the experimental twin engined F5F "Skyrocket". Its Army counterpart was the tri-geared XP-50 which reputedly crashed on its first flight (It actually had a relatively trouble free flight test program lasting from Feb. to May 1941 when a supercharger blew up over Long Island and it was lost, the pilot parachuting safely) and was never named. Both provided the data and experience that later resulted in the successful F7F "Tigercat".

10.) The Northrup P-61 "Black Widow" night fighter was later modified into the far better looking P-61E long-range escort fighter by cutting down the fuselage and adding a long bubble canopy to house the two crewmembers. One prototype had a side hinged canopy, the one on the other slid aft. It was obvious almost from the outset of the program that jets were going to overtake piston-engined fighters in future and , in any event, the long range day fighter contract had already been won by the P-82 "Twin Mustang" anyway. So the design then morphed into the F-15 "Reporter" photo-recon aircraft, 36 of which were produced and 16 of which saw service in Japan with the 8th Photo Recon Squadron.

When the F for photo designation was dropped in favor of F for fighter in 1948 these aircraft were all redesignated RF-61Cs by 1949.

The first conversions of the P-61 into day fighters was accomplished by modification of two P-61B-10 fighters yanked off the production line prior to completion in 1944. They had the fuselage top cut down, a bubble canopy added, the nose radar removed and replaced with four .50 cal guns, the lower 4 20mm cannon were not fitted in favor of adding 518 gallons in underfloor tanks, and provision for four 310 U.S. Gallon drop tank added to the wings. The F-15 version added 2800 HP turbocharged R-2800C series engines with the large P-61C type scoops under the nacelles, deleted the wing mounted "fighter brakes" unique to all P-61 fighters, and added a camera bay forward to replace the gun armament.

I had the pleasure of literally crawling all over the last one in existence when it flew into Van Nuys back in 1967 for some maintenance work. It was owned by Cal Nat Airways and was being used as a borate bomber to fight fires. It had also been converted to a single seater and was an exceptionally good looking airplane. Unfortunately, it crashed on takeoff out of Grass Valley the following year. Although it was easliy rebuildable by todays standards, it was scrapped, as was the fate of so many other irreplacable aircraft up to that time.

[Britbrat]

Damn --- I knew that he'd appear sooner or later ;D

[Galvin]

"d**n --- I knew that he'd appear sooner or later "

Yup and it gets even worse: Miss Moneypenny was first played by Lois Maxwell, one or two films had Pamela Salem in the role, and the most recent Miss Moneypenny has been Samantha Bond.

[Britbrat]

Go away -- you're too good! ;D ;D ;D

[jetmex]

See, everyone? I TOLD you he would find us sooner or later!!

Welcome back Dave, and thanks for getting the REST of the answers....... ;D

[jetmex]

Doh!!

I just noticed no one answered question #6....

So, all you trivia buffs, what was the world's fastest biplane?

[RetNavySuppo]

Was it one of the Schneider floatplane racers?

[jetmex]

Believe it or not, no. The airplane did originate from one of the countries that participated, though....

[stetto]

Heh heh, had to be one of the Italian jobs then, what with the Lamborghinis and Ferraris and such...

[Garf]

#5-DC3-I know of P&W 1830, Wright 1820, and I saw one with 3 turbo props. Thats no mistake, 3 turbo props. The one on the nose had to be stopped for landing so the pilot could see to taxi.

[Galvin]

Here are some of the world speed records for prop-driven aircraft. Based on this it appears that the Curtiss R2C-1 was the last biplane holder of the absolute world speed record for airplanes back in 1923. Everyone figured out soon after that that one set of wings was far better than two sets if one wanted to go fast.

But the question referred to the fastest biplane, not an absolute world speed record. The fastest biplane, although it didn't hold any absolute speed records and was notably slower than the contemporary monplane record holders, is still the Italian Fiat CR42B. The plane had a 1,100-hp Daimler-Benz DB601A engine,and reached a speed of 520 km/h (323 mph) in 1941. Only a single CR42B prototype was built.



1.) 1913, absolute speed record of 126.64 miles per hour established by French Deperdussin landplane.

2.) 1920, absolute speed record of 194.49 miles per hour established by French Nieuport 29V landplane.

3.) 1923, absolute speed record of 267.16 miles per hour established by American Curtiss R2C-1 landplane.

4.) 1927, absolute speed record of 297.83 miles per hour established by Italian Marcchi M-52 seaplane.

5.) 1931, absolute speed record of 406.94 miles per hour established by British Supermarine S-6B seaplane.

6.) 1934, absolute speed record of 440.60 miles per hour established by Italian Marcchi-Castoldi MC-72 seaplane. (This record for propeller-driven seaplanes still stands and is unlikely to be surpassed in the near future.) Hughes set the landplane record in the H-1 in 1935 but it was less than the seaplane record.

7.) 1938, absolute speed record of 469.22 miles per hour established by German Messerschmitt 209VI landplane. It had been briefly held by a specially modified Heinkel 100 prior to this.

8.) 1969, absolute speed record of 483.04 miles per hour established by highly modified American Grumman F8F landplane. It was Greenamyer's "Conquest I", now in the Smithsonian. I was there on Rodgers dry lake that day and watched him set it. I guess Lyle Shelton eventually beat his record a few years ago with "Rare Bear" but by then nobody really cared.

[Galvin]

BTW: If we include the Grumman American light aircraft based on the original Bede designs in the "cat" names there were the T-Cat, Tiger, Cheetah, Lynx, and the Cougar light twin. There was also the unofficially named "Hepcat", a tiny lightplane produced in prototype form only immediately after WWII. I guess the employees didn't think that much of the official name "Tadpole", even though it strongly resembled one.

[Wayne]

Hmmm Steve Hinton busted the German speed record at 499.083 mph in the Red Baron in Aug 1979. I was in Reno when they made the presentation. (The following day he shredded the Red Baron on a pile of rocks at the bottom of "Hoover Gulch")

[Galvin]

There are a bunch of records that don't show up in that list, including Hinton's in the "RB-51". It was not intended to be complete, just some examples. Some absolute world speed records for aircraft only lasted a few days, one lasted thirty years. The answer to Jetmex's question is not in that list either because it wasn't an absolute record, just the one for biplanes.

[Wayne]

Yeah, I was just sidetracked by the Greenamyer record....I distinctly remember they made a huge deal of the "fact" that the record that Hinton had broken was the German Me 109R one...there was no mention that Darryl held the absolute record..

I guess that "fact" was based on selective history, or something....