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Post by trimtab on Feb 14, 2007 22:37:15 GMT -7
More please. I've sat in the cockpit of the CAF C-46 China Doll located in Camarillo, CA, (bought the souvenir baseball hat and often wear it) and don't remember it looking anything like the one pictured here (except for the trim wheels and yokes). I distinctly recall the China Doll cockpit having a flat-top overhang on the top of the panel similar to the one in this link. www.militaryfactory.com/cockpits/c46_commando_cockpit.aspAlso, the additional side windows located at and below waist level would have been a giveaway if they were depicted in the wide angle shot. Must be getting old I guess. I don't even recognize an old girlfriend. www.vistech.net/users/rsturge/chin_dol.html But then, Piper and Cessna's wide angle cockpit photographs have always appeared to offer the room of a family size oldsmobile. The book Murrow's Boys, describes Eric Sevareid's experience as a passenger in a C-46 that took off but never landed while flying over the "Hump". They lost one engine and bailed out over mountains in a remote area of Burma. The co-pilot stayed with the airplane to the end, fighting to keep it stable while everyone jumped. The view from those side windows in the cockpit while flying over the Hump must have been both spectacular and scary especially if an engine hiccuped
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Post by jetmex on Feb 15, 2007 8:24:33 GMT -7
This photo is probably of the original cockpit configuration as it came from the factory. Many of today's restored airplanes have had significant upgrades to instrumentation and radios and no longer look like anything original. I never worked on any two DC-3s that had the same cockpit layout.
My least favorite cockpit has to be the one that belongs to the Lone Star Flight Museum's B-17 "Thunderbird". It looks like it belongs in a business jet instead of a WWII bomber. The radio compartment is filled with airline seats to accommodate paying passengers -- a sad but necessary way to pay for the upkeep of the airplane.
Stay tuned -- more on the way.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 15, 2007 8:52:41 GMT -7
It looks like the original WWII fit. These airplanes have been around for over sixty years so a few changes might have crept in from time to time. ;D
he later aircraft not only had a somewhat different panel, they also had a stepped windshield a little like that of the DC-3 rather than the original smooth contured one. The other often used major mod was the replacement of the four-bladed Curtiss electric props with three bladers.
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Post by trimtab on Feb 15, 2007 9:35:37 GMT -7
jetmex: Is 1/2 or partial credit available for naming the cockpit correctly? With all of those similar military and civilian versions out there, our contestants should at least receive some credit for knowledge factors. Kind of like Thomas the Train, we know there's a manufacturer and engine type and yet the train is named Thomas. Like Thomas, the B-18 Bolo has an added face and that face would stop a train. A person could fail in this game by recognizing the panel and getting the aircraft wrong. Now if one thinks a plane is a C-47 or DC-3 and you know it's an R4D, how can a player win a million? Perhaps we could give points according to the number of engines. Calling a DC-4 type a C-54 and it's actually an R5D could get at least two points out of four (engines). ;D Single engine aircraft could be a .5 (Maybe I shouldn't have watched the Westminster Dog Show)
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Post by jetmex on Feb 15, 2007 10:44:20 GMT -7
Depends on how close you are! In this case, the DC-2 answer was close, but the cockpit was not that of a DC-2. There are usually clues that distinguish military from civilian cockpits, such as radio equipment or interior appointments that will be seen on one, but not the other.
I usually take these one at a time, and if you're REALLY close, I'll give you credit for that answer. I'll use the previous cockpit post as an example. The photo was of a WB-57 cockpit, credit was given for just "B-57". Close enough for government work. Then again, I could get really nitpicky....... ;D
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Post by trimtab on Feb 15, 2007 22:04:15 GMT -7
The military indicator in my C-47 answer was the seats. The antiquated panel screamed out DC2. I'm looking forward for someone to determine that an R5D is not a DC4 or C54.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 15, 2007 23:48:00 GMT -7
If you think THAT was bad, try this one: While you are at it, ID this one too: (I mean ID in the sense of "identification". The other ID, "Intelligent Design," does not appear to have been a factor in the creation of this one.) Most of this aircraft still exists at a museum. Unfortunately (or perhaps mercifully) this aircraft suffered the attentions of a recent natural disaster and may have to be scrapped.
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Post by jetmex on Feb 16, 2007 13:58:01 GMT -7
Does that instrument panel belong to a Super Gooney? Military designation R4D-8 or C-117. Still looking for the airplane. I've seen it but can't remember where.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 16, 2007 21:12:33 GMT -7
Nope and good luck.
The clues for the first photo (and a rather nice photo it is too, dontcha think?) are that it is not a DC-3 nor a C-47.
Or C-53.
Or R-4D.
And the engines are neither Wrights nor Pratt and Whitneys.
Extra Credit: Who is sitting in the right seat and holding onto the wheel and why isn't the rest of him visible?
As for the airplane in the second picture montage, if it looks familiar it is probably because nearly all of us THINK we have seen it.
That is, we do until we suddenly remember that we have all seen the Oscar Meyer Weiner Wagon at one time or other.
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Post by trimtab on Feb 16, 2007 22:14:45 GMT -7
The first one is a Lockheed PV-1 Ventura and or Lodestar.
The second one looks like someone attached pusher engines to a glider design. Maybe Waco played with this one. I'll keep looking.
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Post by trimtab on Feb 17, 2007 10:21:47 GMT -7
The first one is a Lockheed PV-1 Ventura and or Lodestar. The second one looks like someone attached pusher engines to a glider design. Maybe Waco played with this one. I'll keep looking. Further research indicates that the Ventura/Lodestar/Hudson could not stand the test for an accurate answer. The engines are either P&W or Wright depending on the model. Nice refurbished cockpit. Dee Howard came to mind, briefly.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 17, 2007 10:42:25 GMT -7
It was not built at Lockheed.
Or Douglas.
Or North American.
Or Curtiss.
Or Republic.
Or any other major U.S. manufacturer.
Or minor.
Or Dee Howard
There were quite a few built too, something like 5000, but only one known to be flying.
There were two still flying but the other one was rather spectacularly wrecked a little while back.
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Post by ctdahle on Feb 17, 2007 13:09:01 GMT -7
Looks like someone tacked wings to a microbus...
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Post by zrct02 on Feb 17, 2007 18:45:36 GMT -7
Monsted-Vincent Star Flight
Your pics contained the clue. Took a while.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 17, 2007 21:55:24 GMT -7
You got it Roger.
I had removed the "aerofiles" logos from the other two pictures and the one in the lower left corner of the one with the remaining "aerofiles" logo placed so that it looked like part of the hangar but I figured that the one remaining was innocuous enough to be missed and if found anyway and anyone was determined enough to go through the entire Aerofiles listings to find this obscure airplane well...
It is supposedly the only four-engined airplane ever built in Louisiana and its remains are still at a museum there. I guess Katrina pretty well scrambled the airframe so I don't know if it will ever be restored.
The guy who created Aerofiles, K.O. Eckland, is a former artist at the L. A. Times and someone I knew very well thirty-five years ago. He illustrated many of Richard Bach's books and gave me the leather flying helmet I still use when flying open cockpit airplanes.
He has done a tremendous job on the Aerofiles site but is now in his eighties. I sure hope he is around a while longer and that the site doesn't go when he does.
OK you experts, we still have a cockpit to identify. I gave you a lot of clues and deduction should give you more.
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Post by zrct02 on Feb 18, 2007 5:29:52 GMT -7
After I did some research, I see that it got hit by hurricane Andrew in August of 1992. Mother nature does not like this airplane.
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Post by Galvin on Feb 25, 2007 18:31:31 GMT -7
We still have a cockpit photo that has not been ID'ed.
C'mon you experts, it isn't THAT tough.
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Post by jetmex on Feb 26, 2007 13:47:22 GMT -7
Is it an American or foreign aircraft? Still think it looks a lot like a Gooney. ;D
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Post by trimtab on Feb 26, 2007 21:03:15 GMT -7
Is it an American or foreign aircraft? Still think it looks a lot like a Gooney. ;D According to Galvin, sounds like it's foreign built. Probably English and used as a multi-engine trainer and/or laison with their Fleet Air Arm. How about a Russian version of a C-47?
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Post by Galvin on Feb 27, 2007 0:44:19 GMT -7
Trimtab wins almost as an afterthought.
It is a restored Lisunov Li-2, the airplane that was originally a license built Russian version of the DC-3/C-47.
The Russians built over 5000 of them, some as bombers with a big turret on the upper rear fuselage but most as transports.
They were really DC-3s in name only because they used Russian engines and equipment, everything was metric, etc.
Interestingly, friends of mine who were invited onto Russian aircraft like the Tu-54B and the An-22 back in the seventies reported seeing huge old WWII vintage U.S. Army Air Corps radios and ADFs still in use on board the aircraft.
They were obviously ancient lend lease stuff but they must have worked better than the standard Russian issue radios to have been kept soldiering on for so long.
By the time the production run of the Li-2 was over there was little if anything that could be interchanged with a DC-3 or C-47.
This one was very nicely restored but was cracked up a while back and ended up in several large pieces. Maybe someone can find a shot of the wreck. I have seen it several times on the web.
You're lucky I couldn't find a cockpit shot of a "Tabby", the Japanese version. I did look for one.
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