B24RESEARCHER

Captoveur, Good show! I'm sure nearly everyone will be excited to see your final masterpiece. I'm leaving for five weeks at the National Archives in about ten days, so if you don't get me soon it may have to wait until early June. If you have an email address I can go ahead and forward what I have that will be of value for the XC-109 prototype if that is what you choose to build. I look forward to being of assistance. And thank you for understanding my desire for a bit of secrecy with those photos. Alan Griffith Aviation Guru, currently levitating with joy

A number of years ago I did some rather serious research on the XP-72, the R-4360-powered, low-to-medium-altitude version of the immortal P-47 Thunderbolt. This research was for an anticipated kit in 1/48th scale which, unfortunately, never came to life. During that research I had the honor of interviewing Ken Jernstedt, former AVG/Flying Tigers pilot and one of the two main test pilots on the P-72 project. To say he was a wealth of information would certainly be an understatement. He shared many things, including the true story of the crash landing of one of the prototypes (that has yet to

I've always found the XB-15 to be an interesting aircraft. That slender fuselage and that huge wing just scream "build me!" from a modeling standpoint. And given the circular shape of the fuselage this would actually be a comparatively straightforward scratch build project. I'm in the process of redrawing some excellent factory 3-view GA drawings right now for several reasons, including maybe giving the build a shot. In the process of my research I uncovered quite a bit of interesting information and dynamite photos. Just for the heck of it I thought I'd share a very small slice of it in th

Documents. Documents. Documents. Specific references. Stand and deliver. I'm sure they can be shown here. I'm willing to be wrong, but it needs to be proven. Alan Griffith

A nice write-up by Joe Baugher on the B-24Ds, but - based on a very quick read-through - with a couple of mistakes and ommissions. First, there was another nose-turreted D-mod carried on at the Middleton Air Depot specific to ASW aircraft. I don't have my data right in front of me, but they were similar to the Oklahoma City (OCAD) Mods with a major visual difference being in the side windows on the lower front nose. On the OCAD mods the side windows were in a straight line with one another. On the Middleton mods they were at a slight upward angle with the front window being higher than the re

Cedarsales, you're going to hate this reply, but...it depends. For me, it depends mostly upon the color of the basic plastic of the kit. Odd? Yes, and proud of it! But here is why. Natural metal finishes are generally very, very thin, and the underlying color of the plastic (or primer) will have an impact on how light or dark the NMF appears when finished. I use Alclad II metal paints exclusively, and when painting their Chrome or Shiny Aluminum it is critical to use a glass black paint beneath them. I believe lacquer-based is required to avoid having the Alclad lacquer eat up an enamel b

You're in trouble now...I figured out how to post photos! Below you will find an example of the early (first 77) PB4Y-2s with several very interesting features. This is PB4Y-2 BuNo 59374, taken at Whidby Island in, I believe, 1944. First item worthy of note is the nose section, looking for all practical intents and purposes like a mid-production B-24J-CO, complete with the A6B nose turret. The next items are the top turrets. Note that the forward turret has all the appearances of the Martin A3C, while the rear turret is the A3D High Hat. While I have pretty much stopped researching the Pri

Ignore this. I figured out what I did wrong. See above! Alan Griffith

Okay, hopefully the photos will magically appear when I do this. This is B-24D-15-CO 5AF 90BG 321BS 42-24070 "Miss Deed" This is B-24H-20-FO 8AF 44BG 506BS G6- -D 42-95016 "Down De Hatch" C-109 "Murphy's Mother In Law", possibly B-24L-1-FO 44-49057, believed to have been taken in India A great photo showing both the bomb bay doors still on the aircraft and the bottom of the bay tanks. I have shots of the bay tanks themselves outside the aircraft prior to modification. I'll just leave it up to the readers to determine which is the easier, more direct means of achieving his goal.

Well....I believe you've missed the point. In my humble opinion, making the C-109 nose would be easier as a modeling project if one started with the H nose than the D. Both will require some Milliput (or A&B, etc.) and a bunch of carving and sanding, but I believe would be a much easier project starting from the H than the D. Specific facts with regard to the production C-109: It has the Ford "shelf" (as does the H) but with the turret removed and a rounded metal nose replacement, The "S" is present (as on the H), although part will need to be sanded away as it was what I've called

Don, An FYI for you about "Dragon...". As a 5AF aircraft it underwent the appropriate HAD (Hawaiian Air Depot) belly turret mod and the ball was removed, replaced by the hand-held twin .50cal mounting. If you go to this link http://www.b24bestweb.com/dragonandhistail3.htm and look directly below the fuselage insignia you will see the windows (dark strip) that were part of this mod. Sorry for the off-topic post, but your photo of the model reminded me of this common error and I thought I'd clarify it with some visible evidence. Alan Griffith Copyrighted forever under no law known to man

I recommend you find someone with a copy of my new book, "Consolidated Mess", and look at the photos, drawings and manual page reproductions for a fairly complete and well-illustrated examination of the H and J noses (Ls and Ms, too, for that matter) and their differences. I say "fairly" as it is clear that research on the B-24 can NEVER END!!! It is unquestionably the most fooled-around-with aircraft from the factory floor to the combat unit ramp of any aircraft in WWII and new information is constantly coming forward. Always ask someone who posts here or elsewhere for the specific document

Captoveur, all is not lost!! While it is true that the "production" C-109s were J and L-FOs and as such were quite different in front appearance from the C-87, the PROTOTYPE was a Ford B-24E-20-FO (Ford equivalent to the D) sn 42-7221. This aircraft was subsequently lost on August 28, 1944, near Tezpur, India It just so happens that this aircraft and the C-109 in general will be covered in depth in Volume II of "Consolidated Mess", so I'm not yet prepared to release everything I have on it to the general public. However, I am willing to send you the photos showing the tail, the nose (a great

Prop....wow...the coveted Bronze Canine Cluster...(sniff)...I'm so honored I don't know what to bark...er...say. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Slarti and all, you do NOT have to at the Archives to do the computer searches I have talked about. However, to actually retrieve the data you have discovered and noted you must be physically present at the Archives, have an official ID (which they will give you), etc. You would need computer capacity of about a Beelzebyte (totally made up term, but meaning gobs and gobs and gobs) of memory just for Sarah Clark/RG342 much less anything else. S