Warbird Information Exchange

They don't even have to be underwater. I was once chatting with another visitor at the Yankee Air Museum who claimed that when the Lancaster was first put on a pole over in Windsor they forgot to remove the guns, and by the time someone remembered they had all been stolen. I tried to politely tell him that all the armament had been removed many years earlier when she was reconfigured for SAR duties, but he wouldn't hear of it..his story was much cooler! He also claimed that parts for WWII warbirds are easy to get, because the military still has thousands of them sitting in mothballs out in the desert or on islands in the Pacific. In fact I still regularly run across people who are convinced that there are masses of WWII aircraft just quietly sitting desert storage. Of course the average person can't tell a B-17 from a C-130. It's not that they're stupid, it's just not a subject in which they have any knowledge or interest. I'm an airplane , but I personally doubt I could tell the difference between weaponry from the American Revolution and the Civil War (separated by nearly a century.)

Back to the original topic, a guy in our model club was telling me once about a collector in Indiana (not Dean Kruse) who had a bunch of WWII military vehicles, and a largely complete Japanese Zero. The collector was supposedly very private, but had once showed my friend and his buddies around the treasure trove (sometime in the 80s as I recall.) He claimed to have gotten inside the Zeke, and I think he's knowledgeable enough to tell if it was just some old T-6 or the real thing.

SN

Is this the museum you are thinking about? http://www.ropkeyarmormuseum.com/index.html

I'm just curious, how many stories do you hear about 'collections' that turn out to be nothing? There was a long standing story of someone who had several WW2 planes and a T-38(!) in a barn in North Florida. It wasn't very well known but a few people swore they were there. I got to visit the place and found the reamins of a very tattered biplane of some kind (no wings, probably would collapse if you leaned on it) and clear signs nothing else had ever been there.
Like Steve Nelson mentioned earlier, it's amazing how fast these stories can blow up. These days, I'll only pay attention if someone can specifically name what they've seen and would swear they've seen it with their own eyes. If you press long enough, most people will admit they've never seen the stuff in person and are only going on what someone else said.
Even then, I'm always skeptical.

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Life member, 91st BG Memorial Association
Owner, 1944 Willys MB #366014
Former REMF (US Army, O3)

I remember posting a news piece many years ago, on one of the incarnations of this board, about a collection (That I had never heard about) of warbirds out of Arizona that included a P-39 or P-400 being available for donation... It was NOT The Champlin collection. Never heard anymore about it..
Does the story ring a bell with any of you other old timers?

as a kid on a bike ride in the mid to late '70's, I KNOW I spied a P-51D fuselage just inside a warehouse on Deerfield road, north of Cincinnati. exactly where the indoor gun range is now. nowadays there is the mustang Cincinnati Miss, a nameplate rebuild (?). I've wondered if it could be the same one, but of course many other things are more likely. that's all I got. more along the lines of my old B-29 in a ditch posting, i.e. long-gone!

Back in the early 90's i heard that Bob Schlaffly in Wash irrc had a Mustang in his barn. Bob had some PB4Y slurry bombers.

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Well if I can't rollerskate around my playpen while smoking and drinking a beer, I'm staying home..

In 2000 or 2001, several warbirds came to Knoxville for a Veteran's Day celebration, including the Missouri Wing's B-25 "Show Me" and their TBM Avenger as well as the A-26 "Spirit of Carolina." The BAHF "Spirit of Freedom" was there too. Anyhow, the Avenger was parked next to a nearby hangar. At one point, somebody checked a door handle and it was unlocked. Inside, an bare metal P-47. It had an N-number so I wrote that down and later sent it to Baugher for reference. Turned out that it was "Wicked Wabbit" before the paint job.

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Donate to support WIX here:

http://www.warbirdsresourcegroup.org/donate.html

I'd ike to find this one - only about 2000 lakes to search!

http://www.luftwaffe.cz/mullerr.html

regards

MS

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'Coups De Foudre'
(511FS, 405FG watering hole), St Dizier, France 1944/45

The name "Ropkey" does sound familiar..but I'm not sure where the story of the supposed Zero fits in.

SN

Over the past 17 years of hunting Warbirds and vintage aircraft, I have come across many cool finds. You never know how close something that you are looking for can be. I found a warehouse that had at least three Stearmans, one Stinson 108, BT-15, lots of engines and parts all over. It was right on the fence line of the Gillespie field, San Diego. Every time we took off from 27R I would look at that warehouse and never thought it would have such a treasure in it. Found the owner and he had two more warehouses full of the same. He ended up passing away and everything was sold off.
I have found many places like that. I'm on the trail of one now. Found a guy that has a friend that has some plane in a building that is really old and has a round engine on it. (T-6, Stearman, BT-13,15 ?) I hope to go see this plane soon.
I never give up looking and talking to people. I have traveled to other states just on a story and I do find stuff. There are still finds out there!!!!! Just think of how many buildings are in your town.

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Don't let the scrappers win !!!!!!!

Eric Miller
Project Warbird Salvage/Museum
http://www.projectwarbird.com

Sonar imagery of the Lake Washington fleet. It shows 8 different airframes "still out there".

Some folks are reporting a suspect link here so I got rid of it.

http://www.boydski.com/diving/Lake_Wash ... Wrecks.htm
This site has some good pictures of some of the wreck the preservation is amazing

This tug sank in 1922


PB4Y

these two lumps would seem to be hub assemblies - found anywhere else i would probably say truck - but they are quite far apart either side of a creek mouth in the intertidal zone of a bay south of Cooktown which gets a lot of flotsam and jetsam washed in from the Coral Sea - so of course i wondered - if tyres were attached could they have floated in ... no shortage of wrecks out from Cairns back in the day.



and at least 200 yards north;


OTOH - they would seem mostly ferrous, the obvious dissimilar being something like a brass breather cap on each ...

Got a threat warning on that link.

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All right, Mister Dorfmann, start pullin'!
Pilot: "Flap switch works hard in down position."
Mechanic: "Flap switch checked OK. Pilot needs more P.T." - Flight report, TB-17G 42-102875 (Hobbs AAF)

May have to look for another link with the sonar images from Lake Washington.