Warbird Information Exchange

The Commemorative Air Force covered the other side of the Zero restoration in one of their history videos:

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Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

His methods were unorthodox but if not for Bob several airframes would have been lost to history. I'm not saying he should be held up as a paragon of the industry, but he has earned a place somewhere in the historical record.

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Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG".
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

"It's his plane, he spent the money to restore it, he can do with it what he wants. I will never understand what's hard to comprehend about this." - kalamazookid, 20/08/2013
"The more time you spend around warbirds the sooner you learn nothing, is simple." - JohnB, 24/02/22

Diemert's 4 seat P-51 ( with C-133 canopy) and his 7 seat Fairey Firefly ( and his B-25).
Created using a central lengthwise bench seat and automotive lap-belt seat-belts.

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remember the Oogahonk!
old school enthusiast of Civiltary Warbirds and Air Racers

Anyone know what happened to the Mustang and Firefly, are they still extant?

A quick, morning-coffee internet search for Firefly WD840 found it on Platinum Fighters "Sold" list between 2009-2014.

FAA database still has it listed...sold & deregistered by 2015. Tossing the given address into Google Maps pulls up an auto dealership in Monaco.

Does this ring a bell for anyone? Off to work.

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

Always liked that Firefly. It is a Lancaster/York QEC on a Mk.VI. It is on my list for a modeling conversion. Probably will take me longer to build in 1/72 in plastic than it took Bob to build the real plane.

August

I found this AvCanada thread which was tracking down identities of all Bob's aircraft if interested.

http://www.avcanada.ca/forums2/viewtopic.php?t=114027

Thanks Dan and Thomas, much appreciated.

That was his other Zero restoration. It's now hanging in the Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. It's definitely got some odd non-Zero features, but from a distance it looks the part. Sadly, the museum gave it a horribly inaccurate paint job a few years ago. Here's a photo I took of it in 2019. Sorry about the image size..I couldn't figure out how to resize it in Imgur.

SN

https://pacificwrecks.com/people/restor ... index.html


Firefly http://www.warbirdregistry.org/fireflyr ... wd840.html
Hurricane http://www.warbirdregistry.org/hurrireg ... f5377.html
P-40 http://www.warbirdregistry.org/p40regis ... ak940.html
B-25 http://www.warbirdregistry.org/b25regis ... 30456.html
P-38 http://www.warbirdregistry.org/p38regis ... 26761.html
P-51 https://www.mustangsmustangs.com/p-51/s ... al/A68-175 , http://www.warbirdregistry.org/p51regis ... 74950.html

Me too! Maybe you could send me a QEC and prop?

For whatever reason Diemert fascinates me and building models of his aircraft is something I enjoy. I've already done the Zero and Val:
Airfix 1/72 Bob Diemert - CAF Zero by Zac Yates, on Flickr
val-cf-tzt-by-me-as-a-fujimi-172-model-and-by-bob-diemert-in-11_49279730533_o by Zac Yates, on Flickr

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Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG".
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

"It's his plane, he spent the money to restore it, he can do with it what he wants. I will never understand what's hard to comprehend about this." - kalamazookid, 20/08/2013
"The more time you spend around warbirds the sooner you learn nothing, is simple." - JohnB, 24/02/22

Nice work Zac, I am sure Bob would have loved to see those!

Yes, nice work indeed!

I might have an extra Lanc QEC for you. I have an old Airfix Lanc kit (the 1980s tooling) and of the four engines, one is reserved for the Firefly, two are earmarked to convert an He 111 into a CASA, and one is unassigned.

August

What? You're talking about a Douglas C-133 Cargomaster, correct? C-133s didn't have a bubble canopy. I'm very confused.

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Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

Guessing that's supposed to be CT-133 canopy.

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Matt