Bomber Camp 2010: Mission complete-Photos

[Taigh Ramey]

Last week we completed our 2010 Bomber Camp put on by the Stockton Field Aviation Museum for the Colling's Foundation. It was a great success and the campers had a wonderful time.

Here are some wonderful photos thanks to our great volunteer photographers.

The first two are from Jim Dunn:





These are from Roger Cain:









Ricky took the WWII tech manual on cooking and made authentic GI meals. He put in his personal touch and the food was great. I especially liked the SPAM and eggs; man it was good! Well done Ricky!



We are so fortunate to have the best Ground Crew Living History group led by Capt. Bill Gaston. These guys truely live the part and also come up a week early to clean up and get things set up.

What a great bunch of guys they are too! Thanks!















Jimmy flew Dave's L-5 for range safety and bomb spotting. Using the L-5 for exactly what it was designed for was a real kick.



















More photos and videos will follow soon.

[mustangdriver]

Those are just amazing!!

[warbird1]

Awesome pictures, Taigh!

A few questions:

1) How many bombs did you guys drop? Did anybody get a bullseye? How was the accuracy?

2) Did the 262 participate or is she still up at Ione?

3) Do you guys plan on using the B-17 or any of the other Collings birds in future bomber camps?

4) Will this be an annual affair?


I really wish you guys would put out a Blu-ray of that camp. I would pay just about anything to have that bomb dropping in High Definition!

[Nathan]

Freakin' awesome! I love the bombs. COOL!!!

[Django]

That is too cool!

[CAPFlyer]

3) Do you guys plan on using the B-17 or any of the other Collings birds in future bomber camps?

Screw Collings, when are you guys gonna get FiFi up there?

[warbird1]

3) Do you guys plan on using the B-17 or any of the other Collings birds in future bomber camps?

Screw Collings, when are you guys gonna get FiFi up there?

How about doing the same thing out at Midland? Because it is so isolated, Midland would be perfect for dropping bombs and firing machine guns without disrupting or having a chance of an accident around populated civilian centers. Midland is virtually surrounded by farmer's fields, oil fields and many, many acres of private land. I can think of no better place to do this at. Surely, there has to be some CAF Col. with a big chunk of land near Midland that wouldn't mind it being used for this purpose. I'll bet Connie Edwards would be willing to be a participant! Connie has had .50 cals fired on his ranch before.

[cg51]

Screw Collings, when are you guys gonna get FiFi up there? [/quote]
I would love to see them drop a replica of FatMan

[CAPFlyer]

How about doing the same thing out at Midland? Because it is so isolated, Midland would be perfect for dropping bombs and firing machine guns without disrupting or having a chance of an accident around populated civilian centers. Midland is virtually surrounded by farmer's fields, oil fields and many, many acres of private land. I can think of no better place to do this at. Surely, there has to be some CAF Col. with a big chunk of land near Midland that wouldn't mind it being used for this purpose. I'll bet Connie Edwards would be willing to be a participant! Connie has had .50 cals fired on his ranch before.

I'm sure if Taigh is willing to host it (as he's got the experience), Steve would be more than willing to entertain that idea. Hell, it's Taigh who's (been) helping with getting the aft guns operational on FiFi.

[warbird1]

How about doing the same thing out at Midland? Because it is so isolated, Midland would be perfect for dropping bombs and firing machine guns without disrupting or having a chance of an accident around populated civilian centers. Midland is virtually surrounded by farmer's fields, oil fields and many, many acres of private land. I can think of no better place to do this at. Surely, there has to be some CAF Col. with a big chunk of land near Midland that wouldn't mind it being used for this purpose. I'll bet Connie Edwards would be willing to be a participant! Connie has had .50 cals fired on his ranch before.

I'm sure if Taigh is willing to host it (as he's got the experience), Steve would be more than willing to entertain that idea. heck, it's Taigh who's (been) helping with getting the aft guns operational on FiFi.

That's an outstanding idea. Somebody should submit a serious proposal to Steve to make this happen. I'm sure Taigh could host it initially, but then teach others in the CAF on how best to run that program, then he could concentrate on the one in California. You wouldn't have to limit it to FIFI though, as anything with a bombrack would suffice - Texas Raiders, Sentimental Journey, any of the B-25's, etc. While we're at it, why not include some dive-bombing with the P-51's, or even a Naval version with the Helldiver, Dauntless or Avenger's? Lots of potential there for something very special!

Taigh, do you have an opinion on this proposal?

[Taigh Ramey]

This is our third year for the camp and it keeps getting better and better. As it grows in popularity I will take it on the road as we are already planning to do this around the country especially at surviving WWII air bases. Having a completely authentic setting is the goal so that if you look around you will see nothing out of place. Stockton isn't very authentic but until we have the client base it will have to do.

I would really like to do an 'Atomic Bomber Camp'. I would love to see FiFi or Doc at Wendover over the loading pit shooting the tail guns into the gun butt. I have almost all of the parts to complete the tail turret which would easily install in one of the B-29's. All I am missing is the amplidynes which is also what I am having trouble with in FiFi's lower forward turret project. I have had two different electrical engineering folks helping to come up with solid state replacements to help solve the amplidyne problem but this is off topic and I will start another post to see if anyone else can help me to move this forward more rapidly.

This is one of the photos that I would like to recreate someday at Wendover for Atomic Bomber Camp:



I have the Wrecker and information on the lift used in the pit. So far from informal conversations with folks at Wendover they seem interested so I think we could put together a great program at that wonderful old air base. It certainly is a long ways off in the future but the ball is slowly rolling so to speak as we keep improving what we have going here.

To answer another question yes we will use Mac's B-17G; 909 (it doesn't really belong to Collings anymore). Mac has tentatively given me permission, with witnesses, to use his beloved gal for bomber camp. My vision is to use both the B-17 and the B-24 together, in loose formation, for a simultaneous drop. Mark Rouch at Top Gun Aviation and I spent a couple of weeks at Gary Norvilles shop working on the bomb racks, bomb door safety and firing circuits. It all works and 909 is just about ready. I have been so busy at the shop with my customers aircraft that I haven't had as much time to devote to working on the B-17's other needed systems like the ball turret. The ball turrets on both aircraft are in need of major surgery to get them back into full operation not to mention all of the other turrets. Maybe this year Gary will work on the turrets for us... It is real hard to try and do the needed work while the aircraft are on the road. They really need the work done at a shop with concentrated efforts. How 'bout it Gary?

I mentioned to Rob Collings that I would like to rip the wing tanks out of the P-51C and put gun bays and bomb racks back in her and Rob didn't seem to mind the idea. I gotta say Rob has a wonderful attitude about the aircraft and making them as authentic as possible. He is all for putting the gear back in and making it all work. My hats is off to the guy for all of his support. I also want to thank all of the other Collings crew for all of their help. Pappy (Jim Goulsby) was our Navigation instructor as well as one of the pilots. He is still has a Navigator 's rating on his FAA license! Jason was a great help too along with Neon's flying skills all helped to make the mission a success.

More answers: we dropped four bombs on each flight. A single bomb on two individual runs and a double on the last run. Our bombing results were not so good this year compared to the last two years. We went in at a lower altitude and as a result things happen quicker with the Norden. I found out later that the winds were stronger and gave us a lower ground speed so most of the bombs hit short. It would also be a big help if I would practice more than one day a year...

More pictures:

[Randy Haskin]

More answers: we dropped four bombs on each flight. A single bomb on two individual runs and a double on the last run. Our bombing results were not so good this year compared to the last two years. We went in at a lower altitude and as a result things happen quicker with the Norden. I found out later that the winds were stronger and gave us a lower ground speed so most of the bombs hit short. It would also be a big help if I would practice more than one day a year...

What altitude/airspeed, and what kind of accuracy in feet?

Those of use who drop bombs for a *living* don't even shack the target on every single pass. In fact, there is a miss distance (called CEP, Circular Error Probable) associated with each different type of pass (each different dive angle, too) that tells us how far we can be away from the bullseye and have the pass still be called a 'hit'.

Manual bombing is a serious bitch; it relies on both real-time math and precision flying. You have to be able to compute two legs of the 'bombing triangle' in real time in order to get your ordnance to the perfect ballistic release point. You also have to make sure the aircraft is right on those same parameters.

Did you compute out all that data before the flight? Did you know exactly what distance away from the target the release would take place at given the temperature, winds, altitude, etc?

Just curious what kind of accuracy you were getting and how you went about it.

[Gary Norville]

It is real hard to try and do the needed work while the aircraft are on the road. They really need the work done at a shop with concentrated efforts. How 'bout it Gary?

Taigh,

I'll have to clear it with Mac since he is in control of the plane, I'm sure he will be fine with it though.

[Obergrafeter]

Those orange ear plugs aren't authenic. Stick cigarette butts in your ears. Much more realistic!

[Taigh Ramey]

It's morning and I'm alittle slow on the uptake, so forgive me if this is an obvious joke, but........What?!

Shirley I missed something here.

Mac flies the B-17 for the Collings Foundation and has done so for as long as anyone can remember. 909 is his baby and he cares for her when she is on the road. Even though she may belong to Collings it's still Mac's B-17 if you get my drift. I think Mac is the highest time and most experienced B-17 pilot around today.

When the B-17, B-24, B-25 and fighters are in maintenance at American Aero Services in New Smyrna, FL, Gary and his gang are the guys who keeps them in good shape.

...and don't call me Shirley!!!

Last edited by Taigh Ramey on Tue Jun 08, 2010 2:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.