PBN Nomad Pictures Wanted

[Rocketeer]

Just wondering if anyone had any Naval Aircraft Factory PBN-1 Nomad pictures that they wanted to share. It's hard to find any information about this further development of the PBY.
Thanks.

[jdvoss]

If you can find the book "Red Stars Vol 4" by Geust there are about 18 photos of the type all taken in Russia. The Russians fitted some with their own engines and attached 4-bladed props. According to the write up they flew them into the 1970's!

Another source is "PBY in Action" series that has a write up on PBN's and a few photos in USN markings. Another source of photos in the US Naval Institiute in Annapolis MD (not to be confused with the Naval Academy). They have a great photo section and individual 8 x 10 glossies can be purchased from them . Google them for the actual contact info.

[Canso42]

Check out www.PBY@yahoogroups.com.

[N3Njeff]

Try and find a copy of the book "wings for the navy". Its a history on the NAF.

[Rocketeer]

Are there any known surviving PBN Nomads in Russia? If they flew them up until the 1970's, is it possible that a few might still be around? Thanks for the response.

[Canso42]

A&S recently mentioned a website, ' lend-lease.airforce.ru' a Russian/English website.
Also see David Legg's book on PBY's "Consolidated PBY Catalina- the Peacetime Record." by Naval Inst. Press.

[Rajay]

Are there any known surviving PBN Nomads in Russia? If they flew them up until the 1970's, is it possible that a few might still be around? Thanks for the response.

Wasn't the PBN built only as a pure flying boat and never as an amphibian? If that is so, then it might not matter so much that they were operated in the Soviet Union up until the 1970's - without the capability to be readily moved to just about any airport, to some out of the way back corner or ramp, they would have remained dependent on a certain amount of seaplane port, ramp, or dock facilities. Without that support infrastructure, there probably would have been a lot of impetus to scrap them after they were withdrawn from service. We've all seen old airplanes parked out of the way on the "back" of an airport ramp or whatever, but when was the last time you saw anything survive for long unattended in the water or anchored or tied up at a waterfront area?

In aviation and otherwise, water can be the source of a lot of fun, but it is almost never your "friend" - if you know what I mean.

[David Legg]

[/quote] Wasn't the PBN built only as a pure flying boat and never as an amphibian? [/quote]

Quite correct.

I looked in the Red Stars Vol 4 book by Geust mentioned in an earlier posting but could not see that it said PBN-1 Nomads were operated "...into the 1970s". It does say that they were still in use by Polar Aviation in the early-1960s. The Gordon/Komissarov book US Aircraft in the Soviet Union and Russia states that KM-2s (4-blader Nomad variants) served until the late-1950s.

Personally, I think the 1970s is unlikely but, that said, I would not be surprised if there was a derelict airframe or two extant given the other aircraft that have come out of the former Soviet Union in recent years. I have never heard of any however and the last surviving Nomads I know of were the two in a Culver City studio lot many years ago, unidentified but presumably US Navy.

Last edited by David Legg on Fri Sep 23, 2011 1:16 am, edited 1 time in total.

[51fixer]

A while back I posted some pages from an employee manual for the Naval Station at Philadelphia.
In it is some pics of building the Nomads their.

[N3Njeff]

A while back I posted some pages from an employee manual for the Naval Station at Philadelphia.
In it is some pics of building the Nomads their.

Still would like to see the rest of that book

[J-Christophe]

David Legg wrote :
"... the last surviving Nomads I know of were the two in a Culver City studio lot many years ago, unidentified but presumably US Navy".

Is it a picture (1970) of these two, David?


from WINGS vol.5 No2, Apr.1975.
Bought from War Surplus, they had been acquired for the movie High Barbaree (1947), staring Van Johnson as a Navy pilot.
Not that long to be scrapped... a great pity.
J-Christophe.

[David Legg]

Certainly the same aircraft J-C but the photo is from a very slightly different angle and not quite the same as the one I had seen in Air Classics (or Warbirds Interrnational?).

[Rocketeer]

Interesting pictures! It's a crying shame that those two were scrapped.

[Rajay]

That bulbous nose turret looks like something that only the Russians could design, at least to me.

The Squadron/Signal publication PBY Catalina In Action (No. 62) shows a color plate side profile of the PBN-1 in a Soviet paint scheme supposedly representing BuNo. 02821 (Buzz number "30") at NAS Kodiak while enroute to Russia in September 1944. That PBN had a much smaller nose turret, similar to the original design but with less framing. It was still smaller than the "eyeball" turret used on the later PBY-6A, much less the huge honking monstrosity shown above.

The inline B&W photos of the PBN in the text section about it all show USN versions with similar small semi-frameless turrets, but there is also a diagram of the huge "retractable power turret" like the one in the photo above. Based on it, it doesn't seem possible that the pilot and co-pilot could see over it or see anything out in front of the airplane, especially at a higher angle of attack such as during a landing flare!

On the other hand, the Soviet paint scheme shown shows a red star on the aft fuselage and the remnants of the star above are on the forward fuselage, just like most USN Catalinas....

[J-Christophe]

It depends on the position of the turret, extended or collapsed.


(source National Archives)



(coll. N.M.N.A.)

The Russian GST had its specific design (source coll. G.Petrov)

Not that ugly...

On YouTube, I've found this :
NACA tests on redesigned hulls, with different angles to the first step.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXnmOpVD ... re=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIJilQw6 ... re=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rz_Sfca ... re=related