Official B-29 Doc Restoration Thread

[B-29 Watcher]

The number one engine is on! Fit like a glove. Number two will follow within a couple weeks.

It has been two weeks no new news. What has been happening, hungry for news.

BTW ; I E mailed Doc's friends they told me I could order shirts from them so i have two shirts comming.

Last edited by B-29 Watcher on Wed Dec 11, 2013 12:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

[ryguy135]

No more big news at the moment. Goal is to get two more engines on by Christmas. I've been keeping busy just working through tags for certification purposes. Work continues on the big items - RH Aft bomb bay reskinning and rebuilding the skin and frames between the bays. Lots of other small work being done but nothing big yet like another engine.

BTW....anyone have any turrets?

[TAdan]

I believe the Mid Atlantic Air Museum has twin gun upper or lower turret, I've seen it on display with the P-61. I think I also saw one at the New England Air Museum on display near their B-29.

Taigh Ramey would probably be a good person to contact too.

[Jerry O'Neill]

I think NEAM's are spoken for for "Jack's Hack". They all are not installed yet.\

[Taylor Stevenson]

CAF has a couple spare turrets IIRC

[Brad]

CAF has a couple spare turrets IIRC

Nope! They are gone or being used.

[Taylor Stevenson]

Whoops. Nevermind. I just remember there being one at HQ (years ago) and one in the Collins hangars at KADS a year or so ago (may be the same).

[Jeremy Housdan]

As was mentioned, the first engine went on recently. I don't think it will stay up there, pretty sure the engine guys are just making sure everything matches up.


She's coming along well. We still have a few structural things that need to be finished (one of the bomb bay doors is still being repaired and the bottom cap/belly pan that goes between the forward and rear bomb bay doors is still being rebuilt as well) but she's come a long way since 2000. You can't see it, but the belly pan is being restored at a station roughly behind and between engine nacelles #1 and #2, while the bomb bay door is being restored near its native position just aft of the #3 Nacelle (we're in a race with Dave and Jerry to see who finishes last... pretty sure they're going to win, lol)


We *may* have a line on a complete set of turrets for the plane but I'm hesitant to say more until I hear from TJ for sure. Even if we get them it seems unlikely that they'll be ready to go on the bird until after the FAA has certified her for flight. Thats all just speculation at this point though. The "official" line is that she'll be ready for ground testing in may with the first flight to follow in June or July. While we would all be thrilled to keep with that timetable, a *lot* still has to be done before we come to that point. We're definitely in a race against the clock though, Boeing would like us to be out of their hangar by December of next year.

(edited per our marketing team)

Last edited by Jeremy Housdan on Fri Jan 31, 2014 10:35 am, edited 3 times in total.

[Jeremy Housdan]

Not a whole lot of big news to announce.

"Big" or not, any news is good to see with a project of this magnitude!

I agree with K5054NZ, as do many on here I'm sure. There's always something being done, and posting pics gets some of your volunteers some face time recognition that they really deserve. A picture is worth a thousand words, and we're a big believer of that on WIX.

I just want to encourage you to try to post whatever you can. Why? - because your project may be one of only three civilian B-29s ever to be restored to flying and deserves the recognition. I realize that the time commitment to regularly go to the hanger and photograph and then post here can be burdensome or seem redundant to your Facebook page. One difference between this site and Facebook is that on WIX you'll probably reach a few more folks with experiences or family history with this aircraft. There's a great deal of enthusiasm and a hardcore group of regulars that are strong enthusiasts of WWII aviation and history. I believe that both sites are great tools to reach a greater audience and build a community of financial supporters of the restoration and future operations. If you're not sure what doing a photo essay/sticky entails on WIX, there's plenty of inspiration within the B-26K Counter-Invader sticky, PV-2D Harpoon 84062 (Tanker 101) sticky, Texas Raiders, B-17E Desert Rat, Bald Eagle and Dave-Whats the Plan with FiFi? stickies. These get a great many looks on WIX (just see the Views) plus people link the images to other enthusiasts around the world, so your audience won't be limited to the US. Broadening your support could make a difference in the long run.

I think most of us are really glad you're posting whatever your able to do, so many thanks from me for keeping us in the loop and continued good luck! Chris Wilkinson

Thanks, Chris!

The only thing that kinda bites about our facebook group is that it isn't manned by any of the volunteers, but someone a little higher up... and I don't think they look at it very often. the "official" updates don't come along often enough so it leaves people wondering what's going on. I know the website for Doc is due for a major overhaul (they have new logos for "Docs Friends" and a million other things to put into place). I wish more of my fellow volunteers (like ryguy, who I am ashamed to say I'm not entirely certain I know without seeing a name lol) were on here or on the facebook B-29/warbird groups to help spread the word. However, a good portion of our restoration team is well past retirement age (I think we figured it up and the mean age of the Doc Volunteer group was like 71...) and most of them don't spend time on internet bulletin boards. I've been watching the warbird exchange group for a bit but I waited until I got my PC set up in my new apartment before I joined here. Backing up ryguy, I'll do my part to be vigilant in passing on any progress. The light is finally at the end of the tunnel (after thirteen years!) so I know we're certainly all excited.

[Jeremy Housdan]

One of the projects we're working on right now is restoring the bottom cap that fits between the forward and rear bomb bay doors. This piece was modified later in Doc's service life to house a radar system that lowered down out of the plane (possibly at the same time the guns were removed in Birmingham... its difficult to say) and having seen the work that was done on the structure from the mod work, it was pretty shoddy). What we are doing is restoring the piece to "wartime standard" which did not feature the radar.




We've cleared out all of the old skin and are restoring the ribs to go all the way across again. We just need to replace the support on one side, do some trimming on the spacers, (the spacers are clecoed into place on the outside) and we should be ready to start shooting the new skin on.

One of the guys who works for Boeing polishing "Air Force One" when it comes in has been donating some of his time over in our hangar polishing Doc... talk about shiny! You can definitely tell where he's polished and where he hasn't. I watched him work tuesday morning from where we were working on the bottom cap, he polished the undersides of the horizontal stabilizers and they look brand spanking new!

[ryguy135]

Hey Jeremy glad I have someone else on here helping me post updates! I haven't been able to be by this week so it's good to know that the airplane keeps getting shinier. I know polishing is the only thing keeping the elevators and rudder from going on so I bet that'll be up soon if the polishing is getting done.

When did you hear about the turrets? Last I heard a week ago from TJ was that he'd found one on eBay but that was the only lead he had.

Regarding the engines- TJ told me that the engine fit well enough that it is on there for good and he's run the wiring to it and the number 2 position. We're just waiting on some parts that we were supposed to have a few weeks ago to put the No 2 engine on.

Again, welcome to the boards! Glad I'll be getting some help!

[Jeremy Housdan]

When did you hear about the turrets? Last I heard a week ago from TJ was that he'd found one on eBay but that was the only lead he had.

Regarding the engines- TJ told me that the engine fit well enough that it is on there for good and he's run the wiring to it and the number 2 position. We're just waiting on some parts that we were supposed to have a few weeks ago to put the No 2 engine on.

Again, welcome to the boards! Glad I'll be getting some help!

This was about 2 weeks ago I think. TJ mentioned Jeff found a guy out west who had some stuff and mentioned that it was a complete set... I think they were ironing out whether or not they could get what HE wanted in exchange or enough money. Either way it isn't anything definite yet.

I wondered about the engine... I thought for sure they would've pulled it back off by now. Last time I talked to Scott, he still seemed to be under the impression it was coming back down, but I admit its been several days since I asked.

[Prop Dome Polisher]

Great photos Jeremy, thanks.

[Jeremy Housdan]

We had our christmas party friday. We ran the formation/strobe lights on the wings as christmas lights during the get-together, it was fun. Looks like shortly after the new year, either some of us are going down to Texas or some of the Fifi guys are coming up to us and we're going to have our first ground school for crew. This is exciting news for those of us (myself included) who are going to help crew this magnificent bird when she's finished. We also got our new restoration team jackets... well, MOST of us. Those of us who ordered a bigger jacket (I have huge linebacker shoulders) have to wait until after the holiday to pick it up.

The gentleman who is selling us fuel cells has put a halt on sales/delivery until after the new year (tax reasons I guess... don't know exactly why), and since we just finished cleaning up all the fuel cell spacers, we're just about ready to start installing them. We're all also anxiously waiting to hear how our new exhaust system is coming along

Ryguy, I talked to Scott Sarver on friday and he said that #1 will have to come back off... not all the parts are there and they were just making sure all the mounting holes were properly aligned.

Work has halted for the holiday... volunteers will be back in the hangar the day after Christmas!

[jtramo]

I think there is a turret on barnstormers in the warbird section. Fairly new posting.