Warbird Information Exchange

OK, let's see if I can answer the other questions.
I do not recall ever seeing any canvas bag under the guns. The only canvas I knew of was thecanvas fitted around the gun ports to seal them off where the barrels protruded through the nose.

My first duty station after tech school was Hurlburt Field Fla, July1 1965. Moved to England AFB in Jan. 66 with the A-26's.
From there we eventually deployed to NKP June 6, 1966, with the original 8 aircraft arriving on 18 June 66. I was there until late November 66 and returned to EAFB, La. Consequently got sent back to Udorn Thailand in Aug. 67 to the 432nd TFW and was there til Feb. 68. Finished out my enlistment at Seymour Johnson AFB in Goldsboro, NC. with the 4th TFW.

There was quite a bit of brass from the 8 guns, but don't ever recall any mention of causing a problem with anything shifting. Due to the shape, they tended to stay in the bottom, but I guess any violent maneuvers would have caused them to move around a bit. I did hear of some pilots mentioning the smell of cordite in the cockpit on occassion. There was only some kind of canvas separator between the gun bay and cockpit. We had a gun blow up in one instance and the pilot definitely commented on that. His comment to the guys in the de-arm area when he came back was "I don't know what the hell happened out there, but I'm surprised the gun bay doors are still on." I have a picture of the gun, but have difficulty posting pictures on this forum. The side plate literally was peeled back from the frame of the gun. I was impressed at the force it took to do that, since it was rivited on!

_________________
Randy Ryman
Project Big Eagle
NKP Thailand 1966
http://www.coastcomp.com/av/florence/florandy.htm

Randy,

Thanks for the additional excellent information. I would be interested in seeing the picture you have talked about, or any others you might have covering your A-26/B-26K experiences. I will send you a private message with my contact information.

Thanks again.

Ron

Hi Randy,

I was watching the A-26 Legacy Foundation DVD "A-26 Film Archives" the other night. In the armament section, there is great footage of an armament tech loading and preparing the guns for a mission. I have a question for you. After the guns were loaded, I understand the gun barrel tubes were taped or sealed somehow to prevent dust or dirt from getting into the guns. In the DVD, it looks like the armament tech is shoving something into the gun barrel tubes - almost like paper mache or putty. Can you provide me with any information concerning what you used to seal the gun barrels prior to a mission?

Thanks. Did you get my PM with my contact information?

Regards,

Ron

Try http://napoleon130.tripod.com/id488.html
and scroll to bottom of page for article by Ron Lapp

I am curious about the clipped props on the K model. Can someone explain the why and how they came to this model ?
If available would they work or be of benefit on the B or C models ?

Thanks,

Woody

On Mark used both the DC-6's brakes and props on both their civilian and military Invader conversions (but not always both) and carried this over to the B-26K. It offered some performance improvement, but as far as I've ever been able to tell, the main issue is simply that at the time of the conversions, the DC-6's were being retired en-masse and thus these props were cheap and plentiful and could be overhauled to near new status and NOS parts still acquired and delivered to the USAF whereas the old props were no longer in production and spares were getting sparse.

The engines were upgraded to a later CB series of the R-2800 on the K IIRC.
This engine had a 60 spline prop shaft, larger than the earlier R-2800's 50 spline.
They had to change the prop.
This prop won't fit a stock A/C.

_________________
Rich Palmer

Remember an Injured Youth
benstear.org
#64- Stay Strong and Keep the Faith

BOOM BOOM, ROUND ROUND, PROPELLER GO

Don't Be A Dilbert!

Rich, thanks for that additional information. I wasn't aware that On Mark had "upgraded" to a version that required the change. The books and information I'd found simply was about the DC-6 prop being available at the time and being the right size to fit so they used it. Then again, it'd kinda figure that you could move parts between Douglas aircraft.

All this gun-talk brings back memories. Most of us considered the gun set-up on the K as first rate. They were new manufacturer and dependable and eight guns with a couple of thousand rounds of .50 caliber gave a lot of fire-power. The fire control panel for the .50s was on the center overhead console, just in front of the emergency jettison handle of the clamshell canopy. The .50 cal. trigger was on the right horn of the pilot's yoke.
Guns were fired electrically, charged pneumatically. On a gun run the nav. usually charged the guns as the pilot rolled in. Coming off the target the nav. held the "gun hold-back switch" open to keep the breeches open and let the guns cool down.
Most of my experience was in the B-Model and those guns were anything but reliable. At Bien Hoa most of our Bs had six-gun noses. A couple had eight gun set-ups and a couple had 14 guns in the wings and nose. They were all bad about fouling, jamming, cooking-off and burning out.
Every aircraft we had had its own history and no telling how old most of those guns were. I know barrels were burned-out and scrapped regularly. On strafing runs guns would start and stop firing randomly and as a navigator my job was to do a quick re-charge when we got down to 2 or 3 guns firing. I always tried to hold the breeches open for a couple of extra seconds to get fresh air blowing into the barrels. Coming off of strafing runs it was common to have rounds cook-off long after the pilot released the trigger.
On the six-gun nose the number five and six gun was not in the nose but in the right side of the fuselage right in front of the cockpit. That put the breeches of those two guns right in front of the navigator’s knees. There was suppose be a canvas curtain separating the cockpit from the gun bay but it had usually rotted away. When in action the cockpit was filled with smoke and cordite. To the good the canvas curtain in front of the bomb bay was usually gone too, as well as other canvass gaskets and rubber canopy seals so that wind constantly roared thru the cockpit. A guy could get a chart sucked right out of his hand thru the crack in the canopy where the seal had long since rotted away.
I don’t remember much about how the brass was managed but I do know that we would regularly have a hot brass rattling around in the floor-board.
Another oddity I remember………..at least two of our Bs had manually-charged guns. There was a panel just below the nav’s instrument panel that had six cables dangling out of it. Each of these cables had a T-handle that let the navigator manually pull open the breech on each gun. It took a pretty good tug on each T-handle to chamber a shell and I was always told to charge twice. On strafing runs I would cradle the T-handles in my hands and when one of the cables stopped jumping I knew it was time to give that gun a yank to chamber a fresh round.
M W Bourne

Thanks guys for the information on the props and engines.

...................It took a pretty good tug on each T-handle to chamber a shell and I was always told to charge twice. On strafing runs I would cradle the T-handles in my hands and when one of the cables stopped jumping I knew it was time to give that gun a yank to chamber a fresh round.............
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I can only imagine the stamina that took to manually charge the guns. With the pneumatic chargers that attached to the side of each gun, there was a "stud" sticking out from the gun that the charger would pull back. I can tell you that I couldn't do it by hand. I seem to remember that we had to have 400# of air pressure to charge the guns. The air pressure gauge was behind the pilot. When we were working on the guns, we could look through the canopy and observe the air pressure gauge to see if we had pressure. Sometimes, for some reason, the circuit breaker on the air compressor would be pulled and we would have to get into the cockpit and reset it to build air pressure. The compressor was located in the rear gunners compartment. There were two solenoids located in the gun compartment, in the top of the gun nose, one for the right side guns and one for the left side. When we loaded the guns, and attached the belts, there was a button on each solenoid that we could manually push to activate the chargers for that particular side. It would charge the guns. We would charge once to get the first round in place. above the bolt. Once in flight, the Nav would charge them again, which would put the first round in the chamber. Wasn't a good idea to have the rounds chambered on the ground, since they could actually fire, if the ground override switch was in the "on" position. This was located in the (I believe) right side of the nose gear well.
The entire armament system was disabled when the gear came down, and the only way to do ground testing was to engage the ground override switch.
As an aside, we did learn that there was another way to bypass the ground override. One day, a crew chief was working on something behind the instrument panel and quite accidentally "shorted out" the bomb bay jettison switch, and dropped a load of M120 frag bombs on the ramp. Caused a bit of excitement for a bit, but nothing happened except a bit of embarassement, and a new directive that when an aircraft came back, the battery cables would have to be disconnected to prevent further incidents like that. On the other hand, it became a real PIA to have to go connect the batteries each time we wanted to check something.
Randy

_________________
Randy Ryman
Project Big Eagle
NKP Thailand 1966
http://www.coastcomp.com/av/florence/florandy.htm

......... I have a question for you. After the guns were loaded, I understand the gun barrel tubes were taped or sealed somehow to prevent dust or dirt from getting into the guns. In the DVD, it looks like the armament tech is shoving something into the gun barrel tubes - almost like paper mache or putty..........
=========
Hi Ron,
Yes, I did get your PM with your contact info and replied. Did you not get it??
We used Colored duct tape for taping the gun barrel blast tubes. While I was there we didn't stuff anything into the tubes. What people percieve as the actual gun barrels protruding through the nose is actually what we called the blast tubes, which was a simple sheet metal tube that went over the gun barrel. Through each nose opening was a canvas piece that kept water out of the nose compartment. As I remember, we used Red duct tape when we had it, but any color would do the job. We were told that the only purpose of it was to keep water out of the gun barrels/gun compartment in the event they flew through rain enroute to the target. I heard somewhere once that it was to indicate that the guns were "armed". I never heard that, but sounds plausible, as that was usually the last thing we did before leaving.

One funny story about the "Paddle blade" props. We had a guy in our detachment that was a "Prop" guy. He was also referred to by one crew chief as the "Fan Man". He would come out in the mornings and check all the props for nicks that they may have gotten from the PSP runways when they reversed the props and stones got picked up. I remember that he had this enormous flat file that he would file the nicks out of the props on the leading edge. I asked why he did it, and he said it was to prevent "fissures" or cracks from developing from the nicks.
One night, we had an aircraft return that had taken several hits, one of which went right through the center of one of those paddle blade props, about a foot from the end of it. Nice neat hole, with scorch marks around it, indicating that it was an incendary round. The "fan man" showed up that morning with his file, and I said, "I want to see you file that one out!" He just looked at it in disbelief, and shook his head, and mumbled something like, "Why am I doing this!"
That happened to aircraft #666, which is now on display at Hurlburt Field, Fl.
Randy

_________________
Randy Ryman
Project Big Eagle
NKP Thailand 1966
http://www.coastcomp.com/av/florence/florandy.htm

Hi Randy,

No, for some reason I did not receive your PM. Please send it again, or send your e-mail to my work and home e-mail addresses as contained in my PM.

Regarding the taping of the blast tubes, I always thought it was to keep moisture and dirt out of the guns. This seemed to be the practice in WWII. In the Battle of Britain and subsequent operations, the RAF taped their fighter gun ports with red tape to indicate the guns were armed - as well as to keep moisture and dirt out of the guns. The USAAF, RCAF and other air forces did the same. When the aircraft returned from an operation/mission, it would be easy to determine if the guns had been used. Due to the high altitude the fighters flew, I guess the freezing up of the guns became a problem.

I look forward to hearing from you.

M W Bourne, thanks for providing your excellent comments as well. It sure sounds like the 8 gun Invader was an awesome bird.

Ron

Hi Randy,

I neglected to thank you for providing the excellent information in your previous posts. Thanks again for the outstanding information. Please resend your PM when you have a chance.

Thanks.

Ron

Smart man. He obviously understood stress risers. I -never- left a prop nick unfiled. I suspect only one side of his file was flat, though; you need to round out the nick.