Warbird Information Exchange

Yanks Air Museum's and Rod Lewis' Hellcats have been painted in the same livery. This is because they are both indentified as Bureau number 40467. Rod Lewis' Hellcat was originally built as F6F-5 80141, but it adopted the identity of 40467 when it was restored using parts from that aircraft in the 1980s. As a result, Yanks Air Museum's Hellcat (the aircraft that I regard as 40467) is identified by the FAA as 08831 (did Yanks Air Museum use any parts from that aircraft?) because of this identity clash.

Which aircraft do the rest of you think is which? There are other examples of this instance that I will add to this discussion soon.

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Tom

D-Type Jaguars spring to mind here. OK not warbirds, but the race car world often echoes that of the former.

At least one D-type was restored with a new front-end spaceframe (steel), using the original monocoque centre-section (aluminium) in the restored car.

The discarded front spaceframe (which carries a chassis number) was later incorporated into a second restoration by a different party and claimed the same chassis number. So which is which? Well I'd say that morally the car with the original centre-section is the one that carries the essence of the car's identity in this case.

But what if the swap was done at the same time, and by the same organization?

Back to the F6F. If it really came down to it, I'd say that it depends on what parts have been used in which aircraft. Cockpit/centre-section would be the part that carries the identity surely? And then if items such as wings, tail, engine etc are incorporated into another aircraft that's pretty much what happened in period. It didn't make "aircraft #2" turn into "aircraft #1".

And I'd also suggest that the FAA's definition of an aircraft identity wouldn't be legally binding. But it does beg the question: who does have the legal power to tie an aircraft's identity to a physical entity and certificate it? Going back to the automotive world, there are often official registries which will do this but as far as I know, no equivalent for warbirds and the like.

I thought whomever owned the data plate owned the identity.

Reminds me of the identity crisis between P=51s 44-63864 N251L "Twilight Tear" & 44-12016 N98CF "Fragile but Agile" . I believe that was more of a data plate issue then sharing parts from one airframe though.

For reference, Vintage Aviation News has an excellent article covering the history of Yanks' airframe in detail.


Regarding the FAA's position on this sort of thing, there's an article in DOM Magazine that is particularly informative.


Honestly, what is so interesting about this F6F situation is how it has brought the subject to the fore. (For example, I raised this particular situation in a separate online conversation just three days ago.) It's no secret that the concept of "data plate restorations" has discussed and debated over and over again on WIX, other forums and the historic aviation community writ large. However, just about every time it has come up in the past, it seems the issue has been academic - or at least the evidence is not immediately apparent. However, now with the very real possibility that the two airframes that could end up parked next to each other at an airshow lineup, it has suddenly gone from a purely philosophical issue to a practical one.

This is the reason I am quite curious to see if the FAA will end up involved on the subject. However, a quick check of their registry entries reveals that Yanks' airframe, N40467, is listed under the "serial number" 08831, while the entry for Lewis's airframe, N467RL, uses 40467 as the "serial number". So while the statement that:

is true in regards to the way they are painted or presented to the public, it is not in a regulatory sense. I imagine this will give the FAA just enough room to ignore the issue, but there's always the possibility that they could decide otherwise.

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Tri-State Warbird Museum Collections Manager & Museum Attendant

Warbird Philosophy Webmaster

I'd suggest that we already know instances of 'person x' owning a data plate and 'person y' owning the complete, original aircraft. This isn't about owning an identity, it's about being able to prove the identity of a genuine artefact. This is where the warbird community is decades behind (for example) the historical automotive world.

Car registries are not lists of data plates but instead a way of recording the provenance of a particular vehicle. A good example is that recently it's been possible to prove that the 1963 Le Mans winning car is in fact the same chassis that won in 1964 too. Prior to this, it had been recorded that the '63 winner was a different chassis number to the similar 1964 winner.

Back in the day, many teams used chassis numbers in a rather 'fluid' manner and would often swap identities if it made things easier when crossing international borders. In this case, IIRC the intended 1964 #20 car caught fire just prior to the race, and in order to make the carnet agree with the chassis number presented to various authorities, the chassis number was swapped with another similar car. That car just happened to be the 1963 Le Mans winner, which now assumed a different identity and became the '1964 winner', while the burnt chassis (presumably) became the '1963 winner' and could well have been scrapped.

Fast forward to 2018 and the lucky owner of the 1964 winner suddenly found out that his or her valuable Ferrari racer was overnight extremely valuable. Moreover it was an item of significant global importance.

So a proper warbird registry would ensure that a historic artefact was correctly catalogued, proven and traceable. Then, if someone claimed ownership by virtue of possessing a data plate, it could be possible to prove that the only thing they owned was the data plate. Meanwhile the identity of the actual airframe could be preserved and unimpeachable. Would it stop data plate restorers scrapping the original airframes? I'm not sure, but it might make it easier to prosecute wilful destruction of a historical artefact. This issue has been bubbling away for years and many folks have missed the point when we've questioned the validity of data plate 'restorations'. I have nothing against that per se - in fact it's likely to be the only way we'll see an airworthy P-51 in a hundred years' time.

I can fully understand why many owners would be vehemently against such a registry, since it would immediately devalue anything that is in effect a replica. But equally if the subject is not treated with gravity then the warbird community cannot be seriously considered as custodians of our aviation heritage.

There would (and should) be a monetary incentive in being able to demonstrate high levels of originality. Maybe that will get someone thinking and start the ball rolling. Equally, I suspect it's already been a big incentive in doing nothing.

Thoughtful post by quemerford. Warbirds probably have a lot to learn from classic cars for all the reasons he stated plus the fact the both fields likely have powerful factions that want the provenance of the artifacts NOT to be clear. A lot of those folks prefer to fall back on black-and-white rules like "data plate = identity" or the identities assigned by the FAA and other agencies, because for them, obscuring the shades of gray that exist is a feature, not a bug. If classic cars have overcome these pressures, we should find out how, and see if warbirds can do the same.

I don't see it as too likely that the two #19 Hellcats will appear at the same show. The Lewis planes don't get out to many events, Yanks none at all, and we seem to be done with big shows at Chino. Good thing; it's just so awkward when two girls show up at the party wearing the same dress.

But such an event is not necessary for the problems to get noticed. Last year I was struck by the way the P-51C Thunderbird is presented as if it were a 100% barn find NX5528N just as owned by Jimmy Stewart and Jackie Cochran. Anyone knowledgeable knows that the real plane crashed and burned, can see that the new one has a P-51D wing, and wonders if the original content from NX5528N amounts to a couple of shoe boxes' worth of fittings or something. But Air Corps Aviation has a full web page on Thunderbird which links to a second full web page with a "Full History" of Thunderbird and neither page mentions that it ever crashed. That doesn't help the credibility of any authenticity claim in this field. Does either #19 Hellcat contain more than a suitcase's worth of content from the original 40467? We only have hearsay on the subject, nothing really verifiable.

August

For your information, I have always regarded the correct identity of Rod Lewis' Hellcat as F6F-5 80141 (websites such as Geoff Goodall's Warbird Directory and Aerial Visuals do as well). It was the Fighter Collection that changed its identity to F6F-3 40467, obviously because they wanted it to have a more valuable history. Perhaps they didn't know that the original 40467 (or what was left of it) was being restored by Yanks Air Museum because if they did, it is likely that 80141 would still be registered with its correct identity today.

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Tom

My post wasn’t meant as a serious comment. More of a jab at the never ending data plate debates.
I too appreciate quemerford’s thoughtful insight. Very interesting and true indeed.

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“Knowing what’s right, doesn’t mean much unless you do what’s right.”

I figure that TFC must have known that when Yanks was restoring their plane (N100TF), Yanks also had 40467. Where they got the idea that Yanks used parts of 40467 in N100TF, I don't know. The plane ended up painted in bad Royal Navy markings by someone at Chino (don't know whether Yanks, MARC, or POF had custody of it by then) so it doesn't look like it was promoted to TFC as being 40467, because then it would have been painted as #19. Instead they assumed that TFC wanted it with a horrendous Royal Navy scheme. The thought process by which TFC decided, "No thanks, we want it to be Vraciu's plane" would be interesting to know.

August

By chance, this video has been uploaded to YouTube today with footage taken at the time of the first Flying Legends Airshow in 1993.

https://youtu.be/NIns2rNLleg?t=943

There's a segment in it about their recently acquired Hellcat, with an interview with both Stephen Grey and Alex Vraciu.

Cheers

Paul

Since trading identities on Warbirds is common practice, who cares (aside from me)? The aircraft is whatever the data plate says it is. Doesn't matter if parts of another aircraft are used, the data plate is what matters. The aircraft should be restored as whatever the data plate says it is. Nothing more, nothing less. Zero confusion. Pick a time in the aircraft's life, find pics, and restored it that way. No more wannabe aircraft.

That won't work. It will only satisfy a few people who worship at the altar of the magical data plate. For everyone else, it will make the plane no less a wannabe. I don't know which Hellcat has 40467's original data plate, or if neither of them does, but if I did know, it would not alter in the slightest my view of which one (if either) merits being identified as 40467.

Great video by the way, Paul. Brings back some awesome memories. Seems to confirm that TFC only learned/decided that their Hellcat was Vraciu's after purchase, though it doesn't shed any light on how.

August

Again, the data plate is the one and ONLY thing that matters. If one aircraft is representing another who actually has THE correct data plate, the one without THE data plate is wrong. Simple as that. Nothing else matters. The data plate is the one thing that identifies the airframe. It is like your social security number. If someone else has a clone of your social security number, are they you? No. They are a fraud. Same here with airframe data plates. Its not a difficult concept to grasp.

If you don't have THE data plate on your airplane, you don't have THE airplane.

I can certainly understand your conviction, but I’m not sure a data plate is the absolute ‘end all’ in establishing a warbird’s provenance. An example that comes to mind; if a diver were to recover a data plate from an intact sunken plane somewhere in the South Pacific, came home and slapped that data plate on a new built warbird. Would that new built plane assume the identity of the sunken airframe? I think not, as the original plane is still under water without it’s data plate.