Warbird Information Exchange

Where if any could anyone obtain actual enginered drawings of aircraft? Would anyone even have them for research purposes?

Here's the starting point, Paul...the National Archives.

http://www.archives.gov/

Any aircraft engineering drawings that were formerly kept by the Smithsonian are now with the NARA. They will be able to tell you whether the drawings you seek are in their files.

If the drawings exist, your next step will be to secure permission from whatever entity holds proprietary rights on the drawings. NARA will not release copies of engineering drawings to you without a signed document. Also understand that you will be signing an agreement by which you promise not to use these drawings to construct a flyable aircraft.

Hope this helps. Let me know if you could use any more assistance.

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

Thanks I will start there!

I have just got a quote for PBY drawings on microfilm from the Smithonian, I think you will find they have most military aircraft on file.

regards

Mark Pilkington

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20th Century - The Age of Manned Flight
"from Wrights to Armstrong in 66 years -WOW!"

Hi Mark,

A little over a year ago I also contacted the Smithsonian for engineering microfilm. At that time I was informed that everything was now handled by NARA, and all my further contacts were with the folks in NARA's cartographic section. Did you receive the same instructions?

I'm guessing that Lockheed-Martin holds the proprietary rights on the PBY drawings. I found them to be most helpful and cooperative in obtaining microfilm on the TBY. I've heard that some entities are not quite as cooperative in authorizing the release of microfilm copies. Have any posters had the experience of being denied access to microfilm?

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

Dan,

I was advised by Pensocola that the Smithonian had the PBY drawings, I applied to them and they are the ones who provided the Quote, I will grab the letter later (its not with me atm) and let you know, but I do not recall any mention of having to apply to someone else as they gave me direct quotes for everything in the Smithonian letter?

I am rebuilding an Australian built CAC Wackett Trainer and purchased many drawings directly from CAC before they were taken over by Hawker de Havilland, when I applied to Australian Archives and our equivalent of the FAA for copies of further drawings held by those groups I required a letter from CAC authorising them to permit me to have copies of the drawings.

So this might be the normal commercial requirements of some manufacturers to control who can produce parts etc from their drawings held in archives, however even this was not an issue for the PBY drawings, although I recall the Smithonian quote refers to these drawings being available for research and not for production?

Again I will review the letter and confirm these aspects.

regards

Mark Pilkington

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20th Century - The Age of Manned Flight
"from Wrights to Armstrong in 66 years -WOW!"

Dan

The drawings are quoted from the Smithonian National Air & Space Museum - Archives.

They are accompanied with a document use and indemnification agreement which acknowledges the reproductions are made available solely for personal, non-commercial uses such as historical research, model makign or non-profit restoration purposes and they may be further controlled in their use by copyright, trademark patent or related interests not owned by the Institution.

It specifically states no representations are made that the drawings meet current or past airworthiness standards or are in any way suitable for construction or repair of aviation equipment.

regards

Mark Pilkington

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20th Century - The Age of Manned Flight
"from Wrights to Armstrong in 66 years -WOW!"

Dan,

I noted in my quote that the Smithonian also refer to some other PBY drawings that they have returned to the National Archives NARA, and refer contact there for those,

however they seem to be dupicates or different sets to the copies Smithonian are quoting to me direct.

Perhaps some drawings were not owned by the Smithonian and have been returned after copying or review by the Smithonian?

regards

Mark P

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20th Century - The Age of Manned Flight
"from Wrights to Armstrong in 66 years -WOW!"

There's thousands of aircraft and billions of drawings. Are you thinking of something in particular?

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Raven

Interesting! I stand corrected, as it appears that not all drawings have moved over to NARA. Perhaps it is a work in progress?

In my case with the TBY stuff, the Smithsonian offered photocopies of a couple of manuals, but engineering microfilm was all NARA.

And--as I'm sure is the case with others who have pursued microfilm--prepare to be disappointed! The quality of images typically ranges from "quite good" to "virtually invisible." Shame on those who managed to sell microfilm equipment to museums so that they could toss all those original drawings in the dumpster!

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It was a good idea, it just didn't work.

I work for a company that archives their original data in their vault, but provides online scans for daily use. Often those scans are unreadable and I have to request that they be re-shot. There is no conspiracy here, just the limitations of the equipment and a lack of quality control. And don't think that this problem is limited to photography and scanning. Most everything is currently done by computer at my company, but vendors sometimes even find the printouts from computer generated drawings unreadable when the number 5 turns into a 6 or the number 6 turns into an 8, then the parts don't fit!

Some of the well known restoration shops have redrawn some of the original warbird manufacturing drawings so they can get parts reliably duplicated by suppliers (like machine shops or forming houses).

As BDK says, it's a quality control issue, rather than a technology issue.

Of course, IIRC, 'Blueprints' are blue to make copying (by film and Xerox technology) difficult, which incidentally will cause archiving problems!

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Raven

I've never seen a blueprint in aerospace, although they may have been used some places.

I think most common mediums for originals are pencil on vellum, ink on mylar, and scribecoat (coated fiberglass scratched with an awl to make the lines transparent). A lot of aircraft drawings are full scale and need to be drawn on stable materials to be used as flat patterns and for lofted surfaces. Stable mylar "washoffs" are then made from the originals to be sent out to suppliers and for shop use and the original is archived.

Buildings are usually rectangular (or other simple shapes) without complex contoured surfaces and full size patterns are not used. Blueprints have now been replaced with bluelines (a negative image from a blueprint) in most cases. I guess this saves ammonia which is used in the process.

Of course computer drawings are easily scalable so all this full scale "paper" stuff is obsolete in industry for archival purposes.

The blue (sometimes black) line drawings still commonly called "blueprints" is the Diazo process. This came into widespread aviation industry popularity just prior to WWII, but goes back a bit further. If I'm not mistaken, the B-17 was one of the first aircraft which had its drawings made in this way (according to an old Clearprint ad). This is the pencil on paper vellum process. NAA, and Grumman used this as well. By and large ink work was forgone for the speed of very soft lead!

Those that have been hunting down "microfilm" for years, used to be able to get nearly any USAAF (or earlier, back to WWI) aircraft drawings from the DOD. I got my set of Mustang microfilms under the Freedom of Information Act. Then the demand was such that NASM took over. Not quite sure who (NARA???)the latest agency is that's supposed to have them. Hope they provide better service than the NASM did!

It is my understanding that all US Navy aircraft drawings went to the National Archives, some years back.

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Charles Neely

A contractor I worked with for a while worked on the KC-10 program. He had a great 25' x 4' drawing of the DC-10 he showed me. He kept it as a souvenir.

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