PV-2D Harpoon 84062 (Tanker 101) comes back to life

over/out · **Posted:** Wed Dec 28, 2011 4:26 pm

WOW! Great Job Taigh !, I'll pass the word around San Antonio here! Being a Cat/Dog rescuer for 35 yr.s, I can tell you why Mama Cat's the way she is, She's a TORTI!! :twisted:

That breed is either VERY sweet or NOT! :wink:

I 'm going to bring up the Wix yearly Mascot thread in Jan. Let's see her there! Keep up the GREAT work. Anthony Neira :drink3:

Taigh Ramey · **Posted:** Thu Dec 29, 2011 12:34 am

Mike Halbrook wrote:

I was an electronics tech in the Navy in the early 1970's my first ship was the USS Lexington...

Hey Mike, I'm not sure where you live but how about coming to California for a month or two and getting all of the WWII radio and radar gear up and running? I'll even provide all of the solder you need!:wink:

Dean, No worries about the hijacking. I love talking old radios. I will have to go back and read about the storage on the B-17's 274N stuff. I recall radio gear stored as spares from the factory to be delivered to the destination but I am unaware that they were part of mission equipment. I haven't seen storage racks on the floor of the B-17 in the radio room but I do know of storage under the floor around the camera area. Sounds interesting for sure. I need to find some radio operators with sharp recollections and ask a bunch of questions before it is too late. It's getting harder and harder these days.

If for some reason I miss anyone's question please let me know. Some days I'm bouncing around like a pinball

B-29 BomberMan wrote:

What is the black box w/meter on the back of the co-pilots bulkhead, just above the hydraulic system in the original photo?

As Ken said it was a carbon monoxide indicator that sampled air and set off an alarm if tripped. The Harpoon used an engine exhaust heat exchanger for leading edge anti ice and cabin heat. The CO detector let the crew know if the system was leaking into the cabin. I was surprised to learn about this system from Doug Lacy 20 some years ago as I had one in my collection that he identified as having been used in the PV-2. I gave it to him and he installed it in 84061 that went down in Clear Lake, CA. I found a new one a few years ago and it is on the shelf waiting its turn to be installed. I will take a shot of it and post it for you to see up close. I wonder if it will still work. Only one way to find out.

Mike Halbrook · **Joined:** Thu Feb 25, 2010 1:42 am **Posts:** 106

Taigh, I'm in Idaho, I help out at the Warhawk Air Museum. Twenty year ago in Hollister, CA I rewired P-51D Strawboss II. I would love to help out on your plane, but I'm without funds to do any commuting. :cry:

Taigh Ramey · **Posted:** Fri Dec 30, 2011 1:20 am

Okay Mike, so we'll send you a greyhound ticket and have 10 pounds of solder waiting for you. When you get here we promise a Hot Pocket and a Coke each day, two Cokes on Sunday. We can offer a choice of beds: a wonderful WWII stretcher, the hose bed of the 1944 Chevy fire truck, the ball turret (fetal position required) or anywhere in the harpoon. Sound good? Cool! Where do we send the one way bus ticket?

B-29 BomberMan · **Joined:** Tue Dec 27, 2011 8:41 pm **Posts:** 3

Redtracer wrote:

That would be a carbon monoxide detector.

Thanks for the info Ken hope to see you in April.

Redtracer · **Posted:** Sat Dec 31, 2011 1:06 pm

No problem! Man, we can't wait to get out there and really show her off! April will be our first show. I need to hear thoses 2800s humming again so I can stop having to make airplane noises while I'm sitting in her! All you Warbird nuts know what I'm taking about.......

cooper9411 · **Posted:** Sat Dec 31, 2011 2:07 pm

Redtracer wrote:

No problem! Man, we can't wait to get out there and really show her off! April will be our first show. I need to hear thoses 2800s humming again so I can stop having to make airplane noises while I'm sitting in her! All you Warbird nuts know what I'm taking about.......

Sorry, I couldn't hear you the engines were running :lol:

B-29 BomberMan · **Joined:** Tue Dec 27, 2011 8:41 pm **Posts:** 3

Redtracer wrote:

No problem! Man, we can't wait to get out there and really show her off! April will be our first show. I need to hear thoses 2800s humming again so I can stop having to make airplane noises while I'm sitting in her! All you Warbird nuts know what I'm taking about.......

R-2800 Humming? Man, you will have to SPEAK LOUDER as those are the engines that made me go deaf.

But I had fun doing it.

rclausen · **Posted:** Tue Jan 03, 2012 11:19 pm

B.Cat/S.Fury wrote:

WOW! Great Job Taigh !, I'll pass the word around San Antonio here! Being a Cat/Dog rescuer for 35 yr.s, I can tell you why Mama Cat's the way she is, She's a TORTI!! :twisted:

That breed is either VERY sweet or NOT! :wink:

I 'm going to bring up the Wix yearly Mascot thread in Jan. Let's see her there! Keep up the GREAT work. Anthony Neira :drink3:

I would say that she is the best argument for 'Tort reform' there is. On Monday she exited Taigh's office, attacked Kenny's son Carson for no apparent reason, and then went back into the office. While she is a buddy of mine, she has made several enemies by virtue of her behavior.

cco23i · **Posted:** Wed Jan 04, 2012 9:50 am

She was probably loking for Kenny but found his son instead. You know how he is with females. :lol:

Scott

wingman1 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 04, 2012 2:51 pm

B.Cat/S.Fury wrote:

WOW! Great Job Taigh !, I'll pass the word around San Antonio here! Being a Cat/Dog rescuer for 35 yr.s, I can tell you why Mama Cat's the way she is, She's a TORTI!! :twisted:

That breed is either VERY sweet or NOT! :wink:

I 'm going to bring up the Wix yearly Mascot thread in Jan. Let's see her there! Keep up the GREAT work. Anthony Neira :drink3:

LOL! please post that link here. :wink:

Redtracer · **Posted:** Wed Jan 04, 2012 9:12 pm

Quote:

She was probably loking for Kenny but found his son instead. You know how he is with females.

Scott

That's right! You know me and the ladies! And BTW she's my wife! HUBA HUBA!

Taigh Ramey · **Posted:** Thu Jan 12, 2012 8:38 pm

Sorry for the slow updates lately. It hasn't been for a lack of work it's just that I have been traveling a lot and other business crap sucking up the time in the day. I know; lame excuse so here goes:

The radio table had to come back out because I finally dug the table light out of the parts storage hangar. The light has a fitting on the box that will only allow it to slide in the slot from the rear. It worked out great as I had a bunch of other parts to bolt on to the table anyway. My daughter Sydney came out to help on a Saturday and she hit the deck so to speak. Here she is under the radio ops seat turning the nuts that hold the table in place

Here is Sydney fixing up the table light. This is the same one used in several other WWII aircraft including early B-17's. The light is in great shape and only needed wiring added so we can hook it up when we get power in the area.

This is the radio table on the bench and you can see the silver table light box and the newly fabricated drawer added to the bottom of the table.

The table all ready to go back in with its compliment of gadgets and doo da's. The aforementioned explosion proof Morse code key, original Globe Wernicke clip board clip and a Lockheed made pencil holder complete with pencil. Maybe I should clean up my work area as it is starting to look as bad as my desk in the office...naw, nothing is that bad!

Ken gave me a Christmas gift of 5 pencils that are reported to be exact replicas of original Naval Aviators pencils. Too cool! The Harpoon thanks you Ken.

The table goes back in hopefully for a longer time

Syd also got one of the cabin dome lights working again. It will need the hokey wiring replaced but along with the two other dome lights we installed we can now work better at night!. The lights are hooked up to the battery hot bus with a switch at the main door for easy entry lighting. There is even supposed to be one in the cockpit which is sure handy. Boy Lockheed thought of everything. I wonder if the toilet seat is heated...?

More to come...

Warbird Kid · **Posted:** Thu Jan 12, 2012 8:53 pm

Awesome Taigh! Always does my heart proud to see other young(er) kids workin' of warbirds when they can! Props!

Taigh Ramey · **Posted:** Fri Jan 13, 2012 1:56 am

I found the D-12 compass in the storage hangar so here it is for a fitting. It lined up nicely with the new shock mounts but I will not bolt it in quite yet as the whole Nav table still has to come back out for paint after the table top material comes in. The top gets a layer of material so the Nav can write on it and the protractor will ride smoothly.

The cover for the D-12 compass is fabricated and fit

Here is a shot of the new Mk 3 Aircraft Protractor (Navigators drafting arm) from eBay installed on the nav table along with the compass cover.

The Protractor was $25 band came new in the box. The only problem is it was for an Army contract but I found the correct Navy one and the gentleman was very kind and donated it to our worthy project. I have a special fondness for the Navigators station as my Dad was a B-29 Navigator. He and I would collect navigation gear a lot of which is going in to the Harpoon when the time is right. The Nav station will be darn full of gear just waiting for a navigator to sit down and get to work.

Interesting how the arm will stow and pivot out of the way.

The next project at the Nav station is the equipment shelf above the table. This shelf mounts the Flux Gate Compass amplifier, caging switch, master indicator and dynamotor. It also has supports for circuit breakers, controls for the instrument lights and heated suit plug. The first thing was to bend up the brackets. The lightening holes are then punched out and flanged with dies.

Then the angles are bent, clamped in place and drilled

After paint the parts are riveted together. I love the big brute rivet squeezer. It can rivet better than I can!

Best $50 I ever spent

The parts are clamped in place, leveled and then back drilled through the original holes

I had one of these original shelves for the PV-2 that I picked up at the Pima Air Museum back around 1978 or so and I dug it out. Who knows it could have been removed from our very Harpoon. Here is one of the brackets being cleaned up. The paint is in decent shape and is full of part numbers and inspector stamps so it is going to keep its original paint. It matches the rest of the interior pretty well. It's only original once

The flux gate master indicator mount also came on the old shelf I picked up at Pima 30 plus years ago but it needed some new paint.

The old shelf can be seen in the background and the new one is ready to assemble. Interesting how the shock mounts are riveted right to the wood shelf

Final assembly begins

The old master flux gate compass indicator on the left which is not bad but the one on the right is new old stock so it in goes

Gotta love the Navy anchor stamp too. Army contract parts in a Navy aircraft makes for bad juju!

Oooh the nav shelf is nearly complete

The flux gate compass amplifier still has the QA seal. So if it doesn't fire up then is should still be under warranty!

The Flux Gate Compass is a fancy magnetic compass system that has a remote transmitter out in the wing as far away from magnetic interference as possible. The magnetic compass in the remote transmitter is also gyro stabilized to prevent wandering during maneuvering. The amplifier takes the signal from the transmitter and and powers the master indicator. There is also a slave indicator for the pilots panel. Its a standard 3 1/8th instrument that is not as precise as the master. This same system was used in most all Army bombers too.

That's all for now. More tomorrow

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PV-2D Harpoon 84062 (Tanker 101) comes back to life

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