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

[Taigh Ramey]

The bathroom thing is a good one I never thought of Gary. That would explain a lot!

Taylor,

Yes, we use the AN104 for our com radio and it works great. The paint on it is it's original WWII paint. Sadly some of the paint came off with the masking tape during our recent paint job. I have painted these antennas before without noticeable degradation. Don't use any lead based (would these exist any more anyway?) or other paints with metallic components.

When I was working for FHC we tested the antennas and disproved the rumors that their performance drops off on the ends of their VHF spectrum. They are great and efficient antennas that I try to promote their use whenever I can.

[Taylor Stevenson]

Perfect! Thanks, Taigh. Looks like that may be a winter project. To avoid a modern antenna on the L-5, we put one in the wooden core of the vertical and it gets iffy reception. Sometimes I have to do 360's to get the angle just right!

[Taigh Ramey]

You have seen the end results but I'll back up a bit to show some of effort that went in to achieving the end result.

First the Harpoon was prepped for paint at home. This involved repair, dent removal, crusty screw and Dzus replacement, some body work and lots and lots of cleaning.

Here is Cade, and Ricky in the inside, finishing up the skin repairs that were started by the Colorado Boys a while ago.



Larry was removing dents and using body filler to smooth them out. The skins are pretty good on the Harpoon but there are a few places with road rash that needed his attention. You can see some of the rusty screws on the left that are some of the many in need of replacement. Lots of new screws to go in prior to paint



The old markings on other areas were cleaned off with soda blasting. Here is the gang on one of the work weekends going at the endless cleaning and prep work needed



Scott and Ken working on the belly



Mike and Ron changing hardware on the wings







Ron scrubs the flaps with Scotchbrite. Pretty much the whole airframe was cleaned by hand like this to be sure it was clean and ready for primer



Larry and Jeana having a good time working on the Harpoon



Ken was scrubbing the nose and replacing the old transponder antenna with a new one while Ricky was getting the new intercom up and running



Lots of cleaning and prep. Preparation is 90% of the battle.

While the cleaning and prep was going on the cowlings came off for their own special attention. The old rusty Dzus buttons were replaced with beautiful new ones that I bought about 30 years ago from an old warehouse in Burbank. I have to wonder if they were WWII Lockheed PV surplus as nothing in that old warehouse was newer than 1945. They were the perfect size for the PV-2 cowling. I thought they would come in handy some day.

We hadn't replaced so many Dzus fasteners at one time before (over 500) so with a great idea for a removal tool from Rich Palmer we fabricated our own (since we couldn't find one to fit the portable drill) that worked great for fast production work and fast it was. Here is Jeff and Phillip going hard at removing over 500 old Dzus fastener studs by cutting out the collars with the new magical tool. Thanks for the idea Rich!



Here is a shot of one of the smaller Dzus fasteners to be replaced. Most of the 500+ were FA6 1/2's.



Unfortunately we had very few of the correct length collars in stock but a lot that were about 1/8th of an inch too long so we made a tool to hold them and shortened them up to the correct size. A lot cheaper than buying new ones





After the old Dzus fasteners were removed the cowlings were cleaned with soda blasting and then prepped with acid wash and alodyne. Then they were primed on both sides and the inside was painted dull aluminum. After this we would install the new Dzus fasteners.

It is amazing to me how many comments I received from folks coming by the shop saying I should paint the blue on the outside of the cowling and then install the new Dzus fasteners. They said it would look a lot better with shiny new unpainted hardware nezt to the blue paint. This is great for a custom build but to me it produces what I call the zipper effect and is completely the opposite of the main idea of the paint being camouflage. I also have received grief over the flat paint for the same reasons but that's okay. No zipper effect or gloss paint on this old bird and when asked why I chose to paint it this way the answer is simple. I didn't choose the paint job, the US Navy and Lockheed did it this way and I am simply recreating what this PV-2 carried when she left the factory.

Back to the cowling...

Here are Jeff and Phillip setting the new Dzus studs in the collars in the cowling. Jeez there are a lot of these to do but they turned out great.









Now the cowling has to go back on so we can fly the Harpoon to the hangar where we are going to paint her







It was a late night getting her all cowled up but the gang pulled through and got the job done

Here is the gang posing for a group shot before we were ready to head off to the paint the old gal
Alex, Ricky, Jeana, Phillip, Jeff, Cade, Larry and Mike



Getting all cleaned up to fly her and just get oil all over the place once again...clean, fly, clean, fly...repeat. Welcome to Warbirds

Last edited by Taigh Ramey on Mon Oct 01, 2012 10:46 am, edited 2 times in total.

[cco23i]

OUTSTANDING! Wish we could have been there to help more. Thanks Taigh and the gang for more "POON porrnn" I always wait to see what new stuff happens.

Scott

[hbtcoveralls]

"I didn't choose the paint, the Navy did" That's Fantastic! I absolutely love this restoration thank you so much for posting this for us all to see. The Poon is just phenomenal I wish you the best of luck with her.
Tom Bowers

[Dan Johnson II]

There's gotta be a kids book in this somewhere. The Harpoon is just meant to be caricature. How can't the story of a lost and wayward Harpoon, found and lovingly brought back to life and restored her former glory, not have a kids book to be sold at airshows, written all over it?

Pass on the history, and let Dad's read it to their little ones too?

I don't know what it is about this restoration, but it's above and beyond somehow. Thanks for sharing all this Taigh.

[Taigh Ramey]

I asked my daughter to come up with a caricature of the PV-2 to appeal to the kids and she made this:



We sell stickers and shirts with this logo on it for fundraising.

I thought the logo would be good for a kids book too. A bunch of different paint schemes and configurations from the factory through her tanker career and to today would be cool to do. Ill ask Maggie about it.

Last edited by Taigh Ramey on Mon Oct 01, 2012 7:37 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Taigh Ramey]

Paint: Chapter II

The paint hangar was provided by a gracious gentleman named Joe Davis of Eagle Field. As many of you may know Eagle Field was a WWII primary training base and Joe has been restoring the air field to its former glory. Joe also has a PV-2 project. Thanks for letting us use your hangar Joe!

I was a bit apprehensive about landing the PV-2 at Eagle because it has a 2300 foot strip with dirt over runs at each end. I have been in there in the B-25 quite a few times and we use most of the runway and dirt getting in and out. The last time I flew a Harpoon at Eagle Field was with my friend Doug Lacy in the sister ship to our D model but that was 20+ years ago.

I figured landing there would be straight forward and we had ample room but I will have to admit the adrenaline was flowing a bit more than usual. I three pointed her on the end of the dirt over run and had a smooth transition onto the asphalt and she slowed down great with little brake and made the turn off in the middle of the runway. It looks like the landing roll was just under 1800 feet which is right where the book says it should be at our weight.

One of our guys was video taping the landing from the tunnel gun and this was also his first warbird ride. All he could see out the back were the farm fields and wires getting closer and closer and then we plunk down on dirt. He didn't know that we were landing on the over run so his commentary recorded on the video was pretty funny.

After landing we put the Harpoon on the WWII wash rack and began the final round of cleaning, prepping and masking of the PV-2.





By that evening she was in the new paint booth and ready for more masking



Which happened the next morning





Let the priming begin.

Sherwin Williams was very kind to donate the primer and the paint. Don't much care for the color but the primer is a good one. Beggars can't be choosers...



Cade and Jeff; what a cute couple!



Cade came up with a good one especially for all of you shark mouth enthusiasts here on WIX





And then the paint goes on. The color looks good but it sure is flat. A bit too flat... Doesn't look quite right but tomorrow, after it cures it will be different, so be patient...

[Dan Johnson II]

I asked my daughter to come up with a caricature of the PV-2 to appeal to the kids and she made this:



We sell stickers and shirts with this logo on it for fundraising.

I thought the logo would be good for a kids book too. A bunch of different paint schemes and configurations from the factory through her tanker career and to today would be cool to do. Ill ask Maggie about it.

Love the logo! Good to know I wasn't completely off my rocker when the idea popped into my head about the kids book

[phil65]

Should have left the shark mouth

Nice job everyone !

[Fred41]

Thank's for the new chapters !!

[Taigh Ramey]

Chapter three of the paint saga. This is where it gets interesting...

After painting the blue on the fuselage and tail we had a wonderful dinner cooked by our own in house cook (he doesn't like to be called a chef). Since we arrived at our outpost a couple of hours drive from home Ricky has been cooking us three square meals a day. I can't remember having three home cooked meals a day, every day, in a long time. Wow how nice that was. We all were working hard and eating well and we all felt great and were loosing weight too.



Funny how the thought of fast food seems repulsive when you are content with home cooking. Thanks for that Ricky!


Back to the paint. The next day we came in to look at the new paint and it still looked too flat, if that is possible. The more important thing was that it was still very tacky when it should have been dry. Hmmm... WTF?

Well to make a long story a bit shorter; after a lot of phone calls it turns out that we had used the wrong hardener/catalyst and the blue paint that we shot would never harden.

How could this happen since we used exactly what Sherwin Williams sent to us. Well the folks that sent it said that the paperwork was cut correctly but somehow we were sent the wrong product. I had heard of this happening to other folks but never dreamed it would happen to us after all we received the paint directly from the manufacturer who should know best.

Now the fun part begins. The bottom line was that we had to remove all of the blue paint and do so in such a manner that we didn't damage the primer. If the primer had cured enough then we may be able to remove the blue and be able to still use the primer. How do we remove the top coat? Well the way that worked out best was to use razor blades to scrape it all off and then hand rub it with acetone and rags to get it clean.

Needless to say this was a real heavy blow to us all. Talk about taking the wind out of your sails.

The depression lasted about an hour and then the gang rose to the occasion and jumped back in to get the job done. I have to say that these guys are fantastic. There is nothing they can't do with the positive attitude that prevails.

I also need to thank Sherwin Williams for their support to help us get through this paint disaster. They arranged for me to go to a local distributor and load up on the cleaning supplies needed to remove the paint and get it back to where we could shoot the blue again. They also put together a new order of paint with the proper catalyst and then sent it to us overnight.

When we decided to paint the Harpoon we also set a goal to finish it and fly to the California Capitol Air Show in Sacramento. The idea was Capitol would give us the fuel we needed to make it to Reno for display on the NAHI ramp. We had planned to get the paint done with a full week to spare before the Capitol show in order to have time for any unforeseen glitches and to be able to paint other markings and apply decals etc. In meeting the schedule I made the decision to shut down the shop for a week and use all of the troops to get the PV-2 painted quickly and efficiently. One week of no income is a hard hit for our shop but it is a worthy project so off we went.

In planning for the extra week I figured we would have brought the PV-2 back to Stockton for the detail work but I had not planned on having to spend that extra week stripping and repainting and having to do so away from home. The extra week of hotels, food and more importantly the loss of income was a killer to not only the shop but on the museum's bank account too. The idea of stopping and coming back another time was out of the question so we pressed on and would just deal with aftermath later. LET'S GET THE JOB DONE! was the prevailing attitude. Once again the guys kicked butt.



















Even though it looks like Larry is having too much fun it was not a good time. What a pain in the back side...The paint, not Larry that is...well sometimes Larry can...uh, oh never mind...

If at first you don't succeed...strip, clean and try again.

[Taigh Ramey]

Chapter IV-trying to move forward once again

Speaking of Larry being a pain. He was working on the platform on the fork lift when he unknowingly pissed off one of the local wasps. Right next to the eye. Ouch! Wasp 1 Larry 0



"you think I look bad? Well you should have seen the other guy...He was this big!"





Later that same week with the airframe cleaned up we were able to start applying the blue once again and it was looking much better than before.

Mask the wings and nacelles first then shoot the tail and fuselage. After that is dry mask the fuselage and shoot the wings.









At one point we were worried about running out of catalyst so I called Chuck Wahl and he had what we needed. Larry Gaines (not the Larry pictured above) was kind enough to fly up in his Bonanza to Chucks place and bring down the materials quickly. Chuck also had shot this type of paint a lot so he gave us some great advice on how to get the flat; flat. Thanks Larry and Chuck for your awesome assistance! A lot of people have bent over backwards to help the Harpoon and we are very grateful for all of that help.

With Chucks help and the able hands of Larry (pictured above) and Cade we were able to achieve what we think is the correct finish as called for in the Navy specification SR-2E as amended. The wings and horizontal stabilizer are semi gloss and the rest of the aircraft is non specular sea blue.

Here is Cade, our in house painter, showing the highest painting standards to which he adheres to and his ability to multi task. You should see him paint Gangnam style!



Just to the left of Cade is Bernie. Bernie is also a judge at the NAHI event at Reno and he came out early to help us with whatever needs doing. He kind of came in in the middle of the mad dash to try and make it to the Capitol air show. Once again the paint was calling the schedule as it was taking a long time for it to dry enough to be able to tape to so making it to the California Capitol air show was not looking good at this point. So much for our fuel to get to Reno. darn!

Here is Bernie drawing up the patterns for the national insignias and having fun doing so.





After the fuselage was dry enough to tape, the national insignias were masked and the fields were shot with non specular insignia blue and then the white.

We have a factory production drawing for the size and location of the fuselage insignia which is close but does not quite match. Thankfully we have a photo taken by Brian Baker of 84060 while it was in storage at Litchfield. This great shot of a PV-2 just two serial numbers away from ours gives enough detail for us to scale up the national insignia and determine its correct size and location. It seems the addition of the side camera window in the later aircraft made it necessary to re-size and relocate the insignia on the left side of the fuselage. You just can't have too many photos of these aircraft because the manuals, production drawings and photos all have clues and added together help to document the authenticity. If you do your homework and detective work then it makes it real simple to recreate the paint and markings accurately. This is the fun of it. Finding all of the clues and information and bringing it back to life.

















There is Joe's PV-2 in the background waiting for its turn to turn blue.



It would have had the same paint scheme in fact here is a shot of Joe's very Harpoon awaiting flight test at Van Nuys



We were all worried how she would look once we pulled her out into the light of day and it was quite the roll out. She looked real good. After several weeks of long hours of back breaking work the end result was certainly worth the effort.



Well done guys and gals. Look what you did!



Just a nap. Just one little three day nap is all we need...

















No time to nap we have to hurry up and get to Reno.

[martyhall]

I was told before you showed up that "that plane will never fly again!" You and your crew 'done good' and do deserve the 'Bravo Zulu' some one mentioned in an earlier msg. I was getting concerned about the future of 062 until you came flying over the horizon at the Eleventh Hour, and couldn't be more please with the results of our dealing. She could not have found a better home.

If you ever bring her up here, the first round's on me....

Marty Hall
Fairbanks, Alaska

[Kyleb]

Chapter three of the paint saga. This is where it gets interesting...

Well to make a long story a bit shorter; after a lot of phone calls it turns out that we had used the wrong hardener/catalyst and the blue paint that we shot would never harden.

...

Now the fun part begins. The bottom line was that we had to remove all of the blue paint and do so in such a manner that we didn't damage the primer. If the primer had cured enough then we may be able to remove the blue and be able to still use the primer. How do we remove the top coat? Well the way that worked out best was to use razor blades to scrape it all off and then hand rub it with acetone and rags to get it clean.

Oh my God...

That had to be devastating. Glad (and impressed) that you guys were able to push on through.