Warbird Information Exchange

Seen on defenseaustralia.gov.au: (DAN) Today (4/1) the Australian Defense Ministry announced that its studies have concluded that no modern CAS airframe has yet bested the performance of the venerable Douglas A-1 Skyraider. As a result, the statement continued, "We are pleased to announce a full production run of 167 airframes of updated A-1's, designated A-1K, to begin rolling off the line sometime during the summer of 2015." The airplanes will come equipped with turboprop engines and numerous other modern touches, however the same proven airfoil and toughness of earlier Douglas models will be an integral part of each one. In a related move, the commandant of the Basic Flying Training School in Tamworth has issued a press release detailing his efforts to add tailwheel conversion training to those to be tracked to fly the A-1K. The airframe chosen for this mission, not coincidentally, will be a turboprop-modified North American T-6 to be designated "Texan III". Not surprisingly, a number of RAAF students have already sought to be tracked to the new attack platform. As one young Pilot Officer remarked, "Here we thought we'd missed this place in history, yet here we are. The more things change, the more they stay the same."

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"Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves."

You are a cruel man... this was the most heinous April Fools joke ever!

I knew it was a joke, but that model is very cool.

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Better is the enemy of Good.

It's apparently an ex-VNAF (MAP-spec) airplane, not ex-USAF, as evidenced by the VNAF-type VHF antenna and the lack of tailhook. Most likely one flown out to Thailand in 1975. I didn't have any luck with the SN or running down the identification any other way, either. Oh well, I'm just glad it still exists.

I see that like the USAF Museum example, they incorrectly painted the undersides white. The USAF-spec A-1Es were overall gray. Beautiful airplane anyway.

ETA: Just re-read the original post and saw that it was "returned from Vietnam around 1999." Oh well, I was close.

Welcome señor Snake. Glad to have you, I can tell you'll fit in nicely here. Be ready for some brain overload.

We'll find you some nice VNAF bearcats as well, their here.

M

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

Hi Mark, thanks for the welcome.

I posted a Hi/introduction post, but it seems to have vanished. Huh. Ah shucks oh well.

The fact that the 300 gal centerline tanks were generally left USN white and that a few A-1E's made it into USAF service with less-than-spec-paint jobs has probably led to the confusion. Although you are correct, I'll admit that there are several USAF A-1E photos where it is really hard to tell. Some might be illusion, others, I'm not sure. I just wish they'd gotten the silver leading edges right for these two museum birds ...

Ken

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"Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves."

I know what you mean. I've managed to collect a few photos of some of those "less-than-spec-paint jobs" (one of them is in this thread), and others where it looks like the bottom of the fuselage from the cowling back might be white, but not the underside of the wings or tail. But I have yet to see one in full USAF-spec gray where all the undersides are clearly white.

It's not rare, though, to see white outer pylons on a gray airplane, or a mix of white and gray pylons. I've even seen a few pylons that I'd swear were still Glossy Sea Blue.

I'm also finding that VNAF Skyraiders in the USN Gull Gray/White scheme are rarer than I'd originally thought. Most of the VNAF A-1s are also overall gray. It's not hard to find some of the A-1E/Gs delivered to VNAF in 1965 in GG/W, the H/J in GG/W is rarer though I've got pics of several.

The initial batch of 31 VNAF Skyraiders from 1960-61 all seem to be in overall gray, though I'm not finished my research on this yet.

Some VNAF Spads where listed as COIN grey. This was apparently left over from French supplies from what I am guessing. Sometimes the COIN is listed as French Blue Grey. There was a period where the US Navy experimented with camo patterns early on in the conflict. Some deployments had mixed batches of camo and overall Gull Grey. The camo was later abandoned in favor of the Gull Grey.

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Better is the enemy of Good.

Adam, I believe you're sorta right, sorta not. Looking at photos, one might say that gray VNAF A-1's prior to 1964 essentially wore USN paint, down to the font on the tail number. The COIN gray is generally accepted as the color & scheme accepted by the USAF; this scheme (with a subtle difference in the black exhaust stain area) is what the first two A-1E's wore when evaluated in Florida and was fairly consistent until camo was introduced in late 66/early 67, depending on who's dates you follow. I suppose in-country re-painting may have used local stocks and that might explain the French shade you mention.

The Navy did experiment with a 2-tone top camo but this was USN only, not to be confused with the similar scheme worn by the VNAF 83rd SAG and, as you say, the Navy was not impressed and discontinued the idea. Of course, the Navy retired its H-models shortly thereafter in 1968 and 135300 ended up in the Museum in Pensacola wearing gull gray.

BTW, here's a nice panorama of the cockpit of 135300: http://www.navalaviationmuseum.org/nnam ... /A-1H/A-1H

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"Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves."

COIN Gray is a standard USAF color, FS 36473, the flat version of 16473, AKA ADC Gray. The standard USAF-spec A-1Es all seem to have been painted this color. Interestingly, 36473 does not appear in the FS 595 book until about 1968.

I'm not sure what color gray the early VNAF Skyraiders were. I think I've seen one source that cited it as 36373, and I've seen that color cited as used on the Farm Gate B-26s of the same timeframe. 36373 DOES appear in the date-appropriate edition of FS 595.

At any rate, all the (few) GG/W VNAF Skyraiders I've found seem to date to the 1964-65 delivered airplanes. And, apparently, not all of those.

One of my favorite Skyraider pics...obviously a factory photo. Apparently Douglas kept yellow and red painted inert ordnance on hand for flight testing and so forth...or maybe the pic is just incorrectly "colorized," I've never been able to tell for sure.

The grey USAF airplanes grow on me the more images I locate of them. Here are a few, sources include the USAF, skyraider.org and some unknown.

1st ACS or 602nd ACS A-1E, likely 1965, may be the runway at Bien Hoa in upper left at the prop tip.


602nd A-1E, terrain makes it likely this was taken at Qui Nhon. Appears to be the smaller 150 gal tank on the centerline.


Hard bombs & cluster frags.


These two photos have been confirmed to be 132649, the airplane flown on Bernie Fisher's MOH mission in 1966.




A-1E, I'm guessing at at either Bien Hoa or Pleiku with what appears to be wall-to-wall napalm.

Incidentally, I recently watched "Brothers in War" on the National Geographic channel. Near the 17:00 mark there is a color clip of a grey A-1E dropping two cans of napalm in the Delta that I had not seen before. Although brief, it is some of the best color/quality of any Vietnam A-1 clip I have seen so far.

Ken

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"Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of themselves."

Skyraiders, always more Skyraiders ... BTW someone here was asking for photos of the six skyraiders below in the first photo. Might just be one in there that is of interetst

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

You guys are killin' me...KILLIN' ME! I'm at work and while I can read, log in, and even post, they have Photobucket blocked here so I can't SEE the new Skyraider pics!

Oh well, five o'clock will get here sooner or later....