<VV> Navy AD's and AF A-1E (no Corvair)

[Tony Underwood]

At 10:42 hours 01/13/2005 -0600, James Davis wrote:
>Agree.  I worked on the USAF Douglas A-1E (Navy designation AD-5) for quite 
>a while.  All had the 2,700 hp Wright R-3350-26W.
>Jim Davis         


A Viet era pilot wrote a book, "Skyraider" and told some stories (among
many others) of how the E-model drivers would use their airplanes to
transport "stuff" since the E model Skyraiders had that twin-seat
arrangement up front and a large canopy in back that would open up wide
enough to carry livingroom furniture, and this one fellow did just that,
flew a detour with his "Spad" (AF slang for the Skyraider) during a
military business trip, bought some nifty oriental furniture cheap... had
it brought to the air base and loaded into the Skyraider and flew it back
to Vietnam where he shipped it all via "wholebaggage" back to his home
stateside.   Two chairs and a couch...   

The E could also serve as a currier with seats in the back area, enough to
carry 6 people if I recall.    Imagine a fighter plane that seated a total
of 6 plus the 2 crew.   


By the way, a 'Nam era Skyraider A-1D (bubble canopy variant) was credited
with shooting down a MiG-17 that made the mistake of thinking that at low
altitude his jet could out-turn a Skyraider.   The "Spad" had 20mm wing
cannon intended for ground attack; no air-to-air gun sights but the pilot
managed with what he had and tore the MiG-17 up, down it went.    

There were instances in Korea where prop planes shot down jets when the jet
pilots failed to exploit the advantages of their airplanes and got caught
at lower altitudes where those WW-II vintage "obsolete" piston engine
fighters showed the N Korean jet jocks that both a Corsair and a Hawker Sea
Fury could still ruin their day... especially that British Hawker Sea Fury,
which was a Helluva fighter plane and able to hit off over 500 mph when it
had to, propeller or otherwise, and was powerful enough to really haul its
nose around in a dogfight particularly at lower altitude, and heavily
enough armed to ruin just about anything it shot at.    Word had it that
the N Korean, Chinese, and Russian jet jocks kept a wary eye on the Sea
Furies in Korea.    Nobody wanted to get picked up from the China Sea and
have to tell their comrades that an old piston engine fighter shot their
ass down.     

Alan Wesson might appreciate the fact that the Sea Fury used a *large* 18
cyl radial engine with sleeve valves.    And they *would* do 500+ mph; in
the late 1950s or early '60s or thereabouts, a fellow in Texas bought  a
Sea Fury surplus from the Aussies and had it shipped to Texas where he
intended to outfit it for racing.   In military trim, with the Australian
insignias blotted out with brushed-on paint, he gave it a shakedown flight
and flogged it over a measured course between two reference points and was
clocked at 502 mph.   That, in a war weary surplus Sea Fury with a ton of
hours on the engine and peeling paint.   That pass was a tad bit quicker
than the then-current official air speed record for a piston engine
airplane.   

Trivia:   The longest standing "semi-official" air speed record for a
piston engine airplane was set in 1939 by a modified Me-109 Messershmitt at
497 mph.   The record stood for over 16 years before a modified P-51
Mustang finally "officially" beat it.   Since then, the speed king crown
has been bounced back and forth between Sea Furies, Mustangs, and Bearcats.
  Currently the crown rests upon a P-51 which nipped the record from Rare
Bear, an F8-F bearcat that has managed to go much faster than it had any
right to fly, having at least one (unofficial) 545 mph pass behind its
belt.   That's getting up into the realms of approaching compressibility
speeds,  and likely to start getting dangerous for a prop driven airplane
that was never intended to go that fast.    The Bear's owner is working on
getting the official record back from that Mustang, last I heard...
assembling and wringing out a new engine.   I need to check up and see
what's going on; I'm kinda partial to that old Bearcat seeing how it was
salvaged from a junk heap that had crashed and been left for scrap,
derelict before getting rescued and taken to the races.     

By  the way... I chased down some info on that silver and blue Corsair with
the corncob engine which was hangered at Chino that crashed a while back...
it wasn't flown by Skip Holm but by a fellow named Eldridge I think... and
I'm still not sure whether it was a Goodyear F2G or an FG1 that got an
engine swap.   According to the owner, the airplane was always regarded as
a "Super Corsair" which was the tag stuck on the ten F2G hotrod Corsairs
that Goodyear built before the war ended.   Then again, I've never actually
seen any documented listing for this airplane where its original military
nomenclature was mentioned...  just "Super Corsair" owned by J Maloney.    

The airplane was odd looking with a razorback faring leading back from the
canopy which wasn't quite like the typical Corsair faring, and certainly
unlike the bubble canopy the F2G variants had.   Then again, there are
P-51D race-prepped Mustangs flying with "razorback" farings on them and
they originally had bubble canopies as well, as did the Sea Fury although
at least one S.F. also has a razorback faring added to its bodywork...
something about lowering wind resistance and air cavitation/turbulence over
the taillplane at speed.        

 
Since I'm not personally acquainted with the guys who own these airplanes,
I don't know for sure how most of them ever started out.    


tony..