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EFV-8 Club Forum / General Ford Discussion / Not Ford Willow Run

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Posted By Discussion Topic: Not Ford Willow Run     TonyM 12-30-2020 @ 8:18 PM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 458 Joined: Sep 2010 The photo of the B24 production Line featured on page 25 of the current V8 Times is not the Ford Willow Run B24 Plant. The line pictured is actually the Consolidated B24 line at Fort Worth, Texas. Attached are photos of Ford Willow Run. 1940 Tom 12-31-2020 @ 7:23 AM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 240 Joined: Oct 2009 Tony-- Thanks for the clarification. I'll check it out myself if and when the USPS decides to deliver my V8 Times issue to me. Best wishes to you, and to ALL EFV8CA members for a great 2021. Tom woodiewagon46 12-31-2020 @ 7:59 AM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 698 Joined: Nov 2012 It's a common misconception that Ford built all the B-24 Liberator Bombers, in fact Ford only built 6600 of about 19,000 in total. Other manufacturers were North American Aircraft in Texas, Consolidated Air in California and Texas, Bell Aircraft in Georgia and Douglas Aircraft in Oklahoma. The B-24 wasn't the favorite airplane of the aviators in WWII and called it "the flying coffin". I have flown in a B-17 and a B25 and am trying to work up my nerve to go up in a B-24. This message was edited by woodiewagon46 on 12-31-20 @ 8:25 AM therunwaybehind 12-31-2020 @ 8:44 AM reply profile send p.m. New Member Posts: 180 Joined: May 2019 I went and looked online at several more obvious Willow Run Ford images and now must concede that all of the Ford bombers were not unpainted and with round nacelles and not oval with the ducts on either side of the engine inlet. Even looking at whether the posts of the walls were Kahn reinforced concrete or steel uprights does not definitely establish where the photo was taken. Nose turret missing? Maybe a Patrol version check for two rudders. 70 vs. 71? Russian destroyer IDs are not more deceptive. My first solid wooden model was a B-24 and decades later at the Liberator museum in Pueblo Colorado they only had a B-29. Was this Witchcraft? or were my eyes deceiving me? Mr Rogers 12-31-2020 @ 11:02 AM reply profile send p.m. New Member Posts: 106 Joined: Jul 2019 Yep, gotta hand it to that American generation era ...... they stepped up to the plate!!! My dad worked at Cadillac in Detroit turning Tank crank shafts. My uncle worked at Willow Run assembling cock pit controls. TonyM 12-31-2020 @ 11:53 AM reply profile send p.m. Member Posts: 458 Joined: Sep 2010 Hello Runway, therunwaybehind QUOTE: "I went and looked online at several more obvious Willow Run Ford images and now must concede that all of the Ford bombers were not unpainted and with round nacelles and not oval with the ducts on either side of the engine inlet. Even looking at whether the posts of the walls were Kahn reinforced concrete or steel uprights does not definitely establish where the photo was taken. Nose turret missing? Maybe a Patrol version check for two rudders. 70 vs. 71? Russian destroyer IDs are not more deceptive. My first solid wooden model was a B-24 and decades later at the Liberator museum in Pueblo Colorado they only had a B-29. Was this Witchcraft? or were my eyes deceiving me?" TonyM reply: The first Ford built B-24s were B-24E type airplanes. Ford built B-24E airplanes (all painted olive drab and neutral grey) resembled the B-24D, which were produced with the glass "greenhouse" nose. No Ford built B-24E ever went overseas or served in combat; all subsequent Ford built B-24s served on all fronts. All B-24s from B-24D onward to the end of production had the oval cowlings. Nose turrets came on later models and some B-24Ds were retrofitted with the turret. As for the "Patrol version", the AAF had some early model B-24s painted in the "Sea Search" camouflage scheme and these airplanes were assigned to anti submarine groups, such as the 479thBG. That paint scheme can be seen in the photo that was published in the magazine. Only a small number of B-24s were painted in that scheme and all went to the US Army Air Forces (AAF). The most notable Ford built B-24E was the aircraft that crashed into 20,000,000 cubic foot natural gas holder two miles SE of what is now Midway Airport in May 1943. The explosion and flames reached over 1,000 feet agl. Eleven airmen were killed. A kid who went to my high school was killed test flying a B-24 out of Willow Run in August 1944. His name was Kenneth Howmiller. I have been to the Pueblo Air Museum and I posed in the B-29 there. We had an aviation archaeology conference there. I don't think that museum has anything to do with the Collings Foundation B-24 airplane "Witchcraft." I don't want to confuse the matter, but there were "knock down" versions of the B-24 produced and these were delivered to and assembled at a different location. The V-8 Times covered these topics a couple years ago in a superb series of articles. The photo published in the magazine is certainly Fort Worth, Texas. It is a well known photo. Find attached photos of a painted Ford Built B-24 and an unpainted Ford built B-24. The army air forces stopped painting most aircraft in January 1944, to save weight, time and resources. The third photo is of the tail section of the Ford built B-24E that crashed in Chicago in May 1943 mentioned above; I wrote about it in my well-received book treating fatal AAF accidents in the US. Almost 500 B-24 airplanes were involved in fatal accidents in the United States during the war years. All can be found in my book titled Fatal Army Air Forces Aviation Accidents in the United States, 1941-1945. I have flown in many warbirds over the years, including the B-17 and B-25 mentioned above. And I, too, had hoped to fly in the Collings Foundation B-24 Witchcraft same as my fellow club member Woodiewagon. Maybe we'll get our chance some day. . . . 78-730B This message was edited by TonyM on 12-31-20 @ 12:20 PM woodiewagon46 12-31-2020 @ 1:55 PM reply profile send p.m. Senior Posts: 698 Joined: Nov 2012 Tony, my dream is to fly a P-51 Mustang. The B-17 I went up in, was the Collings Foundations, ill fated "9-0-9" that crashed on Oct. 2nd, 2019. The Foundation has acquired another B-17 that is being restored at the American Aero Services facility in Florida. No completion date has been announced as of yet, as not only time, but 55 gallon drum's of $100 bills are required for the restoration.

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