CWAM visits the CAF WWII Air Expo - Dallas

We are lucky to be in an area that keeps so much aviation history alive. This weekend the Dallas area saw one of the biggest gatherings of flying WWII aircraft we have seen in a long, long time.

Several of the Cold War Area Museum Directors are also Life Members of the Commemorative Air Force (CAF) and several of the CJ's from the CWAM group flew to the event. 

In addition to the many aircraft we are used to seeing, others flew in, to help attract attention and support for the creation of a new area aviation museum and headquarters for the CAF.

These CAF aircraft, based in this, and other areas, have all been beautifully restored and maintained. If the new facility is built, some will base here and others may come for display on a rotating basis.

Families came and children got to see and touch a part of history that their grandparents (or great-grandparents) may have been part of. Rides were also available in many of the planes. All of the aircraft on display were flown to the event.

The centerpiece for the event was Fifi, currently the only fully restored and flying B29 in the world.

Our hat is off as always to Charlie Wood, who has helped co-ordinate so many joint events for the CAF and Cold War Air Museum at Lancaster. Now a National Officer for the Commemorative Air Force, Charlie was, as usual, actively recruiting new members in support of keeping these wonderful machines on display and flying.
 

If all that is being discussed comes to pass, Dallas Executive Airport, a few miles from where the CAF/DFW and CWAM museums are currently located may gain a new facility, a home for permanent and rotating display of these fine historic aircraft.

Director Boede and several volunteers took time out to contemplate the event.

And to contemplate as well, the changing times and changing trends in acceptable nose art.

Flight Time

Flying the aircraft at the Cold War Air Museum sometimes seems like a full time job.

As someone once said, "That's the kind of problem you want to have."

Once aircraft are restored to flying condition, they need to be maintained in flying condition. Doing so requires - "Flying them"!

Jon and Sean took the "Chang" up recently because it "needed" to be flown.

It was a beautiful day for flying and the two of them enjoyed a short local flight to warm the engine up before the aircraft's annual inspection.

They had a good flight, and as always, visitors to the museum enjoyed the experience of seeing (and hearing) our associated aircraft being flown.

Most weekends, one or more aircraft are being flown at the Cold War Air Museum. Come visit us at the Lancaster Regional Airport in Dallas. Click our links for driving directions and local events.

Come see us soon!

Two Changs a'Flying

On the second day of Cold War Air Museum Christmas,
Jon and Miles gave to me,
"two CJs flying".

(With apologies to The Twelve days of Christmas Song)...

Christmas eve and Christmas day saw a rare sight in Dallas - SNOW. But as you can see from these pictures, by the next day it was all gone. With the weather cold, clear and calm, Jon and Miles took the opportunity to take to the air. Miguel had a chance to go along with them and we thank him for these pictures. You can see more of his photos on his Flikr pages. Without much narration, this post is simply dedicated to the fun of flying.

The day was beautifully clear and the moon was visible in the sky.

The long lens on Miguel's camera makes the aircraft appear much closer than they are.

Miles smiles, looks like they had a good day of flying.

In the calm air, the vortices from the propwash are clearly visible when Jon turns on the smoke.

F.A.S.T. Formation

With midnight, December 31st fast approaching it was time to double-check F.A.S.T. (Formation And Safety Training) credentials for everybody. It wasn't enough to have flown during the prior year, paperwork needed to be completed. Which, of course, it hadn't been. So it was necessary for Mustang, Crash, Duck, and Pig Pen to take to the sky to keep their F.A.S.T. cards from turning into pumpkins when the New Years ball drops in Times Square.

F.A.S.T. is a committee, recognized by the FAA to ensure that a certain level of training and proficiency is maintained by all pilots wishing to fly in formation in the waivered airspace at at an airshow. F.A.S.T. member organizations, such as the Red Star Pilot's Association (RPA) manage their own training programs to F.A.S.T. standards and maintain records on training and proficiency through the "Wingman", "Lead Pilot", "Instructor", and "Check Airman" levels.

At least once a year a Lead Pilot must sign off paperwork saying that another lead or wingman has flown in or conducted a four-ship formation.

Communication is accomplished in formation with minimum radio traffic; in fact, an entire flight can be flown — beginning to end — without a single radio call.


Shown here is what the "cross under" signal looks like from the lead pilot...


And what it looks like from the wingman's point of view.


The RPA manual's guidelines on accomplishing the cross-under.


An echelon turn, where all aircraft remain at the same altitude (vice "stacking up").


The beginning of a "B&R" — breakup and rendezvous.

What started off as an overcast day (ceilings less than 100 feet) turned into a great day for some of our Cold War Air Museum associates to go flying and take pictures. Thanks to the RPA for the formation graphics and thanks to Miguel for the pictures, more can be found on his page on Flikr.

Cold War Air Flight, with Yaks and Changs

Jon and Miguel took the Cold War Air Museum CJ-6 out for some exercise last weekend. Jon needed to keep his formation skills current and Miguel needed an excuse to fly and take pictures.

Yaks often fly with CJ's but there are some distinctive differences on view. The rounded tail is noticeable on the ground or in the air as different from the CJ's more squared tail. In flight the nose gear of the Yaks hangs lower and the main gear comes forward rather than folding into the wing as the CJ's does. No matter the differences, aircraft in flight are lovely to behold. Miguell's picture of a red and white plane against a blue sky is beautiful and the colors are appropriate whether you think of them as belonging to its original home in Russia or its current home in the U.S.

The Yaks in the exercise are seen here in formation. Our next post will feature more pictures and Jon talking about formation flying and the pilots and ships involved.

Another well restored, painted and maintained CJ was part of this flight. We all look forward to the times we can fly together.

No matter how much fun you are having, at the end of the day coming in for a landing is a welcome sight.

Credit and thanks for the pictures in this post go to our friend and associate, Miguel Relayze. For more pictures of this flight, visit Miguel's latest postings on Flikr

Event Pictures - Cold War Air Museum CJ6A's

Coverage of the Cold War Air Museum aircraft at the 9/05 event continues with pictures of the Nanchang CJ-6A's that flew at the event. The CJ's complimented the CAF aircraft and our jet and helicopter displays.

It's always a pleasure for Miles to fly up and join us at these events. His CJ, Bord 69 is a beautiful example of the type. Clicking on the photo will enlarge it to show more details of the plane and the ground displays below it.

Kevin, our intrepid photographer friend, couldn't pass up the chance to go out with the two Cj's while they did some air work. The reflections from the tinted plex give Jon a "Halo" as they taxi out for takeoff.

The CJ has classic lines and its "round" engine makes classic noises, just right for air shows. Allthough the CJ's are distinctly different from the Russian Yak-18, they are frequently called Yak's in the airshow circuit because of a similarity of design. The two types, Yaks and CJ's often fly together. The nose wheel, seen in trail below the fuselage does not fully retract by design. The wheel extending slightly below the fuselage will roll, reducing damage if the student forgets to extend the gear on landing.

Once clear of the airport area, Jon cleared a practice area and the aircraft began some turns so the photgrapher could get some aerial shots.

The CJ shows its classic lines in all profiles.

After giving Kevin the opportunity to get some photographs, the planes head back to the field.

Thanks and picture credits go to Kevin, www.sectorkmedia.com. To aggregate the posts and pictures from this event, click on the 090509 label below. Clicking on other labels will agregate posts for these aircraft or all events.

Generations

Jay is an associate of the Cold War Air Museum and one of two father-son pilot teams in the extended group.

He favors the CJ when he is in town (which lately isn't often). Currently in St. Petersburg, Russia, Jay is an ardent student of history, languages and economics. On his return to Washington, D.C. where he works and studies, he will be receiving a Masters Degree from George Washington University. His undergrad degree was from Michigan (Go Blue!).

With his love for history, Jay gathers contacts and pictures during his travels. This picture from Vietnam shows a montage of aircraft from that conflict on outdoor display. As time moves on and younger generations take over from the older generations, museums such as ours or even unattended outdoor displays like this one are a meeting point for the past and the future.

Corsicana Airshow

The community of Corsicana, Texas is about 50 miles away.

Our CJ-6 attended their annual fly-in this year as it has in the past.

A number of WW2 aircraft flew in from around the state.

An L39 from the museum, made a brief visit with a fly-over and "touch and go" at the airport.

The event drew a nice crowd from the surrounding area. Unfortunately, we have heard that some communities are cancelling events this year because of the economy and the difficulty of finding sponsors. Those who are holding events however are saying that attendance is good because families are interested in events such as these where they don't have to travel very far or spend much money for a day of fun.

Community airshows often have other things to enjoy as well, like cars, motorcycles and RC model planes. And, as Jon pointed out in an earlier post, plenty of ice cream and junk food to consume.

CJ6, Take Two

We often have two CJ's going to events together. That always makes a special hit and people love to ask questions about them. This CJ is also the second CJ to belong to this particular owner.

While it is sometimes confused with the Russian Yak 18 and that lineage has been debated. The Nanchang CJ-6 should be recognized as an indigenous Chinese design. It's predecessor, the Nanchang CJ-5, was a Yak-18 design built under license.

When advances in pilot training brought a need for a new aircraft with improved performance and tricycle landing gear, the PLAAF (Peoples Liberation Army Air Force) engineers brought the CJ6 to life. Featuring an aluminum semi-monocoque fuselage with flush-riveting throughout and a modified Clark airfoil with pronounced dihedral in the outer sections, the design was transferred to the Nanchang Aircraft Manufacturing factory in May of 1958 and the first prototype flew on August 27th the same year.

Initially, production aircraft were equipped with the Housai HS-6 radial engune, a locally manufactured version of the Soviet AI-14 260 hp radial. In 1965 the HS-6 engine was upgraded to 285 hp and redesignated the HS-6A. Equipped with the new engine, the aircraft became the CJ-6A. Total production is estimated at more than 10,000 aircraft including exports worldwide. As of 2007, the Nanchang Aircraft Manufacturing Company was still manufacturing the CJ-6G, a modernized version featuring increased power, a strengthened fuselage, bigger fuel tanks, and other modifications. For CJ-6A flight characteristics and other specifics, click on the museum web page link at the end of this post.

The CJ-6 makes extensive use of pneumatics to control the gear, flaps and brakes as well as to start the engine. An engine driven air-pump recharges the system, if air pressure drops too low to start the engine, the on-board tank must be recharged from an external source. In sub zero climates, air start was more reliable than battery starting an engine. Most of the former soviet aircraft at the museum share an extensive use of pneumatics.

This CJ-6A is currently flying and often used in flyovers, formation flights and aerobatic training. It carries on the tradition of the Nanchang CJs by being reliable and ready to fly at a moments notice. It is shown below exchanging lead in a formation flight during the Lone Star Red Star fly-in and formation clinic last year.

"Bord LN" was recently restored and painted at Long's Aircraft Service in Coleman, Texas. Randy also restored the Fouga CM-170 located at the museum for another previous owner. Randy based the paint scheme for this CJ on a T-34 he saw at a Navy Base in Florida. That T-34 was used to clear an aerial gunnery range before practice and the Commander (not to mention the pilot) wanted a high visibility paint scheme so the aircraft could be seen in case the live fire exercise was started before the aircraft left the range.

For more information and pictures go to the museum's CJ-6A web page. For related posts, click a label below.

Smoke on

A Smoke system adds visual impact by leaving a trail of smoke behind the aircraft.

Although not normally used on the ground, Jon demonstrates the smoke system on Bord LN as he taxis past the museum.


Smoke is generated on props and jets by injecting a light weight oil, "smoke oil", into the exhaust. The oil is stored in a separate tank and an electric pump is used to spray the oil into the exhaust stream. Viewers generally enjoy the smoke and it can be especially effective when used in certain maneuvers such as the "Missing Man" formation. It is more difficult to generate a smoke trail from a helicopter because the big fans on top and at the tail tend to blow the smoke in different directions.

Bluebonnet Air Show

Despite a low overcast ceiling, the Bluebonnet Air Show in Burnet, TX was a resounding success. Jon took CJ-6A bord LN out to the show and was joined in formation by Mile's CJ, 7NF. The show featured a demonstration by the USAF West Coast A-10 team, parachute jumpers, and a large number of WWII warbirds. A P-40 can be seen in the background between the two Changs.

The CAF squadron at Burnet was kind enough to fill up the smoke tank on bord LN, some of which may even be left when Jon gets back to Lancaster. :-)


Of course, one of the biggest reasons to go to air shows is for the junk food. Bluebonnet did not disappoint. Here, Jon is seen participating in that age-old tradition.