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She's a Vought-Sikorsky F4U-5N Corsair, Model V-1668, built in 1951. According to Joe Baugher's site:
BuNo¹ 124692 Assigned to VC-3 onboard USS Essex, from Nov 1951 thru Feb 1952 flew combat missions over Korea. After this tour, served on USS Leyte as well as USS Tarawa and USS Boxer. SOC² in 1956. To Honduras AF Mar 27, 1956 as FAH-607. Recovered incomplete in 1978. Returned to USA under civilian ownership in 1979. To Collings Foundation 1988 and rebuilt 1988-1997. Restored and flew as N45NL Feb 20, 1997. Ditched off New Smyrna Beach Apr 4, 1997 and recovered Apr 13, 1997. Restored again by Collings Foundation and first flew Sep 22, 2003. Made wheels-up landing at New Smyrna Beach Sep 24, 2003 when right undercarriage leg failed to extend. Recovered after 2 weeks underwater Repaired. Seen at Sun'n'Fun, Lakeland, FL Apr 2004. Seen at Corsair Fly-In in CT May 29, 2005. Seen at Langley AFB 2009 Air Show Apr 26, 2009.
Apparently after one of those mishaps they used parts from a Vought F4U-5P Corsair, BuNo 122179:
122179 to Honduras AF as FAH-604 Mar 1956. To Houston, TX Dec 1978 and registered as N4903M. Damaged in forced landing near Houston, TX in 1984. Wreckage parts used in rebuild of 123168/N179PT. ID transferred to N179PT. Other parts used to rebuild 124692/N45NL.
That FAA registration number, N45NL, led me to this. It claims she's still owned by the Collings Foundation but their website shows no listing for an F4U Corsair. So her exact whereabouts are unknown to me.
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| As I do periodically change the blog header, this is the one in use during a big chunk of February 2023 and depicts the aircraft in question. |
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| Cutaway diagram of a U.S. Navy AN/APS-19 radar. The AN/APS-19 was an X band search and intercept radar by Sperry Corporation for night fighters. It was used on McDonnell F2H-2N Banshee, Vought F4U-5N Corsair, Grumman F7F-4N Tigercat and Grumman F8F-1N Bearcat. U.S. Navy - U.S. Navy Naval Aviation News/(Archive) September 1946, p. 26. |
It's good to know that she's probably still flying, if anyone has any further information on her, let us know in the comments. I love the old warbirds and the mighty "Whistling Death" is no exception.
¹ BuNo = Bureau Number
² SOC = Struck off charge, similar to decommissioning for a ship
³ Hey, I can say that, she's two years older than me!
Now there's a good looking aircraft Sarge.
ReplyDeleteShe is indeed.
DeleteI can't provide any additional info on the Corsair but that is one gorgeous airplane. I joined the Collins Foundation years ago; worth every penny as I get four spots on their planes when traveling between air show sites. Spouse and I have flown as passengers on the B-24 "Witchcraft", the B-17 "909" (lost in a crash 2019), the B-25 "Tondeleyo", P-51C "Betty Jane", and the P-51D "Toulose Nuts".
ReplyDeleteExciting yet humbling to fly on those aircraft; the B-24 was especially cramped for the bombardier and front turret gunner (that guy had to be short!). Crawling on hands and knees under the flight deck and then around the nosewheel to get to the bombardier position just to lay on one's chest on a padded support. And carefully moving through the bomb bay while in flight brings just a bit of adrenaline into the blood. Lots and lots of hydraulic lines in that B-24...
And last evening around 1740 hours, I was on my front porch and heard a louder than usual aircraft approaching. I'm thinking, "That sounds a lot like a radial engine" so I step into the yard and look for the sound. There, directly over my house, about 2000' up and heading south, was a B-25. Made my entire weekend! And the spouse got to see it also which made it even better.
:-)
-Barry
Nothing like the sound of a radial engune!
DeleteBarry - Yes, the B-24 was rather cramped compared to the B-17.
DeleteRob - Agreed!
DeleteThere's a great video of a walk around of Jim Tobull's Corsair. I'll see if I can find it.
ReplyDeleteThe crash of the Collins Foundation's B-17 "909" was tragic. The report on that one is hard to read.
Boat Guy
Here's the link. Good stuff. Lots of interesting little bits, like the maintenance stand on the nose.
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkSI8abs0Ig
BG
"Tobul" not "Tobull" damn spellcheck.
DeleteSince you love old Warbirds, Sarge; you oughtta check out the National Museum of WWII Aviation in Colorado Springs. All of their aircraft fly.
DeleteBG
The crash of 909 wasn't that far from here, flown out of Bradley many times. A sad day indeed.
DeleteGoing to have to set aside some time to watch that video. In the intro I saw a Connie flash by (the flying one), need to spend a lot of time at that site I'm thinking.
DeleteHad no idea that the Springs had a WWII aviation museum. Might be time for a trip out west to visit old haunts and explore new ones.
Sarge - I only know the Corsair because it was one of the few airplane models I built during my youth which almost looked like the box. Love the wings.
ReplyDeleteThe distinctive shape is a result of several design considerations; 1) they needed to hand a BIG propeller on the airplane and at the same time 2) you want the landing gear on a carrier aircraft to be shorter rather than longer because of the landing stresses. IIRC the Navy wanted a fuel tank between the engine and the cockpit which elongated the nose considerably.
DeleteBoat Guy
TB - The gull wings are cool looking.
DeleteBG - And that is a very big prop on that bird.
DeleteBG - Thanks; that makes sense (except the fuel tank between the engine and the cockpit - was that not incredibly dangerous?).
DeleteNot where I'd want it, but compromises are often made in design.
DeleteThe Corsair is one of my favourite fighters of WW2. It looks a proper 'bruiser'.
ReplyDeleteRetired
P-38, F4U, and P-51 make out the top of my list
DeleteP-47. The best all-around fighter of that war; fast, rugged, great performance at altitude. The old saying was "If you want to impress your girl, have your photo taken with your Mustang; if you want to get home to your girl, have your photo taken with your Thunderbolt".
DeleteLove 'em all, especially the P-38, but the Jug was the best.
Boat Guy
Retired - She is definitely a bruiser!
DeleteTuna - As much as I love those birds, the Spitfire is still my favorite.
DeleteBG - The Jug was an awesome warbird.
DeleteIf you make it to east central Florida, be sure to visit the Warbird Air Museum at the south end of Titusville: https://www.warbirdairmuseum.com/
ReplyDeleteThe Army's Golden Knights also set a world record at that airport a few years ago.
And they have a twin Mustang!!
DeleteAn amazing aircraft. Funny how the engine was in 3 of the best fighters of WWII, and two of them looked similar but not. That would be the Corsair, the Thunderbolt and the Hellcat.
ReplyDeleteFunny how the F6Fs successor, the Bearcat, was designed as a high performance aircraft for escort carriers, as many of the Jeeps couldn't or shouldn't fly the F6F or Corsair. Thus, Grumman got the order/idea to take the Hellcat and make it smaller, lighter, and produced a totally different vehicle. Of course, changing out the signature Grumman razorback cockpit to a more 'modern' bubble helped change the lines of the plane significantly.
Planes are fun, aren't they?
One of the things that fascinates me about the evolution of aircraft pre- and during WWII is watching parallel and branching evolutions of design. Like the aforementioned engine that was in three different planes. Or given a speed requirement, engine of such size requirement and type and different countries produced almost the same aircraft - to the point that one's countrymen had difficulty in identifying them from the enemy. So P-51 Mustangish planes existed in France, Germany, Italy, Russia, Japan... While Zero and Tony-looking Japanese aircraft existed in Germany, Russia, America (the aforementioned Bearcat kinda looked kinda like...)
Amazing. It's like today's blob similar cars from extremely different manufacturers. Given same performance requirements with equipment requirements, vehicles end up looking so similar. You see it in the Ford Transit Connect and Ram Promaster City and Nissan commercial minivan. Or in any of a thousand similar sedan models.
Another engine used in multiple, successful, aircraft designs - the Merlin. The Spitfire, the P-51, the Hurricane, the Lancaster bomber, the Mosquito, another great engine.
DeleteNothing built by human hands sounds as good as a Merlin - unless it's multiple Merlins.
DeleteBG
Dunno as the Bearcat was the "successor" to the Hellcat; it was a short-range medium-altitude air defense fighter, where the Hellcat was an all-around great aircraft. As you note the F8F was intended for shorter flight decks and so it more properly replaced the FM-2 Wildcats.
DeleteBG
As to the sound of the Merlin, nah, I'll stick to the sound of those big radials. Sweet sweet radials.
DeleteThe Bearcat was a highly preforming aircraft with one problem discovered in development - it tended to shed a wing in high speed,high-g maneuvers. The "fix" is described in "Clipping the Bearcat's Wings" (Aviation Journal, Aug 1988). The idea was to deliberately weaken the wings about three feet inboard of the wingtip so that it would fail there and reduce the stress on the rest of the wings to manageable level (probably inspired by some engineer's erotic nocturnal dream). Turned out that one wing was always under more stress and would fail first, resulting in an asymmetrical aircraft. The fix to the fix was to incorporate microswitches and prima cord (detcord), so that when one wing tip failed, the other would be blown off, resulting in a shorter aircraft, abet with symmetrical wings. Finally, the engineers did what they should have done in the first place and strengthened the wing.
DeleteMy step-dad was a Naval Aviator during the Korean War. He was stationed at Kisarazu and Atsugi flying with a FASRON (Fleet Air Support Squadron) where he flew most of the models in the Navy's inventory. He had to bail out of a burning F4U at Atsugi one time, I asked him one time what his favorite and least favorite of the aircraft he flew. His favorite was the F7F and least favorite was the F4U.
ReplyDeleteWell, having to shed a burning aircraft might lead to it being not a favorite!
DeleteTigercats are special airplanes. Haven't heard anybody knowledgeable who didn't love the F7F.
DeleteBG
As I read in "Devotion" Jesse Brown was NOT happy to trade his Bearcat for the Corsair.
DeleteBG
American Heritage Museum in Hudson, MA mentions her, and has a link to her 2010 performance at NAS Oceana.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xe4pDnKJ-jY
They also note: "*The Corsair is not at the American Heritage Museum. For a schedule of operation and more information please contact the office." and the contact info listed is:
American Heritage Museum
P.O. Box 248
Stow, MA 01775
Phone: (978) 562-9182
Fax: (978) 568-8231
General: ahm@collingsfoundation.org
There is a 30 June 2021 photo of her at Portsmouth Intl (ex Pease AFB) and I get the feeling that pilot Dan McCue may be the owner now, as well as the damn fine pilot flying her.
https://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/photo/001653766.html
John Blackshoe
I've been to that museum, has a superb collection of armored vehicles. Good to know she's in good hands, thanks JB!
Delete