Aero Vintage Books

I have a third photo from that sequence that continues on past the 447th's 43-38466. I used it in a Squadron book I did for the "Fighting Colors" series in the 1980s. Unfortunately it's very like the others - those two 99th tails are visible, also 2nd Bomb Group's 44-6633 and 97th's 44-6850, plus an...

If it’s 41-2412 it left Boeing without a radio call number painted on the tail, which would explain any “non-standard” aspects of that. What puzzles me is the non-standard props. I think I’ve only ever seen one B-17F with B-17E-type props (41-24446, a field modification) but never (again, as I recal...

I feel I may be stumbling into the quicksand here, but that B-17 behind 42-29888's tail is of considerable interest. Can't see enough in that scan, but it appears to have paddle-bladed B-17F props, and yet we see what appears to be the ventral windows associated with the remote belly turrets on earl...

An interesting trio of F-9 photos, including F-9B-50-VE 42-6164 Luck of the Irish , has turned up on eBay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/115083059611?hash=item1acb7c219b:g:~K0AAOSwmYRhhrlj https://www.ebay.com/itm/115083057050?hash=item1acb7c179a:g:oxIAAOSwf3dhhrhS https://www.ebay.com/itm/115083047822?h...

Not really, and in these times I'm reluctant to even try a guesstimate. However, it's not a book about Zeamer/Sarnoski. It's just that the rear end of 41-2666 turned up in the background of an October 1943 photo of another aircraft. There are details visible in that photo which perfectly match the r...

This truly IS an interesting airplane. The object above the port on the fuselage sure looks like a vacuum venturi to me. This has me wondering what gyro instruments might have been added (if any)....... That's what it looks like to me too. I dug through John Stanaway's book on the 8th PRS from the ...

Those B-17Es have always been of particular interest to me, but the plot just seems to be getting thicker. A fellow researcher, the late George Wyatt, came up with this: "in phone conversation with Bill Wilver over the holidays he told me that 12475 was named "Jungle Jim", He crewed the a/c w/Keenan...

Interesting photo of Vega F-9 named Shoo Shoo Baby on eBay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/373567821280?hash=item56fa6095e0:g:c-8AAOSwS2VgkfGJ I can't identify it, but there may be some useful clues for others, including the stuff in the background – Norseman 43-35443 was 8th Air Force in mid-1944, then a...

Thanks, you were the experts I had in mind.

Chris, if you PM me with an email address I'll happily send that image. It's 1.5 MB and a healthy 6085 x 4790 scan. Confirms the serial number of Knucklehead is 42-5307.

I thought some of the trainer experts might be interested in this photo of B-17F Knucklehead – and the partially visible tail in the background. http://www.americanairmuseum.com/media/28228 Knucklehead shows up elsewhere as being at Dalhart on 15 June 1943 but I don’t have a serial number for it. My...

It turns out that this one is 41-2464, a veteran of the 19th Bomb Group and later the 43rd, where it was named Queenie in the 64th Bomb Squadron and Pamela in the 65th.

It's unique (in my experience) in having the modified, enlarged cheek windows restored to the original B-17E style.

That's Lt General Robert Eichelberger's Miss Em II, which replaced his old ex-43rd Bomb Group B-17F.

I think it's a B-17E and, while it's impossible to be sure at this point, I think it's one of the handful that were originally intended for the RAF, but ended up with the 19th Bomb Group (and later the 43rd) in Australia. I won't personally be bidding on that photo, but I know people who will be, an...

To expand on this a little bit . . . Spirit of Cleveland is definitely a Douglas-built B-17F and, to my knowledge, there was only one B-17F-1-DL operational on July 4, 1942 when those photos were taken: 41-2964. Although I don't have access to complete production records and, in the midst of moving ...

Just a hunch I suppose, based on certain details that would be clearer if we could find better versions of the available images, even censored ones.