Picture of the day

I cannot imagine a more hellish environment in which to fight a war! Two years stationed at CFB Churchill convinced me of that.

My late father-in-law was a Panzer Grenadier lucky enough to escape Stalingrad before the complete encirclement, only to be captured and sent to Siberia. The vehicle that got him out was the Kubelwagon. He came back in 1951, broken in health and spirit.
 
Falcorn said:
Extreme cold armaments trials.

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OMG -- that M1 is on a lead sled! the stock will break in half!! the pic in 1807 anyhow...
 
Spare a moment to consider the plight of the poor flight engineers who crewed the infamous "two smoking, two choking, two burning, two turning, and two unaccounted for" aeroplane, better known as the Consolidated Vultee B-36.

Photos are from the 1954 edition of the Flight Handbook. Some staggering stats on the B-36 include: the normal oil capacity for the six piston engines being 450 gallons, the nine fuel tanks held a combined 33,626 US Gallons of fuel, Maximum Takeoff Weight of 357,500 pounds, and a 230 foot wingspan.

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The fourteen and a half pages of fuses and circuit breakers were another eye opener...
 
Dark Alley Dan said:
That's neat. I wonder what else they slapped 'em on.

Here's an original envelope of them some fellow has:

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I've got a couple of those left on a strip. I gave the other half dozen strips to other collectors.

They actually vary slightly in color between lots.

I've seen those decals as big as 20 cm on large pressed cardboard cylinders, painted black, containing aircraft and tank parts.
 
7ECA said:
Spare a moment to consider the plight of the poor flight engineers who crewed the infamous "two smoking, two choking, two burning, two turning, and two unaccounted for" aeroplane, better known as the Consolidated Vultee B-36.

Photos are from the 1954 edition of the Flight Handbook. Some staggering stats on the B-36 include: the normal oil capacity for the six piston engines being 450 gallons, the nine fuel tanks held a combined 33,626 US Gallons of fuel, Maximum Takeoff Weight of 357,500 pounds, and a 230 foot wingspan.

The fourteen and a half pages of fuses and circuit breakers were another eye opener...
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Back when Engineers really were Engineers. :) There's never been a clearer indication of the need for computerized automation in military aviation. During an emergency, I imagine the FE's hands were flying over all that real estate like a church organist on speed.

A scant five years before, the B29 was thought to be a pretty complex critter. The FE had his hands plenty full even then...

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Complex enough to make cartoons about anyhow. :)

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Sharps '74 said:
I cannot imagine a more hellish environment in which to fight a war! Two years stationed at CFB Churchill convinced me of that.

My late father-in-law was a Panzer Grenadier lucky enough to escape Stalingrad before the complete encirclement, only to be captured and sent to Siberia. The vehicle that got him out was the Kubelwagon. He came back in 1951, broken in health and spirit.
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there were millions of political prisoners that spent decades there.
 
Dark Alley Dan said:
Back when Engineers really were Engineers. :) There's never been a clearer indication of the need for computerized automation in military aviation. During an emergency, I imagine the FE's hands were flying over all that real estate like a church organist on speed.

A scant five years before, the B29 was thought to be a pretty complex critter. The FE had his hands plenty full even then...
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Well the Flight Engineers were certainly trained to operate the various systems on the aircraft that they could conceivably end up having to deal with, but beyond that I don't think you could really call them "Engineers" in the technical sense. I'm sure some ring wearer will be along soon enough to dispel the illusion that a fellow walking around with a case full of manuals who got six months or so of classroom training before going off to war is a "real" engineer. :runaway:

I do agree with the organist analogy though, and I'd imagine being an FE in the combat zone would have been a real nightmare. Mixing piston and jet engines on the B-36 may have made it a more capable aeroplane, but it added a stupid amount of complexity for the crews - and the mechanics.
 
Different types of "Engineers"
Ones who actually work of keeping whatever type of engine they are responsible for in good working order.
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We already have ample flight engineer photos.
 
Haha!! Hey... and why not?
You're already in it over your head... 30,000 feet over the Soviet Union fightin' nukyaler combat toe-to-toe with the Russkies!!
May as well light up a nice Camel, sit back and watch the gauges... who cares if you're surrounded with about half a bazillion gallons of Avgas, JP4 and God knows how many other things that could just go 'Bang' all of a sudden...
Nice touch, though! I wonder if the 'modern' USAF has these 'creature comforts' on their B-1 and B-2 kites... and if not, why not?
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7ECA said:
Well the Flight Engineers were certainly trained to operate the various systems on the aircraft that they could conceivably end up having to deal with, but beyond that I don't think you could really call them "Engineers" in the technical sense. I'm sure some ring wearer will be along soon enough to dispel the illusion that a fellow walking around with a case full of manuals who got six months or so of classroom training before going off to war is a "real" engineer. :runaway:
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Walking around with manuals, that’s funny. Where did you come up with that one. Flight engineers were always mechanically savvy with the equipment they were operating and post war Flight Engineers were required to be Aircraft Maintenance Engineers (AME’s) and take a AME maintence type rating before they could be operate the “panel” and sign out the aircraft at away bases.

diopter said:
Different types of "Engineers"
Ones who actually work of keeping whatever type of engine they are responsible for in good working order
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A Flight Engineer was responsible for troubleshooting a problem on the aircraft at away stops, fix it or contract out the fix while supervising the fix and then sign out the log book as a “return to service “. After 11 years as an AME, I was very fortunate to be able to operate as a FE for another 30 years. I absolutely loved the experience. Yes we also were responsible for keeping things in good working order away from home base.

All new aircraft now are computerized enough that the FE is long gone. Standard joke now is that the next generation of aircraft will have only a pilot and a dog. The pilot is there to feed the dog and the dog is there to bite the pilot if he touches anything, lol
 
chofo said:
Haha!! Hey... and why not?
You're already in it over your head... 30,000 feet over the Soviet Union fightin' nukyaler combat toe-to-toe with the Russkies!!
May as well light up a nice Camel, sit back and watch the gauges... who cares if you're surrounded with about half a bazillion gallons of Avgas, JP4 and God knows how many other things that could just go 'Bang' all of a sudden...
Nice touch, though! I wonder if the 'modern' USAF has these 'creature comforts' on their B-1 and B-2 kites... and if not, why not?
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It is obviously for storing ashes of documents you don't want to fall into enemy hands...I say that because I don't see the cigar lighter.
 
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