Good Morning, Oppo

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn) 04/04/2019 at 08:00 • Filed to: good morning oppo

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Behold, the Arsenal of Democracy.

The B-24 Liberator and C-87 Liberator Express under construction at Consolidated’s Fort Worth factory . The C-87 was used for high-altitude, long range transport of passengers and cargo.

Ground was broken  on the Fort Worth factory on April 18, 1941, and the first Liberator rolled off the production line almost exactly one year later. According to the Austin Company, builders of the factory,

This plant would be the largest unobstructed indoor working area in the world; it would be windowless and a pioneering example of controlled-conditions design.

The 4.9-million-square-foot facility would be the largest air-conditioned plant in the world, as well as the largest installation of insulated steel curtain-wall construction. It was also the first building to combine rectified fluorescent lighting, light-reflecting fiberglass walls and ceiling, and a white cement floor for a floor-to-ceiling approach to illumination problems.

And, Austin completed the bomber facility 100 days ahead of schedule.

With the plant ready three months earlier than planned, Consolidated Aircraft asked Austin to add a parts factory to the site – nearly doubling the originally planned space.

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vondon302 > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:02

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Neat. I wonder what that air conditioning plant looked like.

pip bip - choose Corrour > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:03

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war effort kept everyone focused, plus plenty of construction workers too

SilentButNotReallyDeadly...killed by G/O Media > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:08

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I'm not convinced that that's what they were actually selling at the time....

facw > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:23

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I’m not sure how much (if any) of the original building is still in use, but this plant in Ft. Worth was used for F-16 up until 2017 when it was moved to South Carolina, and is currently cranking out F-35s.

Numerous other aircraft including the B-36, B-58, and F-111 were built at the Ft. Worth plant as well.

facw > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:32

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Also, looking at Google Earth, check out the camo on this F-35:

Do we have aggressor F-35s? Is there an export customer that uses this scheme? Were Lockheed’s paint guys bored? I can’t imagine it’s good for stealthiness.

Also, a short distance away there’s this thing (on the right):

Appears to be F-35/X-35 style, but smaller, and with a more F-22 style wing. Maybe a 3/4 scale mockup from the X-35 days? It looks pretty beat, whatever it is.

You can tell a Finn but you can't tell him much > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 08:33

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I’d never heard of the C-87. On its face, military air transport seems pretty boring compared to the combat aircraft. Dig a little bit deeper and consider the importance of air transport and it suddenly gets a lot more interesting.

ETA: Military a ir transport accomplished or allowed the other branches to accomplish a lot of objectives that wouldn’t have happened with traditional transport. I’m sure there are plenty of stories every bit as harrowing as any bomber or fighter pilot could tell that have never been heard, and that’s a damn shame.

facw > facw 04/04/2019 at 09:06

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Actually I’m wondering if the small one might even be a F-22/YF-22 mockup. The space for the engines looks a bit narrow, and I had assumed the circle behind the cockpit was the fan duct, but the wings and tail are definitely more F-22 than F-35, and that color scheme is very reminiscent of the YF-22.

Ash78, voting early and often > facw 04/04/2019 at 09:08

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I was just coming to ask if this was later the General Dynamics factory. My late great uncle worked there for a while in the 70s and 80s.

Ash78, voting early and often > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 09:10

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I thought I recognized the C-87 variant...they flew The Hump over the Himalayas. Not a big deal today, but 25,000+ feet of altitude in an unpressurized tin can was no picnic.

If we’re not pushing hard to fight the Nazis, we’re pushing hard to fight the Commies...often at the same time. A wee bit ironic considering that Russia pulled more than its own weight in defeating the former, only to become the latter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hump

ttyymmnn > Ash78, voting early and often 04/04/2019 at 09:22

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My boys are learning about WWII in school, and keep asking questions.

“We were friends with Russia in WWII, right?”

“Well........having the naming enemy doesn’t exactly make you friends.”

facw > Ash78, voting early and often 04/04/2019 at 09:31

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Yep same plant. As I said, I don’t know if it’s the same building, but it seems unlikely they’d tear down such a large structure for the hell of it.

MonkeePuzzle > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 09:50

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stunning in colour (right planes, may not be the same facility though) . this is a massive image, direct link in case kinja hates us

MonkeePuzzle > MonkeePuzzle 04/04/2019 at 09:53

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I’m sure I’ve said it before, because this image impacts me every time I see it, but the yellow is zinc chromate undercoat, which was a step eventually skipped because it saved weight, let the planes fly faster, and was found that most planes didn’t last long enough to require protection from corrosion .

That just blows my mind, there simple wasnt an expectation of the planes or pilots to last long :(

user314 > facw 04/04/2019 at 10:14

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The camo’d F-35 was a mock-up used for various tests, and apparently some of the LockMart people got bored and had F-16 paint handy...

The other one is probably like you said: an X-35 ground test article. 

facw > user314 04/04/2019 at 10:19

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Neat, thanks.

ttyymmnn > facw 04/04/2019 at 10:26

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That second pic looks like two F-35s and an F-16. No idea on the aggressor livery, and it looks like the nose is missing. I’ve never heard of an F-35 aggressor.

facw > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 10:28

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Skyfire found an article about the camo one, it’s a test article that the painters had some fun with.

user314 > facw 04/04/2019 at 10:28

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Now I want to grab a couple F-35 kits, one to do in that scheme, another as an IAF F-35I:

ttyymmnn > MonkeePuzzle 04/04/2019 at 10:29

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most planes didn’t last long enough to require protection from corrosion.

A reality of war.

That photo was taken at North American’s Kansas City factory in 1942.

ttyymmnn > MonkeePuzzle 04/04/2019 at 10:32

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Here’s a picture of the Consolidated B-32 Dominator being built in the same Fort Worth factory. The Dominator was developed as a fallback should the B-29 not work out. They weren’t built in great numbers, and the last American to die in air combat  in WWII was a cameraman’s assistant in a B-32 taking photographs of Tokyo.

ttyymmnn > user314 04/04/2019 at 10:34

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I knew I had seen something about that somewhere. I thought it was the War Zone. I read the Aviationist every day.

ttyymmnn > facw 04/04/2019 at 10:34

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I knew I had seen something about that somewhere. I thought it was the War Zone. I read the Aviationist every day.

user314 > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 10:40

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I would not be surprised to see the F-35 painted like a Su-57 or J-31 at some point, once there’s enough built. 

MonkeePuzzle > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 10:52

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when you think of how big the planes are, and that image just disappears into the distance, you realise just how massive these spaces are!

ttyymmnn > MonkeePuzzle 04/04/2019 at 11:08

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And the reason we won the war is that we were bombing their factories, but they weren’t bombing ours.

MonkeePuzzle > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 11:11

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it was truly a benefit that the USA was so far physically removed from the actual war. 

ttyymmnn > MonkeePuzzle 04/04/2019 at 12:22

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Which is not to say we were entirely safe. German U Boats routinely sank Allied shipping off the east coast of the US, wth most of the attacks coming in 1942.

https://uboat.net/maps/us_east_coast.htm

facw > user314 04/04/2019 at 13:50

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Seems likely. Especially with the concurrent development approach, they are sure to end up with a bunch that for one reason or another might be deemed unsuitable for real combat, but perhaps still be good enough for adversary use without the high cost of upgrading them to current spec.

RallyWrench > ttyymmnn 04/04/2019 at 14:19

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Japanese subs antagonized the west coast too, though to a much lesser extent, of course. There’s a tanker sunk not far from here, the Montebello. 

Only Vespas... > ttyymmnn 04/05/2019 at 16:57

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Interesting story! There is a sister plant to Ft. Worth in Tulsa where B-24s and later A-26s were built.  

gmporschenut also a fan of hondas > ttyymmnn 04/05/2019 at 23:30

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“ fluorescent lighting” never knew it was that old.

In some situations the reason they went up so fast is they were consistant, but in some corners were cut to keep on sc hedual . I worked in one on the safety and ergonomic commitee and would read old case files.

In one a water pipe was laid where a main power line was supposed to go, so they moved it an never recorded. 60+ years later a a guy with a jackhammer if removeing part of thefloor and boom 1 and 2nd degree burnsover his whole body. welded the jackhammer to the line. similar one below

gmporschenut also a fan of hondas > MonkeePuzzle 04/05/2019 at 23:43

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There is a youtoube channel Military History visualised and non visualized.

There was an episode on tank durability, and the t34 was rated at 800 hours, and a bunch of cynicism  of “why would it have to last longer?”  

ttyymmnn > gmporschenut also a fan of hondas 04/06/2019 at 00:04

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Damn. That’s a wild video.

bubblestheturtle > MonkeePuzzle 04/06/2019 at 00:29

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These are B-25's not B-24's, but the color image is so stunning.