Just A Car Guy: 3/10/13

Saturday, March 16, 2013

This month's Hot Rod Magazine has incredible high quality photos of a bubble top Fury, seriously far better than anything magazines normally do

that photographer deserves a raise!

http://www.hotrod.com/articles/hrdp-1305-the-gas-bubble-1963-plymouth-fury/

African Muscle Cars.com just said hello, so I'm letting you know about them as well

This site is dedicated to South African built muscle cars and other rare South African cars. In the late 1960's and early 1970's several muscle cars were built in South Africa. Very low volumes of these cars were produced and they are becoming very rare.

Some of the cars like the Fairmont GT and Chev SS were imported in CKD form and assembled in South Africa. Other cars were high performance versions of models sold through dealerships like the Capri Perana, Granada Perana and Chevy CanAm.

One thing that is similar amongst all these cars is the fact that they were all built in South Africa. Information on these cars is extremely hard to find. The goal of this website is to provide a central place where information on all the different muscle cars can be found.

Ford

Ford Motor Company of South Africa built several muscle cars and uniquely South African cars. Some of the most well known are CKD (complete knock down) form imports that were assembled in South Africa.

These include both the 1970 style Fairmont GTs and 1971-1973 Fairmont GTs. Many of the uniquely South African cars are homolagation specials like the Sierra XR8, and Capri Perana.

Although many of the Perana cars produced by Basil Green are homologation specials, there are some that were not used for racing at all like the Granada Perana

Chevy

The Chevy Canam is an insane car. It was built in 1973 for racing consisting of a very light Vauxhall Firenza body and the Z28 engine used in racing in America, but better known for their use in Camaros. The high performance engine and light body gave it superior performance figures.

The Chev SS is another car that was imported from Australia in CKD form and assemled in South Africa. It is mechanically virtually identical to the Holden Monaro. It had a modified grill and two lights on each side in the front grill.

Plymouth

Valiant Barracudas are nearly identical to the Plymouth Barracudas of the US. The were assembled in South Africa from 1967 to 1971 and sold as Valiants. They are beautiful cars with the fastback design. In the US the Formula S version is starting command quite a good price, here we also have Formula S versions.

Above is named a Valiant Charger. Obviously, a Duster

Below, named a Valiant Barracuda. Why they held onto Valiant is a mystery

right hand steering wheel visible through the windshield

http://www.africanmusclecars.com

B29 Superfortress

How about this little kids with outspread arms? Cute! I didn't see him when I took the photo, you miss a lot of small things when looking at the image you are about to photograph with a screen the size of a large postage stamp. It's better to be lucky than good

Tires by Dunlop

Friday, March 15, 2013

the B29 cockpit and bomb bay, not one of many, the LAST of it's kind to soar the skies.

The Flying Heritage Collection and museum, funded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, it may be the most diverse and thorough collection of flying WW2 military aircraft

In Everett Washington, (North of Seattle) located at the former Alaskan Airlines base of operations, on Paine Field which has other aircraft museums according to http://www.flyingheritage.com/Content/Docs/AirClassics_NewHangar_Hellcat.pdf is what once was Vulcan Warbirds a decade ago.

There are between 17 and 19 fighter aircraft,
a P40C, P47D, P51D Mustang, F6F Hellcat, B25 J Mitchell, Hurricane, Spitfire, Bf109 Messerschmitt, ME3, FW190D13, Fi156, C2 Storch, Il2M3 Shturmovick, I16 Rata, U2/Po2, A6M3-22 Zero, Ki43 Oscar and a MiG29

And a JN4D Curtiss Jenny

Plus, a Sherman tank.

the Messerschmitt Bf 109 crash-landed on a beach in northern France, disappearing into the sand until a wingtip was noticed poking out again in 1988.

Painted with a toothy snarl, the P-40 Tomahawk was shot down over the Russian tundra where it lay for the next 40 years. It is now the ONLY Tomahawk in flying condition

this Oscar was sent to Truk Island in the Pacific Ocean as part of the Japanese Air Force. Later it served on Rabaul in Papua New Guinea. Shortly after the end of the war, this Oscar was found in dense jungle four miles from Vunakanau airfield on Rabaul. The plane had severe front-end damage from its final landing, but was repaired by Japanese soldiers with parts salvaged from a number of other Oscars.

This Zero was one of many Japanese combat planes destroyed by American bombing on Babo Airfield in New Guinea during World War II. In the early 1990s this Zero wreck was discovered and acquired by the Santa Monica Museum of Flying.
Around 1994, three recovered Zeros, including this one, were sent to Russia for restoration. The fighter's salvageable parts were retained, while missing or heavily-damaged components were created by Russian craftsmen in order to make the planes flyable again.

The B-25 Mitchell was built in Kansas City in the last days of 1944. It was one of 117 modified to carry a Hughes fire control radar for training. The plane served with the Royal Canadian Air Force for ten years until it was sold as surplus in 1961. Soon after, the plane was purchased by Cascade Drilling Company of Calgary and converted to a water-carrying "fire bomber." In the mid-1990s, the B-25 was purchased by the Flying Heritage Collection

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/north-america/news/article.cfm?l_id=9&objectid=10863384

In 1998, Paul G. Allen began acquiring and preserving these iconic warriors and workhorses, many of which are the last of their kind. Allen's passion for aviation and history, and his awareness of the increasing rarity of original WWII aircraft, motivated him to restore these artifacts to the highest standard of authenticity and share them with the public. While the education they provide is significant, we hope you take special pleasure in knowing that these historic aircraft are not meant simply for display in a static museum environment. As part of the Flying Heritage Collection, their destiny is to return once more to the sky, where they were always meant to be. The Flying Heritage Collection is operated by Friends of Flying Heritage, a 501 (c)(3) organization committed to educating the public about these rare, historic aircraft.

the Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet carried two Mk 108 autocannons. Each weapon fired 650 rounds a minute and each explosive round was over one inch in diameter.
http://flyingheritage.com/TemplateMain.aspx?contentId=63

The Night Witches, Stalin's secret air force was invisible to radar

If you knew radar, you'd remember that only metal reflects radar very well, so to be invisible to radar, you fly an airplane made of wood and canvas. The less metal the less radar picks up on.

So, back in WW2, the Russians were sneaking up on the Germans with old wood biplanes flown by women, and they carried the bombs on their laps, heaving them out of the plane the hard way. They cut the engines to glide over the enemy army, and were not only out of sight in the dark, they weren't able to be picked up on radar, and with the engines cut, they were silent.

That must have scared the hell out of the German soldiers on the ground, to suddenly have bombs dropped on them

The Night Witches. The 588th Night Bomber Regiment
info from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/north-america/news/article.cfm?l_id=9&objectid=10863384

photo from
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Polikarpov_Po-2_(1935).jpg

Nightwitches - Female Russian bombers who bombed Germany during WW2. To stop Germans from hearing them & starting up the anti aircraft guns, they’d climb to a certain height, coast down to German positions, drop their bombs, restart their engines in midair and get the hell out of dodge. Their leader flew 200+ missions and were never captured.