SEFEGeorge

Giz, I bought a couple extinguishers I came across at Costo. They're the size of spray paint cans. No shelf life. Just pop the top and spray. Seem to be convenient and easily handled by anyone. You ever seen anything like that or are aware of their reliability?

You'd think that since Howard Hughes got the Spruce Goose "airborne" that they would have figured out a way to get the Herc done.

Sounds like my nickname any more!

What is/was the empty weight problem? Plane too light when it was empty and bobbed like a cork, etc?

Luckily, or unluckily depending on your view, the engine troop showed up the next day and fixed the plane. I don't know but sitting on the Ketchican airport ramp with a broke plane might have been costing the AF a fair chunk of change. Notwithstanding the troops that we were supposed to pick up. Besides free beer at the VFW. Who can argue with that?

Best I can tell you about H's is that the 73 H's are nothing more than 72 E's with -15 engines. As for the HC's, the 64-65 models I flew were basically the same as the 64 E models. Some specific mission systems were added - fuselage fuel tank, fuel system mod, refueling pods on P's and N's, whiskers on H's and P's, avionics, etc.

As far as instrumentation goes, pick a model year, or for that matter, individual airplanes. Rolling off the assembly line I'd say that basically they were 95% the same. 63 Es were the same, 70 E's were slightly different, etc. If you have access to a C-130B-1 just check out the instrument panel pictures. Same for the overhead panel. Then look at the HC's, A's, H's, J's, etc. There's no simple answer here. As far as start-up procedures. I'm going to say that they are all the same. But my experience has been with the B, E, H (73 H's), and HC (H,P,N) models.

Question, seem to recall that the props on the A were positioned so that the #1 blade (?) was positioned in the 9 o'clock position but can't seem to recall why.

LOL.

I believe so.

Amen.

Excessive safety regs! Back in the day when refueling recips over the wing (gas, oil, ADI) we had no safety equipment. If we were sliding off the back of the wing we just held onto the hose and it slowed us down so we didn't just crash. Usually we just landed on our feet. Easy to do during inclement weather if you weren't careful. Pulling that heavy ass hose to 4 different fuel tanks (C-118s) on each wing was no fun.

They're going to keep safety regulating everything so much that the people won't be able to do their jobs unless they're wearing a flourescent yellow haz mat suit and full crash helmet, wearing a respirator with 4 canisters.

In the recip days I can see the concern about walking in the prop arc., etc. (hot mags, p-leads, etc). But with the Herc, without bleed air on the plane, I just don't see how the prop would rotate. I don't know but are there any turboprops out there with electric starters?

Guess i would have caught hell when we broke down in Ketchican. Engine wouldn't light off. Used the ladder to open the cowling. Up the ladder, open fasteners, down ladder, move ladder, up ladder, open cowling, down ladder, move ladder, ended up jumping the speed switch, down, move, up, close, down, move, fasten, down, still no light off. Tools in flightsuit pocket. Spent the night with just our flightsuits. Got a good meal and free drinks at the VFW though. They sent an engine guy down with a geneva lock.

Just wonder if that means if you're the only one at the aircraft you have to wait until someone shows up to hand you the necessary tool? Whoever came up with this is the real "tool." Do they allow belt tool pouches?

Probably been asked before but who does the -1 preflight or even if there is one done? If the zeros do it that must cut into their Base Ops time.

Remember when I was down visiting my grandparents, relatives, etc., in Tennessee. We were out in the fields one day, couple of us had to pee so we dropped our pants, we were about 11, and started peeing. Low and behold there was an electric fence that we started peeing on. Big surprise when the stream crossed the wire.

Seems to me that it was also highly corrosive.

From a foggy old memory, back in the day, as said it's the Station Keeping Equipment radome. On top of the instrument panel there's a mount where we usually kept the APN 59 radar repeater scope for the pilots. For SKE missions we swapped it out for the SKE scope. Each aircraft in the mission had specific info to input into the SKE system - offsets, distances, unique aircraft IDs, etc. It was intended for formation flying in less than VFR weather conditions. Not sure if many people actually trusted it much but it was a tool to train with.

Well if there's no dipstick available, and you're in a bind, you'd use whatever you had available, including the multi-purpose, multi-functional seat rod.

True. I just don't remember if the dipsticks are marked in gallons or weight. But it shouldn't really matter now should it? It doesn't really matter if you use a broom handle (I have) or a fancy-dancy fangled LM dipstick. Dip the side with the operating gage, mark the handle, dip the other side. If there's a difference transfer some fuel into the tank.

Always a good thing to carry around a bag of rat turds.

Got part of it right Giz. It was in "The Outlaw Josey Wales." But it was Eastwood's old commander who was helping the North rein in all the Southern rebels after the war war over. He said it to the General running the operation. And I think it was "down my neck" not "on my foot." I've been paying the VA $75 bucks a month to cover my copays then I get a letter saying that they'll take my benefit to cover the last couple hundred dollars. So I call them, again, and get a nice lady on the phone. She explained what I would have to pay copays for and what I didn't have to because of my disability rating. She also started an audit of my VA account going back to the date I filed my original application. I just might get a refund from the VA for those copays I paid. She said 30 days or so to get an answer. But for me, it's working at the speed of government, so those 30 days will probably be 300 days. She just left off the last zero.

Just filed an additional VA claim. On my last chest xray my VA doc mentioned that it appears to asbestosis in my lung. During my C&P examination the doc said that my primary care doc had noted this in my files. But that wasn't on my claim. So with my disability determination, they provided me with the paperwork to file a claim for that. Probably another year in the works, but I'll see where it goes.