ford built B-24's

[ron74887]

sent to me from Harley P. first time I've tried to copy and pasted one to look over. This is neat and we were in Detroit and never saw this Or I didn't. there is 286 pictures--if it does not work I hope one of our guru's will redo it so you can enjoy!! Ron

Subject: B-24 Bombers at Willow Run, WWII

Amazing what Henry Ford, for one, did for this country...While they were not building cars!!!

Check out # 246 or so - Ram jets in 1944. Thought only the Germans had that technology then. This whole documentary is awesome! Have a lot of time though. There's a lot of material here. Look at what those folks did back then and wonder what the hell happened to AMERICA since then? No political correctness, no frivolous lawsuits. Just git 'er done!

REAL AMERICA …We will probably never see anything like this again. There are a lot of super pictures here…
http://public.fotki.com/Kos/members_pho ... _slideshow
A wonderful slide show of images from the Ford B-24 plant during WWII. 286 pics in all, but you can click through as fast as you wish . . . The scale of the war effort/assembly line is mighty impressive.
Of particular interest to aviators: More than 7,000 Ford-built B-24s; the single-tail Liberator; Ford Gliders; Tri-motors; the jet propulsion section (late '44); and lots of contemporary figures including Henry Ford, visiting Hollywood stars; and English chanteuse Gracie Fields -- all courtesy of the Ford Museum at Dearborn, Michigan USA. (Kudos to TPA/DET QB Don Hassigan for this Forward.) Enjoy!

[ron74887]

hell it worked!!! Ron

[Harold Holiman]

Great pictures, enjoyed looking, thanks for posting.

Harold

[170C]

Ron, what a fantastic collection of photo's Of course I was 135 photo's into it before I realized there was data on each photo in the upper left hand corner so now I can go back and see who some of those folks were in the photos . That just shows you what the US citizens were capable of doing when they had to. One would hope we would band together again if the need arose. Makes me wonder if we would. Its a shame so many of those B-24's and other planes were built and so few have survived in museums and only a few are now airworthy. An interesting side note is that the government, with arm twisting by Amon Carter to Franklin Roosevelt, built Air Force Plant # 4 in Fort Worth and another in Tulsa to build aircraft. Don't rememer what they built in Tulsa. The plant here started building B-24's (J models as I recall) after the assembly plant was completed. At first Ford built all the components and shipped them via long, enclosed truck vans, to Fort Worth's Consolidated Vultee Plant for assembly. The trucks ran 24/7 to get production up and running eventually being taken over by full assembly in FW. Convair then built B-32's (none of which were saved for a museum) followed by the B-36, B-58, F-111, F-16 & now both parts for the F-22 & will be doing final assembly on the F-35 Lightening II's. I wonder if Ford did all of the assembly or if a lot was done by sub contractors w/ Ford doing final assembley? Wish we had gone to Willow Run while in Dearborn. I am not sure if Willow Run was originally an automobile assembly plant that was converted to aircraft assembly or if it was buildt specifically for the aircraft assembly operation. Wonder what it is used for now? Also it looked like the jet engines weren't just a few test articles, but rather a bunch of units. Wonder how or if they were ever used. Thanks again for sharing that with us.

[GAHorn]

They assembled DC-3's in Tulsa. You can tell the ones built there because there's a vertical rivet-line on the Tulsa-three's that attach the tail (which was built in Sandy Aigo and shipped to Tulsa.)

The J's in FtW were the Consolodated-built airplanes. Ford was a subcontractor that supplied subassemlies to the ORIGINAL mfr/designer of the B-24....Consolodated (which became ConVair after Consolodated merged with Vultee).

The B-24 that was my father's crewed airplane was a Ford-built B24-J from Willow Run. He made 33 missions in it without a single scrubbed flight. He said the rumor was that Ford built airplanes flew a little faster (by a few mph) and straighter than most of the others due to the assembly-line technique which made them a bit more accurately than the typical hand-built airplanes that were customary with other mfr's. (I personally believe that was more a function of the nose-turrets which Ford rec'd for installation for most of the J's they built.)

[cessna170bdriver]

They assembled DC-3's in Tulsa. You can tell the ones built there because there's a vertical rivet-line on the Tulsa-three's that attach the tail (which was built in Sandy Aigo and shipped to Tulsa.)

Santa Monica, perhaps? That's where Douglas built DC-3s.

[GAHorn]

I'm only repeating what an old DC3 pilot told me,... that the tails were built by Consolodated in San Diego and shipped to Tulsa where they were assembled onto fuselages.

[mit]

Every company was building war assets all over the country. I think If we had to, we could do it again. but I bet it would take longer to get everyone moving in the same direction.....

[oz502man]

Those pictures are amazing!!

The thing that stands out to me is the huge scale of the operation. Its like a city there.

To think that was only one of many plants around the States. The mind boggles!

Noel

[cessna170bdriver]

I'm only repeating what an old DC3 pilot told me,... that the tails were built by Consolodated in San Diego and shipped to Tulsa where they were assembled onto fuselages.

Ah... I guess I learned something today... I never knew anyone but Douglas built DC-3/C-47's. I guess if Ford could build Consolidated airplanes, then Consolidated could build Douglases. Another thing I learned that many probably already know: Convair was the result of a merger between CONsolidated and Vultee AIRcraft.

[GAHorn]

The Russians built 2,000+ of them under license, designated Li-2's, ...and here's a tidbit.... the Japanese built 485 of them....and used them throughout the war, causing numerous incidents of mistaken identity between friends and foes. The Dutch (Fokker) built 13.

The first 953 built at Long Beach had 12-volt electrical systems!

Guess what's so unique about THIS one?

TS62.jpg

[n2582d]

Could that be a TS-62 with the Russian built ASh-62IR engines? Gotta love Goggle! At first I was going to guess that it was the famous DC-2 1/2 -- the DC-3 with the DC-2 wing spliced on.

[GAHorn]

Yep. A little-known fact is that DC-3 airframes were produced for the purpose of being unpowered gliders (to be towed by DC-3, of course) and they were complete with engine nacelles but no engines (the forward-nacelle area was faired-over.) These U.S.built airframes were acquired by the Russians who had no Pratt or Wright engines available...so they substituted some Antonov AN-2 engines instead! And yes, they were desginated as TS-62 aircraft.