Recent content by Tom Fey

These drones shot off the USS Cape Gloucester are the TDD-2 target drones that used the 8 horsepower Righter or McCulloch engines. 146 inch wingspan, weigh 97 pounds, fly @ 104 mph for up to an hour.

Thanks, now edited, and my apologies to the late Roy Marlin Voris.

Only 23 of these inverted V12 engines were manufactured, 6 engines survive, and only one survivor runs. The IV-1430 powered the XP-49 and the XP-57 without success in either installation, but it was an interesting endeavor brought to life by the restoration efforts of historian and author Graham...

The USN Blue Angels declined to use the F4U for their aerial demonstrations, choosing the F6F and soon after the F8F instead. Dogfights aren't airshows and vice versa, but at the very least Butch Voris didn't trust the F4U for close formation work.

Pretty cool idea. Since it is fiction you have a pretty free hand. I'd suggest the R-2600 use a fictional, high reduction ratio nose gear box ( three or four to one) to slow the propeller speed and a custom 4 blade Curtiss Electric wide-chord, asymmetric blade prop blades like those used on the...

I found your high-quality color film after I published the video. Always the way it happens. I have seen period film of the 6 horsepower OQ-2 being looped at low altitude. That was a surprise!

That is high quality film, so thanks for that. Both videos show the Radioplane TDD-2 in action. The TDD-1 had contra-rotating propellers. The TDD-3 has a bigger engine with the carburetor on the top of the engine. Thanks.

A 56-minute history of the WWII Radioplane sub-scale radio controlled aerial gunnery targets of WWII presenting the technology, hardware, engines, period film clips, and engine runs of these aircraft. https://youtu.be/gBA5Le72aVA

Lawrance.

I just finished the book. The large amount of flight test report information is extremely welcome, the writing is good, the quality and selection of photographs as well as the paper and print quality are excellent. There is a fair amount of material on aircraft using contra-rotating propellers...

Looks like hollow steel blades and Hamilton Standard hub/dome. I'd guess it is off a Lockheed P2V/P-2 Neptune or C-119 as mentioned above.

Let the record show there are no spark plugs in the Wright PRT...

Thanks for your comments. The detailed history of the TC18 in commercial service is complicated, bumpy, inconsistent across operators, and not easily packaged into the current video. The early versions, particularly the "DA" series of the TC18 had numerous serviceability problems, many, but not...

Thirty-two minutes of PRT trivia: https://youtu.be/1j9164wb6TE