B-25 weapons thread

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No problem Yves I owe you a few , very interesting article you posted. Many thanks
 
Getting close to calling it a day when I noticed this, Early picture of the famous Pappy's Folly straffer, note the blisters on the side blisters that I pointed to in yellow. Now here must be a later blister cover for the B-25 Old Dutch Cleanser in second photo. Getting tired but interesting none the less.

 
The second blister is the factory manufactured one. The middle portion is hinged and can be opened for service without taking the blister down. The first one is the original Pappy Gunn design used in the SWPA only. Paul, I guess you already posted the photo below:

 
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Micdrow said:
Here is one of the closest view I have found of a Pacific modified B-25C/D tail turret

View attachment 693060
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Paul, in this particular case I would say it's probably a factory (Fairfax resp. Kansas City) modification or a "hybrid model" D (blocks -25, -30, -35). The complete plexiglass enclosure of the gunner station (not open to the back), the small metal cover on the top of the gun-bag substituting the plexiglass and the circular front "cap" for the canvas bag are all standard features. BTW I have photos marked as B-25 from the MTO with the exact same details:

 
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Close up of nose artwork and source but this might be prior to a modification as there looks to be no side blister pack guns installed. You can just make them out in picture B or the person that colorized the photo removed them.

 
Micdrow said:
Yves,

You might find this interesting per our conversation of nose guns, rest of pictures of Old Dutch Cleanser from RAAF Archives.

View attachment 693217View attachment 693218
View attachment 693223
View attachment 693219View attachment 693220
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Paul thanks! Great find!
In this case we have a B-25D-25, one of those 3 blocks produced in the Kansas City factory as "hybrids", rather than being modified afterwards. Great detail of the waist gunner's position, showing clearly the top and bottom fairings are the same in size and differ from those on B-25H/J. As for the nose guns: those 2 might be already factory installed - the last blocks of D have been manufactured simultaneously with J in the same building and even the first J came out with 1 fixed gun only, the later standard was with 2. Another plausible explanation might be that the top fixed gun is a standard one and the bottom one was added later - see how the cut outs in the plexiglass are different. The blister guns are from the factory type (as discussed 2-3 posts earlier in this thread).
It is not impossible that the colorized photo is a later one (end of the war, after the war) and the a/c is without the blister guns (similar to those a/c that returned to the States for War-bonds campaigns), but what you suggest is also possible.
All in all a great collection of photos of one and the same a/c !
Cheers!
 
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