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Post by circleman on Dec 22, 2009 0:57:13 GMT -5
gotta hand it to the men who made the connies run. hard job. "The following account of living with the Wright Turbo Compound engine comes from an anonymous contributor who was obviously intimately involved with this cantankerous engine. (Although often referred to by its military designation R-3350, the ultimate version of the engine which powered the Qantas Super Constellations was more correctly known by its civil designation of 972TC18-DA3 or just DA3 for short)." www.adastron.com/lockheed/constellation/da3.htm |
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Post by coenraad on Dec 22, 2009 3:07:00 GMT -5
Really interresing read, sounds like they really were not happy about those engines,
"I sometimes felt the main purpose of the DC-4 was to move DA3s about the world after Constellations." That one made my day though. Sounds like them poor guys still have nightmares haha.
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Post by Johan Dees on Dec 22, 2009 10:55:47 GMT -5
"The never ending engine changes - on and on, culminating with the disastrous Queen Mother's flight, (VH-EAA March 1958) where at least three of the four engines were changed. Tales of changing engines to the extent that they even refitted a u/s one by mistake, because there were so many on the tarmac that day in engine stands."
We need a static object to place..
"The ceaseless moving of engine rostrums - noise being moved around - how anyone missed getting a hernia is beyond belief, oily, greasy, heaving into place. Few wheels ever went round - just skittered over the concrete tarmac."
same for wheels..
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Post by ashaman on Dec 22, 2009 15:46:16 GMT -5
The good old times... were not so good after all, it seem. At least for the poor guys who had the ungrateful duty to put back together what others broke.  My father was a train engine repairer for the Italian FS ( Ferrovie dello Stato), and is now retired, and has a lot of those tales to tell too... some of them I even saw happen myself ( long story short, when school was out and my friends in vacation, rather than stay at home with my mother and sisters [there was to go postal to stay with them too long] I went in the repair shop where my father worked... and they let me stay there unhampered, back in those days)... I feel for them.  |
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Post by thomas on Dec 22, 2009 15:49:30 GMT -5
It's my understanding that South African Airways, which flew DC-7Bs, leased two Starliners and converted them to cargo operation for the sole purpose of shunting stuffed and repaired DC-7B engines (also R-3350s) around the world. Really interresing read, sounds like they really were not happy about those engines, "I sometimes felt the main purpose of the DC-4 was to move DA3s about the world after Constellations." That one made my day though. Sounds like them poor guys still have nightmares haha. |
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