The Movie Star B-25: Doolittle Anniversary Special w/ Full Start-up; Winged Victory Ep 32

On the 84th Anniversary of the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo, Scott sits down with Bill Klaers (Rob is busy living his best life) and they talk about taking the B-25 off of multiple aircraft carriers for various commemorations and even the movie Pearl Harbor.  Also enjoy a walk around preflight of the airplane with an in plane start up!

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Hello everyone and welcome to Winged Victory with Rob and Scott, a podcast by the National Museum of World War II Aviation here in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

Welcome to another episode. I'm Scott Clairs, and my esteemed partner Rob Dale is actually off today living his best life. So we're gonna do something a little different. This episode is gonna be dropping on April 18th. So that's gonna mark the 84th anniversary of the Doolittle Raid, which many would consider one of the pivotal, I don't know, actions of flight in World War II. Obviously, you can go online and get all the history that you want out of this thing and learn all about the Doolittle Ray. We're not gonna do that today. What we're gonna do is actually sit with our guest today, who's one of only a handful of people in the world that have actually flown a B-25 off of an aircraft here. Not just one, in fact, multiple. So Bill Claire's. Well, thanks for having me out. So I guess, you know, let's just get into it. Um, obviously, one of the first questions that most people have is aside from being in the military and conducting a raid on another, you know, country, how did how does one go about flying a B-25 off of an aircraft carrier? How does that even come about? Well, you had to know my partner Bob Lombard, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:36

Which you did know. I didn't know Bob. Yeah. So Bob was a dreamer, but Bob was an idea guy that came up with just off-the-wall stuff that we all just looked at him and said, Hey Bob, if you can make that happen, that's great.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

We'll go do it, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:54

And he came in and just it was one day and he said, Hey, you know, we ought to we ought to see if we could get a carrier and go fly, you know, the B-25 off for the you know, the commemoration of the doolittle radon Tokyo. And I said, Bob, if you can make it happen, we're ready. We'll get this airplane ready. So that's how it really started. So it wasn't something that I did. It was you know, we're always concerned about keeping the airplane flying and getting it up to the best it can do. But Bob came up with a lot of ideas, including going to Hawaii for you know, the trip we did there with uh So he actually was able to get this thing to come together somehow, some way. Yeah, he got a hold of an admiral in uh in San Diego and brought up the idea and said, hey, you know, we're thinking about doing this and we really would like to, and you know, what do we have to do? And so they you know, the military, the navy went out and said, Well, that's a great idea. Let's let's go ahead and find some people and you know, because they gotta do it politically, and kind of post a thing, not all over the world, but you know, in the general area and say that you know we can see about doing this. So you know, we met with them several different times, and uh we were all ready to go. They were all good for it. They said, you know what? We'll have to create a syllabus, you're gonna have to go out and learn to qualify. And you know, if you can qualify and meet a few other small parameters, then we'll we'll let you do it.

SPEAKER_03 3:29

So we were part of those qualifications. Some of the parameters they required.

SPEAKER_04 3:34

Well, it it was uh actually, I think it was Slud Slud, who was the CO of the uh of North Island, actually did a lot of research and found out how the Navy went about, you know, qualifying the pilots to fly. And so we ended up getting four aircraft to qualify and we went to North Island and they set up a deal just basically like it was. They had guys standing on the line, you know, on the runway basically. And when you finally lift it off, they raised the flag and let you know if you were off the edge or not. Correct. Yeah. You know, so the only thing we didn't have was how many knots you're gonna have over the over the deck the deck, but I mean you went through basically the same syllabus.

SPEAKER_03 4:23

So wow, that's amazing. So what was the first uh reenactment that you guys did? What was that was that for the 50th anniversary of the Doolittle Raid?

SPEAKER_04 4:32

Yeah, so it was. It was uh I think it was 1991. I can't remember now.

SPEAKER_03 4:37

So but that was the one that was out of Alameda? No, we did it out of North Island.

SPEAKER_04 4:42

North Island. So it was definitely for us, it was probably the most exciting because even though you qualified, you know, you still haven't done it yet. So uh we had two airplanes out of the four that well, four of us qualified and two of us were able to fly off. And and basically I think it got down to I think the last and final thing that the Navy came up with because you always do everything with the Navy and then the JAG, as they call it, which are lawyers, come into play. And the last hurdle they threw at us is uh, you know, if if you can if you can insure a United States aircraft carrier, we'll let you fly off of it. You know, and uh and all of the Navy people want to do it, but that's just the lawyers, you know, they throw something at you. So that was another learning curve. But I learned in that evolution, we went, we came back and talked to all of the insurance companies in the United States, and nobody was gonna do it, but I found out if you write a big enough check, Lloyd's a London will insurance. And they did. Yeah. So it was kind of neat. You go back to the Navy and you say, Okay, well, we've met the last requirement. Here's the letter. So uh then, you know, after the qualifications and everything were done, and you know, uh we got to go out on the carrier, and it was our carrier or our airplane and Mike Pupich's heavenly body.

SPEAKER_03 6:07

So what kind of emotions are going through you as you're in the cockpit and you're facing, you know, you're finally moving, you're ready to go, engines are gone, and it's your turn to go. Like it's now or never, and every you're just hoping everything's going gonna go as it's supposed to, so you don't end up in the drink.

SPEAKER_04 6:26

I I think I got more nervous about whether the engines are gonna start. Yeah. You got a crowd of people, and it was amazing because the ship is, you know, we're going along the coast from San Diego up, and you know, there's a it was advertised, so there's like a whole armada of boats and ships and everything out there. And that makes you a little bit nervous, but you know, the captain was pretty cool because he made a turn, started going one direction, and everybody all you see, all these boats out there going that direction, and all of a sudden he does this hard 270 around and goes in the opposite direction. And I find out not many people can stay up with a carrier. So that cleared all of that, so that got that out of your mind. And then, you know, once you got the engines running and you know, you're just sitting there, you just went through like what you programmed yourself for.

SPEAKER_02 7:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:19

And you know, when when they put 32 knots over the deck, that took that whole common denominator of doing it on land, and you might have seven or eight miles to where you know it was nothing.

SPEAKER_03 7:32

You know, and so when you were doing the one on land, like how many times did you do that takeoff where you made it on land?

SPEAKER_04 7:38

Well, I remember we were at Rialto and I went out and practiced and practiced and practiced, and you know, you don't do it like they want you to do it, which is a full stealth takeoff. You do you do a little increment at a time to see what it's gonna feel like. But after a while, you know, you realize that you know you're gonna run 44 inches, just let off the brakes. You've got the the yoke at neutral, but you're gonna pull it all the way back because you want to get the angle of incidence up. And of course, you don't have that much wind, but we were, you know, we were taking it off in less than a thousand feet. I don't remember because when we were qualifying the restaurant at Rialto, you know, we got done and we went over to have breakfast, and I was laughing because all these guys are talking about short takeoffs, and I said, I think I could beat a Tess and 150 off in a short field takeoff. D25. Yeah, and they go, No way, and you go out and you do it, and you're showing them, man.

SPEAKER_02 8:28

This thing is a performer.

SPEAKER_03 8:30

So what uh what which carrier was this? The first one?

SPEAKER_04 8:33

That was the Ranger. The Ranger, USS Ranger, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:36

So you guys went up to Alameda on that one, though? Is that the the whole thing?

SPEAKER_04 8:40

You went from San Diego up to Alameda, or you just kind of just took off uh out of North Island and got on the coast and just kind of headed north, and again they were just looking to get rid of all the little boats and stuff. So we did it right there, and then returned back down.

SPEAKER_03 8:57

So now that you guys had have done it once, um well now the second time comes around, that and that's the 60th anniversary of the end of the war, I believe. End of World War II commemoration. So now that you guys have proven that you can do it, now it's a much bigger production.

SPEAKER_04 9:13

Yeah, well, my partner Bob again, you know, he goes to the Navy, and now that we've qualified and done it once, uh we have a reputation of being able to do everything we said we would do, then he goes to him and says, you know, there he knew they were doing a big commemoration in Hawaii. And so we didn't just throw out a proposal to go fly the B-25s off. We just threw out a proposal to fly everything we could put on a carrier tech. So fighters, yeah, we had bombers, we had amphibious airplanes, we had we had everything. So we, you know, same thing. We went to the Navy out of North Island and they kind of put a syllabus together, and then that was a lot bigger and we were gonna go out of uh Oakland or out of San San Francisco area. So we had to go up and we qualified up there and we did everything and then uh reloaded twelve aircraft on board the ship. It's a much bigger production for sure. Well it was, and it was, you know, just it wasn't just that. You know, everybody had to qualify to take off. Uh the one guy I really wanted to see take off was Jack uh Carson. So Jack Carson was a World War II veteran. He flew TBMs off of escort carriers, and he became a very good friend of ours later on, but we were very nervous because of his age, you know, letting it fly off. And when he went to qualify at the last minute, he decided he was going to show all these young pups that, you know, he could outdo everybody, and he just a TBM you can't get a certain amount of manifold pressure because there's not enough rudder to hold it, and it came up and it hit the prop. So we ran over to California Airframe and we borrowed a prop from Ted Holgerson and came back, threw it on, and we put Jack's plane on as the dud as they call it. They always leave a a jet when they bring a carrier in or one of their aircraft, you know, that's up there, and it's usually one that doesn't fly, so we left it. And then uh we took Jack and his family out. So fortunately, uh Captain Rollins, who was my counterpart, uh, the day of the carrier takeoff, he we told them, you know what, Jack really needs to go off, and they allowed him to go off in the B-25.

SPEAKER_03 11:35

Yeah. Oh, that's pretty amazing. Yeah, that's a great memory. Because I know, yeah, the TBM didn't get to go off, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04 11:41

So we had eleven we had 12 airplanes that went over, and then we had eleven that were uh took off, and then we flew the end of World War II commemorations. Uh our airplane was uh sitting out when I think the president of uh arrived, actually, uh Clinton. And then uh we actually overflew the president, you know, for they had parade of veterans, they had parade of ships, they had Okay, so you got the you guys were just out beating up Hawaii for a week.

SPEAKER_03 12:12

We had carte blanche.

SPEAKER_04 12:14

I mean and you know, everywhere you went was uh a Navy facility, so nobody ever said anything. You just went out, you could buzz everybody, and just it was incredible. But just the history of the whole place and the stuff that you got to do and the people you got to meet was it's life-changing, you know, you never get to see that again. Well, I I think they've tried it a couple times.

SPEAKER_03 12:36

Yeah, they've been out there a few times, but not off of the carrier.

SPEAKER_04 12:39

Yeah, they didn't get the opportunity to do that, and you know it's it was so funny because the story I like to tell is we go and we take off of the carriers, you know, uh, and then we form up and we come back and we do our flyovers over the ship, and then I'm little lead, so we bring everybody back and we're staged at Barber's Point. And we came in and we landed, and everybody got off, and I said, Okay, congratulations, everybody. Well, then we go over and we debrief. And I'm telling everybody, okay, well, your rooms are, you know, your cars, and you know, because we we organized the whole thing. And we got done, and you see all these people going out, getting their cars and doing everything. And I told my career, I said, Come on, let's go. And they go, Where are we going? I said, We're in Hawaii. We're not going to the surf and we're not going to the hotels. We're gonna go fly. And we flew twice every day. We burned up well, the whole team, the whole group burned up 20,000 gallons of fuel in a week.

SPEAKER_02 13:37

So man, the memories from that gotta be amazing.

SPEAKER_04 13:40

Well, especially the last day because we got to fly over four islands. We had three B-25s, and you know, just go out and you're flying over to Maui or wherever, and you're calling and calling it. I remember we were a flight of three B-25s. And I called and said we're a flight of three B-25s, and we were flying low, so we had to actually get up to be able to talk to the power. And when you called instead of flight of three B-25s, they're like, What? And you're like, Yeah, uh they've never heard that out there. Yeah, and so they called us and they took one of the airliners that was coming in to land and they made them circle. Oh, really? And so as we came in and we broke, and we came around and did another one, we went up and we got to fly by the airline because they wanted to see us fly by, so it was it was pretty cool.

SPEAKER_03 14:29

That's pretty astonishing. Um, so yeah, I guess another one that we like to talk about is a little different because you were taking off an aircraft carrier, but it was moored in Corpus Christi, and it was for the movie Pearl Harbor.

SPEAKER_04 14:43

That was unwell, it was not scheduled, let's put it that way. So we were doing the movie Pearl Harbor, and we had four B-25s. And when we flew into Corpus Christi, we landed before Corpus Christi because it was a Navy base and they didn't have AB gas. And so we tanked up with enough to where we were done doing all the filming, then we were gonna go back uh, you know, start our trip back home to California, so we needed a certain amount of fuel. So definitely it was the heaviest because it wasn't planned, but when we got there, uh the producers came out and said, Hey, you know, we have the constellation set for doing filming, but there's a lot of stuff going on worldwide and we might not get it. Would you guys uh think about going off of the Lexington? So that was a huge challenge because A, it's a morgue carrier in Corpus Christi Bay.

SPEAKER_03 15:41

So originally it was supposed to go off of a moving carrier? Constellation. Okay, so then they had to constitution make a change.

SPEAKER_04 15:48

Yeah, so you know, they were concerned because they wouldn't get that that filming in. So we said, well, okay, let's see if we can qualify. Well, the one thing we didn't have anything that we could do was offload a lot of fuel. So it was the heaviest carrier takeoff we've ever done. Plus, we're in Corpus Christi, and I know the day we took off, the density altitude was 2,000 feet. Uh and you're not underway.

SPEAKER_02 16:14

Yeah, there's no wind over the deck.

SPEAKER_04 16:16

So, you know, we did the filming on the aircraft carrier for a week, and it was the second to the last day, and I think Steve Hinton and uh I remember it was Tony Ritzman, I think, or Carl Scholl took off on those two airplanes. And then we we were kind of the premier airplane, so they used ours because it had the most original cockpit. So we were doing the filming, you know, and a lot of internal shots. And I just remember that you know, we're doing everything, and it's getting later in the day and later in the day, and you kept looking in the the flag, and there was no wind suck. Straight out, straight out, but that's okay, that's good. And uh Johnny got Johnny Maloney got uh Bob Pond's plane ready to go, and they had him launch. And we were still trying to put radios back in the airplane and you know, all kinds of stuff. If you watch the movie, you'll see where they were trying to lighten the plane at the go to take. Oh, so you're putting stuff in and they're throwing all stuff out, you know. Well, movie stuff. So and they used it for most of the internal shots, so you know the radios weren't real. So we we had a lot more to do, and it was getting towards the end of the day, and finally we got ready and we were staging it, and we had I think it was about 800 feet of deck because they had something that was welded onto it that we couldn't move, you couldn't go all the way back, yeah. And so you fire up the engines and you get everything going, and you know you're gonna go, and you see cameras on the very end of the deck, and you know, people all around them. And the last thing you do is you run up and then you look at the flag, and the flag went like this. So I would say I use probably 750 feet.

unknown 18:02

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 18:03

So how does that feel though, knowing that this is the gonna be I mean, you've done it before off of other carriers, and I've seen the footage off like the Carl Vinson, and it looks like you got off on like 200 feet, but you know, it the things moving and you got how many, however many knots of wind over it.

SPEAKER_04 18:17

Now you're well, and you know, it was kind of I forget what there was something else out there, and I remember when you took off, I was running 44 inches on the left engine and 42 on the right, because you kind of had to make an arc also. It wasn't just straight off, which you know that kind of had a problem. And I watched Johnny Maloney when he went off, and he didn't he didn't do the procedure, you know, the way you're supposed to take off. He he waited until he went by the island, and then you could see him pull the elevator all the way back. Well, it takes about three or four seconds to get the elevator authority to where you get the angle of incidence, and then you start taking off. So if you watch the movie again, go back and watch, and you'll see this one wheel going by a camera. I mean, it was impressive. I can't say that it missed the camera by a matter of time.

SPEAKER_03 19:10

I'm sure he would say that that was planned for the for the movie, you know. Oh, it looked good.

SPEAKER_04 19:14

Yeah, yeah. Because you gotta remember there was one guy that took off, you know, that uh didn't have the flaps down. So but yeah, it was it was 750 feet. I mean it rotated and it did everything, but it was, I think, because you're not running 44 inches and going straight off, and you're trying to just you're just barely tapping a little bit on the brake, and then you kind of make the arc around the island because you had cameras and everything else, and then once you got going, it was it was okay.

SPEAKER_03 19:44

So, I mean, really, the doolittle raid is probably one of the most iconic, you know, most heroic, I should say, kind of battles, battles um in World War II. You know, you got all these group of young men that they're doing something that's never been done, and then they're you know, they're getting seen way sooner than they expected to, and they still make the decision that they're gonna take off and and do this raid, and they don't know if they're gonna make it to China or if they're just gonna be out in the middle of the ocean or whatever. But I mean so for you owning one of these airplanes and and being the steward of that, I mean, what does all that mean? That you got to you got to kind of put yourself in their position a little bit to s to feel that and and like you know and honor what they did and be one of the few people in the world that's been able to do it. I mean, that's you know just something that you money can't buy, really.

SPEAKER_04 20:37

I think it goes back to the first carrier takeoff in San Diego. And you know, we're all young and we're all hot, you know, and we got our flight suits a little too tight, and you go out and we're gonna qualify, and we're one of four airplanes that qualified, and we're one of two that are gonna take off. Uh and I and I will say Pupich wanted to be first, which was fine, because I've always said I wanted to be the last person to fly a B-25 off the camera. So anyway, we we you know we get out, we do all of the hoopla and stuff like that, and then the night before on the ship, they had uh several of the doolittle raiders there. And it was kind of a it wasn't a big fanfare, it was just you know a lot of the people on the ship and the brass from uh North Island and the pilots. And I think it it was one of the things that makes me makes it where I think I it's life-changing because you're sitting there and you think you're the heroes and you're gonna do something, and then after they're sit, you're sitting there listening to what they did, and that's the first time I was around them. Yeah, for something like that. It's just life changing because you realize that we have nothing to do with this thing. Yeah, it really doesn't. It's it was all about what they did, and it was a Turning point in the war because we were getting slammed everywhere we turned around because you know, Pearl Harbor, and then you look at it everywhere that the Japanese were attacking and what was going on. And then these guys go out, and it it you know, if everything goes okay, it's still looking like almost a suicide mission. But they did it. And then what happened? It drew the Japanese back in to now that they're yeah, they just can't keep wreaking havoc all over the world because they just got attacked. Yeah. And and that was like changing for everybody during that time. And for the Japanese, you know, they realized, hey, we have to protect the the home front. So it it lessened what they were doing out in the theater. Yeah, it definitely seemed to shift though. But for me, I mean it was just I think it was just one of those things that you just sit there and you cry.

SPEAKER_03 22:54

I mean, you're just sitting there going, oh my god. So it actually kind of hit you in that moment, versus maybe you know, years later when you're like, oh my god, I can't believe that. I mean, obviously, as years go on, you're probably look back on it even more fondly. But I yeah, I look at it as every time we've done it, it's not about us, it's about them.

SPEAKER_04 23:11

You know, it's not we're just the actors in what these guys really did. And we're honored. I mean, I'm totally honored that we've been able to do that as many times as we did. I remember because you know, Carl Scholl and Tony Ritzman are good personal friends of mine. They uh perpetrator and Pacific Princess, and they did an article on Carl, it was his 80th birthday or something, and somebody made the comment, oh yeah, you you've got more carrier takeoffs than anybody in the world, and he said, No, we don't hold that distinction. Bill Claire's has got five, and we're at four. So, you know, and those guys were the guys that got me in the B-25. I got my training from Tony Ritzman. We flew all over Southern California and did all kinds of things together.

SPEAKER_03 24:01

Great group of people, you know, a lot of fun. So I know you know, I don't like to say never, but do you think that something like that will ever be recreated again, or we will see another aircraft carrier take off with World War II airplanes, or is that something that might just you might have done it and that's gonna be it forever and you might be the last person that took off.

SPEAKER_04 24:23

I think if you could get to the president, he's he would probably let us know.

SPEAKER_03 24:27

He might let you do you know, park an aircraft carrier on the White House lawn and do it.

SPEAKER_04 24:31

But you know, where where the world is right now, I don't think there's any thoughts of anything like that happening right now. I and I never say never. I I used to, but bottle umbar taught me you don't say never because you know, with enough gumption and somebody to go over and write a letter to somebody and it got to you know a certain admiral, and the admiral said, Well, hey, you know, let's let's think about it, let's you know, entertain it and then make it happen. I just gotta have the right people in place, yeah. Yeah, the right place at the right time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:05

Well, thanks for sitting down and and regaling us with these uh do little stories. I know it's kind of short, but we're gonna actually go out and do a little walk around and uh and do a little startup for the folks at home.

SPEAKER_04 25:17

So you know, and I just have to say that the podcast is doing a great job. I mean you and Rob taking that on for the museums huge, but you know, I'm around these people all the time and I'm learning it. Well, yeah, that's you don't have a clue who you're talking about. I mean, that's the same thing.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

I mean, I there's been a few times I know some of the stories, but then I don't, you know, Rob maybe sets it up with somebody, and I'm like, okay, I don't even know what we're gonna talk about, and then you just get involved with what they've experienced in their lifetime, and so it's it's a great alley. We enjoy doing it, and it's just amazing.

SPEAKER_04 25:55

It's uh uh truly amazing what this museum is built up with. And I can say you and Rob, but you and Rob and William.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

I mean, you guys take your time and everything else. We like a part of our easy, yeah, yeah. So we'll continue to see. Okay, thank you, thank you.

SPEAKER_03 26:19

All right, so now I'm gonna do the pre-flight walk around on top of the airplane. So we come up to the cockpit, take the escape hatch out. This is a nice easy way to get up on top of the airplane without having to have a ladder when you're out and about. Step up. Trickiest part is getting across the uh turret without going through it. Then we'll start on the left side of the airplane here. So the first thing I'm gonna do is I'm gonna get into the uh open up the oil tank. We're gonna check oil capacity. Pretty simple, just a few Zeus's here. Interesting fact, B25 holds 37 and a half gallons of oil. Thanks to Blazing Aviation for helping us out with that. Check the oil level. Right now we're sitting at about 29 gallons. Um, I would obviously probably put that up to about 33 if we're gonna go fly. It's also an oil fill if I need to service it. So make sure nothing's uh leaking up here at all. Everything looks good. Make sure this is refastened. The next thing I'm gonna look at is I'm gonna get over the engine. I'm gonna look inside the uh carburetor scoop here, make sure we don't have any bird's nest. Nothing's in there. I'm gonna give a look at the cowling as well. Make sure all the cowling, the Zeus's, are all fastened. You can kind of get an idea, they're all kind of in a line usually. So as long as those look like where they're supposed to be, I'm happy. Just kind of give it all a general look over, make sure you don't have a bunch of oil streaks coming out for maybe valve covers or pushrod tubes or something like that. Now I'm gonna walk out. Usually just walk out to the wing tip. Want to make sure everything looks good. We don't have any bird strikes, we don't have any cracks, nothing's coming off. The lens is good for the nav light. I'm looking at the aileron hinge points, make sure that the bolts and nuts and cotter pins are all there. Get down, give the trim tab for the aileron a few a little bit of a shake, make sure that the bearing isn't coming apart, and then this is really important. We have the oil cooler ducts, the inlets and the outlets here. So I gotta get down here. I'll get a good look inside. I'll try to get the light shining through, make sure we don't have any obstructions. You really want to make sure you don't have any oil leaks coming out of this. It tells you you got a bad uh oil cooler, and you don't want to be flying around with a bad oil cooler. So look through. Light's looking good, don't have any oil anywhere. Everything's pretty happy. So then I'll just take it and I'll go over the fuselage and I'll do the right side in the same manner and then make my way to the tail. Just want to make sure that this uh panel is on, handles in, fasten, it's nice and secure, it's not gonna go anywhere. So I just want to make sure that the trim tab's not loose, you don't have any loose bearings going back and forth. Again, make my way down, looking at the fabric the whole way down. Same thing with the elevator, look at the mounts, I look at the bolts, make sure that we got the counter counter pins are all in. I actually kind of tap on the fabric, make sure that it's not coming apart. Make sure I hold on to my foot, grab the tab back and forth. Then I come over here. This is the emergency release for the rear uh tail. So I just make sure that the handle's in, give it a few taps, kind of pull on it, make sure it's not loose coming off. Move over to the other side, do the same thing, just in the opposite fashion. Make sure the tab is nice and tight, rods look good, cotter pins are in, mounts, fabrics looking good. Make sure I get a good hold on it so I don't fall off. Everything's looking good, so the tail's ready to go. And then I get to make my way back to the front, which is just as fun as the way back.

SPEAKER_04 31:11

Okay, so start this thing. We grab all of the equipment we need. We're gonna check the antennas as we're going around, make sure that they're secure, and there are no problems. I always check the windshield wiper, not that we use it, but in case it doesn't come apart, the guns. You come around over to here. This is a critical one. Don't forget the wedge. This is what releases the wheel, so when you put it, take it out and put it in, this should pop back in, and that way you know it's locked in place, otherwise it'll shimmy and shake, and you won't want to do that. You take a look at the uh shimmy dampener once you get this tight, make sure that it's sticking up about 5/16 to 3/8 of an inch. Check the door, make sure that it's good. Scissors are locked, so that's what this pin does here. And then with a light, you'll get up and you'll take a look. You're looking at the uplock, you're looking at the downlock, and you're looking at all the hydraulic valves to make sure they're not leaking, and the security where the gear attaches. That's all good. So we'll continue around. You're just looking at the whole airframe as you're walking around. We just fielded the airplane, so you're gonna check it for water. Sometimes the trucks will have water in them, or if the airplane sits out for any period of time, they can get water in them, so you're looking for that, making sure there's no rubber pieces in there. That's uh they're all rubber bladders. When they start to deteriorate, they'll kind of show that. This is the strainer, so it's also another point of fuel. So this is the last section. So when the fuel goes from here and it's boosted in just before it goes to the engine, it has in there. So if you push that, you don't get any pressure. You know that it's probably clogging up a little bit. Uh usually I'll take this and pour the fuel in, but don't tell the EPA that. So you're looking for security, making sure that the battery is attached, you can see all of that from here. One of the critical points is you want to make sure that you can see the downlock pin. So there's a pin that keeps that gear from coming up, and it's all secure and in place. And then I'll take and stick my head up and go to the back. And you just want to take a look. There's hydraulic actuators for gear, there's flaps, that sort of a thing. Make sure that that's all good. Make sure that the gear doors are safety wired. Come back around. Gears okay, looks and looking good. Then I'll come up and I'll do a check on the engines. So I want to be able to see just inside to see if you see any oil leaks, something that's coming down after you fly the airplane. If you do have a little pushrod tube or something, you'll always see streaks going across. You want to take a look for that. This is looking pretty good. And then I'm a little taller than most people, but I can actually reach the exhaust stacks. So they become loose, or if they start to crack, you get a really different tinny kind of sound to them. And it's like, okay, we better stop and not go anywhere yet. And I'll grab the collector. And one thing you want to look at on the collector is this distance in here, because that tells you if the motor mounts are starting to get loose, then this collector will start to sag, the whole engine will be stacked sagging down. And then the same thing here on this side. Just taking a look. Spark plugs are all attached, the leads are attached to the spark plugs, and then you come around to here, and you'll take a look at all of this for security, but more importantly, is you're looking for the space between the barrel and the head. So they have a about a 25 hours. If they if you start seeing oil around those, it's telling you that the head is getting loose and separating. You get about 25 hours, and if you don't take care of that, you'll probably blow the cylinder head right off, which you don't want to do that in flight. So you can physically get back with a light, and you can see those all the way around. And then take a look at the prop governor up there, make sure that there's no leaks coming off of the pad. Look at the prop blades, make sure that there's no dents or anything from the last time you flew it, and then you're gonna pull blades, but that takes about three of us, and we're not gonna do that, they've already done it for us right now. If you got a really good light, you can look up into those scoops. So those are the oil cooler scoops, and you'll be able to see all the way through. You'll see light going all the way through. So you got to watch that if it's been sitting out. Sometimes you get birds up there. Sometimes in flight, you'll suck a bird in there. So you want to make sure that that's not obstructed. And then generally, if I'm doing the top also, I will go to the back of the scoop where the outlet is, and you can look through and you can see the honeycombs in there to make sure everything's clear and there's no obstructions. Come around, take a look at the leading edge. Make sure that the pedo tube is off the cover. If you don't do that, when you're going down the runway, you won't be showing any airspeed. Check the lights. With a light, you can look up inside of these hinge points. So you're looking up there to make sure that you can see the castle nuts. Make sure that the safety pins are in it. Same thing back here, looking at the surface. We've got to remember that these surfaces are fabric. The flaps are not, they're all metalized, but just make sure that there's no fabric that's starting to deteriorate. Looking at the hinges on the flaps. Come back around. You want to check this? You're supposed to have 450 pounds. That's the fire bottle. In case you have a fire, you can take and shut the engine down. If you can't arrest it, you can hit a a button inside the cockpit. There's a a tank right here, and it'll discharge, it'll go in and it'll spray all the way around. It also puts a the retardant into the carburetor scoop. So very critical. Make sure there's no obstructions. These are your fuel tank vents. If these get clogged up after you get flying for a while, it won't you won't be able to get fuel to the engines. I'll open up the hatch over here, just check inside for security. But usually when we're flying, we have a person in the back, which is one of our crew members, so they'll secure that. Take a look around, leading edges, take a look at the vertical fins, make sure there's no dents or anything you hadn't had before the last flight. Again, you're looking at fabric. I usually carry a pin in my pocket, and I will always go up like this to make sure that there's no obstructions in here, because if you get water in there, which you can, especially if it sits out in the rain, if it gets clogged up with a bug going in it, it'll get in there and eventually start corroding away the aluminum that's underneath the fabric here. I'll kind of step back, and what I want to look at is when I was in the cockpit, I set everything to neutral. So I want to check the rudder trim to make sure that it's it's in the same alignment with the rudder. Same with the elevator. I can tell if it's zero, zero, and zero where it's at. Come around, check to make sure these guns are secure. And basically the same thing on this side. You're looking to see that. Take a look at the fabric, look at the rudder trim once again. Check it for obstructions. Then I kind of come back around and go do the same thing, a little more in reverse. So I'll come over to here, take a look at the tops of the flaps if they're down a little bit, bottoms, again check the fuel. Everything looks good. I'll go over here to the strainer again, get a little of that fuel, take a look, everything's clear. Come back over here, take another good look at the scissors. You're obviously looking at the brakes on both sides when you're going by. So you have a brake on both sides of the wheel just to make sure that the hoses look okay and they're not rubbing on anything. Check this gear door, they're meant to have this kind of a swivel in them. So you want to make sure that that's doing what it's supposed to be doing. Same thing, you're looking up in here, you're looking for the gear, you're looking for the attachments, you're looking at everything you can see up inside of there. Make sure that the gear downlock is in place. Should have brought a good flashlight. Hydraulic valves are all looking good, the boost pump is okay, battery is attached, safety wires on. Back around here, check the vents with your hands. Check the fire bottle, is up. Looking again at the brake on the outside. Everything's secure. Flap followers are all in the right position, so as the flap comes down, those will open up and then close up so there's no gap in there, which helps the flow going over the flap. Trim tab is in neutral. Nuts are all up there. Spec wars like safety wire, cotter pins are in place, tip lights are good. Come on, Reese, getting right in the shot, man. Again, oil cooler, you want to make sure that those two, which I didn't say on the other side, but I looked at them, are safety wired. So that's what cools the oil, and if those plugs come out, you lose all the oil. Oh, yeah. And you're looking back up into the scoops. Check the exhaust again. And I can't reach that when this stretch's a little too high. So then I'll come back on the other side. Check out the cylinders once again. Bark plugs. Plug leads. Make sure everything's in place. No residual oil in the wrong spots. Collector's good. Cal flaps look good. And we step back where I can see the cylinders and the heads to make sure there's no oil coming out of those. They look good. Prop governor is fine. Prop blades look good. And we would pull the blades again, so we got uh a minimum of three, four blades. That'll that's a whole rotation of the engine to make sure that all the oil that's inside the cylinders comes out. So when you go to start the engine, you don't have a liquid lock. And that's it. That's the way you that's the way you do what you have to do. Then we're ready to go run it. And if that everything goes good with the run-up, we're gonna go take it flying. So when I come over to here, the one thing I'm looking at is there's a Bombay safety clip. I'm gonna make sure that's out. I can't get out.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Yeah, usually the co-pilot takes care of that. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 45:58

And then I'm up and in.

SPEAKER_03 46:13

Since we don't have anybody doing that, I'm just gonna follow him in. Okay, I'm up. I'm gonna do the same thing. I'm gonna check the e-brake pressure, check the clip, make sure the clip is out. Which we're gonna leave in for now. Check the hydraulic system pressure, make sure that's good. Get up inside. So here at the National Museum of World War II Aviation in Colorado Springs, Colorado, we have a lot of flying airplanes. Over 25, in fact. In our early years as a fledgling museum, we had like three batteries to share between all of these airplanes. So you can imagine what it was like whenever we decided to fly something, having to remove and lug one of these heavy things called a battery. In the year since Common Corey came on as a sponsor to the museum, our battery malfunctions and need to replace them as gun zero. If you've ever fired up a war burger or lunch one start, you know that you don't always get it light up at the first go. In the number of worry, we used to have hoping you had enough juice to actually get it fired and up to just no longer exist for us. We have total confidence that we will have the battery power we need to get the show going. At the time, we were using the more conventional aircraft battery to take the top off and check each individual spell for pumper acid level. You know the type. You never quite get that level right, and either it would be drum right or it would be overfilling and spilling acid all over you in the plane. I had more than a couple shirts destroyed in the process of moving one of these batteries, but no more.

SPEAKER_01 47:47

Thanks to Concord Batteries. With their innovative fully sealed battery, gone are the days of worrying about acid spills in your beautifully maintained airplane. Not to mention the absolute bulletproof reliability we get out of every conquered battery we have in this museum. If you're tired of the mess and worry your old battery brings to you every time you want to go fly, install one of these beautifully packaged Concord batteries. Get yourself an improved battery monitor, plug it in, and never have to worry about it again. Peace of mind is worth every penny. Find Concord Batteries at Concord Battery.com, private sponsor the National Museum of World War II Aviation in Colorado Springs, and fully endorsed by the Winged Victory Podcast.

SPEAKER_04 49:31

Emergency brakes are both down, the rudder trim is set to neutral. Aileron elevator, and I'm gonna look outside physically to make sure that the rudder trim is in neutral. Then I'm gonna check that the cowl flaps are open on both sides, which they are. The wing flap I'm gonna put in the up position so they'll come up once we start. Landing gear handle is down, locked, and latched. Supercharger is low and latched, carburetor air filter is in the normal position, and the carburetor air is in the cold position. And then I'm gonna just check these, make sure that the throttle is loose so that I can start and run these. And I'm gonna check batteries. I have a left battery, I have a right battery. Then I turn the back back the left one on, and we go from there. So I make sure the throttles are all the way back, and I'm gonna run that up a little bit, but when I go to start each engine, I want to make sure the mixtures are an idle cutoff because I'm gonna turn the boost pumps on, and if these are opened up, then you're gonna get fuel coming out. Uh props are all full forward, boost pumps are normal. I got primers and we got the mags right here. So both batteries are on, and I'm gonna go ahead and bump the ro we're gonna go on the left side. Okay, clear. Clear the prop. Okay, I'm gonna go boost pumped to normal, make sure that I got fuel pressure coming up, and then put the master mag on. So this one will shut both mags off where these are individual. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 52:48

You know, what goes into actually, you know, making these things fly and safe before we actually go out and go for a flight. I'd like to thank Bill for sitting down, my dad, uh sitting down and regaling us with the stories of the doolittle reenactments and the filming and kind of the process behind all that. Uh again, that's something we might not ever see again in our lifetime. Hopefully, we do. Um, we got some patriots out there that really would like to see this all happen at least one more time and people can experience it. But in the meantime, you could always come on out to the museum, see us flying some of these airplanes now and then. Um, so really, if you'd like to help the museum, um, we're in the middle of the process of our new building being built. Um, you could just check out the description page. There's ways that you can either donate directly to the museum. We also have our Kroger uh benefits package up there where if you just put your name and number and stuff, get us in there and your uh Kroger set up on the card. We get a small percentage for every every dollar you spend at Kroger. It's really harmless for you guys, but it really helps us out. Um, also I'd like to speak on the air show, Pikes Peak Regional Air Show. Uh in September 19th and 20th, we still have tickets available. You can go to pprairshow.org and uh secure your tickets for that before the prices go up or before they sell out, which it will sell out, I guarantee it. So for my non existent partner today, Rob Gill, our guest Bill Clares, William Stevenson behind the camera, and myself Scott Clares, stay safe out there.