Official FlightLine RC 2000mm B-24D/J Liberator Thread

[TLewis95]

I finally got my second B-24 flying, complete with a photoshoot from my friend Dylan Phelps.

[marwady]

Yes, I was a bit surprised to understand how much mechanical issues hampered these missions.

Dealing with that along with the Germans trying to kill you makes these men even more heroic.

[quitcherbitchen]

Thanks for posting. Great story. I wish I had asked more questions of my dad as well. Even better, have him write some of it down. Amazing how many engine outs your dad experienced. I thought the B-24 was suppose to be really tough to fly with out one motor and he had a two out situation a few times and landed. Also, the amount of hung bombs was eye opening too.

[marwady]

All,

I have attached a link to our club website.

If you scroll down to "Of Interest", you'll find a very nice tribute to my friend's father who was a flight engineer on B24s in Europe.

Hand written notes and pix, also:

https://www.charlevoixrcbuffs.com/

[boomer108]

Nice work TLewis!

[TLewis95]

Ready to maiden! Pictures with my first one for posterity.

[Hugh Wiedman]

Lil 2.0 is finally almost done. Draco arrives in a day or two so I have been motivated to get this finished and hanging before he gets in - pointing to what will most likely be a double maiden day sometime next week. Decals, clear, and final assembly to go.

Lookin Gooooood TL95! Wait till you get it in the air, then you'll really LOVE IT!

[TLewis95]

Lil 2.0 is finally almost done. Draco arrives in a day or two so I have been motivated to get this finished and hanging before he gets in - pointing to what will most likely be a double maiden day sometime next week. Decals, clear, and final assembly to go.

[meadowhay]

A little black and white nostalgia inspired by our local 486 BG

[davegee]

I think that’s correct on the muscle power it took to fly the B-24, especially in formation flying. The new nose wheel concept wasn’t so easy either, as it wasn’t steerable, but almost free castering, like tail wheels of the time. For taxiing, you had to horse it around using differential power and brakes to get the nose wheel to go where you wanted it to.

[MikeT]

Or, as some pilots in Europe called it (at least according to "Air Warriors"), the "Flying Coffin". The show also implied that the name "liberator" was coined because there were so many ordered and produced, it was the US Air Force's "tool" for liberation of the European countries from Nazi Germanys invasion. Considering the # of missions flown and the tonnage of ordinance dropped, it sure earned that nickname. Additionally, it also was used to fly secret spy missions for a group called "The Carpetbaggers", whose sole purpose was to supply materials to the underground. In fact, one of it's missions detailed in the Air Warriors show was to supply the underground with the means to sabotage the Nazi held harbor of Antwerp so the Allies could take it and supply their advance after Normandy.

They ( some pilots) claimed it was hard to fly and heavy on the controls that's were the "Flying Coffin" came from.

Mike

[davegee]

I had several relatives and friends who flew the B-24s and the B-17s. My dad flew both in combat. He ended up ferrying a B-24M from his base in England to the USA with about 25 guys in it at the end of the war. He's gone now so I can't ask him questions on his experiences. But my father-in-law. now 98, flew 35 missions as an Aircraft Commander on B-17s in Europe during the war. He really liked the plane, they got to fly at higher altitudes than the B-24s with the B-17's "fat" wing that was more stable at 30.000' for many missions. The B-24 had the thin and long "Davis wing" and performed better at lower altitudes, and they were often relegated to flying lower on missions, sometimes taking the brunt of anti aircraft fire. My good friend who flew B-24s finished his 31 required missions in near record time, and volunteered to be a pilot in the Scouting Forces for the rest of the war, flying P-51s. Being former bomber aircraft commanders, they flew ahead of the bomber stream and reported back important things like Flak positions, enemy aircraft, and especially weather ahead.

[Hugh Wiedman]

I've always know it as the "Liberator,"

Mike

Or, as some pilots in Europe called it (at least according to "Air Warriors"), the "Flying Coffin". The show also implied that the name "liberator" was coined because there were so many ordered and produced, it was the US Air Force's "tool" for liberation of the European countries from Nazi Germanys invasion. Considering the # of missions flown and the tonnage of ordinance dropped, it sure earned that nickname. Additionally, it also was used to fly secret spy missions for a group called "The Carpetbaggers", whose sole purpose was to supply materials to the underground. In fact, one of it's missions detailed in the Air Warriors show was to supply the underground with the means to sabotage the Nazi held harbor of Antwerp so the Allies could take it and supply their advance after Normandy.

[MikeT]

I've always know it as the "Liberator,"

Mike

[radfordc]

I too had never heard the B-24 called "Flying Boxcar", but according to Wikipedia: "The B-24's spacious, slab-sided fuselage (which earned the aircraft the nickname "Flying Boxcar")^[13] (Allan, Chuck. "A Brief History of the 44th Bomb Group." chuckallan.com. Retrieved: 15 June 2010". So I guess at least somebody called it that.

Also this: "Whereas the B-17’s fuselage was round in section, the B-24 was basically a rectangle with rounded corners. This gave the aircraft a somewhat boxy-appearance. The joke was that the B-24 was the box the B-17 was shipped in. Its shape also led to one of its nicknames – the “flying boxcar”. https://hi.works/the-flying-fortress...-flying-boxcar

[MikeT]

"Flying Box Car"


Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar

Mike

[Hugh Wiedman]

Not much happening recently here, so thought I'd post some interesting info on the real B-24 I got off of an episode of Air Warriors on the Smithsonian channel recently.

B-24, called the "Flying Box Car", was the first "mass produced" aircraft on an assembly line and as the successor to the B-17, it was faster, had twice the range (4000 miles), could fly at 30,000 feet and carried twice the payload (8000 lbs). The B-17 could not be produced in the same numbers but was more durable to attacks. The B-24 was designed by a small aircraft company based on it's design of a "Flying Boat", of all things, but they could not produce the Air Force's demand for them and many other companies, including Ford, filled out the orders. Over 18,000 B-24's were produce, many at the Ford assembly line called Willow Run outside of Detroit, which my father worked at as a teenager as a riveter to get away from the farm. Eventually, he enlisted in the Navy when the US joined in and he ended up in the Pacific (to get away from farming and to "travel the world"-another interesting story with a lot of twists, at least to me, but won't bore you with that). The B-24 saw service in both Europe and the Pacific, until just before the end of the Pacific War when the B-29 was introduced with double the speed, range and payload capacity and that was it for the B-24 (at least until Flight Line came along).

Over 2000 were downed in Europe alone, giving it the new nickname of the "Flying Coffin", as many pilots thought it was difficult to fly and very susceptible to flack and not as durable as the B-17. But I found my 2 B-24's to be quite easy to fly (although don't have to worry about flack), at least until a marauding F-16 turbine sideswiped me (don't worry, I won't post another picture of that again, but wish I had a video to compete against Aros in the "Best Crash Contest").
The Air Warriors episode details many specific mission in both Europe and the Pacific, including a bombing raid on an ME262 airfield and air battles against that new Nazi jet. Another raid in Europe to take out a refinery resulted in 50 B-24's downed and over 300 crewman lost, but the raid was considered a success. The B-24 was the single most produced Military Aircraft in history, yet only a few remain today. When the B-29 came onboard and the Pacific War ended abruptly with the A-Bomb, many B-24's were taken directly from the assembly line or adjacent airfields to the scrap yards without ever getting in the air, as we were beginning to enter the jet age. If you are a B-24 fan, try catching that Air Warriors episode, great actual footage and interviews with the pilots and crewman who lived to tell their tales. My hat goes off to them for their incredible bravery and service (as to everyone past/present in the military)!

[Hugh Wiedman]

Great point xviper I had just assumed that the twitching he referred to was from the normal initiation when the ESC is first powered up and it gives you the number of beeps corresponding to the number of cells. The props pulsate with each beep in the initiation, but if they are twitching after that with throttle increase, then it could be one of the 3 power wires.

[xviper]

hey guys, newcomer here! looking for help to trouble shoot one of the engines. It will twitch as if trying to move, but will not start continuously rotate. How do i figure out what the problem is? and how will i fix it? All other engines work fine. I tried recalibrating multiple times.

A twitching motor, to me, indicates that of the 3 wires going to that motor, 1 wire has lost its connection or has insulation rubbed off and shorted. You'll need to dig in there where the wires are connected and see if that is the case. If that's what is the problem, then fixing that connection will resolve the problem and you can go ahead and do the throttle calibration again.

[Hugh Wiedman]

BTW rebel1245 the throttle cable for that motor will be coming off of it's ESC. The 3 power cables from the ESC is all that goes to the motor. I've replaced a motor once before (can't even remember why), and seem to remember even that was a bit tricky. Pulled the ESC out a bit to help make the connections but never had to look deep inside to where the throttle cable from the ESC was connected. I'm guessing it goes to a plug further back where the aileron/flap/gear wires also go to bundle into the ribbon cable connection. If you look on page 6 of the manual, you will see the wiring diagram. You'll see that each wing somewhere inside it has a Main wing control board where all the servo wires are connected, including 2 throttle wires, that the ribbon cables plug into. It may even be that the non working motor has it's servo plugged into that board backwards, or not at all. Keep us posted.