Aviation News
Volunteers Restore World War II Boeing B-29 SuperfortressBACKGROUND INFORMATION
Hundreds help renew 'Doc' at Boeing facilities in Wichita
WICHITA, Kan. - "Doc" has come home again. It is not yet the gleaming, shiny B-29 Superfortress that Boeing workers proudly delivered in 1945 from the company's huge new Wichita plant. And it is not yet ready for flight. But the skies beckon, as hundreds of dedicated volunteers tenderly restore Doc, inch-by-inch, section-by-section, day-by-day.
Doc is one of nearly 1,644 World War II B-29 Superfortress bombers built by Wichitans from 1943 to 1946. It was part of a nine-airplane squadron bearing the names of Walt Disney's Snow White characters, and dubbed "Doc." The historic bomber, rescued from a desert graveyard by U.S. Aviation Museum founder Tony Mazzolini, is believed to be the last B-29 anywhere that can be restored to flying condition.
Doc is being brought back to life at Boeing's Wichita facility. The project is a partnership effort between Boeing Wichita the U.S. Aviation Museum. Hundreds of volunteers from all walks of life have donated thousands of hours since restoration officially began in May 2000.
Many of the volunteers are current and former Boeing employees, and a handful even helped build the bombers during the second World War. Others, however - including a piano repairman and a truck driver - had never been inside a Boeing plant before. Equally important to the restoration are the in-kind contributions of parts, materials and expertise from vendors, businesses, and aviation collectors throughout the country.
Redelivery of Doc is planned for 2003 - the 100th anniversary of powered flight. Doc will then become a flying exhibit of American aviation history.
"Without Boeing's generosity and commitment, we could never have realized the work that is under way today," says Mazzolini. "And without the commitment of incredibly dedicated volunteers, the dream of completing this huge restoration would remain just that - a dream."
Mazzolini's U.S. Aviation Museum is a self-supporting, privately financed educational organization. The non-profit organization is made up entirely of volunteers.
Project beginnings
Mazzolini, who is a former B-29 crewmember, first learned of Doc's existence in 1987. An experienced restorer of vintage aircraft, he had searched for years for a B-29 that could be restored to flight.
After the war, Doc suffered the fate of many B-29s that were dismantled for parts or destroyed in training missions. Since Doc's decommissioning in 1956, it had been a ballistic missile target at the remote Naval Ordnance Test Station at China Lake, Calif. It was a target four times. And, miraculously, the missiles missed all four times.
In 1998, the U.S. Navy released the plane to Mazzolini, who approached Boeing about partnering on the major restoration project. In April 2000 - through the funding of a private individual - the airplane was disassembled and transported on five tractor-trailers to Wichita, a city rich in aviation history and skilled aircraft workers. More than 500 Boeing workers as well as retirees and many others greeted Doc's arrival.
Painstaking reconstruction
Doc's volunteer restorers love the work and are determined to complete it. Some have been inspecting, making repairs, recabling, drilling, sanding or rewiring the airplane every week since its arrival. One volunteer (who help build the bombers six decades ago and retired after 44 years with Boeing) has worked together with his grandson, cleaning and priming the rudder.
The restoration crew began their efforts with a thorough power washing of the exterior and interior. (The interior was later painted with 1011 green anticorrosive paint, as well.) The crew discovered that the airframe and wings were in excellent condition. Another plus: Doc still had all four engines, with reasonably few flight hours.
Volunteers spent a full day polishing the skin panels as part of a project "party," which assisted in the analysis of the level of corrosion. Thousands of small parts were hand-washed and identified. Crates of spares, sealed for decades, were cracked open and cataloged.
Doc, already in sections, was further disassembled. This process alone required 16 months. Thousands of fasteners had to be repaired or replaced. A restored Doc will, in fact, be even better than the original under today's tighter quality standards.)
Parts, large and small, from other B-29s have been donated. The restoration crew has a database of salvageable parts from every B-29 still in existence. One lucky volunteer made an interesting discovery when a tail gunner's escape hatch arrived from one of these donor B-29s. The hatch had been autographed by Fred Olivi, co-pilot of "Bock's Car," a B-29 that helped end World War II.
Early in the project, a team of volunteer experts researched thousands of pages of technical manuals, drawings, magazine articles and books to ensure perfect restoration. Former flight crewmembers and others donated manuals they had saved as souvenirs. The experts had to be careful, however, to ensure the crew was following specifications for this particular model.
Aviation history lovers from around the country are also lending a hand. A teacher from Cleveland, Ohio, spent a week of his summer vacation restoring Doc. Some pieces of Doc were sent to machine shops in Tennessee, Texas, Washington and other states for restoration.
Today's technology for yesterday's airplane
Twenty-first century technology has played a critical role in Doc's rebirth. For instance, the team designed a custom support using a special three-dimensional software application. This custom tool allowed one section to be split from the forward fuselage.
Employees in Boeing's emergent manufacturing unit volunteer over their lunch breaks and on Saturday duplicating parts that have been out of production for many years.
When possible, the teams keep as much as they can from original tool designs. For instance, wooden sawhorse cradles were used as support structures during the 1940s. The team recreated the cradles, using wood, but improving on it. They used laminated plywood reinforced with four-by-fours and double two-by-four gussets, and then covered the support to avoid scratching the airplane.
Throughout the project, Boeing has worked closely with the Federal Aviation Administration to assure the airplane is safe and airworthy.
Important milestones
The volunteer crew has celebrated important events along the way. In spring 2001 the team began reassembling the vertical fin, which had been severed. After splicing and then fitting the pieces back together, the reskinned tail is now in place.
That summer, "bead blasting" and power washing of the forward fuselage and aft body section was completed. This allowed volunteers to assess the amount of corrosion that required repair.
Throughout the fall and winter of 2001 and 2002, volunteers continued dozens of detailed restoration tasks.
In spring of 2002, 83-year-old artist Owen Hughes drove 1,385 miles from Newark, N.Y., to recreate Doc's signature nose art. Hughes had painted figures on dozens of B-17s and B-24s during the war while stationed in England with the Army Air Corps.
Shortly afterward, the first installation of manifold pressure tubing for the engines was completed. Sections of the bomber were moved to a hangar for final assembly preparation, a month-long moving operation.
Along the way, Doc has had some special visitors, including retired Brig. Gen. Paul Tibbets, the Air Force pilot who flew the "Enola Gay," the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb over Hiroshima. While he was a lieutenant colonel, Tibbets had been a test pilot for the B-29 at Boeing Wichita. Many others have admired Doc, including hundreds of veterans from several existing B-29 World War II bomb groups.
History of the B-29
Boeing built 1,769 B-29s (including equivalent airplanes in spares) at its Wichita, Kan., plant and another 997 in Renton, Wash. The Bell Aircraft Co. built 668 of the giant bombers in Georgia, and the Glenn L. Martin Co. built 536 in Nebraska. Production ended in 1946.
Wichita played a critical role in the production of the B-29. By the end of World War II, the Boeing Wichita plant had built nearly 65 percent of the total produced during the war, and earned five Army and Navy awards for production efficiency. At the height of production in 1944, 40,000 Boeing Wichita employees were rolling out nearly four B-29s every day.
B-29s were used in the Pacific theater during World War II. Bombing raids over Tokyo sometimes used 1,000 "Superforts" at a time. On Aug. 6, 1945, the B-29 Enola Gay dropped the world's first atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Three days later a second B-29, "Bocks Car," dropped another atomic bomb on Nagasaki.
After the war, B-29s were adapted for several functions, including in-flight refueling, anti-submarine patrol, weather reconnaissance, air defense and rescue duty. B-29s saw military service again in Korea between 1950 and 1953, battling new adversaries: jet fighters and electronic weapons. The last B-29 squadron retired from service in September 1960.
How you can help
In spite of the tremendous progress made over the last two years, there is a great deal of work to do before Doc returns to the skies. For instance, the largest task confronting the restoration is that of raising funds to rebuild Doc's large and powerful R-3350 engines.
Tax-deductible contributions may be sent to:
The United States Aviation Museum
Attention: Wayne M. Gomes
B-29 Restoration Fund
P.O. Box 2417
Grand Junction, CO 81502
News media contacts:
Dick Ziegler, Boeing Wichita - 316.523.1465, dick.Ziegler@boeing.com
Carolyn Russell, C. Russell & Co. PR - 316.932.900, crussell@crussellandco.com
November 2002
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