All that money spent on restoring vehicles and warbirds, and.....

[Blacksheep 214]

They wear civilian clothes to drive them in Parades or if they do wear a uniform its a half assed impression.....or they are too fat, or my favorite, THIER HAIR IS TOO FRIKIN LONG!!!!


As for warbirds, I am a commercial pilot, and a Airframe and powerplant mechanic, flying in UH-1H's and others in the utility industry. That being said, I am also a former US Marine having served as a radio communicator in the Force recon community....

WHY ARE THESE DOPES FLYING THESE WARBIRDS AT AIRSHOWS STR8 AND LEVEL WEARING MODERN DAY JET HELMETS AND NOMEX FLIGHTSUITS??????

now I have heard all the excuses...."I wear tennis shoes so I can feel the rudder pedals"... "My insurance gives me a discount if I wear hardhat and nomex"...

Heres the deal,

I wear BOOTS to fly in and its a HELICOPTER! I CAN FEEL THE PEDALS JUST FINE!! WARBIRDS HAVE THE HEAVIEST PEDALS YOU HAVE EVER FELT BECAUSE OF THE SIZE OF THE RUDDER, AND THE SPEEDS THEY FLY AT...
CIV OWNERS FAIL HERE IN THIS ARGUEMENT.

On NOMEX: You can get a flighsuit made that looks EXACTLY like the USN and USAAC/USAAF ones in Tan with the pockets EXACTLY where they should be. NO EXCUSES HERE FOR THIS EITHER....

Gloves: Wear Tan or chocolate brown Nomex...your flash fire protection is the same but at least you look correct in close formation photos or taxiing by the crowd...

On Helmets: OK hear we go.

jet helmets in warbird aircraft should be worn when: You are flying a JET! not a TBM that flys at a whopping 110 mph in cruise!!!!!!!!!

You can wear the ANH-15 with ANR earphone elements and a boom mike attached to the side for modern communication needs (IE; amount of talking in a modern airspace..)

Your periphial vision is limited anyways with a JEt helmet like the HGU-33, 55's....

The worst aircraft in photoshoots is the SPITFIRE...Guys that fly that thing with these giant jet helmets completely destroy any photos of the plane in flight.

You have to ask yourself the bottom line:

WHY FLY THESE AIRCRAFT? The answer is so we can SEE what they SMELL/SOUND/ AND LOOK LIKE IN FLIGHT IN THIER ERA RIGHT?...

Otherwise lets just paint them pink or purple!!!

Or leave them protected without risk in a musuem....Wearing modern clothes flying these things at airshows contaminates the imagery.

People made these things fly, and at thier different eras, the flight equipment matched the performances of the aircraft. There is NOTHING more stupid than seeing a Stinson L-5 with the correct shade of OD and grey, all the correct gack inside for authenticity, and then see it taxi by at a airshow and the person driving the damn thing is wearing a blue nomex flightsuit with patches of his own made up career all over the place, and hes wearing a gloss yellow navy helmet with gold visor waving at the crowd.

I would like to see the warbird community pay more attention to this overlooked farb...for the sake of telling the right story...The other end of the story is the B-17 guys wearing bright green david clark headsets!!...

CMON ECENTRIC WARBIRD OWNERS!!! CMON WANNA BE MILITARY PILOTS!!!
GET WITH THE PROGRAM!!! ITS NOT HARD! You just have to be a respector of history. You are flying a warbird!!! Its risky only when you are in the air and doing combat maneuvers....not flybys! NO JET HELMET IS GOING TO SAVE YOUR LIFE. THEY ARE FOR BUFFET PROTECTION and WINDBLAST PROTECTION FOR FLYING HI SPEED AIRCRAFT EQUIPPED WITH EJECTION SEATS!!!!!!!!!!! NOT THE CORSAIR, NOT THE STINSON.

WHEN HAS ANYONE SEEN A PILOT SAVED BY A HELMET FOR NORMAL FLYING OF A WARBIRD WHERE A JET HELMET MADE THE DIFFERANCE. SHOW ME. I FOLLOW ALL THE SAFETY STORIES REGARDING THESE....SHOW ME.


ughhh..........


Aloha,
Brad

[Tom Houlihan]

So, basically, pilots are farby?

Remember, it takes a college education to break 'em, and a high school education to fix 'em!!

I spent some time in a MALS. I love bustin' on pilots!!!

[gi-rene]

Originally Posted by Tom Houlihan

So, basically, pilots are farby?

Remember, it takes a college education to break 'em, and a high school education to fix 'em!!

I spent some time in a MALS. I love bustin' on pilots!!!

From an O-level guy I agree with that last statement

MALS-11, 12, or motivated east coaster?

By the way I can see what you mean in the farb area, hate to say it somethings will never change but I agree... As you can see in my picture there I got a decent Marine Naval Aviator get up going... the dudes flying those planes in the show... did not. The helmet thing... irks me... But whatever, they are pilots not reenactors... Now if I had a pilot's license....



Thats a little better (minus the building but hell, we had to pretend it was a blockhouse so imagine our surprise when the Germans weren't taking hits in the building until we assaulted and cleared it with a bazooka and two teams) but the barracks we were staying in were WW2 and prior originals, much of Camp Roberts is the same as it was back in those days or later days (60s-70s). Just a frame of reference, 101 isn't out normal cup of tea, we were invited out with the full time 101 unit, especially since 5 506th PIR Vets were in attendance, including Don Malarkey. They said seeing us out there and the vehicles and everything just made their weekend, brought up the memories good and bad, and made them feel thankful that people actually do want to keep their comrades and their own memories alive and interesting to Joe Public.

[Tom Houlihan]

A year in MALS-12, and my last year or so in MALS-14. They wouldn't let me stay in the REAL Corps. I had to change my 0331 MOS for 6075.

[Blacksheep 214]

Thats the thing! PILOTS AND CREW SHOULD START LEARNING HOW TO BE REENACTORS TOO!! ITS BS! IT TOTALLY DESTROYS THE ILLUSION OF SEEING A FORTIES PLANE IN ACTION....IT RUINS it!

And the BS excuses they give are hillarious...I have literrally have heard them all. It comes down to them being arrogant ecentric jerks. I deal with that EVERYDAY in my job....Tommorrow I will be going up to the mountains in a UH-1H wearing PPE that includes work clothes and boots...and a flight helmet and gloves...two weeks ago we lost a entire USCG crew on a Dolphin...and they had on the madated gear from years of Coast Guard aviation.....it didnt help them one bit.

You can only mitigate or protect yourself up to a point. Then you are at the fate of the gods...

These guys in the warbird community need to be lead...A culture change needs to happen....(snort!) ...as if!

The warbird crowd can be the rudist most arrogant backstabish crowd out there. I have been in the air museum business for ten years now.. I have seen them all. There are soo many good people out there too.. they just need to be learned...

Our policy here with any future aircraft that we fly for events or going to static displays is the crew wears EXACTLY what is correct for the aircraft....Period. No exceptions...

As it should be. You wont see our pilots wearing David Clark headsets to fly our C-47! Just Khakis and ww2 headsets...and a T-17 mike! THATS IT. The aircraft should be a time warp. inside and out.

[gi-rene]

vs



I know I know... .45 outside the vest, doesn't make sense.... but I wanted to show her off (had just bought it) and even more, it kinda made sense, guys back then were big on "fashionable" items, so showing off your sidearm for picture purposes makes sense. (Just as I learned that even the Paratroopers wore their jumpsuits as their walking out uniforms because they figured they looked very stylish... admittedly as a normal GI re-enactor... I will admit that now that I've tasted Airborne impressions, weighed down with a decent amount of gear for a D-day jump minus the parachutes, it got us pumped up, then they handed out well copied versions of Col Sink's letter to the 506 and the goosebumps started rolling, more on this even in my reenactor's section tomorrow after I get a good sleep)

[Blacksheep 214]

Its funny how the guy in taxiing in the F4U-5 is wearing a orange tshirt and a flight helmet???!!!! How stupid!!!!!! Shows they are ignorant and arrogant of the need to educate the public...

The guy in that type of aircraft should be wearing the "Bridges of Toko Ri " get up....
Korean war era flight equipment...

Rich , you know what you could get away with for the big MK-1 vest? is to wear a 45 in a regular hip holster. A knife and or a kabar would be cool and you could even have a canteen on the side. If its not on the side, it will interfere with your parachute harness when sitting in the cockpit seat. too...check out my albums for ww2 pics of naval aviators!