Historic Flight Foundation
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Historic Flight Foundation
The Historic Flight Foundation (HFF) is an aviation museum located at Felts Field in Spokane, Washington. The museum collects, restores, and flies historic aircraft from the period between Charles Lindbergh's solo Atlantic crossing in 1927 and the first commercial flight of the Boeing 707 in 1957, a 30-year period when airplanes evolved from relatively simple wood and fabric biplanes to commercial jets. The museum was previously located at Paine Field in Mukilteo, Washington, but was relocated to Spokane during the spring of 2020 due to the presence of commercial air service at Paine Field. The collection's Douglas DC-3 was manufactured at the Douglas Aircraft Company's Long Beach plant as one of only 300 DC-3s specifically designed to "fly the hump"—the eastern end of the Himalayan Mountains—during World War II. The aircraft have been fully restored to flying condition, and fly regularly at monthly summer Fly Days, HFF's September Vintage Aircraft Weekend, and Paine Fiel ...
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Felts Field
Felts Field is a public airport in the northwest United States, located northeast of downtown Spokane, in Spokane County, Washington. It is owned by Spokane City-County. The airport has two parallel runways. Now used for general aviation, Felts Field was Spokane's commercial airport before the opening of Spokane International Airport. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2017–2021 categorized it as a regional reliever facility. History Felts Field, Spokane's historic airfield, is on the south bank of the Spokane River east of Spokane. Aviation activities began in 1913. Then called the ''Parkwater airstrip'', it was designated a municipal flying field in 1920 at the instigation of the Spokane Chamber of Commerce. In 1926, the Department of Commerce recognized Parkwater as an airport, one of the first in the West. In September 1927, in conjunction with Spokane's National Air Races that Felts Field hosted, the airport ...
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Boeing-Stearman Model 75
The Stearman (Boeing) Model 75 is a biplane formerly used as a military trainer aircraft, of which at least 10,626 were built in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s. Stearman Aircraft became a subsidiary of Boeing in 1934. Widely known as the Stearman, Boeing Stearman, or Kaydet, it served as a primary trainer for the United States Army Air Forces, the United States Navy (as the NS and N2S), and with the Royal Canadian Air Force as the Kaydet throughout World War II. After the conflict was over, thousands of surplus aircraft were sold on the civilian market. In the immediate postwar years, they became popular as crop dusters and sports planes, and for aerobatic and wing walking use in air shows. Design and development The Kaydet was a conventional biplane of rugged construction, with a large, fixed tailwheel undercarriage, and accommodation for the student and instructor in open cockpits in tandem. The radial engine was usually not cowled, although some St ...
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Waco UPF-7
The Waco F series is a series of United States, American-built general aviation and military biplane Trainer (aircraft), trainers of the 1930s from the Waco Aircraft Company. Development The Waco 'F' series of biplanes supplanted and then replaced the earlier 'O' series of 1927/33. The 'F' series had an airframe which was smaller and about lighter than the 'O' series, while continuing to provide accommodation for three persons in tandem open cockpits. A similar performance to the earlier model was obtained on the power of smaller and more economical engines.Simpson 2001, p. 573 The initial models were the INF ( Kinner engine), KNF ( Kinner) and the RNF ( Warner Scarab), all of which had externally braced tailwheel undercarriages. Many further sub-models followed with more powerful engines of up to . The most powerful in the range was the ZPF of 1936/37, intended for executive use. Operational history The 'F' series was popular with private owner pilots for sporting an ...
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Travel Air 4000
The Travel Air 2000/3000/4000 (originally, the Model A, Model B and Model BH were open-cockpit biplane aircraft produced in the United States in the late 1920s by the Travel Air Manufacturing Company. During the period from 1924–1929, Travel Air produced more aircraft than any other American manufacturer, including over 1,000 biplanes. While an exact number is almost impossible to ascertain due to the number of conversions and rebuilds, some estimates for Travel Air as a whole range from 1,200 to nearly 2,000 aircraft.Wilkinson, 28 February 2014, pp.? Design and development Design and development The Travel Air Model A was engineered chiefly by Lloyd Stearman, with input from Travel Air co-founders Walter Beech, Clyde Cessna, and Bill Snook and could trace its ancestry back to the Swallow New Swallow biplane. The Travel Air, however, replaced the New Swallow's wooden fuselage structure with a welded steel tube. An interim design, the Winstead Special, was developed by the ...
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Supermarine Spitfire
The Supermarine Spitfire is a British single-seat fighter aircraft used by the Royal Air Force and other Allied countries before, during, and after World War II. Many variants of the Spitfire were built, from the Mk 1 to the Rolls-Royce Griffon engined Mk 24 using several wing configurations and guns. It was the only British fighter produced continuously throughout the war. The Spitfire remains popular among enthusiasts; around 70 remain airworthy, and many more are static exhibits in aviation museums throughout the world. The Spitfire was designed as a short-range, high-performance interceptor aircraft by R. J. Mitchell, chief designer at Supermarine Aviation Works, which operated as a subsidiary of Vickers-Armstrong from 1928. Mitchell developed the Spitfire's distinctive elliptical wing with innovative sunken rivets (designed by Beverley Shenstone) to have the thinnest possible cross-section, achieving a potential top speed greater than that of several contemporary figh ...
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Piper J-3 Cub
The Piper J-3 Cub is an American light aircraft that was built between 1938 and 1947 by Piper Aircraft. The aircraft has a simple, lightweight design which gives it good low-speed handling properties and short-field performance. The Cub is Piper Aircraft's most-produced model, with nearly 20,000 built in the United States. Its simplicity, affordability and popularity invokes comparisons to the Ford Model T automobile. The aircraft is a high-wing, strut-braced monoplane with a large-area rectangular wing. It is most often powered by an air-cooled, flat-4 piston engine driving a fixed-pitch propeller. Its fuselage is a welded steel frame covered in fabric, seating two people in tandem. The Cub was designed as a trainer. It had great popularity in this role and as a general aviation aircraft. Due to its performance, it was well suited for a variety of military uses such as reconnaissance, liaison and ground control. It was produced in large numbers during World War II as the L- ...
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North American T-6 Texan
The North American Aviation T-6 Texan is an American single-engined advanced trainer aircraft used to train pilots of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF), United States Navy, Royal Air Force, Royal Canadian Air Force and other air forces of the British Commonwealth during World War II and into the 1970s. Designed by North American Aviation, the T-6 is known by a variety of designations depending on the model and operating air force. The United States Army Air Corps (USAAC) and USAAF designated it as the AT-6, the United States Navy the SNJ, and British Commonwealth air forces the Harvard, the name by which it is best known outside the US. Starting in 1948, the new United States Air Force (USAF) designated it the T-6, with the USN following in 1962. It remains a popular warbird used for airshow demonstrations and static displays. It has also been used many times to simulate various historical aircraft, including the Japanese Mitsubishi A6M Zero. A total of 15,495 T-6s of a ...
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North American P-51 Mustang
The North American Aviation P-51 Mustang is an American long-range, single-seat fighter aircraft, fighter and fighter-bomber used during World War II and the Korean War, among other conflicts. The Mustang was designed in April 1940 by a team headed by James H. Kindelberger of North American Aviation (NAA) in response to a requirement of the British Purchasing Commission. The Purchasing Commission approached North American Aviation to build Curtiss P-40 Warhawk, Curtiss P-40 fighters under license for the Royal Air Force (RAF). Rather than build an old design from another company, North American Aviation proposed the design and production of a more modern fighter. The prototype NA-73X airframe was rolled out on 9 September 1940, 102 days after the contract was signed, and first flew on 26 October. The Mustang was designed to use the Allison V-1710 engine, which had limited high-altitude performance in its earlier variants. The aircraft was first flown operationally by the RAF a ...
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North American B-25D Mitchell
The North American B-25 Mitchell is an American medium bomber that was introduced in 1941 and named in honor of Major General William "Billy" Mitchell, a pioneer of U.S. military aviation. Used by many Allied air forces, the B-25 served in every theater of World War II, and after the war ended, many remained in service, operating across four decades. Produced in numerous variants, nearly 10,000 B-25s were built. These included several limited models such as the F-10 reconnaissance aircraft, the AT-24 crew trainers, and the United States Marine Corps' PBJ-1 patrol bomber. Design and development The Air Corps issued a specification for a medium bomber in March 1939 that was capable of carrying a payload of over at North American Aviation used its NA-40B design to develop the NA-62, which competed for the medium bomber contract. No YB-25 was available for prototype service tests. In September 1939, the Air Corps ordered the NA-62 into production as the B-25, along with th ...
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Hamilton H-47
The Hamilton H-45 and H-47 were six-passenger-seat, all-metal, high-wing monoplanes powered by single Pratt & Whitney radial engines. They were built for passenger and mail-carrying work in the US in the late 1920s. Design and development The Hamilton Metalplane Company, which merged with Boeing in 1926, built some of the earliest all-metal US aircraft. The H-45 and the H-47, which differed chiefly in having a more powerful engine, were part of that series. Both types were corrugated-aluminium-skinned in the Junkers style. The Wing configuration#Number and position of main-planes, high wings were semi-cantilevers, unsupported apart from pairs of parallel struts from the fuselage bottom edge to the wing close to the fuselage. The main legs of the fixed, tailwheel undercarriage were attached at the same wing points as the struts and joined laterally by inverted V bracing. The fuselage was flat-sided, with wide windows to the passenger cabin under the wing. This was accessed v ...
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Grumman F8F Bearcat
The Grumman F8F Bearcat is an American single-engine carrier-based fighter aircraft introduced in late World War II. It served during the mid-20th century in the United States Navy, the United States Marine Corps, and the air forces of other nations. It was Grumman Aircraft's last piston engined fighter aircraft. Modified versions of the Bearcat have broken speed records for piston-engined aircraft. Today, the Bearcat is popular among warbird owners and air racers. Design and development Concept The Bearcat concept began during a meeting between Battle of Midway veteran F4F Wildcat pilots and Grumman Vice President Jake Swirbul at Pearl Harbor on 23 June 1942. At the meeting, Lieutenant Commander Jimmie Thach emphasized one of the most important requirements in a good fighter plane was "climb rate". Climb performance is strongly related to the power-to-weight ratio, and is maximized by wrapping the smallest and lightest possible airframe around the most powerful availab ...
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Douglas DC-3
The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner manufactured by Douglas Aircraft Company, which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s to 1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper version of the Douglas DC-2. It is a low-wing metal monoplane with conventional landing gear, powered by two radial piston engines of . (Although most DC-3s flying today use Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp engines, many DC-3s built for civil service originally had the Wright R-1820 Cyclone.) The DC-3 has a cruising speed of , a capacity of 21 to 32 passengers or 6,000 lbs (2,700 kg) of cargo, and a range of , and can operate from short runways. The DC-3 had many exceptional qualities compared to previous aircraft. It was fast, had a good range, was more reliable, and carried passengers in greater comfort. Before the war, it pioneered many air travel routes. It was able to cross the continental United States from New York to Los An ...
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