[ARC5] Museum DC-3 needs radio gear

[Ken Kinderman]

Hello everyone,

I am assisting in the restoration of a very late, immediate post-war DC-3 at
the Yankee Air Museum in Belleview Michigan located at the historic Willow
Run B-24 plant near Detroit.

The guy in charge, Doug Schwartz, pilots the DC-3 and the museum's B-17G
(one of only 11 still flyable in the world). Like all museums these days,
they have their funding challenges, but they appear to be survivable. I am
working with Doug on the DC-3 radio gear. He already has an ARC-8
(T47-A/ART-13 plus the BC-348) including most of the accessories and plugs.
He is shooting for authenticity, and he is achieving it. Example: the key
near the BC-348 in the B-17 is a J-38, and he knows it's out of place, so he
is still looking for a couple of J-37's: one for the B-17 and one for the
DC-3, where the original screw holes are still on the operator's table.
Because the DC-3 flies, he has had to bring the cockpit avionics on the
front panel up to standard. But the rest of the radio gear behind the
cockpit (and some inside the cockpit) looks just like the mid to late
1940's.

Naturally, the hard-to-find control boxes and mounting trays are giving him
the most trouble. But the stuff is slowly turning up. He has been making
fruitless trips to hamfests, which as we all know are a diminishing source
of stuff. The e-place is pricey, and the sellers are not always reliable.

So I told him about the guys on the lists, and that there might be some help
from some of us.

Here is his current shopping list. If anyone has anything, please let me or
Doug know. Whether you donate or sell it, you will have the great
satisfaction of knowing it is back home where it belongs. It doesn't have to
work (although the T-47A/ART-13 and DY-17 are fully functioning and set for
3885 on Channel 1, and the BC-348-Q just needs a dynamotor... so who knows,
maybe a QSO in flight on the ARC-8?)

So here's what he needs:

R-77/ARC-3       VHF Receiver
R-89/ARN-5A     Glide Slope Receiver
BC-733D            RC103  Localizer Receiver
R-5/ARN-7         Automatic Compass Receiver
CU-32/ART-13   Tuner
CU-24/ART-13   Shunt Capacitor

Assume that accessories and racks are also needed. He does have quite a
comprehensive shop facility so that in a pinch he can fabricate mounting
trays, but of course some are not so easy. (The tray for the DY-17 is good
example of something easily fabricated.)

Here's the museum's website:

http://www.yankeeairmuseum.org/

Thanks for reading this far, and thanks for helping.

73,

Ken
W2EWL