D-Day C-47 is flying back to Normandy...

Just wikied the C-47, to see speed, range, etc.

...and found the

XCG-17... a GLIDER version of the C-47! It outperformed the purpose built gliders - better glide ratio, etc.

They gutted a C-47, removed the engines (added ballast weights) and installed 'domes' on the front of the nacelles.

Was towed aloft by 2 tandem C-47's (then the front plane disconnected at altitude), or a C-54 (DC-4).

They only built one... the 'mission' went away during testing.

 

When I was a kid, my father bought me a copy of The DC-3 - The Story of a Fabulous Airplane, by Carroll V. Glines and Wendell F. Moseley (copyright 1966). I really should reread it after nearly fifty years. Along with many other photos, it contains one of the XCG-17. The caption states that it possessed a 14:1 glide ratio, compared to the 12:1 for the Army's best combat glider, the CG-4. It goes on to say that the XCG-17's stalling speed was only 35 mph, and that it could be towed as fast as 290 mph without structural damage. According to the authors, "Military authorities decided...that the C-47 was too valuable with its engines and could not be spared as a glider".

Another interesting fact is that, as they later did with the B-29, the Russians reverse-engineered the C-47 and produced it with the designation LI-2. "Many were equipped with wood-burning stoves for passenger comfort when flying in subzero temperatures".

 

Not so! The Li-2 was a licensed and authorized copy, and supposedly Lisunov spent a fair amount of time at Douglas in the late '30s preparing for transfer of data. The Soviets did make quite a few changes, but I would hardly call it "reverse engineering".

 

The majority of the changes related to conversion of US customary unit measure to Metric. The engines were also Wright units built under license.

 

The Japanese also built licensed copies of the C-47.

Just before WWII.

So the Japanese transported troops to fight US troops in their C-47 copies.

 

I stand corrected. If I'd bothered to read the relevant part of the book again after 46 years, I would not have made that mistake. ;-)

 

I once saw a remarkable photo of a Japanese military DC-3 going down in flames, shot down by.....a B-24 Liberator!

 

I've heard that the Japanese produced propellers under license from Hamilton Standard throughout WW2.

 

Guessing they didn't pay any royalties... ha

But that's not uncommon...

The Germans kept making license built French Rotary engines during WWI... no royalties.

The Germans built 'improved' P&W radial engines (BMW radials) during WWII...

 

The Waco combat glider was never designed to glide like a sailplane, it was designed to drop...and they did... into a combat zone quick as possible. Many were built by piano companies during the war and I knew a glider pilot who said that they flew about as good as a piano. I also knew a C-47 pilot who towed them on D-Day and Market Garden and he told me of seeing a C-47 in front of him over the English Channel when the nose pulled off one of the gliders and after it stalled and nosed over the contents poured out of the front of it, soldiers and a small field piece. before he got to his target area several of the C-47's in front of him were shot down, taking the gliders with them. After his 4th sortie his airplane was grounded because of the holes in it. These guys never got the visibility or awards that they should have received.

 

Bob- My father started out as a glider pilot, but converted to powered aircraft, eventually P-47Ds in WW-II, before seeing combat. He said he was really happy he never had to take one into combat. Between getting shot down and landing and then having the cargo crush you after you hit something, not a great way to make a living. Plus, once you landed, you were an instant infantryman with little training and an M1 Carbine. The Carbine was about as useful as a throwing knife, so they normally gave them to officers, who were not really expected to kill anything. Audi Murphy and a few others excepted.

For all you young whippersnappers, there were huge numbers of DC-3s and ex C-47 DC-3s in the US airlines as late as the 60s. My last flight in a Gooney Bird was from Dallas, Texas to Roswell, New Mexico in 1965, when I started at NMMI.

 

I have seen mention of Sheppard Field in relation to training. That was my basic training staion in 1944 and it was also a CG4 glider training site. We found several of them in the mesquite scrub during field exercises.

 

In other words, the glider tug was a better glider than.....the glider!

 

My last flight in a DC3 was days after the first, around 1983 in South Africa from Londolozi game farm to Johannesburg a return from the flight out afew days earlier. We landed on some sort of dirt strip thta was bumpy even in a land rover, I remmeber us all huddled under the wing to get out of the sun. It was a vsiion of congo in the 50s or China in the late 30's.

Also took a flight in a wright powered casa Ju 52.

 

Sean- Affirmative, they were the backbone of air travel for a long time in the boonies. Big tires were pretty effective on dirt or grass runways.