A15:
The scenario that can be visualised (....and for those who would differ, I will say the scenario is "Hypothetically" made......) is: fuel exhaustion followed by propeller hunting, propellers out of synch, followed by loss of control, followed by possible catastrophic failure, followed by a drop into the trees, some of which are 200 feet high.
The landing gear was electrically driven by a single electric motor driving shafts extending out to the nacelles which had cog wheels at the ends. The cog wheel ran in a large toothed "quarter-quadrant" attached to the gear leg (each side) and which "wound-up" the gear legs into the semi-faiired position in the back end of the nacelles with part of the wheels exposed (a la DC-3/C-47). I have no idea about the "uplock" system, or the "downlock" system and it may have been that there was a cable operated latch for end of travel. There would have been limit switches to stop the motor when full up or full down was reached.
Eight-thousand pounds going into trees is a fair weight and who can say that the driveshaft for the gear did not break at the weakest point and the wheels were flung down and sheared off. I don't know, that's a guess. I will say that when I visited B-17 41-2429 on the hill above the Mumus River one of the wheels was under the port side of the wing centre-section, laying flat on the ground, so in that case that wheel did break off the B-17 gear leg.
As for anybody finding it before the men of Patrol A1... entirely possible being as there were the nomadic and feared Molkolkol around and also possible Japanese troops in the area.
Last edited by David Billings; 12th Apr 2018 at 11:46.