Spooky 2
quote:
Doing the FE station/panel conversion must have been quite a task. Were you directly involved in that project and if so, can you shed a little light on it?
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The “BOAC Project” as it was known at LASI in the mid 1950’s was one of the biggest mod programs of its day. All the work was done in Hangar 7 (still there but now a cargo facility) at the then Idlewild. The vertical fins had to be folded to get the aircraft in. It involved six (I think) ex-UAL and then a number of BOAC aircraft as well for lesser mods. The UAL B.377 Stratocruisers had a strange cockpit layout presumably to make their Flight Engineers feel they were in a DC-6. Instead of the FE having his own panel and sitting sideways as on other B377, the FE was seated just behind the throttle pedestal facing forward. All the instrumentation normally on the FE panel was in front of the pilots necessitating some very small diameter units to fit them all in. How the FE could read them at night in turbulence was a wonder. I would love to hear from some ex-UAL FE that flew them.
This necessitated stripping the entire cockpit and so I saw electricians using bolt cutters on wire bundles to remove them. The B.377 was an electric airplane, only rudder oost, brakes and nose steering (I think I have it right) were hydraulically operated. All that Curtiss prop wiring had to be removed so the wings were stripped too. Essentially, all the wiring was removed and new wire looms fitted throughout.
For access, the turbo-superchargers and their ducting had to be removed. The nose cases of all the engines were removed and sent to Pratt and Whitney for installation of prop control oil passages as these were not installed or were blanked off on the UAL engines.
If this was not enough, BOAC wanted additional seating. This required the addition of another overwing exit on each side. This was no small task ond on one aircraft the cutting of the hole was done without the radius at each corner. BOAC, with its memory of the Comet wanted no sharp corners or repairs and LASI had to replace the skin panel which Boeing was able to supply. In a project that size, there were inevitable cockups. On Day shift one crew started stringing prop and engine wire looms fro the E and E going aft and then outboard. On the afternoon shift another crew started laying engine wire looms from the engines inward. They met at the wing root and were disconcerted to find a similiarly number wire loom coming in while they were going out. One had to be removed of course.
Replacing the instrument panels and installing an FE panel also required replumbing the piot static system as well. I believe our now familiar seat tracks were installed in the cabin as well to allow flexible seating arrangements. A new interior was installed.
I wonder how the aircraft were received at BOAC considering the mods were outsourced? Were they more troublesome than their own original aircraft?