101 Days

2014 Work Schedule...

As this is an outdoor restoration work on the helicopter is limited.  This year, 2014, the "Hands On" period is from May 24th to September 1st or 101 days.

Since there are only 15 weekends I will do my best to make myself available everyday to any volunteers who wish to work. Leave me your contact information in a comment and I will get back to you.

I will be adding schedule notes as they come up...

May 1st to May 23rd will be the period for getting the restoration site ready.  The main weekend for that will be the 17th and 18th.

September 6th & 7th, End of season picnic and secure site for Winter.

Project 892 Is Back

Restoration Area

We are back.  We have had "interesting times" here but we just landed on our feet and I can again post to the blog.

2013 was an off year for the project.  There was no action on the aircraft itself although a lot of work was done in the office

I see many pages views have been done but no comments.  Please remember that any comment/request will be addressed.

For the modelers out there, we too are building the Italeri 1/72 and the FM 1/48 scale kits as part of the educational portion of the project.  Remember, the first H-21 documentation I had to work with were the directions from the Hobby Craft kit.

As for the FM 1/48 kit, my Brother (the professional museum quality molder builder in the family) said the Illustrated Parts Breakdown manual, and a 1:1 scale model in the backyard are not required but are very helpful.  If you are building an H-21 model we will be glad to share what we know,  If we don't know it already we will do the research and get back to you, as it may help us as well.

So, join us in the project.

Take Care!!!

COMMENTS PLEASE

If you have tales of the H-21 (Any Branch - Any Time Period) post a comment.  The more we hear from YOU the more accurate our work will be.

Thanks & Take Care!

H-21 - Markings

My Latest And Most Expensive Manual

Correct markings are very important to the finished project

Although we have very good photos of the markings on 892, we needed the markings manual

It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This

Detailed instructions are being compared to the markings on 892 to see if they match

This Gives Us A Point By Point Reference

So far all of the 892 markings match

Look At Number 9

This was the only marking that was too broken up to identify

Using the manual we finally saw what it said

We never would have guessed it

892 Parts Organization

Most Important Parts Control Manual - The Dash 4

The Dash 4 breaks down the entire aircraft to the nut & bolt level

It is best to use this as all of the part breakdown work is done

Also, by using this information you will be acting, using the same terminology, the way people did when the aircraft was in service

This Index Provides Clarity To A Large Aircraft

There are two far more detailed indexes but this one page summary covers the entire aircraft

Finally, The Figure (In This Case No. 5) And All Included Parts

With this you get to see where the part is on the helicopter, what the part looks like and all the components that make up a usable part

Fig. 5 is the Rainshield (This is missing, if you have one a donation of the part would be appreciated)

I used this example as all the information for this part is on one page

Most parts have one or two pages for the diagram and four to six pages for the parts listing 

All of the parts control can be done on paper, however, an MS Access or Open Office database is more project friendly

892 In Viet Nam?

My Good Friend Randy Removing The Hardware In Order To Separate The Two Fuselage Halves

Over 300 U.S. ARMY CH-21C helicopters were deployed in Viet Nam between December 1961 and August 1964.

At least 19 Americans died (all U.S. ARMY personnel) on missions or in combat with the CH-21C while in Viet Nam.

Circumstantial evidence points to 892's possible service in Viet Nam between December 1961 and April 1962.

892 Did Not Want To Come Apart

892's forward fuselage has 20 skin repair patches.  Four of these (round - small) match up from bottom to top (entry - exit?) as if something ballistic passed through the helicopter

If anyone has documented information on 892 being in Viet Nam, please contact us.

892 Jan. 19th, 1978

CH-21C, S/N 51-15892 Photo By Terry Murphy (All Rights Reserved)

Here is the first photo of 892 that I found on the net.

Great shot from Mount Pleasant, FL.

Mr. Murphy, please contact me at scc158@gmail.com.