A long-neglected B-29 takes center stage at Nebraska’s Strategic Air and Space Museum.
After more than five years of painstaking work, the Strategic Air and Space Museum’s Boeing TB-29B has at last found a permanent home out of the weather. Originally built as B-29B serial no. 44-84076, the bomber was delivered in the final days of World War II and later modified to serve as a trainer. It is a particularly significant addition for the Ashland, Nebraska, museum because B-29s were the first bombers assigned to the Strategic Air Command when it was established in 1946.
When Boeing’s Model 345 was first proposed on May 11, 1940, it represented a giant leap forward from the B-17. The aircraft that would become known as the B-29 was essentially a pressurized tube with a high-aspect-ratio wing that could lift 90 times its own weight. While temperatures in the unpressurized Flying Forts often dropped below zero, requiring crews to don bulky flight suits and oxygen masks, the B-29’s heated and pressurized compartments allowed fliers to work in comfortable, lightweight uniforms.
The production model had a wingspan of 141 feet 2 inches and a fuselage length of 99 feet. The bomber weighed 36,135 pounds empty, with a maximum takeoff weight of 120,000 pounds. Bombload was estimated at 10,000 pounds. Boeing’s prototype and production runs eventually totaled 3,970 Superfortresses. The B-29As were armed with 10 .50-caliber machine guns and one 20mm cannon. The B models, stripped of all guns save for two .50s in the tail, were 2,000 pounds lighter than As and could climb 150 feet higher, with a slightly longer range.
The Superfortress was primarily designed for long-range attacks on the Japanese mainland during World War II, dropping conventional bombs from 30,000 feet. When those tactics proved ineffective, Maj. Gen. Curtis LeMay (later commander in chief of SAC) ordered B-29 crews to make their runs at low level, loaded with incendiaries. The resulting conflagrations decimated Tokyo and other cities, helping convince the Japanese that further resistance was futile.
The Strategic Air and Space Museum’s TB-29B was license-manufactured by Bell Aircraft in Marietta, Ga., and accepted by the U.S. Army Air Forces on August 4, 1945, just two days before the B-29 Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Later that same month 44-84076 was sent to the Second Air Force in Victoria, Kan.
In September the bomber was assigned to the Air Materiel Center (AMC) at Kelly Field, in San Antonio, Texas. Only two months later, with America’s war machine winding down, 44-84076 was placed in storage in California. But in May 1946 it reentered service, assigned to the 4117th Air Base Unit (AMC) in Georgia, then to the 2119th AMC in Alabama. In April 1947, the museum’s B-29 received its first SAC assignment with the 97th Bombardment Group in Kansas. That fall the aircraft was handed off to the 28th Bombardment Group in South Dakota, but was later assigned to Louisiana and then to the RAF base at Scampton, England.
The well-traveled B-29 returned to the States in February 1949, first going to the Sacramento Air Materiel Area, and seven months later to the Oklahoma City Air Material Area to be transformed into a trainer. Redesignated a TB-29B, the bomber took on a new role involving crew instruction, radar calibration and equipment evaluation.
In March 1951, packed with new electronics, recording equipment and instructor’s stations, 44-84076 went to the 11th Radar Calibration Squadron, Air Defense Command, at Hamilton Air Force Base, Calif., followed by deployments to other West Coast bases. Transferred to SAC Headquarters at Offutt Air Force Base in July 1959, the airplane was removed from the USAF inventory and turned over to the Strategic Air Command Museum at Bellevue, Neb., later that year. It was displayed outdoors in the harsh Nebraska weather until June 1997, when all the SAC Museum’s aircraft were moved inside the multimillion-dollar Strategic Air and Space Museum at Ashland.
Initial restoration work began in 2006, with staff and volunteers gutting the forward compartments back to the pressure bulkhead in front of the bomb bay. Then the empty spaces, as well as the instruments and radios, were stripped of paint, cleaned and repainted. The crew seats were refurbished, and seat cushions got new leather coverings. Although the bomber will never fly again, its interior now looks like it’s ready for a mission.
The four 2,200-hp, 18-cylinder Wright R-3550-W57 supercharged radial engines, exposed to the elements for nearly half a century, were fouled with bird nests and windblown dirt. The team power-washed each engine and then covered them all, to protect them during the rest of the restoration.
The underside of the B-29’s wings and fuselage had been painted black, and it sported the name Man-o-War, with a silhouette of a rearing horse—a scheme chosen by the SAC Museum’s first director. With the aircraft moved back outside, the team “sodablasted” its exterior (baking soda, applied under pressure, removes old paint and debris without damaging metal, and washes away without harming the environment).
A team of restorers then inspected the airplane’s skin, making sure that any corroded panels were replaced. On the whole, the B-29 was in pretty good shape, considering how long it had been sitting outside. One exception was the tail gunner’s position, which was in bad condition. Brian York, the museum’s curator of exhibits and collections, explained, “Ninety percent of the tail gunner’s area had to be rebuilt.” In fact, the exterior of the compartment was almost totally reconstructed. Since the aircraft was unarmed when given to the museum, a volunteer skilled in metalwork constructed replicas of the .50-caliber tail guns. New gun barrels and a turret were installed in the newly built position.
Damaged material from the B-29’s control surfaces, which were originally fabric covered, was removed and the surfaces were recovered with aluminum. The team found corrosion on the wing panels from the outboard engines to the wingtips. “We had some great challenges removing all the fasteners holding those wing pieces in place,”York said. The team needed a crane and special rigging to lift off the 30-foot-long, 1,200-pound sections. The rebuilt wing sections actually had to be reattached twice—first right after they were repaired, then again at the end of the restoration process, after the bomber was moved into the exhibit area.
Once the exterior paint had been removed, a team of restorers and volunteers sanded and primed the plane’s skin. The wheel wells, which had been filled with bird nests, dirt and flaking paint, were soda-blasted, then refurbished and repainted. The four-bladed, 16-foot-7-inch Hamilton Standard propellers were removed, sanded, repainted and then reinstalled.
Next the team masked the newly fitted windows and ports, and sprayed the entire airframe with silver-gray paint. Restorers applied star-and-bar insignias, along with the aircraft’s original serial number at the base of the vertical tail.
The final task was to remove the outer wing panels and position the TB-29B on the exhibit floor. With the wing panels reinstalled, 44-84076 is at last ready for its debut, to be celebrated with a gala scheduled for September 22. For more on the restoration and the Strategic Air and Space Museum, see sacmuseum.org.
Originally published in the November 2012 issue of Aviation History. To subscribe, click here.
