Some more updates:

Working is progressing well on the Sabre. The tail inspection is complete, as are the wings. They are closed up now, and we're painting the last of the screws we need to close up belly panels today. We've also started to knock out the placarding in the cockpit, and will have the ammo bay painted this week, wx permitting. Here are the pics:



296 prepped #10 countersunk washers ready for primer and paint. That was a fun job...and not tedious at all.



The aforementioned washers and another 100 or so #8 screws/washers shot with self etching primer, awaiting a base coat of white.



White base coat applied, only red to go.



Done!



Some of them were used on the forward drop tank fairings.



A LOT of them were used closing up the tail..about 120 per side actually.



Tail is done!



Other side.




The ammo bay doors are painted, and new p-channel seals are in. Once we get the ammo bay itself painted this week these will be ready to reinstall.



We made these strips to install on the doors, and once they're painted, we're going to put the "experimental" placards on these in the same red lettering as the "Minutemen" lettering on the side of the jet.



Here is the placarding for the throttle quadrant. By the way, wet application of vinyl decals is much easier than dry...trust me.



Shot of the top of the wings after closing them up.



Bottom of the L. wing after closing it up.



Closing up the belly.

That's about it for today. The ammo bay will be painted this week, and the cockpit should be back together enough to pull the canopy back off and put the seat in. We need to adjust the rear truck eccentric cams to lower them a bit, so this will be an opportune time to that. Also, we have quite a bit of placarding to do, it's all the little stuff, "NO STEP", etc.

We're pushing hard to have this bird done and flying by the middle of next month, we have an event in the Denver area we really would like to attend, it's the 90th anniversary of the 120th FS of the ANG. They've invited us down, and Matthew Burchette from Wings Over the Rockies is coordinating a small reunion of the remaining Minutemen team members. Sure hope we can make it!

Until next time...

This is such a great project! I love reading this thread

Same here...just an unbelievable amount of work involved !!!

The 'HOLY S**T!!' factor in this thread is more than adequate!

Can't even imagine taking on an endeavor like this! I sweat the toys!!

A few more pics from today's efforts:

We spent a good part of the day applying placards:















Also, I got the logo decal for my helmet today and it is finally done! My logo decal is a tad larger than the original, that was intentional. Pardon the centering mark I made below the logo. That has since been wiped off with a little Goof Off.









I'm pretty stoked with how it turned out. I did all the tape/mask work, and a buddy of ours painted it with some of the leftover red from the jet.

Here's a few pics of the original helmet, I think we got it pretty close:

Just finished another 12 hour day in the Sabre hanger. Here's what we accomplished:

Masking off the ammo bay area. Should've waited to take this pic until after the entire plane was draped in plastic as well:



Phenolic hooks used for the ammo bay doors and placard plates for the canopy/cockpit:



Ammo bay is painted!



Another shot of the ammo bay:



These are the support cables for the ammo bay doors. I wanted to polish up the clevices a little since everything else in there is looking so good:




I finished the fuel placarding tonight as well:



Not bad for a day's work. Oh, and I knocked out a local pilot's BFR for him today as well. Sheesh... No wonder why I'm draggin' tonight!

This has got to be my favorite thread on FG right now. Thanks for all the pictures. Can't wait to see if fly!

Originally Posted by dangerboy

A few more pics from today's efforts:

We spent a good part of the day applying placards:

Fantastic thread, great looking airplane.

pray tell.....what is the Yellow plane showing in the reflection and the fade paint cowl pieces?

That would be a local farmer's Lycon-540 engined Harmon Rocket. Here are a couple of better pics of it. I've flown it. It's a bad ass bird.





The engine cowls are off as its in the middle of it's annual.

life is rough over there, haha.

Today I spent the afternoon laying out the wing walk stripes. Tedious, but necessary. Nothing like kneeling and leaning over the top of a wing for 4+ hours. Why 4+ hours? My OCD kicked in big time today. I even caught myself counting rivets on both wings to make sure I was dead on with my lines.

Laying the 2" tape that will be used as the template for the 1/2" fine line tape to follow.



Fine line tape on, and masking tape pulled. The line on the flap will be red, whereas the line on the wing will be black.



Fine line tape laid, and masking pulled.



It's pretty impressive how different the line geometry changes depending on whether or not the flaps are up or down. I did the layout with the flaps up, then extended the flaps and continued the line up to the leading edge of the flap.



Today was one of those days where I turned the lights off in the hangar kind of feeling like I didn't get a lot accomplished. But, the lines are straight and even. I'll mask each of the wings off tomorrow and these should be painted by tomorrow evening. Also, I should be able to mount the ammo bay doors tomorrow, as the paint will have had 2 days to dry.

That plane is waaaaay to clean.

(Says the guy who flys military planes for a living!)

Is that Rocket a straight wing or an Evo?

It's the Harmon, so it's a straight wing. I believe the EVO wing is a variant of the F1 kit.

Originally Posted by dangerboy

I'M THIRD

Out of the sun, packed in a diamond formation and flying as one that day, the
Minute Men dove at nearly the speed of sound toward a tiny emerald patch
on Ohio's unwrinkled crazy quilt below. It was a little after nine on the morning
of June 7, 1958, and the destination of the Air National Guard's jet precision
team was the famed Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, just outside Dayton.

On the ground, thousands of faces looked upward as Colonel Walt Williams,
leader of the Denver-based Sabrejet team, gauged a high-speed pullout. For
the Minute Men pilots -- Colonel Williams, Captain Bob Cherry, Lieutenant
Bob Odle, Captain John Ferrier, and Major Win Coomer -- the maneuver was
routine, for they had given their show hundreds of times before millions of
people.

Low across the fresh, green grass the jet stream streaked, far ahead of the
noise of the planes' own screaming engines. Judging his pull-up, Colonel
Williams pressed the microphone button on top of his throttle: "Smoke on --
how!" The diamond of planes pulled straight up into the turquoise sky, a bush
tail of white smoke pluming out behind. The crowd gasped as the four ships
suddenly split apart, rolling to the four points of the compass and leaving a
beautiful, smoky fleur-de-lis inscribed on the heavens. This was the Minute
Men's famed "flower burst" maneuver. For a minute the crowd relaxed, gazing
at the tranquil beauty of the huge, white flower that had grown from the lush
Ohio grasslands to fill the great bowl of sky.

Out on the end of his stem of the flower, Colonel Williams turned his Sabre
hard, cut off the smoke trail, and dropped the nose of his F86 to pick up
speed for the low-altitude crossover maneuver. Then, glancing back over his
shoulder, he froze in terror. Far across the sky to the east, John Ferrier's
plane was rolling. He was in trouble. And his plane was headed right for the
small town of Fairborn, on the edge of Patterson Field. In a moment, the
lovely morning had turned to horror. Everyone saw; everyone understood.
One of the planes was out of control.

Steering his jet in the direction of the crippled plane to race after it, Williams
radioed urgently, "Bail out, John! Get out of there!" Ferrier still had plenty of
time and room to eject safely. Twice more Williams issued the command: "Bail
out, Johnny! Bail out!"
Each time, Williams was answered only by a blip of smoke.

He understood immediately. John Ferrier couldn't reach the mike button on
the throttle because both hands were tugging on a control stick locked in
full-throw right. But the smoke button was on the stick, so he was answering
the only way he could -- squeezing it to tell Walt he thought he could keep his
plane under enough control to avoid crashing into the houses of Fairborn.

Suddenly, a terrible explosion shook the earth. Then came a haunting
silence. Walt Williams continued to call through the radio, "Johnny? Are you
there? Captain, answer me!"

No response.

Major Win Coomer, who had flown with Ferrier for years, both in the Air
National Guard and with United Airlines, and who had served a combat tour
with him in Korea, was the first Minute Man to land. He raced to the crash
scene, hoping to find his friend alive.
Instead, he found a neighborhood in shock from the awful thing that had
happened. Captain John T. Ferrier's Sabrejet had hit the ground midway
between four houses, in a backyard garden. It was the only place where he
could have crashed without killing people. The explosion had knocked a
woman and several children to the ground, but no one had been hurt, with
the exception of Johnny Ferrier. He had been killed instantly.
A steady stream of people began coming to Coomer as he stood in his flying
suit beside the smoking, gaping hole in the ground where his best friend had
just died.
"A bunch of us were standing together, watching the show," as elderly man
with tears in his eyes told Coomer. "When the pilot started to roll, he was
headed straight for us. For a second, we looked right at each other. Then he
pulled up right over us and put it in there."

In deep humility, the old man whispered, "This man died for us."

A few days after this tragic accident, John Ferrier's wife, Tulu, found a worn
card in his billfold. On it were the words "I'm Third." That simple phrase
exemplified the life -- and death -- of this courageous man. For him, God
came first, others second, and himself third.

True to his philosophy, John Ferrier sacrificed his life for people he had never
met.

Reading this sent chills up and down my spine.