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Airplane Porn (and the occasional helicopter)


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Folgiori ?  They used the Diamler Benz engine and, no surprise, looked a lot like the Messerschmidt ME 209s.  But then so did the Kawasaki Tony!  A prime example of which was discovered [unassembled] in an unmarked crate which had sat in the corner of a hanger at Tachikawa Air Base for many years.  No one knew what it was, so the base sent a team to investigate.  Stapled to the crate was a set of shipping documents, all in Japanese.  So the senior base interpretor was summoned.  No crap!  An all complete, airframe, engine and instruments Kawasaki Tony fighter!  Most of the Japanese Nationals who did the grunt work of overhaul and maintenance at Tachikawa had originally worked at the Showa plant down the road.  That's where the Tony's were built!  To a man they voluntered to assembly this survivor, and did so!  The result was painted in the colors of the Tokyo Air Defense Shunto and presented to the Japanese Air Self Defense Forces, and is now displayed at their museum at

 Irimugawa Air Base, formerly known as Johnston Air Base before reverting to Japanese control.

 

No pix of ther real aircraft, but I do have a Japanese model of the Tony.  The aircraft turned over to the museum was all aluminum skin brightened with a white "belly band' aft of the cockpit with a Red rising sun centered in the white band at fuselage center line.

 

Year?  I seem to recall 1962 or 1963.

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Folgiori ?  They used the Diamler Benz engine and, no surprise, looked a lot like the Messerschmidt ME 209s.  But then so did the Kawasaki Tony!  A prime example of which was discovered [unassembled] in an unmarked crate which had sat in the corner of a hanger at Tachikawa Air Base for many years.  No one knew what it was, so the base sent a team to investigate.  Stapled to the crate was a set of shipping documents, all in Japanese.  So the senior base interpretor was summoned.  No crap!  An all complete, airframe, engine and instruments Kawasaki Tony fighter!  Most of the Japanese Nationals who did the grunt work of overhaul and maintenance at Tachikawa had originally worked at the Showa plant down the road.  That's where the Tony's were built!  To a man they voluntered to assembly this survivor, and did so!  The result was painted in the colors of the Tokyo Air Defense Shunto and presented to the Japanese Air Self Defense Forces, and is now displayed at their museum at

 Irimugawa Air Base, formerly known as Johnston Air Base before reverting to Japanese control.

 

No pix of ther real aircraft, but I do have a Japanese model of the Tony.  The aircraft turned over to the museum was all aluminum skin brightened with a white "belly band' aft of the cockpit with a Red rising sun centered in the white band at fuselage center line.

 

Year?  I seem to recall 1962 or 1963.

 

The Diamler-Benz DB 601 was license built by both the Italians and the Japanese. How interchangeable the parts between them is beyond me, but, the Toni currently under resto to fly will most likely end up using a real German DB engine. 

 

Italian version

 

 

 

Macchi%20C.%20202%20-%20Primo%20piano%20

 

Japanese DB

 

Aichi_Atsuta_31_2.jpg

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The Japanese built version had an output of somewhere between zero Horsepower and design maximum.  Depending on the skill and greed of the subcontractors that made the parts.  The finished engines that eventually pased pre flight acceptance had the uncanny knack of siezing up just as the Tony came within effective accurate range of B29 .50 caliber machine guns!  That's why surviving Tony's were retrofitted with radial engines.  Slightly inelegant, but the pilot got to come home.

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"The Tony currently under restoration"?  Are you talking about the one started at the Santa Monica museum?  Don't know it's current location / status thanks to late property buyers who swear "But my realtor said that the airport was going to shut down."

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No, there is one in New Zealand being restored for an American Collector that will be a flyer. The other one belongs to Kermit Weeks in Florida and the third survivor is the one in Japan. 

 

There are remains scattered here and there, but these three are the most complete 

 

This is the one in Japan

 

Ki-61_USAAF_colour.jpg

 

This is the one under restoration to fly

 

pngmuseum-tony1985.jpg

 

And the Florida bird

 

blog-kawasaki-ki-61-hien-tony-wing-and-e

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