JU88, Avion detzinutin mod abuziv

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Great photos!
Veteran Ju 88 pilot Salajea,who lives in the states visited this 88 in themuseum.
The number on the tail is wrong.
It's along reco not a bomber.

Thanks for the pics Florin.

All the markings are wrong
The Americans repainted it and decorated with large US Flags
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/Rev1...8222/rev235.htm
The museum repainted it again in what purports to be "Romanian Markings".
Radu

The following is the point of view of the museum, as explained on the plate. I trust them at least with something: that at "Wright Field test pilots flew the aircraft extensively". The bomber was brand new when the Romanian pilot defected (it was manufactured in the previous month).
Back home I saw on one of my videos that at least one tire is "Firestone", so I am assuming that the American test pilots succeeded to blow up the original tires. Another thing that could happen is that in the 17 years between manufacturing and shipment to the museum the original rubber cracked/aged. However, their Me-109 seems to have the original tires, or at least they look like original tires.
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The light brown bomb shown close in the last photo is the standard German 250 kg bomb. The light blue "thing" shown further near the Ju-88 is the radio controlled "Fritz" bomb.
Do not get confused by the svastika tail shown on left. It is from a Me-163 Komet.

This post has been edited by Florin on May 26, 2011 03:09 am

Thank you to the Forum members who wrote encouraging comments regarding these photos. The light inside is very poor (in many parts of the hall, really miserable), and that creates problems for the photo quality. For details (components) the camera's flash does the job, excepting the cockpit, where the windows reflect back the light. I don't like to make photos showing the flash reflected in a glass.
And when the time is limited, there is no time for camera's manual settings or tripod.
The museum was not my terminus point - I just used the opportunity of driving on a highway passing few tens of miles away.

They have not designed the exhibition buildings at the National Museum of the United States Airforce for photography. They are all basically large hangers with low lighting and black interiors. If you want to walk around the aircraft up close, its great. Even if the lighting was better, the number of aircraft in each hall usually precludes being able to take a picture of the entire aircraft. Over the years I have numerous film, video and digital dark aircraft pictures. The only good pictures are the few aircraft that are still outside and the experimental and presidential aircraft that are in the WWII era hangers with windows and white interiors. Until about ten years ago, the Ju88 was still outside where you could photograph it. The plane is supposed to be a D-1/Trop(D-3) photo recon version. The pilot defected to Cyprus, July 22, 1943 and the plane was flown to the US and extensively tested at Wright Field. In 1946 is was put in storage in Arizona. It was shipped back to Dayton for the museum in January 1960. I assume they just put on some generic Romanian markings on the plane for display. If the plane still had its original tires when it was put in storage, I think the 14 years in the Arizona desert would have dry rotted them by the time the museum got it. The museum has a decent online virtual tour at www.nmusafvirtualtour.com.

Someone asked on another forum if the fate of the pilot ( Nicolae Teodor ) is known, do you guys have any idea ?

I asked the same question 9 years ago .
Dan Stoian gave me an answer but I don't remember.
Since DS doesn't hear anymore,I cannot call him.
Maybee Victor knows the answer.

Check back with the forum topic Amazing: restored JU-88 with Romanian markings
started by cuski - 10/20/2003.