Older Model USAF Aircraft Numbers

Helicopterfriend

It would appear that Joe Baugher's site for Military Aircraft can only be used to identify planes (maybe). The 1946 - 1948 aircraft before 1000 series read as 46-XXX or 47-XXX, or 48-XXX. However people seem to think that an extra zero has to be added for some reason and that the proper numbers had to be removed. I had added the proper Joe Baugher aircraft numbers and they have been removed and the aircraft pictures have been moved back to the unrecorded numbers.

example:

http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/48-0010.html

48-001/010 North American B-45C Tornado

http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/47-0221.html

47-171/224 Lockheed P-80C-1-LO Shooting Star

http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/46-0062.html

46-62/64 Bell XS-1

DougRobertson

Walt,

Unfortunately. I have found the same thing about the Joe Baugher site. To-wit, the web link referral on the site for further help: re a current serialized military (USAF) Helicopter (on an airport ramp) photo of mine was a non-responder, my experience.

Doug

Ztex

Joe Bauer's site is correct...

His explanation is stated in the preface to his serial number lists.

In 1947, at about the same time that the USAF was officially formed, DoD regulation 5304.9003 was promulgated which required that the sequence number now have at least 3 digits. This means that fiscal year serials with individual sequence numbers less than 100 are filled up with zeroes to bring them up to 3 digits in length. So 48-1 is written as 48-001 in official documentation. Sequence numbers greater than 9999 are written with 5 digits. In 1958, the minimum number of digits in the sequence number was raised to four, so that the 1958 aircraft series started at 58-0001.

What the managers of this site choose to do with the numbers is an entirely different thing.