Proper ID for this site.

Blue,

Your entry should be 05-3784

That is the proper ID for the aircraft.

A little research is required to try and get this stuff right for the database. Some one in the future may depend on the data for some information and we need to strive to make it as correct as possible.

I use J. Baugher's site to try and confirm my military numbers. It is the most complete out there. Some of the newest stuff is a bit foggy but it gets better all the time.

The 2005 entries

http://home.att.net/~jbaugher/2005.html

The home page

http://home.att.net/~jbaugher/

Also for the sake of accuracy the C/N for this aircraft is PT-336

For anyone who may not know or is interested there is a publisher in the UK called Mach III they put out 3 different volumes updated every few years that cover the US military the European Air Forces and the rest of the world these books are a wealth of information and will have most S/N-C/N tie-ups.

Cheers

Nick Dean

The 3 volumes do have all this information but better yet and my main source of reference is another company in the UK called "Aviation Databases Global" this is a subscription service that has just about every aircraft you can imagine listed and is updated weekly it has for example all the known C/N's for warbirds such as the Mustang which usually have the S/N mistakenly listed as the C/N which is incorrect.

If you have aircraft that you cant find the info on send me an email and I will try to help out.

Cheers

Nick

Two additional points regarding USAF and US Army serial numbers

Serials should be YY-NNNN. two digit year, and atleast four digits for sequence. Fill the sequence with zeros if needed or try to find the full serial number with help from sites like Joe Baughers.

On aircraft more than 10 years old you may find a leading 0. it's always Zero not the letter O. But, the O-NNNN is not the actual serial number it. The preferred format should be YY-NNNN. You'll need to do some research to determine the actual serial number.

The American Aviation Historical Society's Third Quarter 2008 newsletter had a five page article on The 'Over Ten years' Prefix -- "Oh" vs. Zero?. Many of the photos in the article came from a A-D contributor, Bill Larkins. This article describes the many formats the Air Force and Army have used over the years. It also points out examples where they don't seem to follow the rules.

Lots of good responses for the proper listings. In regards to:

"05-3755/3811 Raytheon T-6A Texan II

I didn't see a 3 anywhere on the aircraft..."

That's normal. They often drop that first number to fit it all on the tail. I have seen so many permutations over the years! Anyway, the books sound good; I use Baugher's site all the time. I also have a couple older books with military serials: one is just a list of serials up until 1988. The other book is "U.S. Military Aircraft Designations and Serials since 1909" (it goes to 1979). This one has a short description of the aircraft, and short explanation of the differences between marks. It often includes c/n information also.

I have come across some of those bad entries and e-mailed the correct way to post. One of these days I might have time to look at everyone's stuff and offer corrections for military call signs and even ID many of the "unknown" birds that have military serials plainly identifiable in the shots (I've done a few of those already). I'm sort of "Monkish" that way.

Glenn

The 0 thing on aircraft in older photos can make things a bit more complex.

Take this B-25, S/N 44-30349 the tail number in the photo is 0430349.

http://www.airport-data.com/images/aircrafts/small/240/240508.jpg

Some have a dash after the 0 "0-17176" as in 51-7176, ten years old...

http://www.airport-data.com/aircraft/photo/210696L.html

Read the info on J. Baughers site for more detail.

Nick:

Those books sound like a treasure trove. That stuff should be on line...but then they are making a little cash selling the books..

I might pay a bit for the info on line though.

Zane

Blue,

I have several photos from Lowry AFB.

These are photos from my collection that I inherited from a dear friend. He left his airplane photos to me.

John Van Dyke was stationed at Lowry AFB in 1949. He was an aircraft maintenance tech.

Here he is on "get your picture taken with the new fighter jet day"