B-17 Champaign Lady Restoration Tour

I was up at the Urbana Grimes Airport in Urbana Ohio. I did a live video with Randy Kemp, the project manager for the Champaign Lady B-17 Flying Fortress. This Aircraft has been going through a ten year restoration. All work being done on the aircraft is all done by volunteers. They can always use help and if you have a bit extra to give maybe a few dollars. We have to keep the history of these aircraft alive.

[@winstoncope5315]

Keep Up the Good Work on The B 17 , it will be a tribute to The Texas Raiders B 17 🙂 Mr Cope

[@terrymccarthy4284]

Great work!-done warbird,general aviation, fabrication,props,hydraulics,shop work and more.Your processes and tech know how thrills me.Thankyou

[@willamcombs1106]

Thank You, Randy, for sharing your valuable time. Excellent video.

[@retiredtom1654]

Great history. I'm amazed at the time commitment and cost to refurbish an airplane like this. Also the number of parts and rivets used. In this video was a mention of a boat bomber B-17. My mother spent her last few years in an assisted living home. Her next door neighbor was a B-17 pilot assigned to the North Pacific with a rescue boat attached to his B-17 instead of bombs. For those who don't know what this was about, when American airplanes went on missions in the cold North Pacific and had to bail out, they only had minutes in the water before hypothermia set in. Boat bombers were sent to drop a lifeboat near the flight crew in the water in hopes that lives would be saved.

[@None-zc5vg]

The R.A.F. also had similar rescue-planes with drop-able lifeboats and similar "Lindholme Gear".

[@craigchriston5084]

I used to know Randy Kemp at Airborne Express, God Bless you Randy.

[@andersisaac7511]

Pro trick : you can watch series on Flixzone. I've been using them for watching lots of of movies recently.

[@alijahfranklin4473]

@Anders Isaac yea, I have been using Flixzone for months myself :D

[@bobbycarbajal4460]

Wow..!!! What an honor....and for all the hard work you guys are all doing just to preserve our history....and the reason why we are free today....for the brave young men and women that gave the ultimate... My hat goes off to all of you!!! God bless America..and god bless you!!!

[@lesterbeedell9725]

Wonderful project, who on earth left the 4 thumbs down, thanks from England 🇺🇸🇬🇧🇺🇸🇬🇧🇺🇸🇬🇧

[@MichaelJohnson-cm4wp]

For a time on Ebay, there was a seller out of eastern Europe that was selling the digitized version of all those blue prints..I think I paid a hundred for the digital download.. About 38 gigs There was 36 individual downloads all in zip format..Took me several days to download as my ISP has a download daily limit.. As I have look through all of this, it is simply unbelievable what it took to draw all these out.. Boeing was and is on the cutting edge of airplane design.

[@thurin84]

hi art! i ran into art kemp at an airshow years ago. he was gracious enough to share the story how he saved his b-17 from a german fighter after he got knocked out when a 20 mm shell went off above his head. i guess the fighter (cant recall if it was an me109 for fw190) was working his a/c over while he was out. his pilot told him to stay down until he gave the word. then he popped up and gave the fighter a double .50 welcome lol! thanks for the tour randy! thanks for the video dewey!

[@ricksmith7357]

Beauty is made from 6 B 17`s. Should call it Frankenstein

[@timmckenna210]

Wow!

[@oxcart4172]

Excellent! Should have a lot more views.

[@DeweyDavenport]

David Baker thanks for watching. Feel free to share my video's. I have had people contact me about the museum and the B-17. It's a hidden treasure.

[@oxcart4172]

Dewey Davenport Oh, don't worry, I did!

[@winstoncope5315]

Awesome Ya'll " Keep Up the good Work " Gonna be a great B - 17 🙂 W.Cope

[@clenniebaker3990]

It's nice to see a B-17 in 401st bomb groups markings for a change.

[@THOMMGB]

This tour was time well spent. I am amazed at how much has been fabricated from scratch. Expressed as a percent, I've got to wonder how much of this completed plane will be original and how much will have been newly fabricated? Tom

[@bf9142ftw]

THOMMGB Probably not a whole lot, outside of maybe some of the instruments, turrets, and [overhauled/rebuilt] engines. At least, for the 17s and others that fly, it's probably for the better building with new materials and such. Like with the B29 Doc, they used a somewhat different model engine (like 3330 instead of the original 3310 or something like that), but it offers a lot more reliability than the original. Plus, there may be a fair amount of metal fatigue/wear over the years that makes reusing the original material not an optimal choice. So, to your original point/question.... In terms of overall weight of materials, maybe 10%? I could be way off though lol! :)

[@THOMMGB]

Thanks for the quick reply. The thing that most caught my eye was when it was mentioned that the radio room was built from scratch and that the plane has been re-skinned. That's a lot or work!

[@DeweyDavenport]

I'll do another video in a couple months so you can see the progress. The ceilings are really coming along. If you ever come to the Dayton area you can stop by and see it for free.

[@THOMMGB]

I would love to come by and see the progress in person. I love this kind of stuff. Unfortunately, I live a pretty good distance away in Southern California. :-(

[@MJLovesNature]

If this dude wins the lotto he should just open a B-17 plant

[@derekobidowski3301]

if this B-17 flies not sure how the FAA and the NTSB will regulate the B-17 after the 10-2-2019 crash of the Collings Foundation's B-17 at Bradley Int Airport in Windsor Locks Ct. which killed 7 and 6 survived when it crashed after #4 engine problems and hit the de icing facility which the aircraft was consumed by the post impact fire. this B-17G was better known as Nine O Nine. was part of the Collings Foundation's Wings of Freedom tour when it happened.

[@kevinstephenson3880]

Need room in the hangar! If you need a home for the Fairchild 24, Stinson HW-75 and that extra Ranger engine just say the word.

[@DeweyDavenport]

I know right. They just build a big addition on the hangar

[@johnson11b]

So with the engines being overhauled, will she fly one day? I heard she was to be made a static display

[@DeweyDavenport]

Johnson this B-17 will be flown. They have all intentions to fly the plane. I have seen the progress for more than 9 years and it is really neat to see it transform.

[@johnson11b]

Thats great to hear. I do a lot of volunteer work with "Desert Rat" on Moline IL. It doesnt look anywhere near as good as this B-17. Keep up the great work

[@9Apilot]

B-17s went together much faster in the 40's.

[@markhutchinson5926]

can you use an old original serial number?

[@DeweyDavenport]

Mark , yes you can. That is what everyone does that restores a aircraft. As long as we can get paperwork on a aircraft then you can rebuild it. With that said, if you can find the paperwork and a small piece of that aircraft then it can be the actual aircraft when completed.

[@workshop3757]

Tell that f#$%er in the back ground to stop hammering !!!

[@dee3368]

So it's really not a b17 more like a replica

[@Bogman603]

Have you guys done any trading or sharing of parts with other B-17s, such as Mike Kellner’s B-17, Desert 🌵 Rat ?

[@FetchTheSled]

Great story how they figured out the wing riveting tool from a photo. Necessity is the mother of invention.

[@hotironaircraftshop]

Any Rosie-the-Riveters still alive?

[@topturretgunner]

It's hard for many to appreciate just what went into the construction of a B-17 Flyingfortress. The technologies that were developed often on the spot with necessity truly being the mother of invention. the technology at the time being new or recently developed. Now very much old school or surpassed by newer methods. My thanks to Dewey Davenport and Randy Kemp for this glimpse into the restoration of Champaign Lady. It will truly be wonderful to see another B-17 Flyingfortress take wing. As a "baby boomer" and son of a WWII veteran this is my all time favorite WWII aircraft. Yes I've had a love affair with the Boeing B-17 Flyingfortress since the age of 10. I saw my first B-17 at the Air Force Museum in Dayton Ohio. Yep not to far from where Champaign Lady is taking shape in Urbana. That was Shoo, Shoo, Shoo, Baby a combat veteran and now being readied for display at the Steven Udvar Hazy division of the Smithsonian Institute at Dulles Airport in Washington DC. I highly recommend a visit to this great facility to anyone even remotely interested in both aviation and military aviation along with the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton Ohio. If you are deeply interested in the history of aviation and military aviation please allow yourself a minimum of two days for each facility. Yes one can breeze through either in a few hours but to satiate the interest and the desire for all things aviation I recommend a couple days for each. There is good lodging and eats nearby both locations. At Dayton one can see up close the Memphis Belle which was recently put on display after an extensive restoration effort of many years and to the laymans eye she seems mission ready. In closing I would encourage the reader to visit either facility. It's a trip well worth taking to any interested in History or aviation.

[@thomascolones1937]

What a great project ! Enjoyed this and good luck to them on finishing this project !TC

[@sgt13echo]

Thank you for filming and sharing! I feel like I learned so much!

[@happyhome41]

Thank you so much for introducing Randy Kemp to us. Simply AMAZING - unbeatable combination of competence, lucidity, and beautiful attitude.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Thanks for watching..I will soon do a update on the B-17

[@johnbradshaw354]

Great work and important history preservation.Thank you for sharing.

[@LightAndSportyGuy]

Surviveablilty by position - I got to climb in a ball turret once - my first thought was there was no way to get out if things went wrong. First, you have to rotate the turret so that it is "guns down", then undo a belt and open a hatch behind you. Then climb up and out to get to your 'chute. But when I mentioned that to a ball turret gunner he told me that he made it out the door before the waist gunners - he said he was "real motivated". But I was still surprised to see those numbers.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Geoffrey It's hard to even think about what it was like to be a crew member in a bomber back in those days.

[@flyingfortressrc1794]

Great to see this great bird being restored. I hope to make it down there someday soon.

[@davidlawrencebanks4610]

I seriously doubt the guy hammering has anything to do with the aircraft!! If it were a B17 he was hammering it would be dead....

[@crewguy620]

He was probably taking some of the parts apart for corrosion inspection.

[@johngrisanti547]

Absolutely awesome 🇺🇸 🔧🔩⚙️👌

[@brucebellinger9783]

Can you say, "everybody" or "folks" rather than "guys" as, I'm sure, females are watching this video too.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Hahahaha.. Guys means every, Thanks for watching.

[@brucebellinger9783]

@@DeweyDavenport No, it doesn't.

[@keithglaysher9201]

Just an astonishing undertaking there in keeping history alive! Randy should be made a National Treasure, with his knowledge, drive, and all-around good guy demeanor all of the volunteers deserve a medal for dedication. Seeing the massive amount of work needed for just one B17 makes me realize what effort was needed to bring Hitler's Germany to its knees in defeat, a massive enterprise in human effort and sacrifice. A great video Dewey, with appreciation from the UK.

[@michaelneale7813]

Love a Jacket Same as Randys

[@stevetaylor5933]

The men and women who volunteer to work on this and other heritage planes, tank's, ships and just about everything that there forefathers went to war in are firstly, patriots, secondly, proud and respectful of the sacrifice of the serviceman (or women) who lost their lives for freedom, my total respect, from across the pond 🇬🇧🇺🇸🇬🇧🇺🇸

[@DeweyDavenport]

Amen!!! I feel the same way.

[@topturretgunner]

Steven Taylor "from across the pond." I've a great deal of respect and admiration to that handful of courageous pilots (many that were British) "lads" who flew several missions a day from dawn to dusk. Often times in patched up "kites" , some of which should have been grounded. Men whose selfless devotion to duty prompted Priminister Winston Churchill to utter the phrase "Never in the course of human events has so much been owed by so many, to so few." From a "Yank (and friend) across the pond". All the best mate.

[@SuperiorShine]

Fabulous video!

[@busmirror]

*Bang*! *bang*! *bang*! and that's why you use lavalier mics on people you interview... Great job on the build!

[@1957kwick]

This is like 2 years old how about a update!✈️. 5/29/20 please.

[@stormm787]

Wow, how awesome is this? I had no intention of watching this whole video but the ingenuity and humor of Randy reeled me in.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Charles W Randy is one of a kind. His knowledge for this stuff is unbelievable. I'm glad that I know him and he is my friend.

[@lebaillidessavoies3889]

So the all wing will b remanufactured knew ??!!

[@williamsturgell3776]

Will this one fly again or will it be a static display ?

[@DeweyDavenport]

William Sturgell they are building the aircraft to Fly!!!!!. One of these days you will see it in the skies above.

[@williamsturgell3776]

That and the gas station bomber (B-17 "Lacey Lady"). That will a beautiful site to see. If I am correct on the numbers, once this one and the Lacey Lady return to flight status, that will or should make 15 restored B-17's (that I know of ) counting the recent completion of the Memphis Belle and Shoo Shoo Shoo Baby @ the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio; and the Sally B and the Pink Lady over in France I believe. Of those 9 are said to be currently flying in the U.S. and of the two overseas; only the Sally B is still currently flying. The other one is still flyable, but they have chosen to not fly it anymore currently for some reason for a total of 10 currently flying. With these two that will/should make 12. There is also another one an E model called Desert Rat undergoing restoration. Once completed it will/should make for a total of 13 of them total back in the air.

[@motorcop505]

That is so cool about the top turret!

[@19Cub]

What a great video Dewey, I enjoyed it very much.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Dwain Marcus thanks very much. I think only aviation nerds would appreciate a video like this. The history is great and showing the hard work it is taking to get the plane back together.

[@19Cub]

How close are you to Barnhardt Memorial airport in New Carlisle Oh? I bought my Clip Wing Cub from Scott Dingman there in 2009. Beautiful airport and countryside.

[@DeweyDavenport]

Dwain I am very close. My grass strip is about 25 miles away but my house is maybe 15-20 miles away. I go there a few times a year.

[@oldbiker570]

Great Stuff !