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B-17F de-ice boots

PRB

PRB

Administrator
Staff member
Ok, what’s the deal with de-icing boots on Pacific Theater B-17s? I’ve seen photos that clearly show these things in place, and others that kind of imply that they have been removed. Or have they been painted over? But why would you do that? As soon as you used them, it would either impede their performance or crack the paint right off. Or both. Either way, it makes little sense to paint them green like the rest of the plane. Of course it could also be that the paint crews, having more to worry about in the South Pacific in 1942 than masking off the de-ice boots, just said “heck with it” and started spraying paint… In the South Pacific, the de-ice equipment may have been one of those systems that wasn’t used very often anyway…Are they actually removable in the field? Did they remove them in the South Pacific because they weren’t needed?

I’m working on some Pacific Theater re-paints of the WoP B-17F and the FDG2 B-17E. Thanks, John (Bomber_12th) for pointing me to laughingterror’s PSP file that had the panel lines in a separate PSP layer for the WoP ship. That will help a lot.
 
they would be needed, its cold at 20,000ft+ enough to freeze surfaces, my guess is that they were painted over to preserve the camouflage element, as for the bare metal late war B-17's they were usually very visible...
 
Rgr that, Smoothie. The "they've been painted over" theory is what I'm leaning towards as well, with just a couple of reservations... The early months of the Pacific War saw a lot of action by inexperienced flight crews on the US side. But, interestingly enough, the same cannot be said of the maintenance crews. Very experienced maintenance personnel populated the 19th, 11th, and 43rd Bomb Groups, particularly during this period. They often came from the pre-war years and with years of experience. I know the A-7Es I worked on during the 1980ws had “DO NOT PAINT” markings on the stuff we we’re not supposed to paint over, mostly antennas of one sort or other. I’m guessing these experienced ground crews in 1942 B-17 squadrons in the Pacific knew the de-ice boots probably shouldn’t be painted. This led me to wonder if they were actually removed on some planes.
 
Deicers were not built into the wing's leading edges, they were applied to them with flow pipes attached to an air pump. They are [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica]fabric-reinforced rubber sheets containing built-in inflation tubes[/FONT] and due to being inflatable, should "never" be painted. Just speculating, but bombers in the Pacific campaign did not fly at the altitudes flown by those in the ETO, so it is possible they were not required.

Caz
 
It is my understanding that some USAAC units in the Pacific theater removed the de-icing boots from B-17's and B-25C/D's. These aircraft were used only at lower altitudes and the rubber boots and their inflation mechanisms were considered useless. Their removal meant one less thing to maintain and a little less weight and drag on the airframe.
 
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