Budd RB-1 Conestoga: American Transport

A Budd RB-1 Conestoga, BuAer 39294, loading a Navy ambulance, displays the ease with which it could be loaded.

 

 

by Leo Kohn

There probably aren't many Budd Conestogas left in the world today, but it set the pace in 1942 for the true all-cargo airplane and its various features are commonly seen today in almost all of the huge cargo planes.

The Edward A. Budd Company of Philadelphia was awarded a contract by the U.S. Navy in 1942 to develop and manufacture a pure cargo transport of stainless steel construction. The concept of cargo carriers was being radically altered through need and experience from the swift aerodynamically clean de­sign to slower, more lumbering and capacious craft designed for a specific pur­pose and not merely adapted from existing types. For up to World War II the cargo airplane was basically a conversion of the conventional airliner. Even by widening the doors, it was still difficult to load larger items, not to mention the fact that everything had to be lifted into them.

Budd specialized in welded stainless steel products, and had ten years previously built a stainless steel amphibian under the direction of Anea Bossi of American Aeronautical Corporation. The airplane, based closely on the American Marchetti S-56, was subjected to accelerated service tests, and was demonstrated on three continents. Later, it became part of the exhibits of the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.

The engineers at Budd centered their efforts on the problem of designing a "flying box car," something that could carry freight economically on a flight of moderate length, and also be capable of loading and unloading cargo with ease and dispatch. A large cargo hatch in the aft underbody could be lowered to form a ramp to the surface of the airfield, or brought to the level of a loading dock or truck bed. The clearance doors could be lifted out of the way to pro­vide the necessary headroom to get large objects inside. The cargo com­partment would be 26 feet in length, 8 feet 8 inches wide, and 10 feet high.

Weight saved by welding rather than riveting, and economies effected by us­ing thinner sheets of stronger material made up for the weight difference be­tween it and aluminum. The stainless steel was ribbed in such a way as to make the airplane seem covered with a wrinkled, warty skin.

The airplane was designated the RB-1 by the Navy and named the Cones­toga for the covered freight wagon that moved our ancestors and their be­longings across the plains to the Pacific a century ago. The Navy accepted the design early in 1942 and in May of that year construction began at the Budd Field plant. A formal contract for two hundred RB-1's was awarded in August 1942, and the first airplane flew on 31 October 1943. The static test ship was com­pleted on 12 August, and those tests were finished on 17 October.

With an especially heavy load, the Conestoga could carry it 650 miles. It demonstrated that in normal operations it could lift 10,400 pounds of payload off a landing strip after a run of only 920 feet. It could be converted to a troop or hospital ship; provisions were made for installation of twenty-four seats or twenty-four stretchers. Doors on both sides of the fuselage permitted jumping of paratroops from both sides simultaneously, and cargo could be discharged via parachute through the opened clearance doors in the back of the fuselage.

The wing did not pass through the fuselage in conventional fashion. Instead, Budd engineers were able to attach the wing panels to side frames joined across the body by shallow but rigid transverse members, thereby providing headroom of 2½ feet more than otherwise would have been possible.

A specially designed hoist fitted above the loading ramp and a manually op­erated winch mounted at the forward end of the cargo bay made the loading of heavy pieces no great problem. The large loading entrance could accommodate jeeps, small landing craft, trucks, and field artillery. The power to lift all this was provided by two Pratt & Whitney R-1830-92 Twin Wasps of 1,200 horsepower each.

The Army Air Forces became interested in the airplane and placed a con­tract for six hundred, these to be designated as the C-93A. However, delays in produc­tion resulted in a reduction of the Navy order to twenty-five airplanes, these assigned Bureau of Aeronautics serial numbers 39292 through 39317. Cancellation of the Army contract followed shortly on the heels of the Navy contract reduction.

With only twenty-five aircraft of this type it was impractical to keep them on the active list, and they were declared surplus in early 1945. Bob Prescott, an origi­nal member of the AVG Flying Tigers, persuaded eleven of his Tiger colleagues and five Los Angeles businessmen to put up $226,000 to buy fourteen Conestogas. Headquarters was set up at Long Beach in June 1945 and The Flying Tiger Line, Inc., was in business.

Weeks passed while the Tigers convinced cautious shippers to give air freight a try. It was touch and go for the line, more touch than go. In fact, there was so little cash in the till after the purchase of the Conestogas that the Tigers were only able to bring one plane to the West Coast. The remaining Budds were left grounded in Augusta, Georgia, until such time as there was enough cash to purchase gasoline. Eventually gasoline was purchased, and the Conestoga created the huge air-freight line that Flying Tiger became. Sev­eral of the other surplus RB-1's went to Central American operators where they might still be flying.

Span: 100 feet

Length: 68 feet

Height: 31 feet 9 inches

Wing area: 1400 square feet

Empty weight: 20,156 pounds

Gross weight: 33,860 pounds

Maximum speed: 197 miles per hour at 7500 feet

Cruise speed: 165 miles per hour

Normal range: 1,700 miles (3,500 miles with auxiliary tanks)

Budd RB-1 Conestoga transport, seen after the war in civilian service.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga (as civilian NC-45354), Oakland, 1 September 1948.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga in three-tone Navy scheme.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga in three-tone Navy scheme.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga in three-tone Navy scheme.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga all-stainless-steel transport aircraft in flight.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

Sally Siebert from the Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) and Winifred Thompson from the Women's Army Corps (WAC) pose for a publicity photo with a Budd RB-1 Conestoga cargo aircraft at Budd Field, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 29 January 1945.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga flown by The Flying Tiger Line (originally named National Skyway Freight), which was formed by Robert W. Prescott and ten former members of the AVG "Flying Tigers" group in 1945.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga.

View of the inside of hanger two at the U.S. Naval Air Station South Weymouth, Massachusetts (USA), on 14 September 1944. Visible are five blimps and the following aircraft: circa 60 Grumman F6F Hellcat fighters; seven North American SNJ Texan trainers; one Douglas SBD Dauntless dive bomber; two Lockheed PV-1 Ventura patrol bombers; one Budd RB-1 Conestoga transport (lower left corner); circa 12 Beechcraft SNB/JRB Navigator/Kansan, at least three of them being SNB-1 gunnery trainers; one Lockheed R5O Lodestar transport; two Howard GH Nightingale trainers.

Budd RB-1 Conestoga at the Pima Air Museum.