Invisible Themepark

Tag: 1940s

  • B-24 Liberator Bomber Cutaway Drawing, 1943

    B-24 Liberator Bomber Cutaway Drawing, 1943

    Naturally, in the popular press of the time, Consolidated Vultee’s B-24 Liberator bomber would be hailed as a magnificent fighting machine, capable of plowing down any obstacle like cutting through butter.

    While the B-24 did have its strong points, crew members had a different angle on the craft. Lately, I have been reading Laura Hillenbrand’s book Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption.  The person who is the centerpiece of the book, Louis Zamperini, who was a B-24 bombardier, says that the B-24 was called other names by crew members, such as “The Constipated Lumberer,” “The Flying Coffin,” and “The Flying Brick.”

    Click to Enlarge to 1328 x 506 px:

    B-24 Liberator Bomber Cutaway 1943
    B-24 Liberator Bomber Cutaway 1943

     

    Source:  Popular Mechanics November 1943

  • Wright Cyclone Engine World War 2 Aircraft Cutaway, 1945

    Wright Cyclone Engine World War 2 Aircraft Cutaway, 1945

    Wright Cyclone Engine World War 2 Aircraft Cutaway 1945
    Wright Cyclone Engine World War 2 Aircraft Cutaway 1945

    This was a fictional Second World War aircraft meant to illustrate the Wright Cyclone engine (located in the engine cowling, #10) on a test flight.  The aircraft interior has been specially designed for testing.

    Areas of this aircraft shown on the cutaway:

    1. Oxygen supply for crew.
    2. Movie camera recording instruments.
    3. Movie lights.
    4. Instrument panel.
    5. Flight observer and cathode ray detonation detector.
    6. Flight observer at engine operating temperature recorder.
    7. Radio equipment bay.
    8. Fuel volume meter.
    9. Pilot and observer co-pilot.
    10. The Wright Cyclone engine.

    Popular Science October 1945

  • WWII Fighter Plane Cutaway Showing Gravity Suit, 1945

    WWII Fighter Plane Cutaway Showing Gravity Suit, 1945

    WWII Fighter Plane Cutaway Showing Gravity Suit 1945
    WWII Fighter Plane Cutaway Showing Gravity Suit 1945

    A cutaway within a cutaway.  Drawn by Stewart Rouse, this illustrates a generic WWII fighter plane peeled back to show the pilot within.  Then the pilot’s gravity suit itself is peeled back to reveal some of its inner workings.

    Bladders within the suit were inflated with air from the craft, to minimize the chance of pilot blackouts during hard turns.

    Source:  Popular Science January 1945

  • Futuristic Car Cutaway, 1940

    Futuristic Car Cutaway 1940
    Futuristic Car Cutaway 1940

    In 1940, it was asked if we might be driving a car like this in only two years.

    The novel cutaway turned the notion of how to design a car on its head:  streamlined to look like “a giant aerial bomb on wheels,” with the engine in back, driver in the center, and rear passengers resting on upholstered seats in a spacious area as comfortable “as a small living room.”

    Futuristic Aerial Bomb Car 1940
    Futuristic Aerial Bomb Car 1940

    Source:  Popular Science June 1940

  • Quonset Hut / House Cutaway, 1946

    Quonset Hut / House Cutaway, 1946
    Quonset Hut / House Cutaway, 1946

    A gorgeous picture of a Quonset hut from 1946, touted by Popular Science as a possible “stop gap” to the immediate post World War II housing shortage.

    I’ve called it a Quonset hut/house because it clearly does not resemble its earlier incarnation:  Army barracks.  In fact, the vets were said to be moving back to their old barracks “and loving it.”

    Clusters of these 20 x 48 foot huts was sometimes called Homoja Villages, a compound name for Admirals Horne, Moreell, and Jacobs.

    Admiral Ben Moreell (1892-1978) is known as the the Father of the Navy’s Seabees, and himself was known as “Master Bee.”

    Quonset Hut Town
    Quonset Hut Town

    Source:  Popular Science March 1946