Originally Posted by
Dougdrvr
Neat stuff, Cub. I especially like the last photo of the 407 with the three open hangar doors behind it. That's the experimental department at the Military-Twin Division.
In my day it is also Experimental for any and all civilian jets. No military designs were or are around any more, except for Caravans with rockets and certain FBI planes, and pistons are always over at Pawnee as are certain experimental turboprops (see my thread #10 in this series) although the Caravans are at ICT.
...I used to sit in the grass with my lunch bucket against the building around the corner from the doors. Of course this was after the 407 project was terminated. The fuselage was still sitting in the fenced in bone yard on the north side of the hangar.
That grass quadrangle between W1/W2 and W7 was still grass in 2009, and I am sure it is still there now.
...Many years later, when I was killing time at the then new Citation Service Center (the hexagonal one) I walked across the ramp to Experimental to visit with my old supervisor and noticed the center engine and top of the T-tail of the mock up of a tri-motored jet that was curtained off in the corner...
I worked in W1/W2 near C12 (10?) in Flight Test and never saw that so it must have been gone by 2007. Junk airframes were taken across the street to one of the storage houses. I heard the JPATs protos were still there 2007, or at least one of them was. That was the last military aircraft of any merit Cessna attempted to make. They were more than capable, but Russ Meyers disliked government work and wanted Cessna out of the government contract business. Turned out to be a major mistake later on.
...I am surprised you haven't run across some of the early Citation mock up photos or drawings with the sharply pointed nose and horizontal stab mounted mid fin?
Ha, I am not there now but I sure saw them when I was. Can't have everything. Doesn't the Jeff Rodengen book have a few? I might be able to find a few more. I doubt I have anything very good.