The video traces the Convair B-36 from wartime planning to Cold War service. It covers design, testing, SAC drills and production end.
What the video covers
Written in our own words. It only describes what the video shows and says.Long-range bomber origins
The video opens with the early twentieth century advice to talk softly but carry a big stick, then links that idea to the Convair B-36 as a Cold War deterrent. The account then returns to 1941, when the United States Army Air Force had the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress and the Consolidated B-24 Liberator. It says the Liberator had tricycle landing gear, could fly higher than the B-17, and had better range, which made it useful for oceanic surveillance. The B-17 and B-24 could reach Europe from America only one way, and the Boeing B-29 Superfortress was requested but not yet flying. The Consolidated B-32 Dominator is described as a backup that also existed only on paper in 1941.
B-36 design and first flight
The next section follows the long-range experiments that led to the B-36. The video describes the Boeing XB-15 and the Douglas XB-19, noting the XB-19 had a 212 foot span, required 500 people, 9,000 sketches, 2 million labour hours and $1.4 million from the Army, and cost Douglas an estimated $4 million over its original limit. It calls the XB-19 a milestone, with folding tricycle landing gear and provisions for powered guns and a rear gun station. In mass production it would have had a range of more than 7,000 miles. The American Defense Department then asked Northrop and Consolidated for ultra-long-range designs. Northrop proposed a flying wing, while Consolidated proposed a conventional but enormous aircraft with a 163 foot fuselage and six engines mounted at the rear of the wing.
Cold War service and production end
The final section covers the B-36 in flight and service. The video says the first XB-36 flew on 8 August 1946 at Fort Worth with Captain Beryl A. Erickson in command, a crew of nine and 8,000 gallons of gasoline. The flight lasted 37 minutes with the landing gear down. The aircraft's huge single tyres restricted it to runways at least 22 inches deep, and only three of those existed in America, so Convair moved to clusters of four 56 inch tyres under each wing. The video also describes the XC-99 cargo version, which flew in November 1947 and served until 1957, including during the Korean War. Inside the B-36, bunks and a kitchen were provided because long flights required crew rest, but that pressurised centre section sat 80 feet from the cockpit, reached only through a narrow tube with a small cart. Later, the Berlin blockade made intercontinental bombing urgent, Strategic Air Command grew under General Curtis LeMay, and B-36 crews practised bombing with the K-1 system. The video also covers Arctic deployments, parasite fighter tests, the FICON F-84 programme, and the final B-36 handover at Fort Worth on 14 August 1954.
