PROJECT F-84F

Archive for the ‘History’ Category

Several forum members over at WIX (Warbird Information Exchange) have been curious about the process I use to transfer microfilm to the computer. Here is my scanning setup.

On the left is a Canon Microprinter 90. It’s like a copying machine for microfilm. I use that every once in awhile when I just need to look up something quick that I’ve not scanned yet. I actually have two of those thanks to Spirit Aerosystems surplus and $20.

The machine in the center is a Canon Microfilm Scanner 400 (MS400). This is what allows me to scan into the computer. It has a SCSI interface and is attached to a SCSI card in the computer to the right.

The computer to the right is mostly a parts machine. I built it with spare things I had sitting around the house. It uses two of my old 17″ LCD displays. The left display I use the scanner utility and the right display I have Photoshop CS4.

The box the keyboard is on has all the NASM microfilm for the Republic F-84F and RF-84F. If you want to know where every single part in the aircraft goes, and how to make them, it’s in this microfilm. (If you are a museum working on a F-84F or RF-84F display let me know. I can help with reference.) The National Air and Space Museum’s Archives are a priceless resource for historical aviation microfilm and documents. Turn-around might be slow for copies of things from NASM, but it’s for information that can be gotten nowhere else.

The process I use to scan in the film is to center and focus the drawing in the MS400 viewer, then I open Canon ScanGear on the PC. It scans in the technical drawing in B/W (error diffusion) 400 dpi. In Photoshop CS4 I open the file and clean up the scan using a few filters to remove grain, dust and scratches and to boost the contrast on the line drawing. Depending on the scan it can take about 1-3 minutes total manually cleaning up. The scan itself without processing is a quick 5 seconds of scan.

While digging around in a few F-84F history books I ran into this picture — my F-84F while is was stationed at Sheppard AFB. It’s the only picture I’ve been able to find of the aircraft actually in use. With all the F-84F that were produced I was lucky to stumble upon it while reading. I thought it was interesting, so here it is as a post.

While reading, I also learned what the mysterious “S” is in the serial. Apparently, it’s used to designate instructional airframes that are not used for flight.