Hello Jeffrey Neville;
Please let me call on your clarity of expression for an explanation or two. "The Patch" replaced a window. The Patch shows rivet holes, some of which mark where The Patch was apparently fastened to stringers. Were those stringers in place when the patch space was a window? That does not strike me as likely, and so were the stringers installed at the time The Patch was installed in Miami?
Lastly, I believe I read that the A and D shapes are on the exterior surface of The Patch. If the A and D are part of a probuct label, then it appears The Patch was installed with the label facing the outside. Is that characteristic in the world of aircraft aluminum installation? (I wonder if the AD might be discernible to advanced photography in any pre-loss images of the Electra? That would nail it down for me!)
Many Thanks, Guthrie Ford #3422
I'll try -
The 'patch' didn't 'replace' a window, it 'covered' a window (and I actually prefer the term 'cover', as in 'window covering', to 'patch' - but a rose...) -
The stiffener (like a 'stringer', but lighter) and upper stringer (another double row) that traversed the window aperture were truncated by whomever installed the window. The stringer at the bottom of the window (which I'm calling a 'stringer' because it is a more major member by virtue of a double row / being wider than the typical stiffener, rather like the upper double-row member that was truncated) was left intact, and in fact used for the lower edge of the window coaming attachment. We can see this in the various 'window' pictures.
The one set of surviving rivet holes on 2-2-V-1 that may relate to the existing airplane 'stringers' would be those along what we believe to be the lower edge of the 'patch', i.e. the 'double row' where we see the shark-tooth failure. The other fastener holes are where intermediate stringers may have been installed, as I've explained in the bulletin, etc. to help give rigidity and shape to the 'patch' (
cover, says I...). To answer you in part, yes, those extra stiffeners would have been installed in Miami to ensure a durable shape and prevent unwanted flex, or oil canning of the membrane (the 'skin'). I believe the picture of the shiny, reflective 'patch' in Miami does reveal a rivet pattern that appears to match 2-2-V-1, but others may see that differently: I've heard 'clouds' suggested, but the 'rivet' images / lines are at too odd an angle in my view for clouds along the horizon, and odd that a couple of rows of 'clouds' happen to parallel the other rivet lines we see on the ship.
These points are both a strength, and a weakness in the hypothesis -
- A strength in that we're looking at a non-standard piece of construction on the Lockheed, and 2-2-V-1 has many characteristics of a non-standard installation, i.e. repair, or modification: the 'patch' is not a direct fit to any stock location on the Electra (or any other type that visited the area) that we've found; further, the way the rivet lines are laid out suggests something other than a 'stock' installation, as well - something more like a post-production field modification effort of some sort. That fits what we see in the Miami pictures as a last minute 'patch'. It could fit another 'field effort' on a different airplane too, but the method of construction (lightly braced, spacing of members, etc.) tends to support an airframe on the order of the Electra, not the military types we examined as potential candidates.
- A weakness in that we have the obvious problem of not being able to prove a direct and true fit to the Electra, rivet by rivet, which would be nice - and barring the emergence of a miraculously clear picture of 'the patch' in Miami or somewhere subsequent, rivets and all, necessary to absolutely clinch this hypothesis. We are far from blind from these realities.
The remnants of the printed material do, I believe, lie on what would have been the exterior surface. It can be done either way - we've seen examples of aluminum markings turned to the interior, and others of them turned outside. Neither would surprise me. The stuff they used to mark this kind of material apparently had some effect of 'etching' or leaving a permanent trace, even if buffed off: what we see on 2-2-V-1 is not ink per se, but some visual remnant of the process the ink induced, i.e. micro-pitting, etching or staining I do not know, but some residual effect in lieu of 'ink' is apparently the case. Point here being, the outer surface might have been polished in Miami after completing the installation - that would be the norm; but wherever this 'ink' was were tiny etchings or similar that led us to what we see today. This seems to be the case.
I'm glad you asked these things, it is heartening as it is important to me to continue to explore the possibilities of 2-2-V-1 and to share that with others. This artifact still has many details that are not yet understood; any of those secrets might reveal more about potential ties to NR16020. I believe there is a tendency for many to simply say we 'did not prove it came from the Electra', or that there is 'no hope of that'. Conversely, I believe there is still great potential, and that it is very important to completely wring dry any precious potential artifact that might relate to Earhart. Niku has proven rich with things of that nature: the world didn't permit much of Earhart, if anything, to remain as a grave marker, so if we as an interested people - whatever we believe happened, would truly search, then we owe it to her and ourselves to leave no stone unturned.
I believe that is why such a tremendous effort is going into this, and when some promise emerges, then it helps support the next baby step toward success. It's a bit like Edison inventing the light bulb: by the time he succeeded, he knew far more ways to fail than he did to succeed, but to succeed he had to believe it could be done and not give up. This is something I really hope the greater community can grasp.
2-2-V-1 is a remarkable object with an interesting story all its own. It has tremendous potential in the Earhart case despite the odds: the facts and circumstances of what happened in Miami, the nature of such mod work and the construction type of the Electra, and the picture evidence in that place all have shone a bright light on this odd piece of metal found in the flotsam at Niku all those years ago.