My favorite Garage Art objects are my gizmos, gadgets and gauges,
like this one I got last year.
Anything old with a dial, a switch or a knob makes me happy.
But its been a long while since that Allen voltmeter find, so yesterday I decided to head to Grande Gorge, NY, where Mike's Army Navy Surplus
(and military junkyard) resides.
It has been a year since I stopped in, and my goal was laser-focused: One last try at convincing him to sell me an item I saw about 10 years ago.
Mike has tons of surplus clothes, vehicles, military collectables (no repops) and a personal collection of militaria (his "museum").
Unfortunately, the one item in his store that I wanted is in his museum, not for sale.
Every year I stop in and try to nudge him to sell it, and its always been a flat "No".
But this year he has a For Sale sign out in front. He's trying to sell the building
I didn't get an immediate No ( ! ).
After a bit of silence, he said "Imagine a number out of your wildest dreams."
"Sh*t", I thought, he's gonna make this hard, but at least he's talking.
I made him very low offer to get the ball rolling, and he wasn't insulted,
which was good.
Mike threw out a tall number, so I wandered out and drove away,
but I really wanted it,
and he knew that.
So I called him a couple hours later and told him I'd give him his price.
Hell, its only money, right?
So, here it is, a Vietnam-era Bell AH-1 Cobra Gunship (the "Huey Gunship")
Gunner's Control Panel.
The Abrams Instrument Corp weapons counters are dated Aug. '67.
Here is a pic of the full gunner cockpit and instrument panel.
You can see the Gunner Control Panel just above and to the right of the helmet.
From a website:
The AH-1 Cobra attack helicopter was developed by Bell Helicopter Textron Canada Limited (Bell model 209) in 1965 as a successor to the UH-1B and UH-1C Huey utility helicopters that served in Vietnam. It was the world's first dedicated armed attack helicopter and had a crew of two in tandem, the pilot in the rear seat and the gunner in the front. The AH-1 is a fast and heavily armed helicopter and has been built in many versions over the years. The AH-1G helicopter protected unarmed Bell UH-1 Huey helicopters during the Vietnam war and was first used in 1967. A flight also formed hunter-killer units together with scout helicopters. The Cobra was powered by a Lycoming T53-L-13 turbine engine. This engine, a new wide-bladed rotor and the slim design of the fuselage gave it a maximum speed of 170 knots, which is about two times the speed of the Hueys it had to protect.