As has been the case throughout
history, the Army and the Navy have
different ways of doing things.
When it came to official
designations of airplanes during the
World War II era, the two
services had completely different
naming schemes. So, depending
upon whether the airplane served
with the Army or Navy, the same
airplane can have two different
names.
The T-6 you are looking at here is a
great example. All the T-6s
that were produced at the North
American Aviation facility in
Dallas, Texas were the same.
When they came to the end of the
line, they were affixed with a "data
plate" that gave each airplane its
particular model designation.
When purchased for use by the US
Army, this airplane was designated
the
AT-6D (Advanced Trainer, Model 6,
Variant D). As
an Army Air Corps airplane, this
airplane would always be a "T-6."
To fulfill US Navy orders, the exact
same model of airplane came off the
assembly line, but at the end of the
line the data plate was different.
The Navy designated this airplane
the SNJ-5. S stands for
"Scout," N stands for
"Trainer," J stands for
"North American Aviation," and the 5
represents the fifth variant.
How in the world did they come up
with that? I have no idea.
If you are interested, look at our
links page later and you can read a
good article on this because I can't
cover it all here.
The US Air Force was "born" in 1947
when the Army Air Corp was
officially separated from the US
Army. When that happened, many
of the aircraft designations were
changed. As an example, the
AT-6 became simply the T-6.
Later, the P-51 was redesignated the
F-51. There are lots of
historical aviation sites on the web
that tell the whole story.
For the airplanes in our Top Ten
list, here is what you need to know:
For the US Army Air Corps planes, PT
stands for Primary Trainer, BT
stands for Basic Trainer, and AT
stands for Advanced Trainer. P
stands for Pursuit. B stands
for Bomber.
For the US Navy planes, the F in the
first position always stands for
Fighter. T in the first
position stands for Torpedo. P
in the first position stands for
Patrol. B in the second
position stands for Bomber. F
in the third position stands for the
Grumman Aircraft Engineering
Corporation. J in the third
position stands for North American
Aviation. U in the third
position stands for Chance Vought
Aircraft. M in the third
position stands for General Motors,
Eastern Aircraft Division.
Had enough yet? Here's a quiz:
B-25s were built by North American
Aviation for the US Navy, who called
them "Patrol Bombers." They
came off the same assembly line as
they did for the Army. What
did the data plate say for these
"Navy B-25s"? You got it.
PBJ. Simple, right? Wow.
That was a lot. Time for
another Warbird.
