By the way, I saw the F8F Blue Angel #1 at Oshkosh. Stunning bird. I could not help but stand there beside the tail with a deer-in-headlights look. Found out too it was THEE F8F Bearcat that I watched get restored at the Kalamazoo Air Zoo here in Michigan when I was little. Saw it in the museum after it was restored too and on display. So great to see it fly, especially in the colors of the Blue Angels!
I actually helped restore that F8F, it use to belong to Lone Star Flight Museum in Galveston. Its a great looking Bearcat here in the Sim...But Im wondering who's model is it? Where do I get it? 8-)
The current "Blue Angel #1" F8F? I asked the director of the Kalamazoo Air Zoo if that was their old Bearcat, he said it was..hmm. The Bearcat was a restored racing bird. I should have said it was "restored" to original condition, in other words, changed from a racer to a standard F8F. When the Air Zoo got it maybe 15 years ago it was painted in some USN or USMC squadron colors with dark blue overall. Maybe we are talking about different Bearcats?? OR maybe they were actually the same! The Air Zoo had to sell theirs a couple of years after they finished working on it, they also had to sell their F7F at that time AND their F9F Panther crashed, the Kalamazoo Air Zoo used to have all the cats, now they just have the Wildcat, Hellcat, and Tomcat
