Commonwealth CA-6 Wackett

[jan wullink]

Na de oorlog starte de M.L. op vliegveld Kalidjati de vliegopleiding met een dertigtal van deze toestelen.
Ze hadden de registratie b3-01 t/m b3-30 .
Het was echter geen gelukige keus om deze toestelen in Australie te bestellen , ze waren te licht qua motorvermogen ( 175 pk ) en waren zeer storingsgevoelig .
O.a. werd er zonder motorkap gevlogen voor een betere koeling .
Geen van deze toestelen zijn overgegaan naar de AURI , er mag worden aangenomen dat alle toestellen terplaatse zijn gesloopt.

[Stig Jarlevik]

Guys
For those of you (like me) who did not know c/n and P.I. and that ML-KNIL also bought 19 airframes as spares, this site gives a lot of details.

Welcome to ADF Serials

Is ANYTHING known about the type in NEI? I don't think one single aircraft was handed over to AURI, but I could well be wrong here.

Did any crash while in Dutch service?

Cheers
Stig

[Fogg]

Stig,

There was a short article about them in the magazine Luchtvaartwereld/Luchtvaart many moons ago, early 1990s maybe.

Peter

[Stig Jarlevik]

Thanks Peter

But it is a paper I don't have and if I did furthermore could not read.
Does it say anything useful regarding the individual airframes?

Cheers
Stig

[Verbeek]

Maybe helpful:

http://bertus65.magix.net/website/co...l#Commonwealth CA- 6 Wackett

Commonwhealth CA-6 Wackett

[Jos Heyman]

Here is what I got:

The Wackett was an Australian built two seat trainer that flew for the first time in 1940.
On 26 April 1945 the ML-KNIL sought to obtain 20 Wacketts from the Australian Government. period. Whilst this procurement was originally approved by the Australian Government this was cancelled on 1 October 1945 as the Government refused to supply equipment that would be used in the war in Indonesia.

On 11 January 1946 the NEI government purchased 50 scrapped CA-6 Wacketts, including spare parts and engines, from Kingsford Smith Aviation in New South Wales. These comprised 35 dual control and 15 single control aircraft.
Due to arguments, principally due to poor contractual documentation, the first of the aircraft were not delivered to the ML-KNIL at Biak until 1 November 1946 but, as the site was found unsuitable for training purposes, the aircraft were immediately shipped back to Sydney, minus one that was lost in unloading trials. It was not until April 1947 that the aircraft arrived in Batavia packed in crates. Between April 1947 and March 1949 only 30 were assembled at Tjililitan. The remaining 20 aircraft were used as spares.
The 30 aircraft that were assembled were given serials B-301 to B-330 whilst the ‘spares’ aircraft did not receive serials.
The aircraft were used as elementary trainers at the elementary flying school at Andir and, after January 1948, at Kalidjati. With the many technical difficulties, it was a daily problem to keep 10 to 15 aircraft flying.
The fate of the individual aircraft is not known. B-308 crashed on 23 February 1949 near Kalidjati whilst B-303 was written off on 20 May 1948 near the TjiaterPass. Five aircraft were with the Depot Vliegtuigen in long term storage and were never flown after they had been assembled and test flown in January 1950.
In 1950 21 Wacketts were transferred to the AURI although other reference sources have suggested that only 5 were transferred (may be the five in long term storage). According to a letter written by the commander of the Dutch forces on 13 May 1950, 21 Wacketts were still with the ML-KNIL and none had been handed over to the AURI. That was, however, before the handover of the Kalidjati base where the Wacketts were stationed. It is likely that, if the aircraft were handed over, they were not used by the AURI as Indonesian reference sources do not make reference to this aircraft type. It has also been suggested that at the time of the handover, the AURI was advised to write the aircraft off in favour of Vultee BT-13s that arrived in June 1951.
It has, however, been reported that one of the Wacketts was extensively modified to create the early 1950’s Nurtanio NU-200 Sikumbang aircraft.

References:
E-mail from A. Eckford, 2 August 2003, re CAC Wacketts with NEIAF/AURI
E-mail from G. Tornij, 8 August 2003, re NEIAF Wacketts
Ward, O. G., De Militaire Luchtvaart Van Het KNIL 1945-1950, p.160

[Stig Jarlevik]

Thanks Verbeek and Jos

Very interesting details. Looks like the Wacket was not built for long term use and that it was a bit of a waste of money for the NEI.

If anyone comes up with any positive use by the CA-6 with AURI I would be very interested to know, but somehow I don't think they used the type.

I also have to go back to the ADF list and try to locate the 20th spare one...

Cheers
Stig

[Peter Boer]

Guys,
See my book De jachtvliegtuigen, Army Co-op - en lesvliegtuigen van de ML/KNIL 1945-1950 (Bataafsche Leeuw2009), it gives you all the individual ac stories and all the RAAF serials, page 329 and on. Also the RAAF serials of the ac without B serials. Best regards,
Peter

[Fogg]

Could the NU-200 Sikumbang be the aircraft I saw preserved at Bandung in 2005, south side of the airport road? It hardly looks like a Wacket...

Peter

[yudi supri]

Could the NU-200 Sikumbang be the aircraft I saw preserved at Bandung in 2005, south side of the airport road? It hardly looks like a Wacket...

Peter

Hi Fogg,


That's right, NU-200 Si Kumbang preserved in the hangar at Husein Sastranegara Air Field, Bandung.

For additional information about Wackett and NU-200 Si Kumbang, try read article here.


Regards,
Yudi