We are adding four more photos today from the Flight Test Museum at Edwards Air Force Base — F7F-3 (N7195C). It was operated by Sis-Q Flying Service as Tanker 32 in May, 1973, and as Tanker 40 in August, 1975.
From Wikipedia:
The Grumman F7F Tigercat is a heavy fighter aircraft that served with the United States Navy (USN) and United States Marine Corps (USMC) from late in World War II until 1954. It was the first twin-engine fighter to be deployed by the USN. While the Tigercat was delivered too late to see combat in World War II, it saw action as a night fighter and attack aircraft during the Korean War. Armament was heavy: four 20 mm cannon and four 50 caliber (0.50 in; 12.7 mm) machine guns, as well as underwing and under-fuselage hardpoints for bombs and torpedoes.
The F7F-3 Tigercat variant:
Single-seat fighter-bomber aircraft, powered by two Pratt & Whitney R-2800-34W radial piston engines and featuring an enlarged tail fin for improved stability at high altitudes, 189 built.
Surviving aircraft:
Beginning in 1949, F7Fs were flown to the then-U.S. Navy storage facility at Naval Air Station Litchfield Park, Arizona. Although the vast majority of the airframes were eventually scrapped, a number of examples were purchased as surplus. The surviving Tigercats were primarily used as water bombers to fight wildfires in the 1960s and 1970s and Sis-Q Flying Services of Santa Rosa, California, operated an F7F-3N tanker in this role until retirement in the late 1980s.
About the Pratt & Whitney R-2800-34W radial piston engines
The Pratt & Whitney R-2800 (US military designation) Double Wasp (civil designation) is an American twin-row, 18-cylinder, air-cooled radial aircraft engine with a displacement of 2,800 in³ (46 L), and is part of the long-lived Wasp family.
The R-2800 saw widespread use in many important American aircraft during and after World War II. During the war years, Pratt & Whitney continued to develop new ideas to upgrade the engine, including water injection for takeoff in cargo and passenger planes and to give emergency power in combat.