Here are four pictures of the F-86F-40 that was under my care for a short time a few years ago. I took these photos during an inspection that I did with a friend who maintains a flying Sabre, with the idea of evaluating whether the little fighter could again be made airworthy. It would be relatively easy to make this a flyer again--the only real hurdle would be a lot of money to make it happen. This is s/n 52-4689 and originally was built with the un-slatted wing. At some point, probably before it went to Venezuela, it got the slatted wing that it has today.
After a short time with the USAF the airplane was sent to Venezuela and finally flew with the Bolivian Air Arm until it was retired in the early nineties. This was one of the last Sabrejets in front-line service and was still wearing its last camouflage paint from Bolivian service. We are no longer affiliated with the museum that owns it so I don't know what is going to happen to it now.
First two photos shows the airplane all stripped down for our inspection:
North American F-86 Sabre
North American F-86 Sabre
The Bolivian ship number and unit insignia:
North American F-86 Sabre
The Venezuelan roundel is showing through on both lower wing panels. The Bolivian painters appear to have simply scuffed up the Venezuelan paint job and sprayed the camouflage right on top:
North American F-86 Sabre
One of these days I'm going to build a model of this little fighter in its Bolivian camouflage--I had grown to really like the idea of restoring it in exactly this scheme as a gesture of respect to the maintainers and flyers in Bolivia that kept the airplane in such good shape all those years. Of course, the others at the museum were adamant that it be NMF and in USAF colors, even though it was only active in the U.S. for a very short time. Oh, well---it isn't any concern of mine anymore!
