Few basic training aircraft have such a long military service history as the North American Yale/Texan/Harvard family. From the late 1930s until far in the 1990s T-6s or its predecessors were used by the military for training pilots; the South African Air Force was the last major air force to do that. Nowadays, many still fly in the warbird circuit. This is most of the times in the original configuration, but beware that some have been converted to replicate other WWII time fighters! The tail is then often the way to recognise it as a T-6 conversion. By the way, Texan is the name most associated with the American versions, while the name Harvard is more popular in the Commonwealth nations and western Europe.

All members of the family have a radial piston engine in the nose powering a two blade propeller. Behind is a fuselage that has a fabric or metal skin. It end in a tail of which most versions have a typical shape, a triangle with equal sides, that is not swept. The rudder continues past the tail cone, and is behind the horizontal stabilisers. On older variants, the trailing edge of the rudder is rounded though. Another typical feature of the Texan/Harvard is the tandem canopy. It has multiple bow frames and horizontal bars. It opens in two parts, sliding aft. Sometimes, the rear cockpit is not covered. 

Finally, the Yale/Texan/Harvard models have wings with a slightly swept leading edge and no sweep on the trailing edge. They have no dihedral on the inner wings, and a slight dihedral outside the main gear. This main gear can be fixed or inward retractable, depending on the model.

The versions of the Yale, Texan and Harvard family can be distinguished from the outside by

• the shape of the nose and cowling
• the shape of the tail
• the shape of the canopy
• whether the gear is fixed or retractable

Details will follow later.