Couple of old pics

…any idea what happened to the aircraft when they were retired from service, I take it they were just scrapped in the 1930’s unless anyone knows any different…

I have given all the info that the Air Britain book had to give; it doesn’t give their fates but then a lot of the aircraft from those times are fate-less unless they were written off in service or sold on.

Flood.™

The upper tearshaped thingy is a lamp. The lower odd shaped item I don’t know, but could be a pennant for flight or Sqn leader.

Hi all,

Thanks very much for the info, next you will tell me who is flying them!

Couple of small points I was wondering about. On the top photo of F4490, it has something quite large coming out the back of the rudder, what is this, something like a balance horn? Also, any idea what happened to the aircraft when they were retired from service, I take it they were just scrapped in the 1930’s unless anyone knows any different.

Cheers

Steve

Wonderful pictures. It’s amazing what people keep finding.

I might be stirring things up, but doesn’t it look like the upper wings, upper fuselage, tail plane and wheel cover are red. You can’t actually see where the red of the roundel ends, and the red of the tail flash seems to match these tones.

The wings could be green, of course, or even silver like the second picture. It’s funny how light plays tricks, especially in these old photos.

Running for cover.

YR

What?
The upper wings are almost certainly doped matt silver – the upper one is profoundly grey because it is reflecting the blue of the sky above, which is why the blue of the roundel is indistinguishable from the rest of the wing.
As for the rudder…I was confused – but it seems that Bristol Fighters nearly all had the sequence blue-white-red; why, I don’t know…
F4490 has the engine cowling polished (you can see the wing reflected!) whilst F4717 appears to have its cowling painted black – not unusual on F.2bs.
After a little research I believe the pic of F4717 was taken before it was converted to a MkIV since it doesn’t have the automatic slots on the upper wings, nor the enlarged upper fin and horn balenced rudder of that mark visible (can’t see the strengthened undercarriage or fuselage!).

Flood.™

I might be stirring things up, but doesn’t it look like the upper wings, upper fuselage, tail plane and wheel cover are red. You can’t actually see where the red of the roundel ends, and the red of the tail flash seems to match these tones. YR

The red of the roundels (the centre spot) ends where the white inner ring starts! Did you mean to say ‘blue’?

Could it be that the RR Falcon, which was geared, just turns very slowly compared to engines even of late 20’s designs? It is not just shutter speeds that determine the blurring, but the rotational speed of the prop. perhaps at the time of the photos they were partially throttled back – anyone who has seen Shuttleworths example knows how slow the prop turns at low throttle settings. In both cases the blades seem to be more curved than the blades are when viewed statically, which again is an indication of movement whilst the shutter is open perhaps indicating that it was actually a slowish shutter speed.

Some very good observations cbstd and you a right about shutter speeds, speeds above 250/th will freeze props and these don’t look far off that. As you say in the period that these aircraft are portrayed I doubt if that could be achieved either by equipment or emulsions available at the time.
The other observation that I made was in photo 2, the fileds below are quite large with no boundary hedges, quite indicative of second half of the last century farming.

Prop speeds.
Interesting point cbstd. However, if you look carefully, in both pics the prop blades are passing through an arc where they are nearly lined up with the photographer, and therefore will be ‘in line’ for longest. In other words they would be more blurred had they been horizontal and travelling further in relation to the photographer in the duration of the exposure. (Ergh. easier to think of than to say!) Can’t add more to the speed of exposure point though!

Have a look at Charle E Brown’s 1920s and 1930s shots for comparisons.

As a photographer, I was struck by the propellers in these pictures. In old photos, the props are usually blurred beyond recognition. For these photos, the shutter speed would have to be pretty fast to catch the props with very little blurring (at least 125th of a second). Consequently, the film speed would have had to be pretty “fast” (light sensitive) to allow such a fast shutter speed. All of this leads me to think that the pictures may not be all that old, as film stock in the old days was not so light sensitive.

Of course I could be completely wrong on all of this, the pictures could be very old and the fast shutter was enabled by a sunny day. Just something I noticed.

Scott

Wonderful pictures. It’s amazing what people keep finding.

I might be stirring things up, but doesn’t it look like the upper wings, upper fuselage, tail plane and wheel cover are red. You can’t actually see where the red of the roundel ends, and the red of the tail flash seems to match these tones.

The wings could be green, of course, or even silver like the second picture. It’s funny how light plays tricks, especially in these old photos.

Running for cover.

YR

Oh, and it would have been Cardington!;)

Flood.™

Both seem to be from 2Sqn, which was at RAF Manston between 3/24-11/35 with a break at Shanghai Racecourse, China, between 4/27-10/27 (including travelling). 2Sqn phased out its F.2bs 1/30
F4490 – Recond to ‘J’ type, 2Sqn 5/24-11/24, makers reconditioned to duel control, awaiting collection 22/10/25, 2Sqn -/25- -/26 (Diamond on fin), 5FTS 10/25-4/27.
F4717 – Makers recond to ‘J’ type, awaiting collection 16/7/24, Northolt 12/24, 2Sqn 4/26-9/28 (Mk.IV).
Info from Air Britains RAF Aircraft J1-J9999 and WW1 Survivors, and Squadrons of the RAF 1918-1988.

Flood.™

Yes, Bristol F.2B