Perhaps it wasn’t a mock-up….much of the Vampire’s fuselage was only made of plywood anyway 🙂

No the mock up definitely didn’t use the Vampire pod. As you can see in the photo it is completely new. I remember the instrument panel had drawings and / or photocopies of instruments pasted to it – definitely nothing that had ever been remotely airworthy incorporated into it. I do remember seeing Vampire XD527 in pieces in the side building at Aviation Traders and had assumed it had gone to Marshalls at Cambridge as I am pretty sure they built the complete but unflown Mystery Jet which was last heard of in the USA. Marshalls must have incorporated at least one vampire into the prototype. I have never understood how the only complete Mystery Jet ever got to the USA. If Marshalls built it surely it would have been better to do the test flying here or maybe everyone in the UK had washed their hands of the project once the funding disappeared and the owner shipped it to the States to try to raise more funds from unsuspecting investors.