Back in the 80’s when I was a sprog engineering student one of our lecturers asked if anyone wanted to work on a restoration. I volunteer along with some friends on my course. We were given a name & address around the corner and told to be there at a certain time on Saturday morning. We turned up at the appointed hour in a suburban street thinking we would get a lift to the airfield where the A/C was kept.

Wrong, he had the Aero 145 in the back garden with the wings off ! it was a very tight fit. His neighbour gave a sigh of resignation when he came out of his house as myself and one of my friends were getting a fuel tank out of one of the wing sections on the drive. Not enough space in the garden you see. Here are some photos that I posted on the forum ages ago of the restoration.

Given the description above I now believe the engine block in the photos is from WS mentioned above as we were told that it had come from another Aero 145 that had crashed killing all four occupants. Part of the story was that one of the rear passengers was a test pilot who it was thought had tried to save the situation by pushing the control column forward but was to late.

As to the identity of the aircraft we were working on I think it came from Elstree as we were shown photos of it being towed backwards on it’s main gear around the M25 with the tail wheel lashed into a small trailer towed by a Volvo 240 estate. A number plate and light bar were hanging off the nose. Bet you wouldn’t get away with that now. Outer wings removed of course. One clue to it’s identity was that the owner/restorer it wanted to paint the Pink Panther on it. I saw it up for auction some time later in a magazine with this emblem on it. This would have been early/mid 90’s.

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