Duxford Messerschmitt Queries

The Cat was painted up with beer advertising.. it did a trip round I believe South America…a lthough I maybe wrong on location as an advertising thing.

Originally posted by Arm Waver
I think the cat is Plane Sailings original one in her sponsorship colours that is now under going a rebuild at Lee-on-Solent.

I can confirm that, if you look at the photo you can clearly see the carburettor air intake on top of the engines. On a normal Cat engine this intake is inside the top lip of the cowling, but the (original) Plane Sailing Cat was a R-2600 re-engined Super Cat with this configuration.

The colours where those of Peter Stuyvesant Travel. I cannot remember the full story but it involved plans for safari trips to Africa. The Plane Sailing Cat was painted up but I think the deal fell through and the organisation now hired the Cat which is now in NZ for the trips. I’m sure somebody will correct me on this!:rolleyes:

On the Gannet front: if all goes well there will be two flying Gannets in the UK in a few years. The first one is the ex-Amjet example from the US, the other one is currently static but will be restored. Have a look through this forum for the details (it was announced a couple of weeks ago I think).

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Cheers Bob,

I just checked my old travel diary and found it wasn’t Decemebr, but actually the 27th of November 1993. Sorry.

Interesting that the two Catalinas were wearing the same colours.

I rmember in about 1992 there was a documentary on TV3 here (in The World Around Us slot) which followed ‘our’ Cat on a trip down the Nile doing the tourist route that she used to ply. It was awesome, and I taped it, but sadly I have either lost or wiped it because I can’t find any trace of it. Did anyone see that doco? I think the Cat was in a white scheme then.

Dave

Re: Duxford Messerschmitt Queries

Originally posted by Dave Homewood
I visited Duxford in December 1993 (the only time I have been there…yet!) and took loads of photos.

Dave,

We must have been there within a couple of weeks of each other. We ferried a broke C-130 from Saudi Arabia to Mildenhall in December 93 or Jan 94, I can’t remember for sure. Anyhow, I went over to Duxford and took a couple of pictures that are pretty close to yours.

http://community.webshots.com/photo/130239902/131669253yXctBN

http://community.webshots.com/photo/130239902/131669421DoYPsT

A small technical correction – it wasn’t an engine failure, it was mismanagement by the pilot. I just thought that one of the forum members might be happier if it was made known that it wasn’t a failure of the aircraft at all!

Dave
I think the cat is Plane Sailings original one in her sponsorship colours that is now under going a rebuild at Lee-on-Solent.
OAW

You posted a pic of Black 6

That photo is of Black 6 when she was airworthy. She has since been grounded/retired to the IWM after a engine failure and subsequent forced landing.

Keith

Here is a photo of the other Bf109 I saw at Duxford, this one I do know about. But I just realised looking at this photo taken in December 1993, is that Catalina that is sitting in the background the one that’s now in NZ? It has the same colour scheme that our Cat wore when it arrived (it’s now in RNZAF Pacific colours and looks much better than this older scheme).

I thought our one came from Africa. Was it having maintenance at Duxford?

Oh right. I didn’t know that G-BOML had had a wheels up back then. Yes, this was the same day. Here’s a pick I took of G-BOML ijn Wanaka in 1992

If they were both taken at the same time then that would be G-BOML under overhaul following it’s wheels up landing at DX. This was the machine which later crashed fatally in Spain.

Here’s the other one. For some reason I decided to photograph the UGLY Gannet instead of the ME109, I don’t know why. Can anyone recognise it from this poor angle?

The first pic is the aircraft nearing completion at Breighton with the Real Aeroplane company http://www.realaero.com/news/news.htm at the time it was owned by the Old Flying Machine Company. The nose was a mock up.