Flying Lancasters

When I was over to England in 2000, we did the East Kirkby/Coningsby bit to see the BBMF and the Lanc (Could’nt see PA474 at the time as she was away in Scotland for the Queen Mum’s birthday celebrations), but we took the tour of the rest of the BBMF planes and saw all of them up close (a great tour led by a guy named Ted Farrant, if I recall…he was classic!) We saw the ‘Blue’ 5 bladed late model Spitfire run up on the ramp and the noise was deafening! I seem to recall, also, that there is a Handley Page Hampden hidden away in one of the hangars on the East Kirkby site, being restored v e r y s l o w l y…I have the pics somewhere…can anyone update on her progress? All in all, a very worthwhile day even though we did’nt get to see ‘Just Jane’ run her engines….there was plenty else to look at!

Mark

Thats NX665

Don’t forget that the RAAFA machine in Bull Creek, Western Australia has had one of its engines ‘running’ . If you read the article carefully, thats on battery power (?!) as the a/c is very much inside a purpose built hanger. While this mght seem a bit odd, at least the guys believe in making it ‘go’.

They only ran the engine by turning it over on the starter with the plugs removed. A far cry from “running” an engine.
We have done this with three of our engines but hope to use fuel and spark next summer on one of them!!!!

Re: Re: Re: Flying Lancasters

Originally posted by Melvyn Hiscock
From a distance, there is some nice paint over some minor corrosion and their workshop leaks like a seive.

MH

Melvyn, Id not noticed the corrosion but i think just looking at the efforts they have made and the condition of the cockpit, always hard to judge the detail in a photo i admit, that this will be an excellent restoration at the finish. Like Laurent said, they are working on it so it should look great when finished.

Best Regards, Steve

Lancaster NX664

Hello Melvin,

Your right about the cash situation, we certainly need more than we currently have. Regarding our hangars, they belong to the Musee de l’Air, and we have been promised that we’ll get better ones in a near future, so we just have to wait and see for that issue. And don’t worry about those areas of skin that need some attention, the restoration is far from completion, and they will be worked on later.

Bets regards,

Laurent
Lancaster NX664

http://www.chez.com/eternalflight/lancaster.html

Mmmm, that looks rather more severe that I meant. It is a pretty good job but not as good as some would expect. Like a lot of orgnaisations Ailes Ancienne are strapped for cash and I have seen some areas of skin that I would have liked to have seen more work on. The leakiness of their hangar also makes this difficult.

Good detail and paint but 8/10 on the corrosion proofing.

MH

Re: Re: Flying Lancasters

Originally posted by Hatton
Ailes Ancienne are restoring the ex Wallis Island for the Le Bourget museum. They are doing this to Static condition, a very high static condition by the looks of it too.
-steve

From a distance, there is some nice paint over some minor corrosion and their workshop leaks like a seive.

MH

May I bid 3.25?

Don’t forget that the RAAFA machine in Bull Creek, Western Australia has had one of its engines ‘running’ . If you read the article carefully, thats on battery power (?!) as the a/c is very much inside a purpose built hanger. While this mght seem a bit odd, at least the guys believe in making it ‘go’. Strewth!

Re: lancasters

Originally posted by peter

The ex wallis island Lancaster will look great when she is all done. They have done an excellent job on the aircraft. Who knows dont rule out a possible ground run aty some time!

I admire your optimism pete but i doubt this will happen, The Le Bourget museum doesnt seem to have a policy of ground running aircraft so the expense of finding four merlin engines to fit in the Lanc that could run would be rather pointless for Ailes Ancienne to bother with.

Lets be content with three running lancs,

well, until next year, eh Pete 😉

OK Lancman,
If you are nice about the Elvington Halifax recreation, I’ll post some Canadian, French and Australian Lancaster pics. 😀

Allright, I’ll post ’em anyway. Tormorrow.

Cheers

lancasters

OK lets clear some things up a bit shall we…

firstly the cwh lanc is not allowed to be away from base over a 24 hr period this way if someone comes to see the lanc then she will be on display everyday. There was serious kicking around of the idea of flying her to England for a tour but the cost and the engine hours used up would warrant against it. They did a cross canada tour many years ago and went through something like 2 and a half engines.

Lancaster NX611 is not airworthy and is no where near it. Yes they may use raf maintenece schedules etc but for her to be even kept as airworthy is totally wrong. In the movie Just Jane Mike Chetterton says that to make ker fly everything will have to be redone to airworthy condition.

The ex wallis island Lancaster will look great when she is all done. They have done an excellent job on the aircraft. Who knows dont rule out a possible ground run aty some time!

Wow, very impressive! Any more like that? 🙂

Indeed.
And here’s the Fr Lanc interior

The ‘VR’ and ‘A’ are a little out of place; it just looks wrong. I once knew a guy who had talked with Norm Etheridge, one of the people responsible for the restoration; he said that the guy who had applied the codes had simply masked them up wrongly.
Re. the colours, maybe the Canadian Lancs camo really was this dark, but the green and brown still looks all ‘wrong’, to me anyway.

The Frecnh Lanc IS looking wonderful.

Hmm, wrongly positioned squadron codes, (By their own admission) odd looking shades of camoflage (Yes, I know they came from ‘original paint chips’, but still) and a simply dreadful ‘nose art’ with that medal thing on each side.

Ah, I stand corrected. Can you elabourate on the first and second points? The medallion, I think is fair enough – like PA474, it’s a memorial, not a weapon of war, and a commemoration in paint is OK by me. Either way, I confess it didn’t (doesn’t) look ‘wrong’ to me 😮 and I’ll take a flying Lanc in any colours.

The Dam Busters film creases me, as the bomb was still classified secret at the time, hence the ‘blobby’ thing they hung under the machines. What were they going to do? Attack the Russians with bouncing bombs? :rolleyes:

The French Lanc is going to be tasty, VERY tasty. Superb so far, looking good for the rest.

Cheers

Re: Flying Lancasters

Originally posted by Dave Homewood
Is the Lancaster that’s being restored in France intended to be a flyer or s it just for static display?

I have also been wondering about the Lancs in Dambusters. They used three it seems. What squadron were they from? And when they were retired what happened to them, are they in museums, or did they do the usual unthinkable?

Ailes Ancienne are restoring the ex Wallis Island for the Le Bourget museum. They are doing this to Static condition, a very high static condition by the looks of it too.

The Dam Busters (two words, sorry to be pedantic 😉 ), was filmed at RAF Scampton and released in 1954, the Lancs used were brought out of retirement from storage for the role and later were scrapped. I dont know how long since the filming it was before they did this. Lincolns from an operational unit were used as long distance set dressing.

-steve

Couldn’t have put it better myself. Thanks JDK

Happy to help.

I don’t think there have been any high-speed runs on the old runway since then, have there?

In the interests of accuracy I should point out that the high-speed runs were done on the ‘newer’ runway (Outside the old peri track)

There is not enough left of the old runway to use.

Moggy

Originally posted by JDK
That does NOT mean flyable; it means work done now is to that standard.

Couldn’t have put it better myself. Thanks JDK

Apologies for the confusion I caused by not being more specific.

Moggy

Hmm, wrongly positioned squadron codes, (By their own admission) odd looking shades of camoflage (Yes, I know they came from ‘original paint chips’, but still) and a simply dreadful ‘nose art’ with that medal thing on each side.

Ah well, each to their own! 😉

Hi Lancman,

I’m not on your case (honest!)

I really don’t mean to sound horrible here, but I think that looks-wise, ‘ours’ would show the CWH Lanc up a little in terms of paint finish and looks!

Actually, I think the CWH Lanc looks superb. No, I don’t have to choose between her and PA474, but it looks ‘right’ and is well painted and maintained. It would be amazing to see them together sometime.

Cheers