Newark Air Museum

I don’t disagree David – but I was quite shocked when I went on site yesterday and saw the progress that had been made on the MiG-27.

In view of the earlier postings I felt the need to let everyone know about the steady progress that is being made on daily basis! 😉

In the nicest of senses this thread is now like watching paint dry!

🙂 Pleased to be able to report some painting progress MiG-27

TT,

I agree with you 200% about getting all of the aircraft under cover. However as I’ve posted on other threads the changes in the priorities of the Heritage Lottery Fund have [in the short-term] delayed the possibility of funding a third large hangar at Newark. 🙁

However we are actively engaged in identifying a variety of funding options that will hopefully secure the further development of the Southfield Site, where Hangar 2 was built i.e. the land that the museum owns!

Updates and news will be posted as and when progress is made – but I can assure everyone that it’s hard work!!

Thanks for the comments Martin – most people are also happy to pay their entrance fee.

At Newark we all look forward to the day that XS417 is back in a silver scheme like my avatar, especially as the Squadron is now resident in the local area! 😉

Here! Here! However, I also look forward to the day when these lovely aircraft are under cover in a nice big hangar (or 2) so that my children’s children can see them. If we don’t they won’t. It’ll take money (entrance fees and the rest) and a lot of lobbying but its possible. You only have to look how much NAM has come up in the World since the 2nd hangar was brought into use.

…
I called in late in May just to photograph the Lightning ( and happily paid my entrance fee 😉 ). …..

Thanks for the comments Martin – most people are also happy to pay their entrance fee.

At Newark we all look forward to the day that XS417 is back in a silver scheme like my avatar, especially as the Squadron is now resident in the local area! 😉

I’m another one late to this thread, and I certainly don’t wish to be involved in a ‘punch-up’ – but thought it only fair to speak up for the NAM and their Lightning in particular.

I called in late in May just to photograph the Lightning ( and happily paid my entrance fee 😉 ). One of the NAM people noticed my interest and kindly allowed me up-close to the T5 which is certainly looking ‘rough’. He went into great detail about the aircraft, its history, and more importantly the NAM’s plans for an eventual full restoration. Museums cannot restore everything at once ( much as they’d like to ) and money is always short – as is volunteers’ time.

Personally I think that Newark do a superb job, they have some remarkable exhibits – and, if you’re at such a museum and have some questions, try to find a helper or volunteer to ask ; they’ll often be pleased to tell you the full story…..

The ‘great’ British public!

Over the weekend there was a major vehicle event on the Showground at Newark and as a consequence there were a few visitors over to check out the museum. One or two tried to make it in through the Shop without paying and the best excuse for doing so was – “No, I don’t want to pay to go into the museum I just want to take some pictures of the lovely aircraft!”

Coming a bit late to this thread…but I must say I think Newark is a really great museum. It’s not just the attention that you get from the volunteers but the nature of what these guys have achieved to preserve the aircraft.

The Shackleton MR3 WR977 is probably the best case as it was saved within hours of being reduced to total scrap by the intervention of the NAM Chairman Charles Waterfall. The NAM ‘crew’ then stripped it and moved it to Newark (in a great hurry) and eventually, over some years, more ‘volunteers’ (including the whole Lindsay family) have restored the inside to the superb condition that can be visited today.
Howard (TwinOtter) has helped compile two books about this particular Shack. So we now have a beautifully restored aircraft and a pretty fantastic written history of its service from 1957 to 1971. This brings alive a ‘machine’ that was vital to so many in the RAF over those years.
The aviation preservation community along with historians generally deserve to acknowledge the achievements at places like NAM.
So do go along, preferably whilst also doing some homework on the exhibits.
And NAM’s CockpitFest does stand as a great example to other museums of how to work for the public and at the same time further the ‘specialist interest’ that makes preservation possible.

David

Thankyou Twin Otter, I’m onto it.

Finally so am I! 😮

50sqnwop/ag – Sorry to hear that! 🙁

Thankyou Twin Otter, I’m onto it.

78 kicked us out of our hangar, the swines! :rolleyes:

Jack R, pleased to have helped with the helicopter i.d. – as I said before the kids were really impressed. The only better Merlin sighting over the museum was when 78 Sqn visited in early 2008 – that was awesome! 😮

We’re always looking for volunteers but like everything these days to be covered for insurance purposes you have to become a museum member. Details about the benefits of membership can be found here!

There’re all sorts of opportunities from guiding; aircraft opening; fund raising; maintenance / cleaning; restoration / painting etc.

We’re currently looking to expand in this area so you might like to consider joining. I’ve also sent you a PM.

Thats what it was……still flying very low as it came over me on the Coddington Road….fantastic sight.

Also, if you ever need any help there, I’m often free inbetween projects, you know what I do…painting may be beyond me, but I’m up for a bit of light dusting and can talk the hind leg off a donkey….seriously if I can be of any use please ask.

Spent the day at Newark today and I’m pleased to report that some painting was being carried out on the Dove and Sea Vixen! A few more details are shown on the museum website here!

I was working with a school group and the 56 kids went wild when we received a very low level pass by a Merlin helicopter – as recorded in the museum Low Flying Log! 🙂 [also on the news page of the museum website]

Newark C/pit Fest is what helps lighten us up.

LOL-PP,
😀 It’s all been said, you can see that. Folks in this Pastime feel under pressure with regulations and as we are gradually inched away from our enjoyment by a pathetic government and ruthless Euro Nanny State Policies,folks frustrations come out over minor things. Nobodys fault really, Just the time and place we live in.

You will enjoy an in-depth look around Newark, in one form or another, but I recommend you visit C/pit Fest next year, especially the Saturday and stay late Saturday Night and meet up with everyone,– Ken Ellis and Fly-Past really put them selves out too,( he threw free beers at me and everyone else at this years Sat. night session,– Great!! ,brilliant !! not to mention the superb Ox/Cow roast they put on.) Museum staff were right there with us Cockpiteers all having a great time as well. Nothing better than Discussing painting “Lusty Lindy” once a few beers have been downed, it all comes right—lol.

So Newark is very alive and well and there is no sign of that stopping–:D:D

Long may it continue,

Bill T

The aircraft that sit outside at NAM are generally in pretty good condition compared to some that I have seen. Some clearly are in better “nick” than others as they have recently been repainted but the answer “Piston Power” is not just painting or even just cleaning the aircraft up; the answer is another hangar. Valuable aircraft, such as the NAM’s Lightning, Vulcan, Shackleton and (one of my favourites) Hastings are far too valuable to be left outside to the vagaries of the UK climate, birds, light fingered brigade and vandalism. NAM is one of my favourite museums too and its quite close to where I live so I support it when I can. If all those people who gave all that money to get that Vulcan flying again had only just put a little bit………Well, I know it doesn’t work like that but the Vulcan at NAM deserves as much recognition as the TVOC airframe in my view and the former is in a more original condition too if we are in pedantic mode. As regards getting RAF painters and finishers to do the job in their spare time out of sheer public spiritness, not a chance the RAF Painter and Finisher Trade has gone the same way as the RAF Carpenter Trade (which was obsolete when I joined) and contractors do it all now.

As I have said before I was a volunteer at Southend. As a 15 year old I spent my weekends climbing onto aircraft to strip paint with a bucket of water between 3 or 4 of us to wash the stripper off both the aircraft and ourselves (Nitromoors burns just a bit on your skin). I remember working beside another volunteer who stepped on a patch of stripper and disappeared over the trailing edge of the Lincoln wing – fortunately he was shaken but unhurt. We moved aircraft including the Lincoln with rope bridles and a tractor walking beside the wheels and chocking them as fast as possible if the aircraft started to catch up with the tractor and worked on the top of most of our heavies including the Beverley with no harnesses or safety rails and I enjoyed every minute of it.
In those days it was all part of being a volunteer and if you got hurt it was usually your own fault. It is in some ways unfortunate that those days are now long gone. I accept we did sometimes take quite serious risks but the pendulum has now swung firmly too far in the other direction and it must be very hard for museums to get volunteers involved in doing anything really worthwhile, particularly the young, simply because they have to be so over protective towards any worker.
I am saddened by the poor state of the paint on some museum aircraft but having been on the other side of the fence I also understand why it is impossible for all exhibits to be immaculate all the time and know that museums do their best with their available resources.
I take my hat off to Newark and all the other small museums that continue to survive in these difficult times and thinking about it there is a large museum very close to the M11 that has been known to have the odd scruffy airframe from time to time and they are much better funded than Newark BUT they are still doing their best and everything is in a queue for remedial work albeit with so many exhibits it is often inevitably a much longer queue.

Thanks Bruce – as you say a salient reminder of what is really involved. Plus it’s good ‘Audience Development’ feedback fro the museum’s next building project! “Paint it!” 😉

Out of interest 1237 (North Hykeham) Squadron Air Training Corps have adopted the museum’s Varsity – they help open the aircraft and clean it; but they didn’t get involved with the re-painting. 🙂

No, I’m not going to delete it or lock it; it serves to remind of how difficult it can be to try and maintain our heritage in anything like the kind of state we would wish for.

We havent even scratched the surface yet!

Incidentally, we looked at getting Cadets to help on an airframe. By the time I had listed some of the tasks they would be undertaking, it all went quiet. As Scott has said above, it has to be risk assessed, approved by any number of other people, and so it goes on.

Daft world we live in.

Bruce